Longing
“‘The days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will fulfill the good promise I made to the people of Israel and Judah. In those days and at that time I will make a righteous Branch sprout from David’s line; he will do what is just and right in the land. In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safety. This is the name by which it will be called: The Lord Our Righteous Savior.’” Jeremiah 33:14-16 (NIV)
“‘The days are surely coming,’ says the Lord, ‘when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And this is the name by which he will be called: The Lord is our righteousness.’” Jeremiah 23:5-6 (NRSV)
When Jeremiah wrote these words, nearly six hundred years before Jesus was born, Jerusalem was under siege. Babylon was at the gates. Their current king, Zedekiah, whose name literally means ‘Yahweh is righteous,’ was anything but righteous, and things around them were looking increasingly dark. In fact, I think the word ‘despair’ would adequately describe how most of God’s people felt about their situation, the state of their nation, and the prospects for either.
And yet the prophet, certainly not someone any of us would ever accuse of being pie in the sky or a blind optimist, not Jeremiah, felt the need to share a word he heard from the Lord. He called it a ‘good word,’ and the NIV says a ‘good promise.’ No matter what you call it, he believed it was ‘good news’ and he had to share it — even though he probably knew few would take it seriously or be able to hear it amid their real-life experiences of fear, hunger, corruption, and uncertainty about tomorrow.
But he had to say it anyway. First, in chapter 23 to Judah and Israel, and then in chapter 33 to include Jerusalem. He tells them the Lord remains faithful, despite their unfaithfulness, the corruption of their leadership, or the cynicism of their culture, and that the Lord will honor his promises to their ancestor David. That someday—'the days are surely coming’—Yahweh will restore the Davidic monarchy, and that this coming One (this Branch) will reign as a wise, just king, who does what is right; One who would be so thoroughly righteous that his name (unlike the current King) will identify his rule: “The Lord our Righteous Savior.”
What enables someone to declare hope like that when everything around them says something to the contrary?
Well, here we are, experiencing another Christmas season, and let’s be honest: in spite of how tiring and expensive the holidays have become in our modern world, it’s still a season (I think) most of us look forward to. No matter how much work is required, we still put up the decorations, wrap the presents, play the movies and carols, and prepare to spend extra time with family and friends.
Every year, regardless of how inadequate we feel, or how corrupt or cynical we may feel things are in our politics or culture, we still gather…year after year…in our churches and in our homes. We sing the same songs, read and hear the same Scriptures, rehearse and retell stories of a star in the east guiding devout magi, and we join the angelic choirs as they stir the shepherds to go and see the babe in the manger. We keep chuckling at the harried innkeeper who still can’t find any room in the inn and feel touched and moved when Mary ponders all these things in her heart.
Why do we keep doing this?
A Lutheran pastor in the roughest part of the Bronx once wrote, “Probably the reason I love Advent so much is that it is a reflection of how I feel most of the time. I might not feel sorry during Lent, when the liturgical calendar begs repentance. I might not feel victorious, even though it is Easter morning. I might not feel full of the Spirit, even though it is Pentecost and the liturgy spins out fiery gusts of ecstasy. But during Advent, I am always in sync with the season. Advent unfailingly embraces and comprehends my reality. And what is that? I think of the Spanish word anhelo, or longing. Advent is when the church can no longer contain its unfulfilled desire and the cry of anhelo bursts forth: Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus! O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.”
Looking back, two thousand years this side of Bethlehem, we gather each year to declare the promise proclaimed in Jeremiah has found its ultimate fulfillment in Jesus, the true son of David. The New Testament writers declare Jesus is ‘the Holy and Righteous One’ (Acts 3:14); the Lord who clothes us with his righteousness (Rev. 7:13-14); the One who saves and rescues and redeems us; the soon coming King who will renew His creation and restore all things.
Why can we believe this? Why do we declare it year after year? We do so because we are prisoners of hope! Even though we know things are not as they should be in our world, our politics, our culture, and possibly not within us either, we long for more. We hold out hope for something better than what our circumstances present to us currently. Something better than what we know we can produce on our own. Something more than our eyes can envision, or our hands can build. We do this because in our heart of hearts we are longing for the Kingdom of God. Like the pastor, all this also puts us in sync with the season. We love this season, because Christmas reminds us of the time when the Kingdom of God came near, when God became flesh, and Jesus lived out all the hopes and expectations the prophets longed for. Christmas proves to us that longing can become fulfillment. Longing found fulfillment in Bethlehem, finds fulfillment when the Kingdom of God breaks in through our lives and ministries, and will be fulfilled when the Kingdom of God is fully realized at the Second Advent.
For me, Christmas is proof God doesn’t turn a blind eye to the cries and the longings of his people. And I’m thankful. And I think that’s why we keep singing, why we keep reading the story, and why we keep gathering with family and friends, and in our churches year after year. Because we long for something more. We long for something better. And because we’ve already experienced all that in Jesus, on that first Christmas and in our own relationship with Him, we long for others to experience it too. So, like Jeremiah, we continue to announce the good news, to live the good news, and offer others the opportunity to experience it for themselves. I pray that as pastors and leaders we will be prophets of hope and good news this year to the people we will minister to this season.
That divine longing has been placed within us by our awesome God who fosters hope in us, so we can share His hope with a world desperately in need of such a gift. So, with longing in our hearts, and hope in our steps, we also declare: Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus! O Come, O Come, Emmanuel!
Dr. Mark Lindstrom, District Superintendent of the North Arkansas District, NBC Board of Trustee member
Published: 12/15/2023
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