Hijacking Christmas



Starbucks sells an advent gift box.  25 little pockets stuffed with treats designed to fill your heart with Christmas cheer.  I have no doubt there are countless blogs, Facebook posts, 140-character tweets and even entire books and movies out there lamenting the hijacking of Christmas by consumerism.  I don’t aim to write more of that.



But Starbucks’ fun little gift box intrigued me because it got me thinking about the fact that Christmas is so much more than the 25th of December, no matter if you celebrate greed or giving on that day.  It got me thinking about advent.  Advent means ‘the Coming’.  That sounds both vague and grandiose for a concept we know only by calendars of various size, shape and theme all sporting little doors behind which hide verse snippets, flannel-graph style Bible characters, or if you’re lucky, chocolate.  I looked it up.  That’s what’s in the Starbucks advent box.  Sorry to spoil it for you.  So I ask myself, Self, what do 25 tiny chocolates in 25 miniature boxes have to do with this grand Coming?



Perhaps more than first appears.  Advent is an old liturgical tradition.  Like communion and dousing babies and lent.  That must be Starbucks’ deeply spiritual connection – if I gave up chocolate for lent, they will return it en masse in this celebration season!  Anyway I guess before electric guitars, churches had to think outside the box to come up with ways for the congregation to engage in worship services.  In all seriousness, these traditions were specifically designed to be an outward action representing an inner conviction.  Baptism = washing your heart clean.  Fasting = desiring God more than earthly pleasures.  Advent = anticipating the Advent of Jesus.  The Coming.  The Arrival.  The white-horse fiery-eyed people-floating-in-the-sky coming of Jesus.



Pastor and worship leader Glenn Packiam reminds us, “worship routines – or, if you prefer, ‘spiritual rhythms’ – are how we reinforce a desire for God.”  That makes a lot of sense to me, because if Christmas is about remembering to celebrate Jesus then advent is a good way to hijack Christmas back from Macy’s and Wal-Mart.  If I shop ‘til I drop from Black Friday to Cyber Monday to Day-After-Christmas Blow Outs then Christmas feels like it’s about presents.  Pausing on Christmas Eve to sing Silent Night while hot wax drips through the little paper wax-catcher-thingy to burn my fingers just isn’t enough outward action to solidify my inner conviction that Christmas is about Jesus coming to earth.  Taking the 24 days before Christmas to anticipate him coming again sure does help!



But that’s the new advent.  The 2nd Coming.  The advent anticipation of Christ started earlier than 500 B.C.  Isaiah wrote about it.  Jeremiah wrote about it.  “In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch of David to spring forth; and He shall execute justice and righteousness on the earth,” (Jer. 33:15, NASB).  We do well to remember old Simeon and Anna, whose entire lives consisted of advent anticipation.  Read about them in Luke 2:25-40.  To know what life on the earth was like before the hope of Christ was a prayer away would sure put a pep in the step of our Advent longing.  To yearn for Christ the way Jeremiah did as he lamented the destruction of Israel and Judah by their own sin would give Christmas a whole new meaning in our hearts!



The song “O Come O Come Immanuel” has often puzzled me.  Either it was written a long long long time ago, or the author got the tense wrong.  “Rejoice! Rejoice! Immanuel shall come to thee O Israel.”  Shall?  News bulletin: it’s Christmas because Jesus already came!  But while singing it in church last Sunday it began to make more sense.   For a moment we are back in ancient Jerusalem.  Under grey skies fire engulfs the walls, the palace, the temple.  An eerie silence quivers over the city as a distant wail makes its way to our ears.  Entering Solomon’s temple courtyard we see a lone soul standing among the bodies of slain temple prostitutes.  Strewn among them are a multitude of toppled idols.  The large stone image of Molek stands off to the side, his outstretched arms still holding the charred remains of this morning’s sacrifice: an 8 month old boy given in hopes of a successful battle.  One thought pervades all – this is not what was meant to be!  As we draw nearer the lonely figure standing before the central alter, a whisper escapes his lips. “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations.”  He looks up to the eaves of Solomon’s great temple, itself a flaming sacrifice to make some small atonement for the sins committed within her walls.  Pulling a scroll from within his cloak he unrolls it and begins to read flatly.



“Raise the war cry, you nations, and be shattered!
Listen, all you distant lands.
Prepare for battle, and be shattered!
Prepare for battle, and be shattered!
Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted;
propose your plan, but it will not stand,
because Immanuel.  God is with us.”



A surrendered disappointment engulfs his deep grey eyes.  As tears well up, the Weeping Prophet begins to gently sing.



O come, o come Immanuel, and ransom captive Israel​

That mourns in lonely exile here

Until the Son of God appear.



As he sings, a slight smile begins to break across his face, tears streaming freely now.  In full voice he continues,



Rejoice!  Rejoice!  Immanuel shall come to thee o Israel!

​

This, I imagine, is what advent means.  In the face of all brokenness and despair, rejoice!  This is why it’s worth remembering what advent was like before as we embrace what it means now.



Advent has a new meaning for me this Christmas as well.  This Christmas I’m looking forward to my own Immanuel coming home.  Immanuel, my son.  Much the same, I don’t know when he’ll be here.



I hope it’s soon.



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