This past week we got our first Christmas letter.  Just about every card we get these days has one, and they will all tell of trips taken and honor students, of job promotions, grandchildren and new acquisitions.  I'm convinced none ever tell the real story, like who's in counselling and for what reason.  Christmas letters never tell of business failures or bad relationships, nothing about nights spent in prayer or tears.  I don't recall a single Christmas letter telling us about encounters with the Law or of court appointments before a judge.  But now and then a card comes with just the name signed - no letter, no picture, just a signature.  They're kind of refreshing.  It's their way of telling us, "I'm alive, I can sign my name, and the rest is none of your business."  I hope I get a few of those!

          Well, dear friends, Advent is upon us, and it's the beginning of a new Church Year.  We can see it's here by the traditional Advent Wreath.  We can hear it by the familiar music all around us.  And like a new day begins in darkness and moves to the sunrise, so also Advent begins in darkness and moves to light.  Part of the symbolism of the four Advent candles is progression from darkness to light.  Isaiah 9:2 tells us, "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light."  That's us as we begin a new season of Advent.

          These days it's not always easy to begin Advent in darkness.  The brightness and light of our modern Christmas season is all around us.  Our stores start Christmas earlier and earlier each year.  The biggest shopping day for Christmas is already past.  There were pre-Christmas sales, and pre-pre-Christmas sales in the weeks before Thanksgiving.  Some of the stores and malls have been lit up with their decorations for weeks.

          Some in the church have said, "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em," so they've suggested we should start Advent earlier, and make our Christmas season stretch out longer before December 25.  It wouldn't be such a bad idea if it helped keep our eyes on the babe in the manger, but we know it would only keep our eyes on our wallet or the credit card bill.

          But most of this does take our eyes off Advent and it makes the Christmas spirit hard to come by.  Some folks may never quite get there.  A terrible loss has blinded them to any joy; a bad relationship has put them in turmoil; an illness or accident has them in too much pain to feel the joy of Christmas.  Their lives are in darkness, and it's difficult so see any light.

          So then maybe it's good that Advent begins in darkness.  Even for those whose lives aren't darkened by turmoil or troubles, we can begin in darkness with those who are.  Even for those whose personal lives are relatively bright right now, we can look around us and can see a lot of darkness in our world, and we can give thanks we're not there.

          Isaiah 64 begins with, "O that you would tear open the heavens and come down!"  That's the anguished cry of desperate people, people exhausted by unanswered prayer, people who have given up on polite prayers, people who want to see something happen.  They cry, "Come on, God, get with it!"  Earlier in Isaiah 63:15, the prophet said, "Look down from heaven and see, from your holy and glorious habitation.  Where are your zeal and your might?  The yearning of your heart and your compassion?  They are withheld from me."  In other words, "Where are you, God?  Show Your face!"  Those are the prayers of people who long for God, but can't see or hear Him, people for whom God is silent or even absent.

          Elie Wiesel, in his little book called, Night, describes an incident in Auschwitz, a place of terrible human darkness.  In one chapter he described the execution of three people, one of them only a small boy.  Everyone in his sector was forced to watch, so that they might learn the cruel result of some small infraction of camp rules.  When the chairs holding them were kicked aside, the two adults died quickly, but the young boy, so light as he was, took longer, struggling nearly a half an hour before dying.  And the whole camp was forced to march past him as he struggled to live.  And Wiesel recalls someone, probably a camp guard, asking, "And where is God now?"  The Christian response to that must be, "He's there, hanging from the gallows, dying for the sins of the world."

          And where is God today, in all this terrorism, or in the cancer ward, or among the addicts, or in the frenzied stores, or in the lonely heart?  Where is God in churches who fear and condemn?  Where is God when the innocent dies and the guilty goes free?  Our answer: He is in the midst of the world, in the cancer bed, among the addicts, behind the store counter, in the Church Council, in the lonely heart, among wounded and dying in the street after the bomb.

          But Christ does not remain apart from us.  He is with us, in His Word, in Holy Communion, in our baptism.  We need never ask, "Where is God?" as if He has abandoned us.  In Hebrews 13:4, Christ told us, "Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you."  God does not abandon us, but comes to live with us.  This is another lesson of Advent.

          The central thought of Isaiah 64, though, is not in the question, but in the answer.  The prophet knows the answer already.  He gives us a glimpse of that answer in the words of our text:  "Yet, O LORD, you are our Father.  We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand."

          I once tried making something out of clay, "throwing a pot," as they call it.  I got more clay on me and the floor than in the pot.  I followed directions the best I could and ended up with a sagging mess, too limp to stand up, too irregular to look at, too bad to allow into the oven for firing.  My second attempt was worse, and my third attempt resulted in my walking away from pottery for good.  I admire those who have such patience and skill.  And being able to start over if you don't like the pot doesn't make it easy.  Clay doesn't always cooperate.  The potter isn't always patient.  My idea of something good and useful isn't always good and useful.

          But the greatness of this image is that the pot can be salvaged, shaped by the potter's hand.  In Jeremiah chapter 18, this is made clear:  "I went down to the potter's house, and I saw him working at the wheel.  But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.  Then the word of the LORD came to me: 'O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter does?' declares the LORD.  'Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel'."  God is the Potter, and we are shaped by the Potter's hands.

          God can also repair what has been damaged.  He can fix us when we are marred.  God is our Creator and He has the power to mold us according to His plan.  Unless we are worked, we remain just a lump.  We are nothing but clay without the Potter's wonderful working.  St. Paul says, "We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." (Ephesians 2:10)   As we submit to His molding, we will become good and useful to Him, and to the rest of the world.

          While Isaiah's words apply to the Israelites, a people who had been damaged by rebellion, idolatry and defeat, they also apply to us.  It begins with a well-mixed mass of clay placed on the potter's wheel ready to be shaped according to the potter's design.  The potter spins the wheels with his foot while gently and skillfully molding the formless clay.  The potter expectantly waits for the clay to take form.  In just a few minutes, the shapeless clay gradually shows its promising beauty as the potter's hands form it with care and patience.

          To make a bigger vessel, the potter molds the upper part and the lower part separately and then joins them together.  The next step is very important.  The potter carefully taps the vessel with his flat wooden tool to strengthen the joining, to shape the vessel and make it firm and beautiful.  Some extra taps are made to enhance the vessel's distinction and peculiarity, and some to make it stronger.  But all are necessary for it to be useful.

          This word picture represents us.  Every believer is in the hands of God and is being shaped according to His good and perfect plan.  As the potter pats the clay for a purpose, so is the Lord in shaping us through chastisement, not to hurt or destroy us, but to teach, to shape and to strengthen.  The pats and bumps of life are all part of His great love for us.  "We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand."

          The next sentence is also good to hear: "O LORD; do not remember our sins forever.  Oh, look upon us, we pray, for we are all your people."  Like the Israelites, we modern day chosen people have our share of trials, temptations and rebellions.  And remember, like a pot needs firing to make it strong, so we need firing to make us strong.  An unfired pot is useless.  It crumbles and breaks.  But one that has come through the oven is stronger for it.

          Jesus our Lord, went through the oven for us.  He knows the ordeals and trials we have faced.  He was tempted as we are, yet without sinning.  All who trust in Him will not crack or fail; we may feel like crumbling, but we will remain strong if we trust Him.  And if cracks appear, He's there to repair us once again.  Yes, Advent begins in darkness, but it moves to the light.  Each week one more candle is lit to show Jesus as the Light of the World.  May each of us see the True Light, and be guided by the light He gives.  Amen

Copyright © 2005 by Pastor Bob Tasler.  All rights reserved.