"Christ Comes"

On the surface, well, she did not look like Jesus. She was white and female and she had a cat. Not that Jesus might not have a cat. But she was like Jesus in that she showed up at exactly the wrong time for a clergy person.

           You see, I was filling in for my friend, the pastor of the church I attend and I was also filling in for the Christian Education Director who usually handles the children sermons and other parts of the service. There was also the need to assist in the facilitation of the filming of participants for the Christmas pageant. There were other visitors who needed to be greeted and welcomed, a few wanting information, a member who wanted to talk about a concern, and then, well, then there was this woman. Jesus. And her cat.

           The church community was lovely. We gave her lunch, the pizza being shared following the activities after worship, $60 for a bus ticket to Las Cruces, where she was sure she’d find some peace, a bag of assorted goodies, granola bars, a bottle of water, a sandwich, and when it was clear she had to wait for an hour to catch a city bus to get to the Greyhound Station, I drove her downtown to the place she could wait safely.

           I didn’t see her again. I don’t know if she went to Las Cruces, if she found peace, if she showed up at another church the following Sunday. I don’t know if I got anything right in terms of assistance or support. Being unsheltered, facing mental illness, there are no easy answers. These situations, like most of our human dramas are very complicated. But regardless, when I saw her walk in fifteen minutes before worship, sleeping bag over her shoulder, cat in the travel bag at her hip, I could only think of the story of the old monk talking to a novice when asked how it is you treat strangers or visitors when came to their abbey. The old man explained that all were to be treated as Christ. No matter who they were or how they looked, what they carried with them, they are to be treated as Christ.

           “Is it hard?” the young monk had asked. And the older man blowing out a long breath, replied, “not always, but sometimes, I must confess, late in the day when I hear the bell at the gate, I walk to open it and as I walk down to greet the guest, I have to ask, “Ah, Jesus Christ, is it you again?”

           That’s what I thought when I dropped the woman and her cat at the bus station. That’s the question I found myself asking. “Jesus Christ is it you again?”

           The scripture from Matthew used for the first Sunday in Advent tells us that two will be working together and one will be left and one will be taken, that Jesus will come like a thief in the night, surprising everyone with the chosen hour he shows up and how he shows up, breaking a window perhaps, or maybe with what he takes. It’s meant, I presume, to remind us that no one knows much about anything.

           And perhaps during these last few weeks, this year, this sequence of years, demonstrate this notion of unknowingness, of our complete lack of control of things, all too clearly.

           After all, this is a month where friends went to a club to enjoy fun together and some walked away from a mass shooting and some did not. This is a week in which a college student was lured to an ambush; and while his peers will play a basketball game this weekend, he will not. A week in which one college student will take their final exams and one is being laid to rest, a week in which employees at a Walmart were enjoying a break together in one minute, and then, because of a colleague’s choice of gun violence, their worlds forever altered in the next.

           This is a year in which the vitriol and hateful messages in political ads hit a new low and a year in which we literally cannot be sure that when we say goodbye to our children as they go off to school or our parents or spouses as they go grocery shopping that it may in fact be the last time we even see them. In this season, the talk of two working side by side and one is taken, the talk of a thief robbing you, is actually talk we understand all too well. And still, in the midst of it all, right in the very center of the hanging of the greens and practicing for the Children’s Christmas Pageant, right in the middle of a well-planned worship service, and tasks a mile long, Jesus shows up. In the sanctuary, with a sleeping bag, a very long story of woe, and a cat.

           This musing isn’t meant, however, to remind you to stay on your toes. This is not even a passage of scripture, I think, meant to make you anxiously vigilant. It’s a musing, a writing for the week, to let you know that Christ comes across your path more times than you recognize him; so be kind to strangers and care for those who suffer. And it’s meant to remind you that maybe and even especially when you are left alone in the field, when the one you loved has been taken from you, when a thief or some crazy act of fate has taken everything you have, Christ comes then too. Not for a bus ticket or a bag of granola bars, Christ comes for you.

           This is, after all, not the hallmark family holiday event for everyone. Some of you have scars peeled opened every year about this time reminding you of what you have lost, what you never had, what was taken from you. Some of you just try to keep your head down and make it through to New Year’s, without too much sorrow, without too much drama, without too much pain. And perhaps, this is the real reason for this crazy text on the first Sunday of Advent.

           No, nothing is at is seems. Nothing turns out like you expect. People disappoint. Jobs don’t fulfill. There is never enough money. The doctor cannot see you until April. Your rent is overdue. The thief comes and steals everything. And your coworker, your friend, your beloved just ups and disappears.

           And into all of that, into the midst of that, into the very heart of all of that loss and disappointment and grief, Christ comes. God’s very presence is here. And weapons of despair and violence and brokenness will be changed into rakes and tillers, and devices of estrangement and all manner of suffering will be melted into pruning hooks. And nation will not rise up against nation. And war will not be studied or learned or carried out among us or within us anymore.

           So whether it is the cool hand on your fevered brow, the surprise visit from your trusted friend, the nurse with the right medication, the teacher willing to listen, the pastor whose door is always open, the sister you know you can call in the middle of the night, the cup of coffee, the extra birthday money, the grace that appears when you’re at the end of your rope, the song, the embrace, the smile…Christ comes.

           And when you are harried and late and know there is someplace else you need to be, somebody else who is calling your name, some task to complete, some errand to run, Christ comes then too. And maybe with a cat.

           So, keep your heart light, have hope, be at peace, and be ready. Jesus the Christ will come.

You are the light of the world. 

Yours,

Lynne