\nthe principalities and powers, which seem to rule the world and refuse to be
\ntransformed. At the end of the 20th<\/sup> century, we know those powers
\nall too well. Two world wars, the Holocaust, atomic weapons, the arms race,
\nethnic cleansing, poverty, homelessness.<\/p>\n
- \n
- „Mine is the kingdom,“ says old death, as he stands smirking
\nbeside a mass grave in Kosovo.<\/li>\n - „Mine is the power,“ says the Pentagon, as it promises us
\nsalvation through a new generation of high tech weapons.<\/li>\n - Mine is the glory, says ol\u0092 Mammon, as he hoards his gold
\nand crushes the poor beneath his feet.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nWe know these voices, don\u0092t we? And we know the havoc these
\npowers wreak. All too often the world does seem caught up in forces beyond our
\ncontrol. And there appears to be no end\u0097and certainly no new
\nbeginning\u0097in sight. Hope comes hard today, just as it did in the time
\nbefore John the Baptist appeared.<\/p>\nAs Frederick Buechner has put it, hope for the „more than
\npossible“ seems too much for thoughtful, reasonable people.<\/p>\nWe cannot hope such a fantastic hope any more, at least not quite,
\nnot often. It is dead for us, and we have tried to fill the empty place it left
\nwith smaller, saner hopes that the worst possibilities will never happen and
\nthat a few of the better possibilities may happen yet. And all these hopes
\ntwisted together do make hope enough to live by, hope enough to see a little
\nway into the darkness by. But the empty place where the great hope used to be
\nis mostly empty still. . . .<\/p>\nAnd maybe this deep hopelessness helps to explain the shallow
\nexpectancy surrounding the new millennium. For all too many of us today, our
\nexpectations in this millennial year center on little more than human calendars
\nand human technology. The change of the millennium is in fact simply a human
\ncreation, the result of human ways of measuring time. And our plans for „new
\nyear\u0092s“ extravaganzas bear little similarity to the radical hope that
\nstands dripping wet beside the Jordan river. And the same thing is true of the
\nY2K bug. Despite all the apocalyptic imagery surrounding it, this problem is
\nnothing more than a quirk of human technology and faulty planning. And whether
\nwe nonchalantly dismiss the doomsday predictions or stockpile supplies for a
\nworst case scenario, our preparations bear little or no resemblance to the
\nbaptismal repentance of Israel in the wilderness. In many ways, God is nowhere
\nto be found in our millennial expectancy. Instead, we live with little human
\nhopes and pseudo-expectations that offer a poor substitute for hope in God.<\/p>\nReal hope, hope for God\u0092s radical newness, hope for a genuine
\n„new beginning“ seems remote today. But maybe that is just the place to begin.
\nMaybe that is the great lesson of the season of Advent\u0097and this season of
\nAdvent in particular. Despite the claims of the culture around us, this season
\nis not for those who „have it all together.“ Advent is not for the strong, for
\nthe wealthy, for the powerful; it is not for those in control, those who think
\nthey can somehow manage or manipulate the future. The season is not for those
\nwho glow with shallow human optimism about a better and brighter day brought in
\non the wings of a bustling economy.<\/p>\nRather, the season of Advent is for those who cling desperately to
\na little spark of hope when the great hope seems impossible. This wintry season
\nis for those who squint their eyes to search the cold, midnight horizon for the
\nflicker of a single, small candle. This season is for those who hang on to the
\nold memories and promises of God even when their fulfillment seems nowhere in
\nsight. Advent is for those who can sing the old hymn from the depths of their
\nlives:<\/p>\nO Come, O Come Emmanuel,
\nAnd ransom captive Israel,
\nThat
\nmourns in lonely exile here
\nUntil the Son of God appear.<\/p>\nSo we shouldn\u0092t be surprised that the Word John speaks does
\nnot break the silence in the city of Jerusalem, the center of power and
\nprosperity. Rather, that Word comes anew out in the wilderness, where the
\npeople know they must depend on God and God alone. The Word comes not at the
\ncenters of privilege and influence, but out on the margins, where people have
\nleft behind the privileges and security that previously grounded their lives.
\nThe Word comes in that space where the false promises of human progress and
\nhuman systems have been stripped bare.<\/p>\nAnd Mark\u0092s gospel makes this point in a profound way. In
\nplace of Jerusalem, which Malachi prophesies as the site of God\u0092s renewed
\naction, Mark shifts the focus to the wilderness. Mark reverses the promise of
\nMalachi, like a jazz musician improvising on a well-known text. The Word of
\nhope rings out loud and clear, to be sure. But in Mark\u0092s gospel, all the
\nnations do not flow into Jerusalem, the center of religious authority and
\npolitical power. Rather, all of Jerusalem rushes to the wilderness, that place
\noutside the city at the periphery of power, like the place where Jesus will be
\ncrucified.<\/p>\nIn the wilderness, at the margins, the Word is heard and hope is
\nborn\u0097the Word that does not have its origin in human speech; the hope that
\nhuman effort cannot create. This Word of hope comes to those have become
\nuncomfortable or unwelcome in Jerusalem, where the status quo reigns and God is
\nunder the watchful eye of the religious authorities. Hope wears a black dress
\nand stands beside a freshly dug grave in a cemetery. Hope stands in line for a
\nbowl of soup with tired, dirty homeless people. Hope plays in housing projects
\ncontaminated with lead poisoning. Hope sits in a cell on death row and lies in
\na bed in a hospice. As Jurgen Moltmann put it, „The messianic hope was never
\nthe hope of the victors and the rulers. It was always the hope of the defeated
\nand the ground down.“ The Word of hope comes in the wilderness, on the margins,
\nwhen the centers of power and the cliches of the culture no longer offer us
\nlife. For out in the wilderness, only a divine Word and only a radical hope
\nwill do<\/p>\nSo, for those of us who are comfortable in Jerusalem\u0097for
\nthose of us who enjoy our privilege and power\u0097it\u0092s no wonder that
\nhope includes repentance. It should not surprise us that John stands at the
\nriver Jordan proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,
\nwaiting to drown us that we might have life. Hope can be painful\u0097like
\ngrief. For the radical newness waiting for us in the wilderness calls us to
\nturn away from the dead-end ways of the world, which may guarantee our
\nprivilege, but do not bring us life. The Word in the wilderness calls us to
\ntrade in the old securities for the possibility of real newness. In fact,
\nit\u0092s hard to know which comes first, hope or repentance. Maybe a word of
\nhope empowers us to change our lives. Or maybe repentance is the first step
\ntoward hopeful living. We don\u0092t know which comes first, and we\u0092re not
\ntold.<\/p>\nBut we do know one thing. Out in the wilderness, the silence of
\ngenerations was broken by the Word. Out in the wilderness, newness came to
\nGod\u0092s weary people, and both hope and repentance became possible again.
\nAnd, as Mark reminds us, that was only the beginning. Out in the wilderness, we
\nChristians know, the Word continues to come and newness may surprise us still.
\nFor, like the people of Israel, we too have memories to which we cling:<\/p>\n- \n
- Memories of newness that entered the world in Jesus of
\nNazareth, whose mysterious coming still leaves us gaping in wonder.<\/li>\n - Memories of newness that startled a group of women outside an
\nempty tomb, the stone rolled away before humans ever arrived on the scene.<\/li>\n - Memories of newness that changed timid, frightened disciples
\ninto bold proclaimers of the gospel.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nAnd even in our lifetimes we have seen glimpses of God\u0092s
\nnewness breaking into the world out in the wilderness. Martin Luther King, Jr.
\nproclaims the Word, and the seemingly indestructible foundations of racism
\nbegin to crack. Desmond Tutu and hosts of other South Africans preach the
\ngospel, and, impossibly, Apartheid comes tumbling down. A parishioner dying of
\ncancer asks for a harmonica and, with his final breaths, plays a hymn of praise
\nin the very face of death.<\/p>\nOut in the wilderness, newness surprised God\u0092s weary people.
\nAnd that was only the beginning. Such newness may surprise us still. So even in
\nour weary times\u0097particularly<\/u> in our weary times\u0097we continue to
\nsing the refrain of that Advent hymn:<\/p>\nRejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
\nShall come to thee, O Israel.<\/p>\n
\nCharles L. Campbell
\nAssociate Professor of Homiletics<\/p>\nColumbia Theological Seminary, Decatur, Georgia,
\nmailto:CampbellC@CTSnet.edu<\/a><\/u><\/p>\n
- Memories of newness that entered the world in Jesus of