WB Advent Time
Happy Christian New Year! Almost!
For once, Advent actually begins on December 1, just like all the Advent Calendars! So you Advent Purists can get next level giddy about that. Advent is the first season in a cycle that moves through Christmas and Epiphany. It has very weird lectionary texts that don’t feel Christmasy at all. And what’s worst, just when you thought it was okay to sing all those great carols, you’re told to WAIT! Instead, let’s sing these weird minor key songs that nobody is interested in! Then let’s sing a different verse of O Come, O Come Emmanuel each week to try and make everyone happy!
What Color Are Your Candles?
While the rest of us are worrying about what the perfect gift for mom and dad is this year, your pastor and that one person on the altar guild are arguing over whether the candles should be purple or blue. Purple is penitential, and reminds us the Lent and Advent are similar seasons of introspection, preparation, anticipation. Blue is Royal, and supposedly a symbol for hope and waiting. Also, maybe Mary the Mother of God wore this exact shade of blue? It’s called Sacré Bleu after all? And do we keep the pink candle for joy Sunday or is that passé now?
Fear not, O shepherds. For I bring you good tidings of great joy. We made all this stuff up to help us tell the Christmas story and to help us pace our lives around the life of Christ! John Wesley was not really into liturgical propriety, keeping the seasons, etc. They are useful tools, but at the end of the day, Jesus is still Lord whether your candles are blue or purple. Or even if you already started listening to Christmas music last week.
Get Your Christmas Shopping Done!
I’ve been wanting to draw an Adventure Time spin-off for years, so I thought it was fun to tie in the name of this post-apocalyptic cartoon with a season about the Coming of Christ. I do think that there’s a lot of value in the tension of Advent. We tend to rush to the feeling, to jump ahead to the end of the story where everything’s made right, or the cute baby makes no crying.
But life isn’t like that. Life is actually really hard. Really. Stinking. Hard.
Then salvation has to work even harder, in our space, in our flesh, in our relationships. God didn’t point a finger and zap us all into a perfect life. God sent a child to grow in a mother’s womb. Anticipation and hope in the midst of great turmoil is a core commitment of the Christian faith. I do love Advent, even if I’m no purist. The light in the midst of darkness is exactly hope I cling to every day.
New Charlie Baber
The Rev. Charlie Baber, author of Wesley Bros cartoon.
When not drawing the Wesley Bros cartoon, the Rev. Charlie Baber, a United Methodist deacon, serves as youth minister at University United Methodist Church in Chapel Hill, N.C. His cartoon appears on United Methodist Insight by special arrangement.