November 27, 2022 - First Sunday of Advent - Overcoming with Hope
Habakkuk 1:1-7; 2:1-4; 3:17-19
Deborah Laforet
Overcoming With Hope
It’s December next Thursday. We are coming very close to the winter solstice on December 21st. The weather has been extraordinary. We’ve had some light snow fall in our area, but the temperatures have been mostly above zero and sometimes hovering around ten degrees. Beautiful walking weather.
This weather scares me though. For me, it’s a sign of our climate crisis. It reminds me that the icecaps are melting, our sea levels are rising, and our ecosystems are changing in ways that are harmful for life.
A few years ago, maybe 12 or 13 years ago, when I was living in Saskatchewan, I went to a conference at St. Andrew’s College in Saskatoon. It was called the Winter Refresher and was hosted in early February. It was always cold!
I wish I could remember the name of the speaker that year but I know she was there to talk about the earth, how ecology affects our theology, how we see God, and how we live out our faith. What I very clearly remember her telling us is that it was too late. Humans had made too much of an impact on the earth. Species were going extinct, people were suffering and dying from climate disasters, and that it would only get worse. She didn’t want us to stop working to save our planet, but for the most part, she didn’t believe it could be saved.
After the conference was over, it was a four hour drive home. I drove home in the beautiful Saskatchewan sunshine, looking at a sundog. If you don’t know what a sun dog is, it’s when it gets so cold and bright that you see rainbows hugging the sun. I watched the sun shining off the sparkling snow and listened to my favourite tunes, processing what I had heard. I began to sob. I had to pull over. I just cried. I felt hopeless and despondent over what I had heard and at the possible loss of such beauty and wonder surrounding me.
2 O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save? 3 Why do you make me see wrongdoing and look at trouble?
Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. (Habakkuk 1:2-3)
Our bible is filled with texts such as the one that Lyndsey read for us this morning from the prophet Habakkuk, words of lament, suffering, despair, and anger, sometimes against God. We even hear Jesus quote one of these passages of lament from the cross when he cries out, “Why have you forsaken me?”
I think we all feel this way at times. We all experience grief and sorrow, and sometimes it overwhelms us and it feels as if it will never end. I saw a quote this week by Helen Keller, an author and disability rights activist, who was born both blind and deaf. She said, “Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.”
On that day, when I had to pull over, I was grieving. I was full of sadness, but I pulled back onto the road and went home. I continued to speak up on the climate and continued to work towards the good of the planet. I have not given up. I still have hope that we can still save our planet, although I know we will have long lasting effects from our abuse of it.
After the prophet Habakkuk speaks, God answers. “Write the vision,” God says, "and make it plain on tablets, so that a runner may read it.” You’ve seen the protests where people hold up large signs with catchy phrases, or when people on the sidelines of a race or at a sports event hold up signs of support and affirmation, or even the signs outside churches, like our own, that offer inspirational messages. These have to be big so they can be read from afar. They’re important messages that need attention. This message that God is sharing is important and needs our attention.
God continues, “For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay.” On this first Sunday of Advent, as we light our candle of hope, these are words we can carry with us. During this season of Advent, a time of waiting, a time of anticipation, we hear these words, “…wait for it; it will surely come.”
We hear of shootings in a gay club in Colorado Springs. We hear of the death of schoolchildren in earthquakes in Indonesia. We watch politics divide nations. We know people are suffering under rising inflation costs and interest rates. How long must we wait, O God? For what are we waiting? Can we hold onto our hope in the meantime?
The end of Habakkuk’s words in this book might sound like a hope that sounds impossible. We hear, “Though the fig tree does not blossom and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold and there is no herd in the stalls, yet,” the prophet says, “I will rejoice in the Lord; I will exult in the God of my salvation. [God] is my strength.” (17-19a)
Some might hear this and find this kind of hope to be unrealistic and illogical. Some might find it easier to be bitter and cynical, critical and reproachful. I personally find it admirable. I think it takes more work to hold onto hope and to act with that hope.
I want to complete the quote I shared earlier from Helen Keller. Again, she said, "Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.” She continues, “My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail.”
I’m with her. I also hold a glad belief that our world is filled with good. I think we get lost at times. I think we get weary and we get filled with despair, sometimes even anger and hate, but deep inside there is good, always pushing to rise to the top. There is a divine presence inside each one of us. As Keller says, this is not about the absence of evil. There are evil acts in our world. It’s about good prevailing. It’s about humanity coming together under a common cause. Is it possible? I think we’ve reached a time when we’re going to find out.
Holding onto hope can be challenging. That’s why we need to hold close what brings us life, what inspires us, what fills our cup. The year after that Winter Refresher where I pulled over to the side of road crying, I was back. I went back because I love learning, I enjoy the time with colleagues, because it was a couple of nights away from a busy home and work life, and even because of for the four hour drive, alone, listening to music on the beautifully, sunny, quiet roads of Saskatchewan. We need to find what fills our cup, so that we can pour out what this world needs from us, with gratitude and generosity.
May you find what gives you life and fills your cup so that you can hold onto your hope, especially when it is most challenging, and use it to make a difference in this world. May it be so. Amen.