Expectations

Luke 3:7-18

This week, I find myself thinking about expectations. Advent is a season of expectations, and outside of the church this season of prolonged Christmas that seems to start mere days after Halloween in the US is also a season of expectations.

I have come to have my own expectations in this time: Christmas movies will be watched, Becky will make her family recipe of stollen bread, snow will fall (because we live in this magical place where snow falls a lot along the front range), certain songs will be sung, and Christmas day itself will feel like a massive weight off of my shoulders (and the shoulders of many pastors) after a big Christmas eve service at our church.

One of the wisest things I have ever heard is that expectations are just resentments waiting to happen. And so I find myself also reflecting on how our expectations for this time we are in can fail to be met. I also remember those times when surprises completely outside of my expectations occured as well. Surprises that were blessings. I will never forget when we opened as an emergency cold weather shelter the week before Christmas in 2022.

This week in preparation of the third sunday of Advent, our reading will be a surprise. John the Baptist’s diatribe in Luke 3 might shake up our expectations of what we are accustomed to hearing in worship from scripture. Where we expect words of hope like Isaiah’s promise of a “wonderful counselor” and Mary’s hopeful hymn of justice, the Magnificat; we instead get the scathing words from John the Baptist for the Third Sunday of Advent, ironically known as “Gaudete” or Joy Sunday!

“John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?”



(Luke 3:7)

Talk of a coming wrath does not fit in neatly with the expectations I think many of us have for this time of year! But instead of resenting that, pushing back and rolling our eyes or ignoring it, I wonder if we can be curious instead.

Why talk about a “coming wrath” and that the “ax is lying at the root of the trees?” Even if this time of Advent is often a time of joy, hope, peace, and love… that never stops the wrath that is embodied in the world around us, does it? That doesn’t ease the threats that many face. It doesn’t lessen the pain of suffering that so many are experiencing—suffering that doesn’t respect the holiday season at all.

Our expectation of Advent being a time of cheer doesn’t change the fact that, for many, it can be the absolute worst time of year. Grief, often present without permission, accompanies many during the holiday season—especially those spending it without those whom they love for the first time. This season can amplify feelings of loneliness. This season of Advent doesn’t change the status quo of war, oppression, and violence across the world.

The important part of the passage we will hear this coming Sunday isn’t John’s biting words. But the crowd’s response: “What, then, should we do?” The crowd, possibly expecting something different from John, could have allowed their resentment at an unmet expectation to turn them against him. But instead, they turned to wonder. They expressed urgent curiosity. “What should we do?”

What should we be doing, indeed? Do we ignore the pain and suffering around us because we don’t want it to harsh the glow in our hearts as we sip hot chocolate and look at christmas lights? Or do we do something different? We can’t solve all of the world’s or even our neighborhood’s problems. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t be present with them. Instead of looking the other way so our Christmas traditions aren’t interrupted, I want to invite you to make turning toward and being present with suffering a part of it.

We have an angel tree at our church that allows us to help spread some Christmas cheer to families who are suffering during this Christmas season. If you have already grabbed one, I hope you will consider inviting someone else to grab one and help a family celebrate Christmas the way so many get to do.

There are truly awful things happening in the world around us. I hope you will consider being prayerfully present to these awful realities instead of ignoring them. And in being present with the struggles and sufferings of the world, I believe we will find a deeper peace, a stronger hope, a more lasting peace, and a more enduring love.