Hope for Some Evokes Fear in Others

WE ARE LIVING in a moment of ruptured imagination brought on by the growing specter of deadly violence, which has triggered in many a crisis of faith. But these lectionary readings say to Christians, “Wait a minute, not so fast!” A promise-bearing deliverer has come to topple competing kingdoms and bring distress to wielders of death. Matthew’s message is, “Keep awake.” And the prayerful petitions of the psalms outline the marks of righteous governance: defending the poor, giving deliverance to the needy, and crushing the oppressor (Psalm 72:4).

Salvation comes in the form of a child and angels act as divine emissaries—quieting fear in one instance and stirring up disquiet in the hearts of others (Matthew 2). Were it not for an angel allaying Joseph’s fear about Jesus’ atypical paternity, life as a teenage single parent would have been Mary’s lot. Had an angel not appeared to Joseph in a dream urging him to flee to Egypt, or had a dream not disrupted the course of the Magi warning them to not return to Herod, the scriptural record would have unfolded very differently.

The promise of coming joy and peace reveals much more than incarnational presence. Jesus’ coming brings to our expectant minds the essential nature of a God who wields love and salvation. God always provides a way to secure such provisions. Angelic envoys, as Matthew narrates, stand ready to do God’s bidding.

December 1

Stay Woke

COUNTLESS RECENT EVENTS have sought to awaken Christians from spiritual slumber. The invariant strain on community relations and the violence between police and civilians of color have demoralized peace seekers. Violence is old hat. But when it’s normalized in a society that boasts of progressive strides, people cry out in alarm and lament.

Eric Garner’s broad-daylight killing, caught on camera, precipitated a wildfire of events that spotlighted police brutality. Garner’s death suggested that if an unarmed person of his heft could be brought to the ground and choked to death with a billy club by a mob of cops who would later escape indictment, then no opposing force stood a chance against New York’s blue fraternal order. The naked brutality of the scene nudged several thousand into the streets in protest. Five years later, NYPD’s Daniel Pantaleo, the perpetrator, reaped a pink slip, dismissed without pension—a small measure of justice, late on arrival.

Many more instances of violence caught on camera could be mentioned, but Garner’s death was pivotal. To use the terminology of our raging times, it said to vulnerable citizens, “Stay woke!” That is, be vigilant in violent times while adhering to hope. “Wokeness” is postmodern parlance for Matthew’s notion of heeding signs and remaining awake to Jesus’ second coming. Salvation is near. “But about that day and hour no one knows ... Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left ... Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming” (Matthew 24:36, 40, 42).

December 8

Thoughts and Prayers

AT THE CENTER of hokmah (wisdom)—the practical knack for knowing, given on request and grounded in spiritual discernment—is God. For Isaiah, wisdom resembles the righteous relationship between creature and Creator. The readings coalesce around the effect of righteous rule in God’s coming reign. Wisdom and insight, peace and joy, unity and hospitality, knowledge and reverence, judgment and repentance are the definitive marks of the reign of God. The psalmist’s prayer for an anointed king to rule with equity seeks a new created order. According to biblical scholar James L. Mays, this involves honoring the New Testament’s exhortation to pray “‘for kings and all who are in high positions’ in a keen awareness of their need and the consequences for the welfare of all in the way they use power.” Mays continues, “We do pray for leaders because we want them to be drawn by divine help as close as possible to the model of God’s rule.”

As difficult as it may be to pray for leaders who obstruct equity for the weak and who shun diplomacy and good sense (hokmah), thoughtful praying coupled with service (not merely “thoughts and prayers”) prepares the way for the One of whom the prophet spoke: the uncorrupted stem of Jesse (Isaiah 11:1).

December 15

The Coming

IN GRAPHIC DETAIL, Daniel Black’s novel The Coming transports readers into the holds of the Hope, the Lord Ligonier, and the Good Ship Jesus—slave ships traversing the Middle Passage. These ships came first for farmers, healers, orators, and artisans of West Africa. “They stole away everything that made us strong,” Black narrates.

Slave ships came to capture. God forever comes to free. In Isaiah 35, the prophet testifies to a great reversal of circumstance for Judah’s exilic, now redeemed, community. Judah will be ransomed by a God who strengthens weak hands, makes firm feeble knees, and says to those of fearful heart: “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God” (35:4). Judah did not—nor will we—get to be the hero of God’s story; it is God who comes with salvation to free us.

In James’ letter to the diaspora, patience is the prized virtue in expectation of the coming of the Lord (5:7). Endurance has value when coming to grips with suffering (verse 10). James exhorts the Jewish Christians scattered in the wake of Stephen’s death to strengthen their hearts and remain unified, “for the coming of the Lord is near” (verse 8). For the diaspora, as with John the Baptist and Jesus’ disciples, news of the Lord’s coming provides reassurance because a coming Lord brings reversals of circumstance. That is, the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and poor receive good news (Matthew 11:5). In exchange for such reassurance, we jubilantly extol with Mary, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (Luke 1:46-47) and celebrate what makes us strong.

December 22

For His Name's Sake

WHO IN AMERICA signs up for a name like mine, Kenyatta? No would-be assimilationist, for sure. Early in life I understood the power of naming. Many African-American parents with children born in the ’70s named them for African freedom fighters to encourage black solidarity. My namesake is Kikuyu-born anti-colonial activist Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya’s first president. Jomo forged for himself a mythic identity, undergoing several name changes during his life. (Regrettably, his liberationist legacies acceded to autocratic governing in the end.) As a child he was Kamau wa Ngengi. As a teenager, he took a Christian baptismal name combining the names for apostles John and Peter into “Johnstone.” After refusing to fight for the British army, he lived among the Maasai, where he acquired a beaded belt called a kinyata. Following this, he began referring to himself as “Kenyatta.” Names matter.

The story behind the Hebrew name Immanuel (“God with us”) is foretold by the prophet Isaiah and recalled in Matthew’s gospel in its Greek form, Emmanuel. Isaiah’s context is not Jesus’, but the tasks of birthing and naming are continuous in both records. Isaiah seeks to give a sign to King Ahaz of a coming child. Matthew details the genealogy, the spiritual power invested in the child, and how this birth inaugurates a new order in the world. An angel quells Joseph’s fears, “Do not be afraid ... name him Jesus, for he will save the people from their sins” (Matthew 1:20-21). Whether Isaiah’s Emmanuel or Matthew’s Jesus, the prophetic promise accompanying these names express Christian hope: “God will save” and “God is with us.”

December 29

Coming Hope

HOPE FOR SOME evokes fear in others. As Toni Morrison put it, “The danger of sympathizing with the stranger is the possibility of becoming a stranger. To lose one’s racialized rank is to lose one’s own valued and enshrined difference.” Only male infanticide would placate Herod’s vexed mind when he perceived a child not of his household threatening his sovereignty. The coronation of Herod’s son Archaeleus, not Jesus, was supposed to capture the royal consciousness of Judeans (see Matthew 2:16, 22). While the text is silent about the audience to whom the Magi’s question—“Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews?” (2:2)—is directed, their inquiry took place within the gaze of Herod’s court officials. The gasps, fright, and dismayed stares triggered by the query of these astrological agents caused Herod to consult his own wise men, Jerusalem’s municipal aristocracy who had, by the end of Herod’s reign when he ordered political opponents killed, become sycophants.

Coming hope breeds hostility. The lust to seize and retain political power with no regard for the collective good is diametrically opposed to God’s inbreaking, salvific reign. Perhaps the crucial lesson for Christians who strengthen the hands of despotic leaders is that whether one is forced to hide in Egypt or to come of age in ghettos like Nazareth, God makes sanctuary for asylum seekers and becomes savior for them in their distress (Isaiah 63:7-9).