Today is probably the only truly liturgically dysfunctional Sunday of the year.
Is it pink, or blue, or purple?
Is it Mary’s Sunday? Is it Gaudete Sunday? Is it Mothering Sunday? Is it Stir Up Sunday?
The third Sunday of Advent.
So many customs from different times and places have accumulated and accrued on this Sunday from over the centuries.
It is truly cluttered.
And the clutter obscures.
The clutter obscures John the Baptist and his surprising and disturbing message of God being hidden. God being absent. God being obscured.
John bears witness to the one who is light itself, we just can’t see the light.
So we clutter and obscure that disturbing news.
We prefer John’s message last week from Mark’s Gospel, to prepare for the visitation of God, prepare for the arrival.
John’s Gospel is different, John’s message from John the Baptist is that the one who is Light itself, is already here, “Among you stands one who you do not know.”
A simple statement burdened with irony and grief.
John’s Gospel carries that grief all the way through, the light is repeatedly not seen, or known, and is ultimately rejected, denied and crucified.
The light shown in the darkness.
And the world knew him not.
“Among you stands one whom you do not know.”
A simple statement burdened with irony and grief.
We can’t see the light.
The light is darkness to us.
Some mystics call this absence a ray of darkness that pierces the heart.
And John’s Gospel shares that grief with us. The darkness of God.
There have been multiple responses to the hiddenness of God.
One is to practice expectant hospitality, with practices like setting an extra place at the table for visitors incase Elijah shows up, or sharing hospitality with strangers, entertaining angels unawares, caring for the poor and encountering Jesus.
The messiah could be anyone, we don’t know because he is hidden, so we better welcome everyone just to be on the safe side.
The other response is the prayer of lament and forsakenness before the one who we miss.
It is the prayer of Jesus from the Cross when he quotes the 22nd psalm, “Eloi Eloi lema sababach thani”, “My God, My God why have you forsaken me.”
It is the book Lamentations.
Lament over being forsaken by the God who is absent.
The holidays are cluttered.
It can help distract us from the disappointments of both life and faith.
But it can also open us to the grief and loss that sometimes takes our breath away, with so many staggering moments of reminder.
Reminders of absence without any true consolation.
Lament.
Lament is woken up in us and we cry to God, “why”, and “I miss you so much.”
There is no fixing it. No explaining it away.
Just lament at being abandoned.
John’s Gospel is full of that darkness, of the light being unseen.
Where is he? Why can’t I see him?
The prayer of lament is a prayer of pure faith.
Calling out in the darkness, and trusting the one who is light unseen to hear, and to care.
We love the glory of God being everywhere.
But the witness of faith teaches us that God is especially close to those who are in lament, so close that perception fails, and all becomes dark. God is too close, God is too much. We go blind.
The clutter of this Sunday and this Season can obscure.
The prophet speaks to us across the centuries, disturbing our clutter, reminding us that the one we seek is so close that we can’t see.
Trust in that absence. It is the place of the Cross.
On the other side of that forsakenness is Easter morning.
The darkness of God, in whom there is no darkness, is the light unseen. Seek the hidden one.