(part of the “Waiting on the World to Change” Advent Series)

Psalm 122 (Advent 1A)

1I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord!” 2Our feet are standing within your gates, O Jerusalem. 3Jerusalem—built as a city that is bound firmly together. 4To it the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, as was decreed for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the Lord. 5For there the thrones for judgment were set up, the thrones of the house of David. 6Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: “May they prosper who love you. 7Peace be within your walls, and security within your towers.” 8For the sake of my relatives and friends I will say, “Peace be within you.” 9For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your good.

So, we’re four days into Advent, four days into waiting on the world to change, and, as far as I can tell, there have not been any huge changes made.  I mean, wouldn’t it be wonderful if this was the year, if this was the season, when peace came to be?  Wouldn’t it be grand if this was when people began to recognize that each of us is a child of God?  Wouldn’t it be terrific if this was when poverty and hunger and racism and xenophobia and gun violence and global warming and all those things that clutter our world were resolved?  Wouldn’t it be the most incredible thing if all of us could lay down our weapons and our power and our need to preserve the status quo?  Wouldn’t it be something if we didn’t have to wait anymore for the world to change?  What if we discovered that we really were standing within your gates?

But we all know better.  There is so much that needs to change, so much that needs to happen before the Kingdom of God, the vision that God intended all along for us comes to be in its fullness.  And so, we wait.  And, today, we’re given this psalm.  It is a “Song of Ascents”.  It describes the pilgrim throng entering the “house of the Lord”.  It’s the invitation.  Let us go to the house of the Lord.  It is the eternal peace, that vision that we’ve been talking about.  It is the Kingdom of God in its fullness. 

Advent is indeed a season of waiting.  But it is also a season of imagining.  It is a season of beginning the ascent.  It is the season when we journey to the House of the Lord.  And in this way, our waiting, our waiting for the world to change, begins with us.  For within us, is that peace.  Within us, is that vision that God holds for us all.  The waiting on the world to change begins within us.  It begins with us imagining it and journeying toward it.  Our feet are indeed standing within your gates, O Jerusalem.  Peace be within you.  It’s right there….

A dreamer is one who can find [his or her] way in the moonlight, and [whose] punishment is that [he or she] sees the dawn before the rest of the world.  (Oscar Wilde)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli