In her book Teaching a Stone to Talk, Annie Dillard marvels at the nonchalant way in which most Christians come the church. We come to carpeted and comfortable sanctuaries filled with padded pews. Everything is orderly and neat, tied down, and respectable. Yet, says Dillard, if we really know much about the Bible and what it is like to encounter God, then ushers ought to be handing out crash helmets rather than an order of worship. Instead of new hymnals they should be issuing out life preservers and signal flares.
That’s the way God moves, isn’t it? Both the Bible and our own memories are filled with stories about people who were moving along, living their lives in normal, respectable, conventional, and predictable paths, only to be disrupted by what William Willimon has called “the intrusive word of God.” God speaks! They hear God calling their name. Their world and their lives are changed.
That’s the way God moves through Advent and into Christmas. God moves in sprpriseing, earth shaking, and intrusive ways. Are we listening?
“A voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the Way Of The Lord!”
