Homily, Advent’s Song of Heartache
First Sunday of Advent, Year B, 2023
Good Shepherd Episcopal Church
Tequesta, FL
The Rev. Derek M Larson, TSSF
Today’s Lectionary Readings:
In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
You’ve Lost that Loving Feeling! A classic American song of heartbreak and regret. First recorded in 1964 by the Righteous Brothers, it immediately hit the top of the charts in both the United States and the United Kingdom. It went on to be covered by numerous other artists and featured in the 1986 film, Top Gun, where its renewed popularity made it the most performed BMI song for 22 years until 2019.
It’s a song that represents one of the most prevalent themes of music: heartache. We hear these kinds of songs all the time. Break-up songs. I’m sorry songs. I miss you songs. Growing apart songs. And all of these carry with them in common the very real human experiences of longing, regret, confusion, and hope. They all recall the way things used to be, and express a desire to go back, even when it is apparent that it would be almost impossible to do so. But they make the plea anyway. “I beg you please, bring back that loving feeling.” Humans have been writing these kinds of songs since we could sing, because they capture a very real part of being human. When we hear these songs, most of us can feel them in our chest. They are the songs of heartache.
Now, imagine with me the slow, ballad rhythm, the low bass tones, and the passion of a heart-broken singer’s voice when we hear the words of our first reading today, Isaiah 64. Because that’s exactly what this passage is: a song of heartache.
The song was written 500 years before Christ when many of the people of Israel had been exiled from their homeland and sent to Babylon. They felt that God had rejected them and they longed to go home. Their hearts were filled with heartache.
And it was in that context that we hear these words to this song, which include all the characteristics just mentioned.
It opens with longing, “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down.”
It recalls the way things once were, “When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, [and] the mountains quaked at your presence.”
It then sings of confusion and regret, “You were angry; we sinned. You hid yourself; we transgressed.”
And finally it ends with a note of desperation, and it pleas, “Do not be exceedingly angry, O Lord, and do not remember iniquity forever…we are your people.”
Can you hear the music? Can you hear the heartache?
And then, what we don’t get in today’s reading, but which immediately follows in chapter 65 is God’s equally desperate reply, “I was ready to be sought out. But you didn’t seek me. I said ‘Here I am” but you didn’t call my name. I held out my hands to you all the day long, but you walked away.”
The song of heartache becomes a duet. Like a romantic musical in which two lovers sing the same song back-to-back from different places, in this passage we hear the longing of God for God’s people, and God’s people for God. It is a song of passion. A song of pain. A song of longing. A song of love.
That song is still being sung today. And here, on the first Sunday of Advent, it is the perfect time to hear it. For Advent, too, is like a song of heartache. The season of Advent is the season of longing. Of waiting. Of expectation. Of hope. The season of Advent is the season in which we recognize that not all is as it should be in this world, but it could be. It could be, if God would just tear open the heavens to be with us and if we would just stop running away from God. The season of Advent is the season in which we hear God’s longing for us, and we give voice to our longing for God.
It’s not always an easy season. Many of us would rather skip right to Christmas. But just like in any relationship, reconciliation only happens if first we do the work. Advent is the season of that work. The season of preparation. The season in which we check in with the longings of our heart, so that if we have somehow drifted away, we may renew our commitment to follow Christ’s way of love in the world. We may reaffirm our desire for God’s healing presence in our lives. That we may start to bring back that loving feeling.
This morning, God longs for you. If you listen, you can hear God singing. There is desperation in God’s voice. God longs for you. And God has been singing this song of longing from the beginning of time.
The invitation of Advent, then, is to join in that song. To hear the part God is singing to us, and to reply with our own verse, a longing for God. The invitation of Advent is to join in the song of Isaiah. To join in the song of the Psalmists. To join in the song of Zechariah and Mary. Of the shepherds, of the wisemen. To join in the song of the Righteous Brothers, and sing to God, “Baby, baby I’d get down on my knees for you…I need your love…Bring back that loving feeling.” Amen.
Thoughts on Faith 