The Gifts of Imagination

four small sermons by Carrie Eikler
Matthew 1:18-25, Isaiah 7:10-16
Fourth Sunday in Advent

One
Last week Torin told you about a new billboard that went up just around Thanksgiving outside the Lincoln Tunnel in New York. Above an outline of the 3 magi on their way to the stable, reads the words “You know it’s a myth. This season celebrate reason.” It was put up by the organization called American Atheists. You may be relieved, or humored to know, that a few days after that billboard was put up the Catholic League put up its own sign saying: “You know it’s real. This season celebrate Jesus.”

I have followed some of the dialogue going on about these billboard wars and it is interesting to see how people feel: at least those who blog, tweet, and comment on articles about the signs. Of course, some were furious with the atheists’ billboards and were relieved to see the pro-Christmas sign. Supporters of the pro-reason board laugh at the pro-Christmas billboard but under much of the poking fun, one can sense a seething frustration at misguided and righteous Christians. But a surprising number of people had messages like “I’m a Christian, but the reason sign doesn’t bother me” or “I’m an atheist, but am not offended by the Christian holiday. I say live and let live.” Or “It seems to me this tit for tat is completely against what Christmas is supposed to be about: about love, hope, and generosity.”

While there are a good number of loud voices rallying around each of their signs, it seems, like is often the case, many of the people are stuck somewhere in the tunnel, just wanting to get home to families, or get to work on time, or find some quiet from the all the noise the world throws at them: job layoffs, divorce, unplanned pregnancies...

choir sings "The angel Gabriel"

Two
Signs – "that by which anything is made known or represented; that which furnishes evidence; a mark; a token; an indication; a proof."

Our scriptures are laden with sign imagery. King Ahaz is the king of Judah. Threatened with invasion, the prophet Isaiah tells him to for a sign from God. And he refuses. Why would he refuse? Was he so faithful that he wouldn’t ask that of God? He had a lot to lose, so maybe he is taking the easy way out: “What I don’t know can’t hurt me.”

But Isaiah gives him a sign anyway, at least, a prophecy. And a strange one at that. In Hebrew the translation reads: “Look, the young marriageable woman pregnant, and will bear a son” Before that happens, his kingdom would be spared from invasion. What was this about? Was it to be a messianic prophecy, like Matthew later points back to? Was it simply to be a political prediction? It is not clear, but we can imagine. We can imagine…

Joseph didn’t request a sign. But he got an indication of what was to come. He had a lot to lose. Reputation, respect, honor. He could have her stoned to death, but he chooses to dismiss her. “Quietly” it says. Discreetly. Hush-hush. Maybe the neighbors won’t see. And then it comes. A sign, in the form of an angel. “It can be different than what you expect, Joseph” the angel whispers. “How?” he muses. We might ask the same. How can a baby coming be different than what we expect? We can imagine…

Three
Signs – "that by which anything is made known or represented; that which furnishes evidence; a mark; a token; an indication; a proof."

Christopher Hitchens is one of the most popular atheist thinkers of our time. In his 2007 book called God is Not Great: How religion poisons everything, he wrote “Religion has run out of justifications. Thanks to the telescope and the microscope, it no longer offers an explanation of anything important.”
Religion no longer offers an explanation of anything important. What do you think about this statement?

Hitchens argues that the only signs we need to look for are those found in the material world. They only things worth explaining are things that can be explained through reason.

I appreciated what some of the contributors to the Mennonite Church Leader magazine had to say about this dualistic debate. Here are some of their thoughts. “Unfortunately, this brand of debate between since and religion, fact and revelation, faith and reason portrays the [conversation] as an either/or [debate]. [It oversimplifies] complex issues and [leaves] us with answers that do not satisfy. Yet the truth is that science and faith have something significant in common: [that is] their shared passion for mystery. Both religion and science seek to open up Mystery, understand it, know it, and in some form integrate it into the meaning of our lives. And both science and religion must at some point make a leap of the imagination to connect Mystery either to reason or to faith.”

Imagination – "Ability to form mental images, sensations, and concepts in a moment when they are not perceived through sight, hearing, or other senses. The work of the mind that helps create."

“Imagination in the hands of science opens up new avenues of knowledge. [says the authors in "The Leader"] "Imagination in the hands of religion opens up new avenues of hope. ‘Immanuel, God with us’ is more than a neatly packaged theological insight; it is an imaginative leap on the part of humanity and God both.”

The power of imagination, whether through science or religion, is that it opens up new and beautiful vistas of what it means to be human. And discovering new ways to be human, it seems to me, is at the heart of the mystery of Advent.

Four
Last Saturday, Lois Harder, a member of our congregation, took Torin and me to a concert of the Renaissance City Choir in Pittsburgh. And while the voices were enough to draw my eyes closed and send me into the heavens, I found myself wide awake, staring at one person on stage. Not one of the singers, but an important member of the choir, nonetheless: the sign language interpreter.

And at first I thought, how funny, that people who couldn’t hear, or at least who had difficulty hearing, would want to come to a choral concert. I quickly admonished my thought, recognizing that there are those who use sign language who can still hear the music, but can’t hear the words clearly. But maybe even those who were totally deaf could relate to what was going on through the signs.

But why? I thought? If they couldn’t hear the music, why come? If they couldn’t experience it like the rest of us, to experience the audible sound of a 1oo-person choir, how could they experience the beauty?

And I kept watching her—the sign interpreter. I watched how her body moved with the rhythm of the song. How her facial expressions mimicked the tone of the story within the songs.

I watched how there was a wide space of imagination created to connect the signs of her hands to the spirit of the choir’s singing. But I also recognized how that wide space of imagination allowed for an entirely new experience—while I accessed the beauty through my hearing, the signs, and the body, and the expression…the imagination allowed for another way of relating to beauty for the deaf and hard of hearing.

In this wide space of imagination, I realized that two people can come to the same beauty in different ways. And strangely, it was through the signs that I couldn’t understand…that I understood.

Advent is the time to cultivate the imagination. Not to put aside reason in order to blindly believe in a virgin birth or stories of angels. But to imagine about the possibilities. To open up to the mystery and encounter beautiful vistas of what it means to be human. Imagination is sacred because it opens us up to see the sign of God’s advent in our midst.

Where is your imagination being stretched this Advent to see the sign?