Advent and the Power of Silence

Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple. When he came out, he could not speak to them. They realized he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them but remained unable to speak.

Luke 1:21–22

For churches that follow the traditional liturgical calendar, December is a month filled with explanation and proclamation. During the Advent season, we explain what we hope for and why we hope for it. We explain our longing for rescue. Then, on Christmas, we proclaim that the very thing we long for has been given to us.

We don’t appreciate the restraint of the Advent season deeply enough.

Our political culture is built around constant proclamation. (So is our social media landscape!) To be understood, to be taken seriously, to win votes, candidates have to constantly declare their own commitments, their own virtues and their opponent’s flaws. To build and maintain audiences, pundits and political influencers proclaim, many times an hour, why their side is right and the other side is evil.

Yet when Dr. Luke had finished his thorough investigation into everything that was fulfilled in the sight of Jesus’ friends and eyewitnesses, he concluded that it all started with God making a proclamation to a human—who then held his tongue.

When the impulse to constantly proclaim is so much a part of the “water we swim in,” it’s easy to let it seep into the way we practice our faith. It’s easy to start thinking that sharing our faith with others means bombarding them with arguments, with warnings, with exhortations, until we hit on just the right combination of words that can leak into a crack in their hard heart.

The Advent season exists, in part, as a reminder that, while explanation and proclamation are sometimes important and regularly essential, they are only a small part of Christian ministry. They’re only part of what it means to live as Jesus’ body and witnesses in this world. They’re only part of the way our lives are supposed to testify to God’s grace.