Longing for God to Break In

Today we begin the season of Advent: a season of waiting and a season of hoping, a season centered around the anticipation and celebration of the birth of Christ, a season where God breaks in.

But perhaps what we sometimes miss with our beautiful nativities and brightly colored parties is that it is also a season that is born within a landscape of fear. Both the gospel of Luke and Matthew say a whole lot in just five words with “in the time of Herod.” What kind of scene is set with these words?

Herod was widely known as “an utterly despotic and tyrannical ruler who ruthlessly suppressed any murmurs against him. Any opponents, including family members, were immediately removed from the equation. Historians suggest that he may have had a secret police of sorts to keep abreast of and control the opinions of the common people about him. Suggestions of revolt or even protests against his rule were dealt with forcefully. According to Josephus, he had a tremendously large personal guard of 2000 soldiers.” Herod’s power, “secured through imperial alliance, was maintained by coercion, surveillance, and brutality.” In any time and place, there will always be Herods of our world. In the time of Herod reveals “the fearful world Jesus entered, one filled with rampant oppression, economic disparity, uncertainty, and instability.” In other words, a world not unlike our own. And yet, in the midst of intense fear, God broke through.

In the midst of fear, we hear the angel say to Zechariah “do not be afraid” even when he so clearly is. The word used for Zechariah’s response to this long-awaited news is not elation but of fear. It says he was terrified and fear overwhelmed him? Do you have fears that overwhelm you lately? The Greek word tarasso means “to be troubled, disturbed, or even agitated.” This isn’t a momentary fear, but the genuine act of being unsettled. Rev. Dr. Boyung Lee says “Tarasso is the soul’s recoil from the unexpected, the mind’s clamor in the face of uncertainty, the body’s trembling at the threshold of something it cannot control.”

Advent doesn’t tell us a story in which fear is absent. It tells us a story of God breaking through even in the presence of real fear. As Rev. Lauren Wright Pittman was reflecting on this year’s theme for Advent, she recalled a conversation with her counselor in which she confessed that she was afraid of everything. Martin Luther King Jr. reflected on this in his sermon The Mastery of Fear, saying “There is probably no emotion that plagues and crumbles the human personality more than that of fear. Every where we turn we meet that monster fear. Fear expresses itself in such diverse forms—fear of others, fear of oneself, fear of growing old, fear of death, fear of change, fear of disease and poverty…Fear begins to accumulate to the point that at last many face what psychiatrists call phobo‐phobia, the fear of fear, being afraid of being afraid.”

Perhaps before we move forward with Advent, we need to make space to name our fears. To be honest about them. Where is fear leaving us feeling overwhelmed, agitated, and paralyzed? Where in our lives does that tarasso fear raise its head? I want to give you space to name those this morning.

Right now, there is a real sense of fear present in our nation as the threat of deportation at any time or place looms large. The Tuesday before Thanksgiving, the MS Conference had a Zoom call in which they discussed the upcoming “ operation swamp sweep” (set to begin on December 1st), in which border agents will focus on deportations across southeast Louisiana and Mississippi with the goal of 5,000 arrests. The New York Times recently released a 2025 survey of immigrants and found that “more than one in five (22%) immigrants personally know someone arrested, detained, or deported for immigration-related reasons since the president’s return to office—nearly triple the share from April 2025. Forty-one percent of immigrants now fear they or a family member could be detained or deported, up sharply from 26% in 2023. Fear has increased the most among lawfully present immigrants and naturalized citizens, indicating that growing unease is not confined to those who are undocumented….Three in ten immigrants say they or a family member avoid traveling, working, going to other public spaces, or seeking medical care because of fear of enforcement since January. Among likely undocumented immigrants, this avoidance rises to three in four. More than half of immigrants (53%) lack confidence they would be treated fairly if detained.” I understand we all have different opinions around immigration reform and policy, but as followers of Jesus we are meant to look first at the person, to remember these are human lives created in the image of God and they have very real fears. Also, we need to be willing to look at our fears in the face and ask the harder questions.

Saying “Do not fear” doesn’t mean there is nothing to be afraid of. We need to distinguish this. I sometimes wonder if we treat “do not fear” as some sort of magical phrase. It doesn’t seem to happen that way with Zechariah. He isn’t sure. He questions. He doesn’t believe. He ends up mute through his wife’s pregnancy. But here’s the thing. He doesn’t shrink back, ignore, or run away from his fears. He faces them and moves through them.

Instead of allowing fear to isolate us and divide us from others, what if we were to form a different relationship with it? In her article Making Friends with Fear, Denise Fournier says a healthy relationship with fear is characterized by curiosity, compassion, and courage. Often we can judge Zechariah for his fear response, but even he displays curiosity. When told that his wife will conceive and give birth to a son, he asks “how will I know this is so? For I am an old man and my wife is getting on in years?” Zechariah is afraid, but he asks questions in his fear. Curiosity in our fear is when we open ourselves up to discovering something new. What might be possible. How will this be so?

We also need compassion. What if we were more compassionate towards our relationship with fear. What do I mean by this? Beneath the outer language of our fears is an inner language of longing. Rev. Dr. Boyung Lee says “underneath our fears are deep longings. Are you able to look beneath the surface of your fears to discover what it is you are truly longing for? a better world? A different story? A brighter future?” As you name your fears, are you also able to face them long enough to also name your longing beneath the narrative of your fear? Where are you longing for God to break through?

This takes courage. Courage in the midst of fear is being willing to face our fears and ask it some questions. In the movie adaptation of Wicked, part one and two, I am reminded of how easily fear can control the narrative. When we don’t have courage to face it, it becomes easy to villainize anyone or anything we haven’t faced long enough to understand. In Wicked, Elphaba is made into the villain because it becomes easier to hate her than to take time to see behind the lies.

In this season of waiting, maybe we aren’t meant to suppress our fears, but to face them and ask “where does fear have control in my life? What voices has fear amplified? What longings has it silenced? What am I really hoping for beneath the surface of my fears?

Zechariah’s story did turn over into one of rejoicing and hope. It ends with the cry of an infant and Elizabeth saying “this is what the Lord has done for me.” The journey for Zechariah and Elizabeth was a long one, a journey that required holding both fear and hope together. Advent is not a journey in which there is nothing to fear but a journey through fears towards the stable. Perhaps the wisdom of Advent this year is that we can face the most fearful thing we can imagine and still step forward gently toward the light, still insist that God breaks through.

So let’s come together this morning and name our fears and our longings. Let’s name where we want God to break in. Let us name what we hope for.

And let us trust most of all, that God still breaks in.