Layover

Air travel is starting to come back again. Now that more people are getting vaccinated and Covid treatment is improving, there are more people getting back to travel, which means airline flights are filling up. The trip that Laura and I took in October had completely full planes—every seat was taken. Along with more flights and sold-out flights comes the air-travel routines of booking tickets and trying to get the best deals.

There are only a few people I know willing to shell out the extra cash for upgraded seats when booking flights. Most people—however—are willing to pay a few extra dollars if necessary to book a direct flight to wherever it is they are going, if it is possible. If there is no direct flight, that means having to add extra hours to your travel schedule to accommodate one or more layovers in order to catch connecting flights at other airports. We are way past a time when air travel was a pleasant experience. These days, airports and airplanes are just a headache all the way around. And so, booking a direct flight that avoids layovers is a top priority. Air travel is no longer about the experience; it is only about getting to the destination. And the faster I can get to my destination with the least amount of hassle, the better it will be. No layovers. Give me the direct flight.

Today marks the beginning of advent. It is that season in which we wait for Christmas. In fact, the word ‘advent’ means waiting. God’s people in churches around the world recall how it is that God’s people of the Old Testament waited for the promised Messiah to arrive. For people of Christian faith, this season of the year is about waiting. We are people who are not very good at waiting. Our waiting seems to be about getting the quickest route possible to the destination. Microwave ovens heat our food in seconds. Amazon Prime delivers packages the very next day. The internet places all the information in the world right in front of us instantly.

I wonder if our approach to advent happens in the same way. Sure, I know this a season of waiting for the arrival of the Messiah. But the priority is focused entirely on the destination. Book me a ticket to Christmas, but make sure it is a direct flight. Get me straight to the destination. Even here in advent, let’s skip ahead and talk about the birth of baby Jesus, let’s skip ahead and talk about God’s salvation for the world, let’s get straight to where all of this is pointing. It’s Christmas. Jesus is here. Hop on a direct flight to God-saves-the-world.

Except that it is not a direct flight. There are layovers. There are some out-of-the-way stops that make the journey and the waiting a bit more arduous. And yet—even in the story of Jesus—these layovers are not really anything new or surprising. In fact, the story of Jesus contains several déjà vu moments that point us back to the earlier experiences of God’s people in the Old Testament. Let’s take a look today at just one of those moments from the early life of Jesus. It involves a layover in Egypt.

Genesis 12:10 NIV

10 Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe.

Genesis 37:28 NIV

28 So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt.

Genesis 46:6 NIV

6 So Jacob and all his offspring went to Egypt, taking with them their livestock and the possessions they had acquired in Canaan.

Hosea 11:1 NIV

1 “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.

Jeremiah 31:15 NIV

15 This is what the Lord says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, mourning and great weeping, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”

Matthew 2:13–18 NIV

13 When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” 14 So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, 15 where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.” 16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. 17 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: 18 “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”

we try our best to skip past this layover episode and knock it completely out of the Christmas story

Talk about a layover. Why does the Jesus story have to take us back to that whole Egypt thing? And why does the Jesus story have to dig up and re-live all of those horrible baby killing moments. Why does that have to be a part of the Christmas story? That’s a layover I would rather avoid. Can’t we just hop on the advent airlines direct flight that gets us straight to Joy-to-the-World? Here is the honest answer to that question: that’s exactly what we try to do! We absolutely try our best to skip past this layover episode and knock it completely out of the Christmas story! Think about it. I trust that most of us—if not all of us—know the story of the Magi. We know about the wise men who see the star in the East and come looking for Jesus and present their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And then we completely skip over everything that happens next as a direct result of Magi’s visit. I bet you have received Christmas cards in the past with artistic renderings of the Magi following the star with their gifts for Jesus. But I bet you have never received a Christmas card depicting Mary and Joseph fleeing with their child in the secret of night while soldiers come and start slaughtering all the boys in Bethlehem. We have completely washed that episode out of the Christmas story. Even though the Magi story brings us to this layover in Egypt, we always skip past that part.

the story and the lives and the experiences of God’s people have now become the story and the life and the experience of Jesus

And yet, the layover in Egypt is an important part of the Christmas story. Not only is it part of the Christmas story, it makes connections into the story of God’s people going all the way back to Abraham. The story and the lives and the experiences of God’s people have now become the story and the life and the experience of Jesus. The story of Jesus includes a layover because the story of God’s people includes layovers. Look at the way this plays out.

OT connections

In Genesis 12 Abraham escapes famine by going to Egypt for a time. In Genesis 37 Joseph is sold by his brothers to slavery in Egypt. In Genesis 46 Jacob along with all his children seek refuge in Egypt from famine. Hosea 11 summarizes the 400 years of Israel living in Egypt and then being called out by God in the exodus. The Exodus event itself carries connections to this Magi story in Matthew 2. It was during the time when Moses was born that the Pharaoh ordered all the Israelite baby boys be thrown into the Nile river and killed. Eighty years later, the final plague of the exodus culminated in the loss of Egypt’s firstborn children. Matthew also ties this event to Jeremiah 31, which recalls the Babylonian invaders who either carried off Israel’s children into exile or slaughtered them.

Jesus enters into the lives of God’s people in their moments of being far away from the intended or expected destination

This painful and traumatic layover in Israel’s history becomes a vivid episode early on in the life of Jesus occurring after the Magi bring their gifts. Jesus not only enters into the lives of God’s people at their moments of joy and peace and love. (Those advent candles are coming, but we are not there yet.) Jesus also enters into the lives of God’s people in their moments of being far away from the intended or expected destination. Israel lived through layover experiences that appear to be so vastly removed from where they would ever expect to see God show up. And as it turns out, Jesus shows up in those far away places too.

Jesus comes into those far away places in our own lives too

You know, the layover experiences of Jesus are not limited to connecting with the layover experiences of Old Testament Israel. Jesus comes into those far away places in our own lives too. What does your Egypt layover look like this advent season? Does your life have moments of feeling stuck in a far away place just waiting for the flight to board to get you somewhere better? Last Sunday we noted and prayed especially for those who were entering this holiday season during a time of cancer treatment or enduring the recent loss of a close loved one. Maybe your layover is enduring a particularly challenging time at work, or getting through a particularly tough school year. Maybe you are one of those healthcare workers we keep reading about in the news who is overwhelmed and feeling the burnout of a healthcare system being pushed beyond capacity. Maybe your layover is waiting out family tensions or broken friendships.

we sit at this faraway place waiting for a boarding pass to somewhere better

Perhaps the layover waiting is something much more general—something we are all experiencing together. Our entire world is still waiting out a health pandemic. Our nation is stuck waiting through a rather volatile political time when it sometimes feels like only the most extreme voices on both ends of the spectrum dominate the agenda. It always seems like there is someplace in the world that is erupting in violence and war. And so we sit at this faraway place waiting for a boarding pass to somewhere better. We wait during advent to hop aboard that trip that gets our world out of Egypt, out of the wilderness. We keep waiting for the joy and peace and love we know goes along with the Christmas story. Sometimes it feels like those things are so far away. How in the world are we ever going to get there?

it is exactly in those faraway distant places that Jesus shows up in the Christmas story

And this is exactly the place in the Christmas story when we are reminded that we are not the ones who have to find a way to get out of those faraway places which feel so distant from Jesus. Because it is exactly in those faraway distant places that Jesus shows up in the Christmas story. This is the day when we light the candle of hope. The hope that we have at Christmas is not an empty hope that somehow we have to fill by going out and finding the Joy of Christmas. It is not a fragile hope that shatters in an instant whenever we struggle to feel at peace during Christmas. The hope we embrace here today in this advent season is a hope that comes from knowing that Jesus comes into our world exactly the way it is. Jesus enters into your world and into your life and into your experiences exactly where you are right now.

our hope is not based upon going out to find Jesus; our hope is based upon knowing that Jesus has already found you exactly where you are

This is the hope we celebrate today in advent; that Jesus comes into your life exactly where you are. It is not by random accident that Jesus encountered experiences in his first years after being born on earth which exactly match the experiences of God’s people throughout the Old Testament. It is a reminder for us yet today that Jesus shows up in your world exactly where you are. Yes, advent reminds us that Jesus came to bring joy and peace and love. Yes, advent reminds us that those moments when we experience joy and peace and love show echos of the gospel. And yes, advent reminds us that even in those times when joy and peace and love feel so very far away, that is exactly the place where Jesus shows up and comes into your life. Our hope is not based upon going out to find Jesus. Our hope is based upon knowing that Jesus has already found you exactly where you are.