First Sunday of Advent — Hope
Come back for me, too
Photo by Pixabay
If you enjoy this devotional, consider making a modest donation to our Lunches of Love ministry to homeless youth in Salt Lake City, Utah. Even $5.00 can provide one meal.
John 20:24-29 (NIV)
Now Thomas (also known as Didymus), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!”
But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.”
Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Somewhere between last year’s Christmas lights and this year’s divisive headlines, I found myself doing what Thomas did—I stepped away from the room, not from Jesus, but from the noise around Him.
This past year has been heavy. Many of us in my church family were sick with dread over the rise of Trump 2.0. Our progressive, LGBTQ+ welcoming and affirming, Christian community worried not just for policies, but for the tone of public life, the permission it seemed to give for everyday cruelty. We felt the chill of fear and uncertainty in the air. We prayed with trembling hands for the safety of those who would be targeted again. We wondered if compassion still had a place in the public square.
And at the same time, I became wary of others in my own community who celebrated his return to power. Not because I wished them harm or dismissed their reasons, but because their joy felt at odds with the fear that lived in my chest. We were still neighbors, still people who buy groceries in the same stores and wave at each other on foggy morning walks, but suddenly we understood the world so differently.
And that ache drove me into my sabbatical.
I didn’t step away from faith. I stepped away from the meanness, the shouting, the pressure to pretend everything was fine. Ten years of waiting for Christianity in America to push back against White Christian Nationalism wore me down. It felt like yelling into the wind. I grew tired of defending Jesus from His loudest fans.
So I did what Thomas did: I disappeared for a while. I left the room where everyone else seemed to be gathering, not out of disbelief, but out of grief. And like Thomas, I didn’t expect Jesus to come find me in that quiet.
“Then Jesus said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here… stop doubting and believe.’” — John 20:27
Jesus didn’t shame Thomas for stepping back. He didn’t rebuke him for needing time to breathe. He simply returned for him.
This is the stubborn hope of Advent.
Why This Matters Today
Because faith communities everywhere are carrying dread, uncertainty, and relational strain. Because political seasons are ripping families, churches, and neighborhoods apart. Because many are grieving what the world is becoming, even as others celebrate it. Because stepping away has become a form of spiritual survival.
Advent steps directly into that mess.
It says:
Hope does not require you to be unafraid.
Hope does not demand that you agree with your neighbor to love them.
Hope does not disappear because the world feels darker than last year.
Hope returns to closed rooms, anxious hearts, and fractured communities.
Hope is not a mood.
Hope is not cheerfulness.
Hope is Jesus saying, “I came back for you.”
Reflection for the Reader
Where have fear or division pushed you into your own sabbatical?
Where do you feel the ache of living beside people whose choices wound you — even if they don’t mean to?
You do not have to pretend your dread wasn’t real. You only need to keep your heart cracked open when Jesus returns with peace in His hands.
Prayer of Invitation
Christ of the Closed Rooms,
I come into Advent weary, anxious, and unsure of the world around me. The dread that settled over me this year has been heavy, and the divisions in my community have carved deep lines in my spirit.
Yet You come back for people like Thomas, the people who step away, people who grieve loudly, people who are afraid of what tomorrow might bring.
Come back for me, too.
Return to my locked places, touch my trembling hands, and breathe hope where fear has lived too long.
Let this first candle remind me that even in the darkest season, You have never stopped seeking me.
Amen.
Still Waters (Psalm 23)
Great Aunt Maurine said at a hundred and three
Write scripture on your heart for when you need it
Cause anxiety hates Psalm 23
So just say it to yourself ‘til you believe it
And I’m feeling like I’m needing it right now