You think tonight is New Year's Eve? Think again.
Tonight is Watch Night.
In point of fact, it is actually the 150th anniversary of the first Watch Night. On December 31, 1862, free African-Americans and abolitionists gathered in their local churches, waiting for the midnight hour to strike—the hour that the Emancipation Proclamation took effect. When January 1, 1863, began, slavery in America was pronounced dead.
Since that time, many in the Christian tradition have remembered this event, not ignoring the evil that came before and being thankful for the good that came after. And so they should!—for it was a little over two millennia ago that the Christ himself proclaimed, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor and has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor" (Luke 4.18-19).
What beautiful news! What a great charge by which humans could live! If only...
Yet, there is a catch. The Emancipation Proclamation did not make the slaves free, but only changed the tenor of the war from unification to liberation; the 13th Amendment ensured the right of freedom for them. And even though followers of Christ have spread throughout the world, supposedly carrying Jesus' proclamation of freedom with them, the International Justice Mission estimates that at least 27 million people are held in some form of slavery worldwide—many of whom are in the sex trade, in places as far as India and as close as Houston, Texas. Do you see the connection?
I see a need to make a proclamation into something concrete. I see a need to bring the "law of Christ"(i.e. Gal. 5.6: "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that counts is faith working through love") into power so that the proclamation of Christ will be realized.
"The creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God" (Rom 8.19-21).
And, praise God, those who belong to the Way that Christ immortalized are "all children of God through faith" (Gal. 3.26)—they are the ones upon whose revealing creation has been waiting.
So here, a week after remembering the "midnight hour" of all creation's healing in Christ's birth, we find ourselves again on the cliff of a new year.
The proclamation has been made, signed in the blood of the King.
The war continues, "nation rising against nation, and kingdom against kingdom... This is but the beginning of the birth pangs;" yet, the war has been changed.
Slaves are called free, and now are charged by the King to spread that freedom.
So in this night in which so many celebrate beginning anew, let us watch closely. Let us remember freedom proclaimed, and receive that freedom given in love. It will honor pain, praise virtue, encourage a heart in despair, remember the forgotten, sit with the lonely, laugh in mirth, and meet the unforeseen future with courage; and, if you have it, then share it with those around you—it's meant for all people, everywhere.
"For in hope we were saved..."
