The Judge at the Doors

Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged. See, the Judge is standing at the doors! As an example of suffering and patience, beloved, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord [James 5:9–10].

The Gaudete Paradox

This coming Sunday is the Third Sunday of Advent, Gaudete Sunday — from the Latin word for rejoice. In many churches, the Advent Wreath’s rose candle will be lit instead of another purple one, marking a shift in tone from somber waiting. Someone might choose a lighter hymn, maybe something in a major key. It’s supposed to feel different, brighter somehow, as Christmas draws near.

And then the lectionary gives us James 5:7–10.

James tells us to be patient until the coming of the Lord. He provides an image of a farmer waiting for rain. Then James warns us: do not grumble against one another, “for the Judge is standing at the doors.”

Be patient. The Judge is coming.

That’s not exactly “Deck the Halls.” So what kind of joy is this? What does it mean to rejoice while being told to wait patiently for a Judge who is already standing at the threshold?

The joy of Advent’s Third Sunday is something harder and stranger — the joy of knowing that judgment is coming, and that judgment means things will finally be set right.

The Farmer’s Patience

James uses the image of a farmer to explain the kind of waiting Advent requires:

Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains [James 5:7].

The farmer’s patience comes from action. He’s planted seed. He’s prepared the ground. He knows what he’s waiting for — rain that will bring the crop to harvest. His patience is active, invested, hopeful. He watches the sky. He tends what he’s planted. He trusts that the rains will come in their season.

“You also must be patient,” James says. “Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near” [James 5:8].

Strengthen your hearts. It is preparatory language — not resignation, not passivity, but resolve. The farmer strengthens himself for harvest because he knows it’s coming. We strengthen our hearts for the Lord’s coming because it is near — so near that James can say in the next breath, “the Judge is standing at the doors.”

The Judge at the Doors

James then shifts his tone [see 5:9]: “Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged. See, the Judge is standing at the doors!”

Why does James warn against grumbling? Because judgment is not distant. The Judge isn’t off somewhere in a far future. He’s at the doors — right there, almost visible, about to enter.

We’re waiting in the presence of the Judge who sees how we treat each other, how we speak about each other, how impatience has turned into suspicion or bitterness or comparison.

The Judge is standing at the doors. That image should unsettle us. There is no neutral waiting in Advent.

The Darkness That Has Been Home

Frederick Buechner once wrote:

We who live much of the time in the darkness are waiting not just at Advent, but at all times for the advent of light, of that ultimate light that is redemptive and terrifying at the same time. It is redemptive because it puts an end to the darkness, and that is also why it is terrifying, because for so long, for all our lives, the darkness has been home, and because to leave home is always cause for terror” [from Buechner’s sermon called “Waiting”].

The darkness has been home. That is why the Judge standing at the doors is both hope and threat. We say we want light, we pray for justice, we long for things to be set right. But we’ve grown comfortable in the darkness — comfortable with seeing only what we choose to see, comfortable with selective compassion, comfortable with deciding which injustices deserve our attention and which ones we can safely ignore.

Sometimes our blindness becomes so ordinary that we can pray for justice in worship while ignoring the one million unborn whose lives were quietly extinguished this year without a word from us, as unnoticed as the candles we snuff out at the end of the service.

The light that’s coming will expose all of it. And that’s terrifying.

Selective Sight

James will not let us be selective. Earlier in his letter [see 2:1], he asks, “Do you with your acts of favoritism really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ?” He calls favoritism sin.

And just before this week’s lectionary passage, in the first verses of chapter 5, James condemns the rich who exploit their workers: “The wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out.” Their cries have reached “the ears of the Lord of hosts.”

James does not sort the vulnerable into categories. We do.

Churches pray for justice every Sunday. We lift up prayers for the oppressed, the marginalized, the vulnerable. But do we mean God’s justice, or do we mean our own curated version? Justice for all the vulnerable, or just the ones who fit the narrative we already approve?

The Judge standing at the doors will ask that question.

The Joy of Judgment

So with the foregoing, why is this the Sunday of rejoicing? Why light the rose candle when we’re talking about judgment and exposure and the darkness that has been our home?

The Judge who is coming makes things right.

He exposes our selective blindness in the process, yes — but the exposure serves a larger purpose. For those who have been exploited, ignored, declared non-persons, deemed unworthy of protection — for them, the Judge’s arrival is pure hope. Judgment means they will be seen.

The joy of Gaudete Sunday comes from knowing that our comfortable darkness won’t last forever. The light is coming. Things will be set right. The Judge will see what we have refused to see.

That is both terrifying and redemptive. Terrifying for those of us who have been comfortable in the darkness. Redemptive for those we have left in the shadows.

Strengthen Your Hearts

“Strengthen your hearts,” James says, “for the coming of the Lord is near” [5:8].

The prophets James mentions as examples of patience spoke truth that cost them everything. They saw clearly when others preferred blindness. They held onto hope for God’s justice even when human justice failed.

That is the Advent posture James calls us to — active preparation for the Judge who is already standing at the doors.

The rose candle marks this truth:

The light is coming.
What has been hidden will be revealed.
What we ignored will be named.
What has been exploited will be restored.
The Judge is standing at the doors.
Strengthen your hearts.