In these long, last days She has borne creation’s Crown; Heavy, sore, afraid, The weight of love is bearing down.
Refrain: We will wait. Even so, Come, Lord, come. We will wait. Even so, Come, Lord, come.
In these long, last days We must bear the weight of sin, Broken, torn, alone, Till you bring your peace to reign. [Refrain]
Bridge: Don’t forget us, Lord, Don’t forget us, Lord, While we wait. (×3) [Refrain ×2]
Sister Sinjin was founded in 2016 by three young moms wanting to record an Advent album: Elise Erikson Barrett, Elizabeth Duffy, and Kaitlyn Ferry. Barrett left the group to focus on her work in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors, and Duffy and Ferry recorded two more albums. This September the duo announced a name change to A Bright Abyss to reflect the evolution of their vocational identities (they are both now psychotherapists) and music, a genre they call “psychoanalytic folk.”
The lyrics of “In These Long, Last Days,” one of seven original songs on Sister Sinjin’s debut album, were written by Barrett; the music and additional lyrics, by Ferry. The first stanza refers to Mary’s pregnancy with Jesus—her carrying that bundle of Word-made-flesh inside her, eagerly awaiting the birth.
As Mary waited for the Messiah’s first coming, feeling the signs of its nearness in her body, so we await his second, and with it the rebirth of heaven on earth. We do so bearing the weight not of presence but of absence. God is with us in the Spirit, in word and sacrament, and through Christ’s ecclesial body—but the incarnate Christ, the God-man, physically ascended back into the divine realm. “Come back!” we exclaim during Advent, yearning for the return he promised. “Don’t forget us.”
Until that day, we will wait. Even so, come, Lord, come.
You shall have the trumpet sounded throughout all your land. And you shall hallow the fiftieth year and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you . . .
—Leviticus 25:9–10
The LORD has proclaimed to the end of the earth: Say to daughter Zion, “See, your salvation comes . . .”
—Isaiah 62:11
Immediately after the suffering of those days
the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven will be shaken.
Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see “the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven” with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
—Matthew 24:29–31
“Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest.”
—John 4:35
LOOK: Middle Eastern manuscript illumination of a trumpeting angel
Written around 1270, Aja’ib al-Makhluqat wa Ghara’ib al-Mawjudat (The Wonders of Creation and the Oddities of Existence) by the Persian cosmographer Zakriya ibn Muhammad al-Qazwini was one of the best known and most copied texts in the medieval Islamic world. This leaf from a fourteenth-century illuminated version shows an angel blowing a long trumpet that resembles a karnay, an ancient brass instrument still used throughout Central Asia, especially Uzbekistan, to herald celebrations.
The British Museum website identifies the angel in this painting as Gabriel; however, according to the hadith (records of the traditions and sayings of the prophet Muhammad) and the verso of this page, it is the angel Israfil who will blow the horn on the Day of Resurrection. Similar representations can be found here, here, here, and here. I sent a query to the museum asking why they’ve titled the painting “The Angel Gabriel” and whether it might be a mistake, and they told me they are looking into it.
Even though the Bible never specifies Gabriel as the trumpeter of the last days, he has come to be associated with that role in Christian tradition. The Armenian church was the first to assign it to him beginning in the twelfth century, and John Milton did likewise in his seventeenth-century epic, Paradise Lost. Gabriel’s trumpet is also a familiar trope in African American spirituals.
Israfil is not mentioned in the Bible. However, because whole hosts of angels exist and so few are named in scripture, all three Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) have naturally taken to supplying some names of their own.
The unknown artist of this image has creatively imagined an angel’s wing that tapers off into what looks like an animal head!
I chose the image for its ability to evoke Christ’s return—which, FYI, Muslims are also waiting for.
LISTEN: “Days of Elijah” by Robin Mark, 1996 | Arranged by Keith Lancaster and performed by the Acappella Company on Glorious God: A Cappella Worship, 2007
These are the days of Elijah Declaring the Word of the Lord And these are the days of your servant Moses Righteousness being restored And though these are days of great trials Of famine and darkness and sword Still we are the voice in the desert crying Prepare ye the way of the Lord
Behold he comes Riding on the clouds Shining like the sun At the trumpet call So lift your voice It’s the year of Jubilee And out of Zion’s hill Salvation comes
And these are the days of Ezekiel The dry bones becoming as flesh And these are the days of your servant David Rebuilding a temple of praise And these are the days of the harvest The fields are as white in the world And we are the laborers in your vineyard Declaring the Word of the Lord
Behold he comes Riding on the clouds Shining like the sun At the trumpet call So lift your voice It’s the year of Jubilee And out of Zion’s hill Salvation comes
There’s no god like Jehovah There’s no god like Jehovah There’s no god like Jehovah There’s no god like Jehovah
In the fifth century BCE God told Israel through his prophet Malachi, “See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me. . . . Lo, I will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes” (Mal. 3:1a; 4:5; cf. Isa. 40:3).
Four hundred years later came John the Baptist, whom Jesus referred to as Elijah (Matt. 11:14)—preparing the way, preaching the Word.
Northern Irish singer-songwriter Robin Mark invokes Elijah and, implicitly, his new-covenant counterpart, John, in the first stanza of “Days of Elijah,” comparing the ministries of these two prophets to that of the church. Just as John the Baptist prepared the way for the Messiah’s first coming, we are to prepare the way for his second.
The refrain pictures that second coming as a jubilee celebration—as freedom, rest, wholeness, the world set right—announced by a trumpet blast.
We are in the last days, the time between Christ’s two advents. And though we await the fullness of redemption, we do not do so passively. Filled with Christ’s Spirit, we labor as agents of justice and resurrection and praise, as the song suggests.
Above I featured a fairly standard (and skillful!) version of “Days of Elijah” that could be sung by your average church congregation. But here’s one to really knock your socks off: an arrangement by the South African gospel group Joyous Celebration, which they performed live in Johannesburg last month:
Art & Theology 