Last night I looked in the face of one’s who feel “targeted!” As a part of an ethnic group in a context that exudes racial identity and definition, not to say prejudice, I listened as my friends shared their story and what they saw and experienced. We used to use the term “target” when I was a kid on the farm. It signified a piece of paper stuck on a tree with an old nail. We’d shoot at it with the 22-caliber rifle and even hit the target sometimes! My brother was much better at it than I was. Then I learned to use the term in leadership. The organization had a target to hit in terms of growth or outreach or depth of development.
Now the term has a new meaning. People are said to be targeted in shootings in contrast to a random killing. Ethnic characteristics make a person a target of prejudice and the powerful are accused of targeting those who are different, undocumented, foreign. I’m discovering this kind of targeting has no boundaries, no age discrimination, no familial discretion. Targeted people may be employed and hard working, church going, education seeking folks who just happen to be in the cross-hairs of those who hold weapons of death, power to shatter dreams, and a determination to, in a distorted way, right something they identify as being wrong. No matter what the circumstance may be, targeted people share a common factor, they see themselves as victims. In some senses they feel they are powerless victims subject to injustice.
The beginning of advent reminds me Mary was also targeted. God chose her to expand the boundaries of her life and become the mother of God. She was targeted and as such was called on to a risky life-path. In contrast to the targeted persons referred to above, she could have said no. She could have refused the status that went with being targeted. Risk of loosing her fiancé, risk of family rejection, risk of even death at the hands of the law which cursed her as a person with an unwanted pregnancy.
But God’s intentions were different. Mary was targeted to bring a new reality to humankind. Here, the powerful did not impose, but rather became a humble part of the mess we have created to bring redemption. The motivation of the targeting was to resolve the issues we are powerless to resolve ourselves. Thinking of our day, what would happen if our resources were spent targeting those who need a way forward, resolving those issues that make them targeted victims? What if we admitted our system is broken and by repairing it we could expand our world to embrace those who are caught in the quagmire of bureaucracy providing a way forward where freedom and justice are for all?
Advent is nothing if not the story of beginnings, revealing a God who dares to expand, who chooses enlargement over happiness, no matter the chaos. This season shows us the astonishing view of a God gone radial, one who will never stop reaching toward his beloved, no matter the risks. And so, in the true spirit of Advent, we find our courage to change.*
Pondering!
Marv Asfahl Gibbs
Shell Point – December 2025
*https://cac.org/daily-meditations/expanding-beyond-ourselves/
