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Advent in the Land of The Arguers

ByAlan Howell

Corinna Luyken’s beautifully illustrated children’s book, The Arguers (2025), tells a comically tragic tale that is uncomfortably familiar. We learn of a kingdom where the people are most skilled in the art of arguing. They argue with each other, they argue with the rocks, and they even argue with the flowers. The very first argument, it seems, was over whether a brush or a comb was the best way to remove a tangle from the king’s beard. And ever since then, the people have been tangled up in all kinds of arguments.

Arguing has become the national pastime and a source of pride for the people. So, when the king and queen invite the people to a contest “to choose, once and for all, the BEST arguer in the land,” people practiced and practiced and argued even more than ever before. On the day of the contest, with everyone gathered in the center of the capital city, the royal couple tried to bring the group together and announce that it was time to start, but as you could probably predict, the people are so busy arguing that they miss the message. Luyken says this, “And so, there was no beginning. Just as it seemed there would be no end. That is, until the thunder and then the lightning began.”

So this seemingly never-ending arguing contest is finally interrupted by a boom and a blast from the heavens. The thunder and lightning send people scattering. They stop arguing and start acting as they work to put a fire out in the king’s beard. Luyken informs us that this “is how, on the day of The Great Arguing Contest, the Arguers actually found something that they could agree on. For a little while at least.”

This children’s book seems incredibly relevant for the times we live in today. Instead of arguing with rocks and flowers, it is easy to find people today who look like they are arguing with and through phones and screens. There is so little listening and so much arguing that it is hard to discern where it begins and where it could even possibly end. Adults who are caught up in arguing (instead of actually listening or acting) are passing on this toxic trait to the younger people around them – discipling them and developing them as arguers. I have found this book to be a helpful way to name the problem and reframe what I’m seeing and hearing around me. It has helped me pray for some type of heavenly interruption to all this arguing.

For those of us who also find ourselves in a land of Arguers, where can we find hope?

Followers of Christ can find it in Advent. Advent is about awaiting the arrival of a different kind of king. Not a modern-day leader, political figure, or Arguer-in-Chief. Instead, Advent is about how King Jesus is the one who shows up in surprising ways to resolve humanity’s own hairy, tangled problem. He does this by showing up in person – as a baby. And celebrating his arrival in the past also points us to his future coming, where he will return and make all things right. Those four Sundays of preparation on our calendars, where we slow down and consider how our coming King brings hope (Isaiah 11:1-10), peace (Isaiah 9:6-7), joy (Luke 2:8-20), and love (1 John 4:9-16), offer a powerful antidote to the arguing pattern that ails us. So, from my perspective, Advent may be just what our Land of Arguers needs most of all.

Advent reveals a God whose heavenly word is not an argumentative one, but an incarnational one. Christ, the Word-Made-Flesh, gives us the best picture of what God is like. He demonstrates divine love and grace and truth (John 1:1-14). Jesus also shows us a God who is committed to being conversational. Instead of blasting a word or message from the heavens, the Messiah shows us that God is willing to talk with us and engage us right where we are. Advent helps us see that God is less concerned with being confrontational and is focused on connecting (even at great cost) to be truly transformational.

We must be careful not to let the national pastime of arguing keep us from hearing the true king’s message. We can find hope, peace, joy, and love by leaving our arguing ways behind and actually acting alongside those around us. And we can do that even if we disagree with them, because people who live in the light of Advent are engaged in a different type of contest with a different way of winning. As followers of Jesus we are following the ways of the Conversational Word-of-God-Made-Flesh, one who is less concerned about winning arguments and more concerned with winning them over to a Kingdom-centered life of love, service, and blessing.

May the children (and adults!) in our lives heed the warning that The Argurers has to offer, and may we also embrace the promises that Advent has to share.

Alan Howell
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