Advent 4, Year B, December 24, 2023

Quotes That Make Me Think

"It is no small thing to be regarded, to be favored, especially when you are exceedingly aware that you should not be."

Commentary, Luke 1:26-38, Karoline Lewis, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"It's an incredible thing to be noticed, to be called favored, to be invited into meaning work. This is the gift we can give our people this week, Working Preacher."

"Favored Ones," David Lose, Dear Working Preacher, 2011.

We may call the Annunciation a “joyful” mystery, but surely the experience was a mixed one for Mary herself. I believe that saying “yes” to God did indeed bring joy to Mary, but that “yes” was also the beginning of terrible responsibility and heartache for her, heartache that would extend all the way to Calvary. In the meantime, she had all of the usual anxieties of the unexpectedly pregnant (and then some). Through all the uncertainty, in the face of every overwhelming obstacle, she was able to trust that God loved and guided her, whether she sensed God’s presence or not.

Certainly this isn’t the only or the best way to interpret the Annunciation. Nevertheless, it was the version I needed that day.

Waiting For God by Elizabeth Desimone

General Resources for Sunday's Lessons from Textweek.com

Prayer

Great and merciful God, from among this world's lowly and humble you choose your servants and call them to work with you to fulfill your loving plan of salvation.  By the power of your Spirit, make your church fertile and fruitful, that, imitating the obedient faith of Mary, the church may welcome your word of life and so become the joyful mother of countless offspring, a great and holy posterity of children destined for undying life.  We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Luke 1:26-38

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

Resources for Sunday's Gospel

Are we confused? So what is the meaning of Advent and Christmas? As we wait, we might ponder and think about the meaning of our life and the life of those closest to us. If we stop for a moment we might look and around and ask what are we doing and for what are we making this great effort? If the bumper sticker wisdom is true and Jesus is the reason for the season, we might pause on this Sunday and ask ourselves do our actions tell that story or a different story?

I am not talking about doing right, I am talking about serving the good and the God who is good.

Life moves along through this season. We are getting by. We are making our way towards another Christmas. The anxieties about family and being together are growing. Perhaps financial stress and strain are pulling on our souls. It is complicated by the reality of continued family separation. We are ramping up, and we are wondering if this or that is really important? What will we do? What new traditions will be created? What old traditions will pause or not continue?

We are going to Christmas parties and making the rounds, and something in the midst of those conversations and relationships may actually seem more real, more worthwhile, than the rest of the business of the season. 

We are confused. It is, in fact, a confusing time of year with competing messages. It is a confusing time economically. It is a confusing time as people look to the past and then forward into the future. We are a bit confused, and we are hoping someone might offer some good news.

I think that is what we are waiting for...a little bit of good news. We are waiting for a little direction. On this Sunday, as the fervour is building, I believe people are hoping our preachers will somehow give us some wisdom, some direction, and perhaps interpret what we are experiencing and what it all means. What does it mean to serve God in this time - our time.

Mary was confused, to be sure. Luke Timothy Johnson translates Mary's response to the angel's words as "utterly confused." (Luke, p 38) At the same time, it is likely that all those who heard this story were not confused but rather expected it to be so; this is the way great births happen. This is true in other parts of scripture, and it was true in the writings and storytelling of Jesus' own day. We might look at the birth of Samson in Judges 13:2-7 as an example of such writings. (38)

Mary is a woman with no special position within the body of faithful people like most of us. Mary is not a particularly righteous person (according to Luke); she is not known as a pious woman but rather an ordinary citizen like most of us. "She is young in a world that values age; female in a world ruled by men; poor in a stratified economy. Furthermore, she has neither husband nor child to validate her existence." (Luke Timothy Johnson; Luke, 39) She actually is of very little value at all. I think that is actually how most people feel about themselves.

In a society that has more, spends more, consumes more, and prides itself on liberty, freedom, and happiness, we are today a body of individuals who feel pretty miserable, imprisoned by our stuff, and of very little value.

Some leaders are even suggesting caution be thrown to the wind in order to shop.

I think that is why there is so much unrest in our culture. We are confused about our place in the world, and our place in relation to one another. In this world, there are those who are poor in spirit and poor in individual wealth. While most Americans may not be the latter, we are more often than not poor in spirit. And, in that recognition, we discover how much we need one another and how much we are bonded to those who, in this holiday season, will go without.

Even the Starbucks drive-thru suggests - "Cheer this way." As happy as my local barista makes me feel on a workday morning with a smile, where do we look?

It is to Mary, and to humanity that God comes and gives grace. God gives grace and favour to all people in this moment of annunciation. God conceives in the world grace and love incarnate.

Unlike Zechariah who demands proof of this coming Christ, Mary simply wants to be less confused. She just wants to know, in a simple way, how can this be? How is it that such a simple person with no seeming value can be a bearer of God's grace and favour in the world?

After all, that may be the question to which we are all seeking the answer.

Such a simple question, and we seem so adrift. I think this is a great travesty in our church, that we may have forgotten the answer to this question. We in our church have forgotten that everyone, ALL people, those like us, those unlike us, those we agree with, those we don't agree with, those who worship like us, those who do not worship like us, those with money and those without money...ALL people are created in such a way that through God's power (and God's power alone), we are vessels of grace in the world.

In a world where reputations, wealth, and personal identity are more often than not built upon tearing others down, we desperately need to be reminded of this simple truth - god chooses Mary particularly and in so doing, God chooses all of us.

We in the mainline denominations in this world have spent a lot of time making clear who the righteous and who the righteous are not. We have chosen to use our pulpits publicly to require proof of people's righteousness. And, we have chastised used our power to make others feel bad about themselves. I believe that preachers (both liberal and conservative) do this. And, in so doing, what has happened is that the rest of the plebes sancti dei (the sacred people of God) have born witnesses and are left wondering if they, too may not be good enough. Who is? We have echoed consumerism's maxim that we are not worthy enough alone; we must need something else to make us special. We have translated right-belief (whatever you define that as) to be the status criteria for all believers, and in the end, we have preached the leaving out of one another from God's embrace.

When we make Mary out to be anything other than the poor, culturally worthless, outsider she is - we distil a message that is not good news at all.

This Sunday, across the globe, Episcopalian and Anglican preachers will stand in pulpits and in front of their congregations and look into the eyes of virtually every kind of person that God has created. And, we have a moment. Sure, some will preach for 8 minutes, others longer, but in that sermon, there will be but one moment in which we have an opportunity to offer God's people an answer to the questions and concerns they bring with them and set before God and God's church. They are asking, they are wondering, is it possible...is it just possible... that God's grace and favour, if meant for the likes of Mary, is meant for me? Overwhelmingly the answer must be a loud cry of "YES."

May we have the courage to look our people in the eye and see their hearts and speak to them and say: "Yes, you are chosen like Mary, and God's Holy Spirit is upon you, and you are of value to God, for in you and through you God has chosen to make his Grace, favour, and love known in this world. Yes, you are the one. You have been chosen."


Some Thoughts on Romans 16:25-27

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 

Resources for Sunday's Epistle


"The image of God has been restored and believers now live in that image, witnessing and inviting all into this covenantal relationship."

Commentary, Romans 16:25-27, Dirk G. Lange, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"This passage places the incarnation, which we will shortly celebrate, in the broad arena of God's never ending, always existent desire for humanity to live in peace. The reconciliation that is offered in the gospel is the reconciliation to what humanity was created to be."

Commentary, Romans 16:25-27, L. Ann Jervis, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2008.

"... 'obedience of faith' ... suggests rather an ongoing relationship which includes involvement in God's life and compassion reaching out into the world."

"First Thoughts on Passages on Year B Epistle Passages in the Lectionary: Advent 4," William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

The passage for today is the doxology for the letter to the Romans and is a routine way Paul brings his correspondence to an end - in accordance with the custom of the day.

It is a blessing and a kind of proclamation from which we have insight into Paul's understanding of his work - and perhaps our own. Paul believes that God is the one strengthening him to proclaim Jesus. Paul himself is dependent upon the Gospel itself. The living word empowers him as it has empowered the work of God on earth since the very beginning.  He is making it clear that the letter is not simply Paul writing - but God speaking through Paul to the church. God is in Paul's own ministry and writing, expanding the kingdom of God on God's behalf and through the power of God.

Paul is clear that his mission is God's mission. God's mission is the inclusion of the gentile into the kingdom and it is this inclusion and expansion which is obedience.

Moreover, the God who is involved in this expansive vision of the kingdom of God is the God of the Hebrew bible - the creator God who is wise and has set all things into motion.

As we think and ponder, it is wise to remind ourselves that for the Christian, the incarnation is not some add-on to an ancient tradition. The incarnation is itself the reconciliation moment of God's historical movement to embrace and fulfil his covenant with creation.

2 Samuel 7:1-6


"It would be difficult to overestimate the importance of this passage for both Jews and Christians."
Commentary, 2 Samuel 7:1-14a (Pentecost +8), Ralph W. Klein, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2015.

"Israel's hope does not rest in a dynasty but there is hope that from the house of David will come forth trustworthy leadership, attentive to the voices of those in need, and in faithful service to God's goals for Israel and the world."
Commentary, 2 Samuel 7:1-11 (Advent 4), Elna K. Solvang, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"...the Lord maintains divine freedom to the point which allows him to lead his people and all creation to new life. This is what we anticipate in the annunciation of the birth of Jesus."
The Old Testament Readings: 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16. Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.


Oremus NRSV Text

2 Samuel 7 is an important chapter for Christological reasons. God is soon to make a covenant with David. Chapter 7 will connect all that has come before with all that is about to come after. God's next covenant is with David, and commits to bringing about a kingdom and offspring. shortsightedness allows us to see this is about David and Solomon before the fall of the kingdom. But as Paul will make clear, the great Dravidic rule will be unravelled and given away to Jews and gentile alike through the grace and power of God in Christ Jesus. Romans 1.3ff:

the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ...

This is not an otherworldly expectation. Read through the lens of the gospel authors we see clearly that the first Christians believed that this was their inheritance. They were the ones to receive the Davidic promise. "The Son of David" or the lineage found in the gospels was not some mere happenstance but a revelation of the fulfilment of this very promise from 2 Samuel.

God in Christ Jesus was before time and with the Israelites. It was his Word that the patriarchs and matriarchs heard speak from burning bushes and in the whisper of a Temple's night. God was with the ancient faith ancestors of David, with David, and now is with all people through the unique birth of the incarnation into the world. The hidden power of God was to be found in the man from Galilee; we see that he has come to free them from the evil powers of religious and political oppression. The first followers are the offspring of David, God in Christ will unleash God's love and not take it from them. It is Christ's Davidic thrown poured out that, in the end, will reign.

Excerpt from my book Citizen on Mary:

Reversing the origin story whereby God creates humanity from man, the New Testament takes up the narrative with God recreating humanity from a woman: Mary. God spoke to Mary (Luke 1:26) and rehearsed the words used with Abraham. The messenger used words of peace (shalom) and said that she was to be a blessing. Sometimes we translate the words as “grace.”  Mary accepted her role as a citizen prophet in this new kingdom-making. She agreed to serve God’s mission. She would be responsible, accepting both the privilege of service and the accountability that goes with it. Not unlike the people at the foot of Mount Sinai, she accepted the invitation to be part of God’s story and sealed the covenant with the words, “Let it be done.” In that moment she began her journey as an engaged citizen in both God’s reign and in the reign of the religious and political powers of her day.

Mary’s “yes” begins a slow-motion unravelling of the cult of imperial authority. Roman emperors were worshipped as gods. Their legitimacy to rule was grounded in the mythical stories of gods copulating with mortal women and birthing demigods. In these mythical narratives, one of the gods of the Greco-Roman pantheon forces himself upon a mortal woman. Modern retellings of these tales often omit or obscure the implications of rape, but such was not the case in the first century when Luke wrote his Gospel. René Girard calls these Greco-Roman narratives “monstrous births of mythology.”  The mating of the gods with mortals was a violent oppression by a dominating power, undertaken by the gods and then repeated throughout the social orders of Hellenistic humanity. The story of Mary’s invitation and acceptance to serve God’s mission parallels these stories but also turns them on their heads. Mary’s call narrative rejects violence by gods in favour of the peace of God. Girard writes: 

No relationship of violence exists between those who take part in the virgin birth: the Angel, the Virgin and the Almighty. . . . In fact, all the themes and terms associated with the virgin birth convey to us a perfect submission to the non-violent will of the God of the gospels, who in this way prefigures Christ himself.” 

There was no violence done to Mary by God. She was the lost and least and was raised up. Mary did not resist her calling. There was no rape or sexual domination.  More recently, artists have portrayed the overshadowing of Mary as a kind of sexual ecstasy, but these interpretations say more about us than they do about Luke or Mary. The other modern trend, which is to “demythologize” Mary’s experience by arguing that Luke has derived her calling narrative from those other more monstrous mythologies, misses the point. When we remove the mystery of God’s invitation and Mary’s acceptance and flatten Luke’s narrative into an unremarkable recapitulation of Greek myth, we miss the message of shalom that is woven into the story of the Incarnation from the outset. When we deconstruct Luke’s story in order to privilege our modern sensibilities about science, we rob Luke’s Gospel of any chance of transforming us. Nonetheless, this was a predominant trend among many Biblical exegetes writing when the gravitational pull of modern rationalism was at its peak. Episcopal Bishop John Spong rejected Mary’s call narrative as worthless mythology. Theologian Paul Tillich had no interest in the mythic birth of Jesus. 

The story of God’s invitation and Mary’s willingness to serve is significant, not in the ways it mirrors the monstrous births of Hellenistic mythology, but in the ways it differs from those competing pagan narratives in order to undermine both the domination culture of antiquity and the domination culture of modernity. The total rejection of violence that was characteristic of New Testament Christianity is one of the reasons the early Church struggled to achieve legitimacy within Greco-Roman society. God and the conception narrative of Jesus do not adhere to any of the mythic tropes known to paganism and undermine all such tropes with a story of shalom. Our own sexually oriented culture, also consumed by violence, rejects the story, too. God soundly refuses to appease the violent expectations of either epoch.

If we had any remaining doubt about the radical message of peace that Mary entered into, her visit with Elizabeth dispels it. In the home of Elizabeth, who was to give birth to John the Baptist, we hear Mary speak about her ministry as God-bearer: Theotokos. Following in the footsteps of Moses and Esther, both of whom brought about dramatic social change; Abraham, who was the first to be a blessing; and Isaiah and Jonah, who offered transformation to estranged people, Mary takes part in God’s work of shalom by inaugurating cosmic change. 

Mary told Elizabeth that she was humbled and that God had invited her into the work of being blessed and being a blessing to the world. Perhaps reflecting upon the words of Hannah in 1 Samuel 2:1–11, Mary said that God’s mighty acts throughout salvation history had benefited her personally, and now she was part of the narrative. Remembering the words of Jonah, we hear her repeat that God was a God of mercy and quick to forgive. Mary said that God raised up the least, the lost, and the lowly. God laid low the powers and authorities of this world. God fed people good things. Those who wish for the ways of the world, the human ways of rivalry and greed, to prevail, would find the gospel of grace difficult and would be sent away empty. This was the reign of Shalom. This was a new chapter in the promise God invited Abraham and Sarah into. From Luke’s Gospel (1:46):

My soul magnifies the Lord, 

and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 

for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.

Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 

for the Mighty One has done great things for me,

and holy is his name. 

His mercy is for those who fear him

from generation to generation. 

He has shown strength with his arm;

he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 

He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,

and lifted up the lowly; 

he has filled the hungry with good things,

and sent the rich away empty. 

He has helped his servant Israel,

in remembrance of his mercy, 

according to the promise he made to our ancestors,

to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.

Many call Mary’s song the most concise statement of the gospel. It is a statement of God’s vision for a community of the least, the lost, and the lonely. It envisions a reign of peace and rejects any kingdom, nation, or state made from violence. It is such a radical statement of God’s in-breaking peace that it has been feared by the powers and authorities of this world. Mary’s song tells of a God who will overthrow the various states that humanity so violently brings into being. Mary’s song has often been outlawed because it delegitimizes the violent structures of human power. Anglicans join the Roman Church in appreciation for Mary’s song, called the Magnificat in Latin. The states supported by Anglican Churches have not always been so appreciative, however. When India was ruled by the British, the recitation of the Magnificat in worship was outlawed. The same was true in Guatemala during the 1980s. Believing that the song of Mary was a rallying cry for the revolutionary and the poor, the government banned it. Guatemala was one of the first countries to practice forced disappearances—between forty and fifty thousand people were summarily murdered in this way. In South America, after the “disappearing” of many family members and children during the war in Argentina, the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo (a square in the Montserrat barrio of central Buenos Aires) placed the words of the Magnificat on posters in the city. The military junta of Argentina responded by banning all public displays of the song for five years.  Protestant theologian and activist during Hitler’s Germany, Dietrich Bonheoffer, wrote from prison in 1933:

The Song of Mary is the oldest Advent hymn. It is at once the most passionate, the wildest, and one might even say the most revolutionary Advent hymn ever sung. This is not the gentle, tender, dreamy Mary whom we sometimes see in paintings. . . . This song has none of the sweet, nostalgic, or even playful tones of some of our Christmas carols. It is instead a hard, strong, inexorable song about the power of God and the powerlessness of humankind. 

Mary is an icon of faithful political engagement. She bears Christ into the world in a way that rejects the powers and principalities’ mythic and real practices of violence. This story invites us to be God-bearers who witness to a different narrative than the one that legitimises the ruling religious and imperial powers. Here we have a renewed origin story for the Christian citizen. 

Mary’s acceptance of the covenant with God was a declaration of responsibility for God’s garden imagination and a pledge to consider her role in relationship to others. Her “yes” undoes the warped desire, mundane violence, and constant scapegoating that arise out of sibling rivalry. Hers was categorically not an individual pietistic event or an internal private faith response to God. To view Mary that way is to read Enlightenment ideas back into Luke’s text. Making the conception of Christ into a private event of Marian piety is to capitulate to the worldview that Christian and religious philosopher Charles Taylor calls the “immanent frame”, where transcendence is discarded as useless and reality is explained self-referentially. 

Sermons Preached on these Passages

A Love That Puts Hate To Death

Jan 14, 2016

Sermon preached at St. Mary's in Cypress Texas for 4th Advent Year B

Waiting for Christmas is like Waiting for a bus in Milan

Dec 25, 2012

Sermon preached at Trinity and St. Mark's Houston, fourth sunday of advent 2012

Advent 3, Year B, December 17, 2023

Prayer

God of peace, whose word is good news to the oppressed, healing for the brokenhearted and freedom for all who are held bound, gladden our hearts and fashion the earth into a garden of righteousness and praise! Sanctify us entirely, in spirit, soul and body, for the coming of the One who even now is among us, your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who was, who is and who is to come, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever. Amen.
From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on John 1:6-28

"If last week we met the camel hair wearing, locust and honey eating John the Baptist, this week we do a 180 degree turn and meet a whole different John."

Commentary, John 1:6-8, 19-28, Karoline Lewis, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011. 

"Much of the pain and suffering around us comes from people imagining that they are the light themselves. In psychological terms, my mind turns to Carl Jung when thinking about light and darkness within us. Jung warned of the dangers of trying to live only in our light. The shadow within is dangerous when ignored."

John 1:6-8, 19-28, Rev. Todd Weir, bloomingcactus.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

As I walked out on the streets of Laredo, As I walked out in Laredo one day, I spied a young cowboy all wrapped in white linen Wrapped in white linen as cold as the clay. I see by your outfit that you are a cowboy; I see by your outfit you are a cowboy, too; We see by our outfits that we are both cowboys. If you get an outfit, you can be a cowboy, too. (listen to it here)

I grew up listening to the Smothers Brothers, and this was their version of The Streets of Laredo.  I have always loved it.

Who are you?  I can tell you who I am by telling you my life story. Ultimately, you will guess it by my clothes and by my car and by my house...the rings on my fingers and bells on my toes.  Today's Gospel lesson asks, who are you?

To get to the bottom of this, we must take a good look at what is going on this week in the Gospel Text; especially since we have taken a dog leg into John's Gospel from Mark!

This week's Gospel reading is really in two parts. Those of you preparing a sermon (if doing so on this text) will find that it is really two different parts of John's introduction.  The text for Sunday is 1:6-8 and 19-28.

The first piece falls well within what many scholars believe to be the greatest part of the New Testament.  Raymond Brown, in his first volume, writes this about the prologue, which stretches from 1:1-18.

"If John has been described as the pearl of great price among the NT writings, then one may say that the Prologue is the pearl within this Gospel.  In her ccomparisonof Augustine's and Chrysostom's exegesis of the Prologue, M. A. Aucoin points out that both held that it is beyond the power of man to speak as John does in the Prologue." (18)

I think it is important to think of these first verses well within this first piece of writing which has both a form and a purpose. Brown breaks it up this way...  The first section is 1:1-2; this is the Word of God section, which offers a poetic vision of God's very being.  The second section, verses 3-5, reveals the Word's work in creation.  It is the light shining in the darkness, shining through man's sinfulness, shining in the birth that flows from the fallen woman Eve in Jesus.  Then, and only then, do we arrive at our piece, which is nestled quite nicely here.  The third portion is verses 6-9 and is John the Baptist's, witness.  As Brown points out the second part is about the Word's work throughout creation, here that comes to fruition in the proclamation of God's incarnate Word Jesus. (Brown, John, vol 1, 18-17)  Many bloggers this week noted the difference between the John of Mark and the John of this Gospel.  I think the reason for the striking difference is primarily this Gospel's tightly focused presentation of God in Christ Jesus. The only reason to even have John in this section is to make clear he is preparing the hearts of humankind for the incarnation, and proclamation of the Word made man.  Brown tells us that following this proclamation, we return to the fourth section (continuing the ancient hymn outlined in the text), which is about the Christ of God working his mission in the world.  This is followed by the community's response.   The last of the five sections is another few words by John the Baptist, but here in 14, 17-18, is John's proclamation that the Word spoken before time is this Jesus.  He is the pre-existent one.  A radical, revolutionary, and prophetic revelation is being offered in this last section, for in this time, the common person would have understood that God is invisible, so it makes sense that the Word spoken, the Son is the only one who has seen this God.  The unique relation between Son and God not only helps with the contemporary thought of the day but it gives rise to our common understanding of who Jesus is: God's only Son.  (For my theological followers, there is a great discussion in Brown's Vol 1 on pages 35 and 36 about this last section; and it is well worth reading.)

To summarize then, we have in the first two verses of our reading a very clear focus on God in Christ. Jesus is the Word, Jesus is the Word made manifest, and the Word is at work in the world.  As if marching to a drum, we hear for the first time in these very first words what we have faithfully memorized as Christians and Episcopalians who have a Common Prayer Book, and that is that the only Son of God has come into the world to save the world.  Such comfortable and hopeful words. Everything in this first section of our reading verbally illustrates that John the baptist is someone they knew but now is so transparent to the Gospel that all they see now is the coming of Christ.

On the first day of John's ministry in the Gospel, he disappears as the living Word and Jesus take centre stage. On the second day, he offers a vision of who Jesus is; he is the transparent vessel of a living Christ - of light in the world.

In this third week of Advent, a number of things are going on in our context here in the U.S.  One is what I would call the holiday breather.  We began the holiday with a Thanksgiving mad dash to fill our bellies and our shopping carts.  We redoubled our efforts to get to church. And, we are now in the slump; it is the week-long Wednesday between Holiday and Christmas Day.  Unfortunately, preachers are in the same predicament.

Into this slump, we re-read a passage about John the Baptist. Now, you and I both know that is not precisely true. This Sunday's passage is very different from the last.  Brown and practically all modern scholarship recognizes that John the Baptist in John's Gospel is completely different than the one portrayed in the Synoptics.  He looks different than the previous version we preached on last week.  This week he is the transparent vessel of God's grace - Jesus Christ. He points only to God and to Jesus.

Just as John the Baptist in John's Gospel, you and I are, as Christians, intimately tied to who we say God is.

You might remember Stephen Colbert's radical statement that caused so much attention recently:

"If [America] is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we've got to acknowledge that He commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don't want to do it."

I will tell you that not being who we say we are is a crippling missionary stumbling block in a world that is seeking some kind of authentic view of God and Grace and hoping someone will be a true voice of transformation and life in a world of gifts and purchases whose shimmer and shine will fade a few weeks after their delivery.

The truth is that as Christians, we proclaim and reaffirm that the pre-existent Word of God is Jesus Christ, who is God's only son.  And that we are, as a people and as individuals (as is proclaimed in the Isaiah passage for this Sunday), inheritors of a divine relationship with the unseen God through the waters of baptism.  And, that we DO believe we are related as brothers or sisters of God's family.  And, therefore we are to treat people in a certain way, with special attention to God's most intimate friends - the poor.

We say and affirm as a defining part of who we are that we, as Christians, believe we meet God in the text of scripture and in the faces of our neighbour.

We meet God in John's proclamation. We meet this unseen God in the very speaking and retelling of the story of the incarnation of God offered here on the other side of the Jordan, just as it is offered from the ambos and pulpits of our churches.

Moreover, like John, we meet God by venturing out across the doorway of our church onto the other side of the sidewalk, where we have the opportunity to meet the living Word in the storied lives of the people we find out in the world.  We encounter God and his Son in the words of scripture, which helps us to hear the same living incarnate God spoken in the story of our neighbour.

This week we did a bible study with this passage at our meeting of the governing board of the diocese.  A friend and fellow clergyman said he had been praying and thinking about this passage. He realized and offered to the group that, quite frankly, we were simply to be at work being witnesses to Christ (like John the Baptist and John the Gospeller), and if we were not, then we were being witnesses for something or someone else.  In the latter, he had in mind those folks who travelled all that way to meet John the Baptist in the desert and to shut him down for not bearing witness to what they stood for.

This religious stuff is a dangerous thing.  The world right now is taking a breather from its holiday consumption. It is quiet before the holiday storm.  We have an opportunity to tell the truth.  The truth is that how we live out our holiday will reveal if we are bearing witness to God in Christ Jesus, or if we are representing something else.  Yes, what we say and what we do are incarnational symbols of the living God or something else entirely.

Religion on a Sunday like this is dangerous because when we don't tell the truth about the world we live in (the addictions we have, the way we attempt to purchase our belongings, and how we are stewards of God's things), we sell a little piece of our corporate soul to the secular world; creating a consumer faith.

How will the church, how will you, the preacher, how will the people answer the essential question asked on the shore of the Jordan River so many years ago, and which is still relevant today: "Who are you; because you look like someone I once knew?"

Some Thoughts on I Thessalonians 5:12-28

"Once again, on this Third Sunday of Advent, we have an appeal, now from Paul, to a community of faith about the way it is to live in the world."
Commentary, 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24 (Advent 3), Dirk G Lange, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"Closely associated with the ability to rejoice always is a constant prayerfulness. As mentioned, these imperatives are each in the present tense."
The Conduct of the Assembly and The Concluding Remarks from An Exegetical and Devotional Commentary on 1 Thessalonians, by J. Hampton Keathley III at the Biblical Studies Foundation.

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 

In this part of the Thessalonians passage, he is focused most of all upon the relationships of the community members. We are to work for one another's best behalf, and we are to comfort those who are suffering. He offers himself as a model and gives some basic advice:

1. Respect one another.
2. Esteem one another.
3. Admonish the fainthearted by encouraging them.
4. Help the weak.
5. When evil is done to you do not repay it with evil.
6. Always seek the good and to do good in one another and to all.
7. Rejoice and pray.
8. Be grateful.
9. Be patient.
10. Do not quench the spirit.
11. Hold fast to what is good.
12. Abstain from evil.

This is a good list. Some time ago a woman came up to me and was complaining and upset about the church and other people and our culture and our loss of what is important. It was sad. I truly felt for her.

It was hard to do these 12 things for her. It was difficult to invite her to do these 12 things. Yet, this is the Gospel in action. Isn't it?

Some Thoughts on Isaiah 61:1-11

"It is a passage that can perhaps be read placidly by those for whom things are going well, but less so by those who do look around and see only destruction. None of us need look far to see that all is not well in the world."
Commentary, Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11 (Advent 3), Kristin J. Wendland, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"The city where hopelessness had taken root will, by God's spirit and by God's blessing, sprout righteousness and praise."
Commentary, Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11 (Advent 3), Elna K. Solvang, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

" How long can we continue to push God’s promise of justice into the future?
"Repurposing the Promise of Release," Russell Rathbun, The Hardest Question, 2011.

Oremus Online NRSV Text 

Why does God just end human slavery? Why is it that in all the cases in scripture, the end of slavery comes after a long time of struggle? 

Rabbi Sacks suggests that Isaiah 61 gives us part of the answer to this question:

If history tells us anything, it is that G‑d has patience, though it is often sorely tried. He wanted slavery abolished, but He wanted it to be done by free human beings coming to see of their own accord the evil it is and the evil it does. The G‑d of history, who taught us to study history, had faith that eventually we would learn the lesson of history: that freedom is indivisible. We must grant freedom to others if we truly seek it for ourselves.

And so it happened. The Quakers, Methodists and Evangelicals, most famous among them William Wilberforce, who led the campaign in Britain to abolish the slave trade, were driven by religious conviction, inspired not least by the biblical narrative of the Exodus, and by the challenge of Isaiah “to proclaim freedom for captives, and for prisoners, release from darkness.” (See Sack's Slow End To Slavery here.)

Rabbi Sacks suggests that the slaves both in Egypt and in Babylon wait an interminable time. They are forever reminded this slavery is not God's will but human sin. Meanwhile, God works for their freedom and the changing of the minds of the captors and masters. All the while, God reminds us that slavery is an offense to dignity and part of the continuation of sibling rivalry.

Let me pair this with a quote from James Cone's book Black Theology and Black Power (1969):

All white men are responsible for white oppression. It is much too easy to say, "Racism is not my fault," or "I am not responsible for the country's inhumanity to the black man. ... But insofar as white do-gooders tolerate and sponsor racism in their educational institutions, their political, economic and social structures, their churches, and in every other aspect of American life, they are directly responsible for racism. ... Racism is possible because whites are indifferent to suffering and patient with cruelty. Karl Jaspers' description of metaphysical guilt is pertinent here. "There exists among men, because they are men, a solidarity through which each shares responsibility for every injustice and every wrong committed in the world, and especially for crimes that are committed in his presence or of which he cannot be ignorant." (24)

See also A Black Theology of Liberation (1970):

Black theology cannot accept a view of God which does not represent God as being for oppressed blacks and thus against white oppressors. Living in a world of white oppressors, blacks have no time for a neutral God. The brutalities are too great and the pain too severe, and this means we must know where God is and what God is doing in the revolution. There is no use for a God who loves white oppressors the same as oppressed blacks. We have had too much of white love, the love that tells blacks to turn the other cheek and go the second mile. What we need is the divine love as expressed in black power, which is the power of blacks to destroy their oppressors, here and now, by any means at their disposal. Unless God is participating in this holy activity, we must reject God's love. (70)

Cone is leaning into a Gospel imagination, narrative, and invitation to act. 

The early Gospellers heard this passage in a very particular manner as well - this is suggested in a review of Matthew's gospel. Matthew is reading Isaiah (and Psalm 146:5-9) with an eschatological imagination.  (Richard Hays, Echoes of the Scripture in the Gospels, 2016, 150) This is a shift to offer hope in a time yet to come when God will make all things right. The eschatological imagination offers a window of justice-making prophecy that suggests hope in the midst of oppression.

Perhaps it is this eschatological imagination that The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. drew upon when from his Washington, D.C.. address in February of 1968, he said: “We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”

The Gospel of Luke takes the eschatological imagination and locates it in the work of Jesus. (Luke 4:18-19). This is the gift of the Spirit that sets upon Jesus. Moreover, Luke suggests that Jesus' announcement is a kind of sabbath time reordered. Richard Hays points out these are not mere words placed in Jesus' mouth lifted from Isaiah, but that they are the lived narrative of Jesus. (Ibid, 225-229.)

The gift of reading scripture with Jewish rabbinical teaching on one hand and the Gospels on the other is that it keeps us from believing that non-action is an option for the Christian. 

We are invited in Advent to remember the eschatological imagination of God, the words and ministry of Jesus, and the ultimate desire of God that human hearts be changed. We might well begin with our own. Yet the combined revelation teaches us that our own hearts are only the first steps in the work of an incarnational faith.

Here I want to end with Howard Thurman. He intertwines both the Jewish understanding of the text, the Gospel's eschatological imagination, and the work of mission together. He wrote in a beautiful essay entitled "The Work of Christmas" in The Mood of Christmas & Other Celebrations (1985), the following words:

When the song of the angels is stilled,

When the star in the sky is gone,

When the kings and princes are home,

When the shepherds are back with their flock,

The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,

To heal the broken,

To feed the hungry,

To release the prisoner,

To rebuild the nations,

To bring peace among people,

To make music in the heart.

Advent 2, Year B, December 10, 2023

The King's Highway

Prayer
O God of all consolation, to us who journey as pilgrims through time you have promised new heavens and a new earth. Speak today to the inmost heart of your people, that leading lives of holiness and godliness, and with a faith free from spot or blemish, we may hasten toward that day on which you will manifest in the fullness of its splendor the glory of your holy name.
From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Mark 1:1-8

"This is the kind of change that stops us in our tracks and makes it impossible for us to live the same way anymore."

"The Change Within and the Change Without," John van de Laar, Sacredise, 2011.

"To be at a beginning is to find that we are not prisoners of the past. John the Baptist announced as much. We and our blessed and foolish land need not be bound to our idolatries or regrets, our greeds or fears. We can begin again."

"On Your Mark," John Stendahl, The Christian Century, 2002.

"So…is it actually possible amidst our abject familiarity with the Christmas story to again hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ Son of God as Good and as News and as that which only just Began with the birth of Jesus and is yet to end?"

"Go Ahead, Judge a Book By Its Title," Nadia Bolz-Weber, The Hardest Question, 2011.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text


(This was written in 2017)
A tale of Thanksgiving: Good news, as it had been forecasted by news media who sent out word well in advance, people made their way from their Thanksgiving tables (some at midnight) to the malls and stores and worldwide web. They cried out in the wilderness for deals. The way was cleared, and stores made ready, the paths for savings and deals galore were opened so that all could find the perfect gifts for loved ones. It was a wilderness out there! Commercials, advertisements, and emails proclaimed savings, and people from the whole countryside, in fact, the developed world over, came out and bought and charged. You should have seen some of the people, in all kinds of clothing, ragged by the day's end. They looked, and they looked, so the story goes until, at the close of the day, Black Friday (the shopping day after Christmas) and Cyber Monday (the online shopping day after the Thanksgiving weekend) saw the sale of over 53 billion in merchandise goodness.

As I reflect on the week that is past I have several topical thoughts rumbling around in my head.

Global desires and hopes for spending to help our economy.
Football games galore.
A ton of food.
The poor and the hungry on a wet and cold weekend.
Advent wreath making.
Time with family.
People dealing with the complexities of family.
Reflections on the Occupy Wall Street movement.
Thanksgiving Day parade.
Political election anxiety and hope.
The readings of Advent 1 regarding the coming of the Messiah.

It was a great holiday in so many respects. Yet it was a holiday of extremes as well; was it not? I wondered first: what is it that we are looking for? As a culture and as individuals, what is it that we are hoping to have in all these things? With all these gifts?

I have decided that the truth in such spending, chaotic action, and wild divergent events is actually not best described by analyzing what we sought through our actions but by what drives us in the search. 

I am curious about how desire continues to work on us: how we desire to be with one another, how we desire to have the thanksgivings from the past, how we might hope for a return to football, and hope for black Friday. Each of us has odd, complex, strange, and even simple desires.

I think the continuing theme is "human desire." Humanity is made to desire and long for that which is outside of itself. Certainly, we are seeking to purchase and make our own kind of imagined normal life. We are trying to attach ourselves by virtue of our needs to something meaningful. We are hoping that somehow we will fill the emptiness that is inside with something that is outside of us.

It is as if the desire for our constitutional right of "happiness" has become confused. One might even say that people who have the right to happiness and consume most of the world's resources, we are some of the most unhappy people.

I offer all of this because the Christian understands that human desire is created within so that we will long for that which is outside of ourselves - in particular, God in Christ Jesus, and God's community and body of Christ - the church. We are created to be in a relationship with God. We are created to long for God. And, we are created to long for one another.

What we do, though, is that we fill that longing with all kinds of other things. This is an age-old axiom and is explored in the first autobiography by Augustine of Hippo: Confessions.

Today we fill that longing by purchasing massive amounts of gifts to show we care. We fill that longing with goods and products that promise beauty and normalcy. We fill that longing with media. We fill that longing by consuming food. We fill that longing by hoarding. We fill that longing by not dealing with family dynamics or by not facing up to our own shortcomings. We fill that longing by scapegoating others in our lives, in our workplaces, and in our governments for problems we ourselves are intimately involved in.

I say all of this not to be some Christmas (or Advent) Scrooge. Quite the contrary. I say this because the message of Mark's Gospel this Sunday, it turns out, is really good news (and quite inexpensive). The message is that God is the one we are longing for, and his incarnation Jesus Christ came into the world so as to fill that missing piece of our own soul for the sake of the relationship God himself desires.

As Irenaeus once described, the reality of God's creative act is the ultimate outpouring into the creation of God's own longing to walk with his creation in the garden on the eve of the day. The incarnation of Jesus helps to mend that hole. He has paid the ultimate price, and we may find our longing transformed into fulfilment in the community of friends called the church.

It is a wilderness out there, and it is our wilderness. We have lived in the wilds of consumer goods, ageing parents, complex lives, poverty, and longing. Today we live in the wilderness of political anxiety, and economic anxiety. It is a wilderness, and the voice is crying out and proclaiming, "Stop! Listen! Here is some good news!" This voice is important and one to be listened to.

The wilderness is a refuge, it turns out, in Mark's gospel. It is a place tied to the fleeing slaves from Egypt. It is the place of good things and good happenings.

Tied intimately to Isaiah's proclamation of freedom to the Israelites in Babylonian captivity (Isaiah 40.3) this passage refers to the same promise of freedom to those who now choose to live a different life in the wilderness of our time and culture.

Unlike many apocalyptic communities in Israel at the time of John's proclamation, his was not a proclamation of sectarian private life or private faith; that certainly was present, but it is not a Gospel notion. In point of fact, it was quite the opposite of what most people will experience at a church this coming Sunday. The proclamation was public, it was in the wilderness of the world, the confession was public, the washing was public, and it was all focused on living life in the world.

As we lean into the Gospel of Mark, we must be aware of the central motif of "The Way." This is a Gospel of The Way. And, the way leads to the cross and to resurrection. John proclaims, Jesus shall lead us, and as disciples, Mark intends us to follow.

As we read John's charge to us today, the message is much the same. We are leading a particular life, in a particular world, making our communal way with Jesus.

We are to make room in our lives for the God who chooses to make us companions. Notice the passage does not say that God makes the paths straight and the valleys low. It is we who are to do the work of making room in our lives for God. We are the ones, not unlike the innkeeper, who in Advent remind ourselves and so create space in our calendars, at our tables, and in our lives (privately and publicly) for God.

John the Baptist, like a new Elisha or Elijah, is offering us a moment of change. A moment to see the world differently and to be different in the world. Most scholars believe there is a scriptural link. At the same time, those gathered at the water's edge and those hearing, Mark's Gospel for the first time would have actually recognized John as a vision of the great prophet because of the word pictures used to describe his clothing and eating habits.

John himself, in his words, and in his actions, is making a way in the wilderness. He is both prophetically offering a word of transformation and the vision of his ministry also offers an understanding that now is the time!

The understanding was that the waters themselves remade the body right and that this was an event of urgency. They prepared it for the mission ahead. Furthermore, important is the proclamation that a public confession and a singular baptism given by another, as opposed to daily ritual cleansing administered by yourself privately, was enough.

John's unique baptism for sins, for repentance, is a message of incredible grace. It is one wherein we understand that the waters of baptism are themselves the powerful waters of grace and freedom to live in relationship to this God. We are freed to live without the great consumptive game being played out all around us. We are freed to live no longer for ourselves but for Christ alone, and for our neighbour. We are given, in the words of Isaiah and in the proclamation of John the Baptist, an opportunity to turn and repent from lives lived for ourselves alone and not for God or others. We are invited to walk a path, a road, with Jesus allowing our desire for things other than God to be crucified and our false selves as well.

And what we discover is that in the end, though we are not worthy to embrace our savior Jesus or to stoop to untie the thong of his sandal as if a servant, this God calls us friends most of all.

Some Thoughts on 2 Peter 3:8-15

"The believers to whom Peter writes have, in his view, two interrelated problems: they doubt the coming of Christ and they are drawn to immoral living."

Commentary, 2 Peter 3:8-15a, L. Ann Jervis, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2008.

"Part of our task is to transpose the eagerness and urgency from the cosmological speculation to the register of human need and the state of the present world and its future."

"First Thoughts on Passages on Year B Epistle Passages in the Lectionary," Advent 2, William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 

We begin this portion of the letter from Peter with a reminder that just because God in Christ Jesus has not yet returned he will return. Using images that remind us of Jesus' own teachings, Peter reminds us that we do not know when the thief or the master comes. The author then goes on to say that this time of waiting should be used to work on walking The Way of Jesus. 

The work of the follower of Jesus is to live lives of holiness and godliness.  We are seeking after, hungry for righteousness, and should long for and wait patiently for the coming of God. 

The description of the end time is cataclysmic and is unique in its vision within the rest of the New Testament. Anne Jarvis writes:

This is the only place in the New Testament where the day of the Lord is described in this manner. The New Testament writings agree, by and large, that a cataclysmic event is in the offing when God, with the agency of Christ, will set everything right. They disagree on whether there will be intelligible signs of the impending day (for instance, 1 Thessalonians [5:4], like 2 Peter, claims the day will come like a thief in the night, whereas 2 Thessalonians [2:1-4] argues that there will be a visible signal that the end is near). They also disagree on whether what is will be destroyed (2 Peter) or will 'pass away' (Revelation 21:1) or whether it will be renewed (e.g., Romans 8:18-23), perhaps in light of the revelation of the true and eternal heaven (Hebrews 9:24).

Jarvis continues:

Peter's proof for this is that it will not be the first time the world will have been destroyed (3:5); and that both his scriptures, our Old Testament and the inspired word of the apostles (3:2), have said it would be so. There is no doubt in Peter's mind; and he takes it as essential to faith to believe this. Moreover, he warns his readers that doubt about the day of the Lord leads directly to what he calls "licentiousness" (2:2).

Peter is clear that this is a time of repentance and a time to take seriously not only God's judgment but also an opportunity for us to take seriously God's invitation to change.

Scholar William Loader writes: 

The purity and godliness espoused in this letter may have a strongly moral quality and focus on piety. For us such purity and godliness has to be transposed into singleness of endeavour and solidarity with God's action and promise that there can be peace and there can be justice in this world - within people and among them. Part of our task is to transpose the eagerness and urgency from the cosmological speculation to the register of human need and the state of the present world and its future.

The question for us is, what are we to do with this time?  We are to work for God and God's kingdom. We must set about the co-creating of God's reign. If we are to take seriously the urgency and the work then we must not delay in addressing those issues that plague our reality and context today.

We must not delay in feeding the hungry; and, setting about to build a community where people do not go hungry. We must not delay in providing clothes and shelter for the naked; and, setting about to ensure that all people have a safe place in which to dwell. We must not delay in caring for the sick, and, we must set about the work of transforming a culture where all those who are ill may find health care. We must visit those in prison, and, we must set about to create a just system of government.  Moreover, we must examine carefully what the social determinants of these failures to be a goodly and Godly society may be and we must act today to stem their power tomorrow.

Every act of goodness and righteousness that we undertake in this life will be taken into the kingdom to come and will in fact, be the living stones upon which Jesus will build his reign.

So do not wait. Do not joke and jest as if the coming of the Lord is just an old idea. Do not pretend as if the end will not come. But in everything and in every way, let us transform the society in which we live and move. This is the invitation of Peter and Jesus alike.

Some Thoughts on Isaiah 40:1-11

"The message given is confident and hopeful, "Here is your God!" Here is a God who comes to feed the flock, to gather the lambs, to lead the mother sheep -- to bring comfort. Here is God in whom one may have hope."
Commentary, Isaiah 40:1-11, Kristin J. Wendland, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2014.


"What an interesting array of metaphors in this pivotal text."
Commentary, Isaiah 40:1-11, Corrine Carvalho, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2017.


"The King's Road, which connected Heliopolis (modern Cairo) to Damascus, literally put Israel on the map as spices, gold, textiles and olive oil flowed through the great caravans. Unfortunately, armies travelled the highway as well, as Egypt, Assyria, Babylon and Rome all coveted the strategic dominance that came with subduing Palestine. It was a perilous and wondrous journey that traversed the Sinai desert, wound through the ravines of Petra and across mountain ranges, fighting heat, thirst, stubborn camels and bandits along the way."
"Straight Highways," Rev. Todd Weir, bloomingcactus.

Oremus Online NRSV Text 

So much has been written online about a season that needs a firey Advent. There is a call for repentance and listening to the Markan invitation to prepare for the Lord. Isaiah's passage appointed for this Sunday has a different message.

The passage comes from what many of you may remember as 2nd Isaiah. The third chapter of Isaiah's wilderness prophecies. The passage begins with: "Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God." It continues with God's invitation to,  "Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins."

After such a brutal time through - of which we still face a long time of managing the trauma and leading through some of the most difficult months yet before us. After a hostile and anger-producing political season on all sides of which indeed some repentance by many people is probably in order. We continue in a season of death and economic suffering for the great majority of people. Here is God's invitation to take a different tack... to comfort.

Isaiah then continues, 

“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Then the prophet questions, and God answers: 

A voice says, “Cry out!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All people are grass, their constancy is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand forever.

In the midst of this preparation, we are made aware that God's faithfulness and Word last forever. It reaches back behind us in faithfulness and goes out before us. Time passes, and pain is felt. Life and death have come to many generations. Comfort them is the implication. Comfort people from the everlasting spring of hope and love that is the living God. Then God continues:

Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings, lift it up, do not fear; say to the cities of Judah, “Here is your God!” See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep.

Here is the prophecy of Christ, understood by Mark and the other Gospellers. Here is the invitation to imagine the Christ who comes. 

First, Robert Hays, in Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels makes an important connection between Jesus' words in Matthew 24, stating that heaven and earth will pass away, but his words are eternal and our Isaiah passage: "The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever." (169) Further, in Matthew John, the Baptist is the one who heralds the Good News in the wilderness. This is a particular and powerful Christological claim.

Mark mixes this image with the images from the books of Exodus and Malachi. Mark is playing upon the themes of Christ as a bringer of judgment and the time of a new exodus. The judgment is for those who have been oppressed, not for those who are oppressed. This is important. We cannot confuse the first Isaiah with the second. Mark is clearly pressing on an Exodus theme. The oppressed are the ones to be delivered. Rikki Watts, in Isaiah's New Exodus and Mark (specifically see page 90ff), we have a kind of 'Isaiahnic Exodus.' It is an 'eschatological comfort.' Robert Hays suggests this is one of the primary frameworks in which Mark is playing. (Hays, 30ff) This is the Good News - in fact, Jesus is the anthropomorphic embodiment of Exodus. He not only brings euagelion he is euagelion. 

If we turn to Luke, we find a bit different thing happening. In Luke, Mark's quote is taken and corrected - disconnecting it from Exodus and Malachi. Luke pulls a Pauline-like theological twist. (Remember that Paul will, in his Epistles, make God's people - all people. All Gentiles will be the inheritors of Abraham's promise. In the same light, Luke sees the message to the nations as a message of hope for all people - all tribes. To read more, I suggest Peter Mallen's The Reading and Transformation of Isaiah in Luke-Acts; see pages 108-113 specifically. More importantly, this is the last piece of Isaiah to be quoted by Luke and Hays, and others see it as the final foundational piece of the Lukan mission to the world.

John takes a different position altogether. John's use of the text falls within the first chapter. For the gospel author of John, Isaiah is a witness to Christ having prophesied his coming in this particular passage and in the passages to be found in John 12 where Jesus fulfils the prophetic words of Isaiah 53:1 and 6:10. John's use of Isaiah is not mere oracle but as a key piece of God's work in the world. The God who is faithful delivers the people and takes the place of earthly rulers (as in King Uzziah). (See Hays, 193.) 

This passage holds within it a deep debate. For many rabbis, this passage is about Israel, and it is not a prophecy but an invitation for the people to be a different kind of nation among nations. It is an invitation to hear the good news of release to the captives. It is a longing for Israel and a return home. While for Christians there is the prophetic Christology apparent. These two places are easily reconciled within the doctrine of the Incarnation. We as Christians do not have to leave behind our understanding of the work of Christ or the message as the first hearers would have received it. As we are in Christ all baptized into his death and resurrection, so too does his work of proclamation (of euagelion) and a life lived upon a Word that will never fade as part of the invited response to the cross. 

Indeed, let us hear the power of Advent. But in this particular season, perhaps a word of comfort is in order?

Advent 1, Year B, December 3, 2023

Prayer

Through all generations, O God, your faithfulness endures, and your fidelity to the covenant can never fail. Since you are the potter and we are the work of your hands, remember us and strengthen us to the end by your grace; that with a love beyond reproach, we may faithfully keep watch for the glorious coming of our Redeemer, and be found blameless on the day of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever.

From Prayers for Sunday and Seasons, Year B, Peter J. Scagnelli, LTP, 1992.

Some Thoughts on Mark 13:24-37

"The Gospel text for the first Sunday in Advent is certainly not anticipated and most likely not welcome."
Commentary, Mark 13:24-37, Karoline Lewis, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"So remember how you answered that question about what you would do if the world were to end tomorrow? Well, guess what? You don't need to wait. You can do those things now!"

"If the World Were to End," David Lose, Dear Working Preacher, 2011.

Oremus Online NRSV Gospel Text

The lesson for this Sunday describes the coming of the Son of Man. In Mark's Gospel, this is a prophetic vision of the apocalyptic judgment. It is a passage filled with first-century understandings about the end time, and it places Mark firmly in the tradition of apocalyptic writers.

I remember teaching my first adult forum class at my fieldwork site. The class was on the Nicene Creed. When we got to the part about judgment, I was asked by a leader in the congregation if I believed that Christ was going to come back and judge the world. It was a question that caught me off guard as I had never really thought of it in that pronounced fashion. Did I believe this to be true? Will our Lord, Jesus Christ, come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and will his kingdom have no end.?

The man's point was that he didn't believe it, and he didn't think most people believed it. There it was in the middle of my Sunday morning class - a non-believer, confronting all of us in the room with the very words we say every Sunday but don't think about, and he was certain we didn't believe.

Let me tell you first that I have hope. My normal human mind begins to dance this way and that and I think honestly that first (if I am honest),  I don't want a judgment. Second, if I am wrong, then I want for the judgment to have already occurred, and having been found guilty have now had the price of my guilt paid for by Jesus Christ on the Cross. Thirdly, just for safety, I want to believe that Jesus Christ's mission is already complete. (For the theologians among the crowd, we do well to remember the Brunner and Barth debate on this issue as a perfect example of the divide and impasse of the varying views on this topic.) Yes, that is what I hope; that is what my human mind wants to believe. That is indeed what my heart longs for: Jesus to be ultimately and perfectly victorious and to save the whole world.

And, I want to believe in the great capacity of goodness in all human beings to live in that grace and give freely of themselves for the work of the kingdom of God and of his righteousness.

Having said all of that, some interesting things begin to happen in terms of our lives with God and our lives with one another.

Over the years, I have reflected on this passage and others like it. I think something interesting seems to slip away as we deal with it - or don't, as the case may be. Sure, we all want this great salvation to be true. And, being the humans that we are, we then let ourselves off the hook. Yep! That's right. What happens is that we let ourselves off the hook because the mission is successful, there is no urgency to act, and after all, what does it really matter?

In Mark's Gospel, and in point of fact, in all of the Gospels - it matters. It matters a whole lot. Over time the emerging church of the first century had to come to terms with the fact that Jesus did not return as quickly as they thought - but they believed that evangelism, virtuous citizenship, mission, and service to others was essential. We can even see the change in Paul's own letters preserved in our New Testament. Paul wrestled with the time it was taking for the second coming. Even still, Paul inspired and encouraged people because it mattered how people treated one another and what they did or did not do. Even the Gospels written in the latter part of the first and early part of the second centuries have a different tone regarding the urgency - but Matthew's Gospel which is focused on this emerging church of the centuries, offers a vision of a community that is waiting but where it matters.

Over the years, there have been blossoming apocalyptic movements. Some have even birthed churches. Still, others have ended in disaster. Probably all of them have created a general public sense that thinking apocalyptically is silly at its most innocent and dangerous if taken to its natural conclusion.

Dismissal seems to let us off the hook somehow.

Over the years, I have come to understand that I think it really does matter to God how we live our lives on this earth. I think it really does matter how we treat one another. I do think that to the God we believe in, it matters how the poor are cared for, and it matters how we take care of the earth we have some measure of control over. I think it matters to God. Moreover, based upon our current global societal troubles (the economic turbulence of recent years, the great divide between the rich and the poor, the lack of good education, the commoditization of a person's health, leaving millions without care, and the destruction of the housing market wherein others make money off of what is one of the most important human needs - shelter) we should all be concerned.

Regardless of whether you or I will live out our whole lives and pass into the arms of Abraham (God willing) before the end time, or we together only have a few moments left on this earth, we are measured by how we treat and take care of others. This is and continues to be one of the central themes of scripture.

Those who go without have an urgent need today, and our actions matter to them as well.

In the immortal words of Bishop John Hines (IV Texas, and TEC Presiding Bishop) "The Kingdom of Heaven is for all people." Some of those people are still waiting for the Good News and transformed lives, and God is waiting for us to do something about it.

In this season of Advent, I hope you won't excuse Jesus' message in Mark's Gospel. I hope you won't pretend like it doesn't matter or that it isn't urgent. I hope you won't dismiss the judgment. Rather, I hope you will challenge your people to think about: how is their report card with God going? If God came back today, what would he say to them? You might invite them to think about the Advent Conspiracy and how we might change how we do things in our lives, beginning with today and this season.

I hope you will challenge them to see if they have lost a sense of urgent work on the part of God in Christ Jesus and his Gospel. I hope you will inspire them to see that God is hoping in us and that we are being judged by our actions. And, by the way, the people of this world are also judging us by our actions.

I can say today, "I believe." I have come to believe the words I speak, and I pray: Our Lord, Jesus Christ, will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom has no end. Let me work to the end of days on behalf of God and on behalf of his kingdom and his special friends, the poor and those in need. Let me hope eternally for grace enough for me, a sinner of his flock. And, finally, let my work in word and action see no rest; after all, who knows when the master of the house will return?

Some Thoughts on I Corinthians 1:1-9

"It is perhaps not surprising that Paul, as he addresses the church in Corinth, speaks of the gift given, God's grace shared, as "speech and knowledge of every kind" and wealth (i.e., being enriched in Christ Jesus)."

Commentary, 1 Corinthians 1:3-9, Dirk G. Lange, Preaching This Week,WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.

"Private faith of a personal future is more comforting and marketable, but has little to do with the hope Jesus came to bring and doesn't really spell good news for the poor except in another life."

"First Thoughts on Year A Epistle Passages in the Lectionary: Epiphany 2," William Loader, Murdoch University, Uniting Church in Australia.

Oremus Online NRSV Epistle Text 

In this passage, we have a typical Greek greeting and form for a letter. Paul emphasizes his call to ministry and his apostleship and addresses the letter to the community at Corinth. 

He reminds them that they are to be at work in the world, as saints, on behalf of Jesus Christ. He also reminds them that they are unified beyond Corinth with other followers of Christ Jesus. 

He blesses them with grace and peace. And he gives thanks for their ministry on God's behalf. He reminds them, finally, that God has given them the gifts needed for this ministry. They are lacking in anything spiritually to undertake the work of God in Corinth and within their community. 

So what is this all for? Certainly, we know that Paul is writing because there is conflict. Here though, is something more than just a letter about bringing peace out of the division. Paul tells them that they have these gifts and that the purpose of the gifts is this "fellowship of his Son." Fellowship here could also mean companionship of Christ, according to scholar Joseph Fitzmayer (First Corinthians, Anchor Yale Bible, 2008, 134). Paul is referring to the community quality of unity around the Lord's table - koinonia. (Ibid) Paul is, in some way, reminding them that they are, the people of Corinth, united by Christ for the purpose of salvation and the kingdom. (Ibid) 

Fitzmayer points out this is particularly Pauline - the idea that Christ is the unifying agent and Christianity is the living companionship with Christ. It is also, as we will see as we read his letter, a companionship of peace and unity at the table to be brought about by his followers one to another. 

In other words, those who follow Jesus are to be united. This is a very real icon of their unity in Christ. If they are not one in companionship with one another - then this reveals that they are not one in Christ. For Paul, our inability to be together, work collaboratively, work peacefully, and be united is not a revelation about us but a revelation about our individual dependence upon the koinonia created by Jesus Christ on his cross. 

I would go a step forward to say that the way we frame the relationship between God and the world attempts to sever the unity of this koinonia - meaning:

• that companionship and fellowship with God, yes 
• companionship and fellowship with one another, maybe if you agree with me 
• and companionship and fellowship with the world - no

We so separate the world so that we are not accountable for these values and ways of being. We separate our own life within the Christian community so as not to be accountable for the companionship and fellowship of Christ. This particular predicament would have been completely foreign to Paul and his theology.

Paul sees the world as one cosmos - united by God as creator and Christ as the bringer of salvation and reconciliation of the world with God. So there is no disunity - but only unity. God is unified with his creatures and his creation. The whole world is re-united - united - with God. We are to be a goodly and Godly community. Paul imagines a seamless unity between God and the individual, the individual followers of Christ and the other followers of Christ, and the followers of Christ and the people of the world - our neighbors. So it is that we offer a witness of a church community unified by God's reconciling love and at work in the world, building a unified peaceable kingdom for all people. 

As William Loader reminds us - 

"Even 1:8 which focuses on the day of the Lord most likely contains some hint of another problem to be faced: some Corinthians were denying a future resurrection. Their understanding of the future was so much bound up with the notions of eternal souls, it seems, that they saw no need for anything beyond the salvation of individual souls. Who needs embodiedness? Who needs a community? Who needs a day of the Lord, which would establish a kingdom of justice and peace? Isn't it enough to know that my soul will go to heaven? Here in 1:8 and in 1:9 Paul celebrates the future with Christ and the future in community (koinonia).

Some Corinthians had difficulties with such images of the future and any literal interpretation is likely to meet similar hesitations today, not without ground, but Paul's logic is driven by an understanding that salvation has to mean something bigger than the individual. Many Christians still have difficulty making it to this level of understanding. It opens up too many questions about the social and political implications of the gospel. Private faith of a personal future is more comforting and marketable, but has little to do with the hope Jesus came to bring and doesn't really spell good news for the poor except in another life."

God's companionship, fellowship, and koinonia are about a unity of purpose and calling where all our gifts, given by God, are put to use in transforming the world and the lives of those around us.

Some Thoughts on Isaiah 64:1-9

"The people cry out in one voice for God to act on behalf of the people as a whole and on behalf of the individuals who make up that whole."
Commentary, Isaiah 64:1-9, Kristin J. Wendland, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.


"We begin our journey of Advent pointing the finger at ourselves not at God. And yet so often when we believe God is hidden we fault God. We focus on the hidden part of the equation and not our part."
"Has God Hidden?" Beth Scibienski, 2014.


"Their appeal is for God's intervention -- to heal the alienation and to halt the damage of their sins. The people's pain is clear. How God will respond is not."
Commentary, Isaiah 64:1-9, Elna K. Solvang, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org, 2011.


"The speaker of this text places the community (the speaker included) and us in the same place as Pharaoh."
Isaiah 63-64, The Dark Side of God: Considerations for Preaching and Teaching, Richard Nysse, Texts in Context, Word & World, Luther Seminary, 1997.

Oremus Online NRSV Text 

I wish to speak about the theme in this passage from Isaiah is apocalyptic prayer. The apocalyptic prayer begins with a context of deep brokenness, then moves to a plea/prayer, and ends with hope. This is the passage we have before us. Equally important, they capture the essence of Mark's own understanding of the context in which the Messiah Christ Jesus comes. [See: Richard B. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels, (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2016), 16-17.] This is an overall framework from which many scholars believe Mark himself is working. Therefore, all the more reason for us to read it carefully. In this way, we have a message for us today that transcends both the Babylon Captivity and the Roman occupation of Jesus' own day.

This passage begins with a wider view of the prophet's voice. If we take the whole of the text (pericope, if you will), we want to frame it between 63:15 and 64:9. There is hope in God's faithfulness to generations that have come before us; there is the present moment in which we feel disconnected from God, and there is the prayer that God will open the heavens and come down. 

Let us begin with hope. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks reminds us that in Leviticus 26:44-45 it is written: 

Yet in spite of this, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away… I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of Egypt in the sight of the heathen, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.

Reflecting upon this, he writes, 'This is a turning point in the history of the human spirit. It is the birth of hope: not hope as a dream, a wish, a desire, but as the very shape of history itself, “the arc of the moral universe,” as Martin Luther King put it. God is just. He may punish. He may hide His face. But He will not break His word. He will fulfill His promise. He will redeem His children. He will bring them home.' (See - https://rabbisacks.org/the-birth-of-hope-bechukotai-5779/) 

Sacks is helpful in that he suggests that in this time, gods were far away, they were absent, and at times even malevolent. The best thing to do was to avoid them and stay away from them as much as possible - trying not to bring attention to yourself. Here though, is the God of Israel who wishes to be known, to be seen, and to be recognized as faithful beyond generations. In the end, the God of Israel is a God who will bring the people home and out of oppression. 

This is the God that Isaiah is remembering. In the present context of Isaiah, the prophet is giving voice to people who know the faithfulness of God and have hope in God's promised redemption and presence. No matter how bad the present moment is, this God cares and will be faithful and will act. It may feel, as the prophet tells us, that God has hidden God's face. Yet, time and time again suggests the tradition of Israel God will, in the end, not cast the people away but will be their God. This is the God of hope of Israel, this is the God who intervenes in terrible situations, this is the God of the apocalyptic prayer. 

Lastly, the use of the word "tear" is specific and limited to Isaiah 64.1 and Mark's similar use. The Gospel is Mark's answer to Isaiah's hope, context, and cry. It is a similar tear that is described in Mark's baptismal scene. A sign that God has come down to make God's self known to the people. (Hays, 18, and 92.) The Gospel proclamation in this passage for Christians is that it is Christ who comes down as the embodiment of hope, to be present in the catastrophe of life, and to bring healing, wholeness, peace, and justice. 

In this time, of deep concern, fear, and anxiety, we may very well feel as though God has hidden God's face from us. Isaiah and Mark call out to us from the past. They remind us that this has never been so. Humans do, from time to time, get themselves into a terrible mess. But the mess they are in will never have the last word. Regardless of how bad the world and our situation may look, we are people of God as Christians, like the other Abrahamic faiths. We are people who remember the hope that is in us. We remember faith and hope in a God who has for generations shown up and delivered God's people. We remember a God who is for us and wishes to be our God, and will not leave us in the midst of our brokenness. We remember a God who comes over and over again in scripture and finally comes in the person of Christ Jesus. We remember our own baptism and the image that we, too, are baptized into a family of hope who knows the heart's song and the apocalyptic prayer of the faithful.

To paraphrase Rabbi Sacks, the Jewish people have kept hope alive, and hope has kept the Jewish people alive. Might not the same be said for the faithful brothers and sisters of Abraham's family - those who follow the Gospel of Christ? (See Galatians 3; Romans 13, and Hebrews 11) In any time or place, where Christians have looked for hope, we have found it in the inheritance of Isaiah's apocalyptic prayer language and the person of Jesus Christ. Indeed, we, too, have joined our Abrahamic family in keeping hope alive; just as hope has kept the Christian alive as every adversary has been faced. Today the work and message are the same. Let us call out in the language of apocalyptic prayer; let us call upon God to remember God's faithfulness and tear apart the heavens and our hearts so that the Christ of hope may enter in.