Into the Messiness of Life
As I read these passages and reflect on them, we as Americans are experiencing a world in the midst of great upheaval. The papers and airwaves are replete with stories of economic woes, political uncertainties, warring nations, genocide…and the list goes on. If ever there was a season for calling our congregations away from the glitter and commerciality of the Christmas event, it is now. If ever there was a time when we as a people could use some good news, it is now. If ever we had a responsibility to call ourselves back to what is at the core of this story, it is now.
And so we begin. Many of us will enter into this Advent season with the same hope as we have carried into so many previous ones, the hope that this year we can turn aside from the worldly cares and enter into a peaceful and uncluttered reflection of the story of God’s incarnation. This is a hope that has long gone unfulfilled in many of our lives and perhaps this year we need to rethink even that.
I am a person who does not deal well with clutter and yet I find myself increasingly being challenged to live with the clutter of life. Hard as I try, I cannot “clean up” all the messiness before I move on to the next task. In this struggle I have recently been enlightened and inspired by a phrase from Dorothy Day, the founder of the Catholic Workers. Day was known for, among other things, her tireless efforts on behalf of the poor; these efforts were not carried out from behind a desk, but in the midst of the people she served. She insisted that poverty is a reality of life in America and it must not only be recognized but also must be addressed. Day captured an underlying reality of her work in a line that has become something of a mantra for me. “Life itself,” she writes, “is a haphazard, untidy messy affair.” Life is indeed a messy affair — and it has been so for a long, long time. As we turn our attention to the readings for December we join ranks with those from days long gone who were living in the midst of their own troubled time.
With this reality in mind we continue through the Advent season of 2008. In these weeks we must remind ourselves and our congregations that God enters into the messiness of our lives with a message of hope and a promise of presence and calls us into the messiness of life to deliver that word.
Second Sunday in Advent
December 7, 2008
Isa 40:1-11, Ps 85:1-2, 8-13, 2 Pet 3:8-15a, Mk 1:1-8
In these (and any) troubled times, the opening lines of the Isaiah passage provide a wonderful focus. Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. We have the opportunity this month to guide the church through these moving verses of Isaiah (40:1-11) and let them echo through the gospel message for this and next Sunday as well as be a powerful resounding voice throughout the rest of Advent and into the first Sunday after Christmas.
There are innumerable opportunities for preaching here. These are the opening verses of Deutero-Isaiah (chapters 40-55). It is important to note this and to offer some explanation of the shift in emphasis and tone found in chapter 40 and beyond. Here we find a prophet who is consoling, sympathetic, and greatly concerned for the people who are a people in exile, discouraged and despondent. These opening verses are a kind of call passage in Deutero-Isaiah as we witness the “marching orders” for the divine council called to go forth and declare the power of the divine word. The first five verses evince both the mercy and majesty of God, and the hearer (then and now) is uplifted by the tender and life-giving tone. Verses six through eleven reflect, not surprisingly, the prophet’s concern and unease with the call. In a question whose tone and uncertainty are reminiscent of Moses’ first encounter with God, we hear the prophet wonder aloud about just what is to be cried out to a people who are no more constant than the withering grass of the field. As is so often the case in our biblical text, this contrast serves to underscore the everlasting nature of the Word of God and the power of this Word is amazing.
No doubt that these verses will already have called to mind the New Testament’s voice crying in the wilderness, John the Baptist. This combination of readings can be a springboard into a sermon about the perennial call from God to “cry out” in the wilderness. Surely we are no less called upon than Deutero-Isaiah to be that voice, to be comforter of the people who are in both individual and collective wildernesses. In the same way that both the prophet and the people who are the subjects of Isaiah 40 needed to hear the good news that God is here, so do we today need to hear and proclaim the good news. What better time than in our Advent season to remind ourselves to lift up our voices, to refrain from fear because God is here!
Third Sunday in Advent
December 14, 2008
Isa 61:1-4, 8-11; Ps 126; 1 Thess 5:16-24; John 1:6-8, 19-8
Again, with echoes of Comfort, O comfort my people and the mandate to be a voice crying in the wilderness, this Sunday’s readings offer more from the prophet and another view of John the Baptist. The Isaiah passage is familiar to us from its quotation in chapter four of Luke’s Gospel. If we choose to focus this month’s sermons on prophesying, this Isaiah passage is rich with imagery. The power of the Spirit of God so beautifully expressed in today’s reading can be added to the power of the Word of God from last week’s readings and the combination of these can be a soothing balm in our own times of global distress.
It is important to recognize and address (as Day would argue) that we today are surrounded by the oppressed, brokenhearted, captured, and imprisoned spoken of in the opening verses of chapter 61. Our call to offer a prophetic word is meant for a large and suffering audience.
Moving to the gospel passage, we find a different rendering of the John the Baptist story. With the textual emphasis on John as the witness, the one who precedes the Messiah, we have opportunity to allay the fears and doubts of congregants who would shy away from the role of prophet. Hesitancy on the part of a prophet is not new. We can suggest that here we see John as one not claiming to be other than he is — a witness, a forerunner, a voice crying in the wilderness. We can and must be willing to do this.
Fourth Sunday in Advent
December 21, 2008
2 Sam 7:1-11, 16; Ps 89:1-4, 19-26; Rom 16:25-27; Lk 1:26-38
The promise in the Nathan prophecy of 2 Samuel 7 is another familiar story. As pastors, we could always take this opportunity to look back at God’s promise as declared here and then to look forward to a fulfillment in the birth whose anniversary we are about to celebrate. If, however, we are willing to take a new look at this story we might think about the lesson learned by the prophet Nathan who spoke quickly before checking with God. The emphasis on our role as prophets (introduced in earlier Sundays in December) can be built upon with this reading as the responsibility to be in conversation with God is highlighted.
The gospel passage sheds even more light on our communication with God. We see through the story of the annunciation that we are in good company if we find ourselves perplexed by a word from God’s messenger. Verse 29 highlights two very important elements of our communication with God — perplexity and pondering. In these days of “instant everything” we have lost the art of pondering and we, as pastors, would do well to encourage one another and our congregants in this exercise. This reading also provides an opportunity for suggesting that perplexity is an acceptable state of being. In fact, we need to become comfortable in perplexity if we want to truly assess what is going on. As Rainer Maria Rilke so wisely wrote over a century ago in Letters to a Young Poet: “…and the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.”
First Sunday of Christmas
December 28, 2008
Isa 61:10-62:3; Ps 148; Gal 4:4-7; Lk 2:22-40
As we gather to worship on the first Sunday after Christmas we recognize that surely the perplexing feelings are not resolved, but it is indeed a time for rejoicing. Just as the Isaiah passage tells of Jerusalem’s celebration of the love between Yahweh and the people, so too might we this day celebrate.
The gospel passage provides a powerful focus for the celebration. In a story of promise and fulfillment, the masterful Lukan storyteller weaves the stories of Hannah and Elkinah and Samuel and Eli with those of Simeon and Ann and Jesus. The universalism of God’s love expounded here is worth noting. Simeon (whose name means “God has heard”) brings us round full circle to the first Sunday in December and the announcement that God has indeed heard and offers comfort and consolation. Indeed, in Simeon and Anna we have the quintessential “prophets” clothed in the garb of ordinary humankind. We can and we must do the same.
Prophesying in the midst of the messiness of life is what we are each called to do. Seen throughout the December readings are many who are hesitant to answer the call. Regardless, however, of the seemingly unlikely qualifications of those called to prophesy, the indomitable Word and Spirit of God empower those who answer to be the voice needed. As we make our way through the Advent season, may we each take seriously our own calls to be one voice crying in the wilderness.
