Grace and peace to you from God our Father, from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and from the Holy Spirit, who gives us life, amen.
This is the paper that we received on our doorstep this morning. As you can see there are a lot of ads here for a variety of stores. Let’s see what we have here. (Peruse the ads looking for the juiciest ones). As you can see these folks who pay for these ads desperately want our attention. They want to announce to us that their sale is by far the best thing since sliced bread and that we would be a fools to ignore such a proclamation. It seems that at this time of year we are bombarded with messages of various stripes that compete for our attention. It all gets so confusing. And of course the cynic (and former business person) in me asks how can these places sell this stuff for so cheap and still maintain a profit? And my cynical answer is that theses places are still profiting from our desire to make sure we have that “perfect” Christmas. The other thing is that all of these ads say that we can save big money by spending our dollars at their establishments. Isn’t that an oxymoron? How is it that I can save by spending? Save big! Save now! Save today! And I want to scream, Lord save me from all of this!
Ok I think I have ranted enough. After all what does any of this have to do with our texts today? Just as businesses try to get your attention with these ads (hold up ads), our texts are about announcement and about proclamation. There are two announcements that are proclaimed in these texts. And although they speak of two different stories they are in essence saying the same thing. These two texts, rather than try to sell you something, or have you give up something, offer the greatest gift we could ever imagine. It is the gift of hope in a hopeless world. It is the gift of being saved rather than trying to save.
The first announcement comes in our gospel lesson. It speaks of a man named John who has been sent by God as a witness to testify to the light. Immediately there are several questions that come to mind. First, what does “the light” mean? Lets see what the proceeding verses have to say about this:
John 1:1-5 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
In the first sentence we get what Jesus’ beginnings really were. It wasn’t just at the birth of the Christ child in a manger. The author uses the same words laid out in Genesis 1 “In the beginning”, to place Jesus at creation, and that he came forth from God as Word and as Light before he came to dwell among us. Simply put then, “the Light” is the co-creator of the world, Jesus the Word of God. The second question is then, who is this man named John? The other three gospels, also called the synoptics, often refer to this John as “John the Baptist”. This is the man who wore camelhair clothes, and eating locusts and wild honey. That likeness was to evoke the image of Elijah the great prophet. But notice that we have a different picture of this man named John. This man, he did not come on his own, unauthorized—to go before the Lord. No, he was sent, he was authorized by God to be a witness to the one who gives life as he entered into our lives in a very real and human way. And he came to testify, so that all might believe through him. He did not claim any proper title but rather as “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness”, like the prophet Isaiah. This man, whom we call John the Baptist, was in effect announcing the arrival of Jesus. And notice something else. He did not point to himself, unlike the advertisers of today do. He did not say look at how great I am. Look at how I live a life that is sparse and ecologically friendly. No, he pointed to, and then confessed, the fact that Jesus was truly the Son of God.
The second announcement comes in the Isaiah text. Listen to these words again: “The spirit of God the master is upon me because God appointed me. He sent me to preach good news to the poor, heal the heartbroken, announce freedom to all of the captives, and pardon all the prisoners. God sent me to announce the year of his grace – a celebration of God’s destruction of our enemies – and to comfort those who mourn” (MSG). You may have heard these words before. In Luke 4 (3rd Sunday after Epiphany) Jesus stands before his home congregation in Nazareth and speaks these words to his community. And then he tells them that in their hearing the words of the prophet have been fulfilled. You may remember that Jesus was subsequently tossed out of Nazareth for claiming this prophecy. However, when Jesus claimed this prophecy, he added a stipulation to it. His [contention] was that this prophecy was not just for the Jews, but also for the entire world. That is what upset his listeners so much. But that is good news for us. Jesus was announcing that salvation was not just for the Jews but for all; that is, you, me, our neighbors, and for those who may not have heard these words.
We have in our texts two announcements. The first announcement, the one given by John, points to the One who brings good news to us. John also gives us the example that we should have in our own lives. We are too commanded to preach, to testify, to announce this good news. We all should proclaiming that Jesus came to us, as a vulnerable infant, to clothe all of us with garments of salvation. The second announcement, first expressed by the prophet, and then echoed by Jesus, proclaims the gospel, that is, good news. After all we live in a broken world, where our lives are far from perfect and that we need words and deeds of comfort. Don’t we need to hear that we are being set free from poverty, affliction, and oppression? Don’t we need to hear that our broken hearts will be bound up, healed, and fixed? Don’t we need to hear that we are released from captivity and that we are prisoners no more? Don’t we?
In this time of advent, when we are being assailed with the message of just buy more, it is at this time that we need to hear the message of not to save, be it time or money, or other resources, but rather we are saved. Saved from oppression, broken heartedness, and captivity. Saved by the one who comes in a manger to offer salvation for you, me, and the whole world. Amen
Monday, December 29, 2008
Monday, December 1, 2008
Hide and Seek
Grace and peace to you from God our father, from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and from the Holy Spirit who gives us life. Amen.
(Reread Isaiah 64:1-9)
When we were little kids one of the games we used to play was hide and go seek. I am sure that you remember this game. Someone is designated as the person to be “it”. He or she count to 100 while everyone else goes off to find a place to hide. Then the “it” person would go and try to find those that were hidden. If your were “it”, it was always a challenge to find those who were hidden, especially those that were clever in their hiding places. Our first lesson from Isaiah is also concerned with hide and seek. It concerns the Israelites who have just returned from exile and find themselves persecuted by outside forces. For them this was no game and there was despair in not being able to find God. Despite this, there is reflected in these passages the expression of hope.
At this point I am going to do something that the professors at the seminary say that you should not do when preaching. I will be telling you about a time in my life when I too was looking for God. A bit of history. Although I was baptized when I was five years old, our family did not attend church with any regularity. By the time I was a teenager we were lucky if we attended the Christmas and Easter services. When I left home at 18 there was not even the thought of attending church. This changed 15 years later when Deb and I moved out to the Puget Sound area of Washington State and we began attending Pilgrim Lutheran church. Five years later in 1994, I went on a men’s retreat and recommitted my life to Christ. My life for the first year following the retreat was great. I had a good job with a nationally known restaurant chain, relatively low stress and was able to be involved in our church. I was in effect living on the mountaintop. Things changed when I was transferred to a different location, to the place that I called the “Store From Hell”. If anything could go wrong with this store it usually did. This went on for 10 months until I asked for a transfer to another location. And although it was initially a good move to make, it too became a place that became almost unmanageable. My stress levels rose, my frustration increased, and it was all that I could do to try to maintain some semblance of sanity. In all of this I tried to stay involved with the church, to continue to be involved in bible study and to keep meeting with a friend who was my accountability partner. Although I was doing all these things, I still felt like God had abandoned me. I wanted to scream out, “Where are you God ?!?!” “Why am I being punished?!” “What did I do that you are angry with me?” Like the Israelites I wanted to say “O, that you would tear open the heavens and come down so that the mountains would quake at your presence”. Like the Israelites I had returned from exile and had a hope that God would bless that return. Like the Israelites I now felt abandoned and wondered where God was.
Maybe you have felt like that at some point in your life. Maybe you feel like that right now. Maybe you have just been let go from your job and are wondering what is going to happen next. Maybe you are dealing with a chronic disease that saps your energy and will. Maybe you are coping with the recent death of a loved one. Maybe you are stuck in an untenable situation, whether it is with a bad job, or a bad relationship with a spouse, a parent, or a child, and it looks like there is no hope of resolving it. And you wonder, where is God in all of this? You might be asking, “Where are you God, now that I need you? You have done amazing things in my life in the past and now you abandon me?”
When I was in the middle of my restaurant crisis, as I wondered what it was that I had done, the self-recriminations begin to set in. All of the unanswerable thoughts began pouring out. Perhaps it isn’t that it’s God that has abandon me. Perhaps I’ve abandoned God. What was worse, since I thought God was no longer present; I began to act out my frustrations. I became angry at the smallest thing. If something went wrong, either at home or at work, I would get mad and start swearing, yelling and throwing things. My co-workers didn’t know how to react to me. I’m sure my family was at times fearful of their husband and father. To put it charitably, I was not acting like a Christian should act. According to the apostle Paul in Galatians 5, I was displaying some of the traits of those who are under the sinful nature, that is, idolatry, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, and envy,” I definitely was not displaying the fruit of the spirit, which is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control”. As it says in the Isaiah verse 6, I had become like one who was unclean and my righteous deeds were like a filthy cloth.
Patience has never been my strong suit. Frankly I was tired of playing hide and go seek. I was tired of being “it”. I was tired of having to live up to this Christian expectation. I was tired of living in this valley of despair. I wanted this experience to be over and to return to the mountaintop where I could easily find God. The text says in verse 5 that “no ear has perceived and no eye has seen any God beside you who works for those who wait for him”. We are in the time of advent right now. It is a time of waiting. Waiting is an active verb that requires a passive stance. Waiting requires patience. It means persevering in the face of delay or provocation without becoming annoyed or upset. Waiting requires trust. Trust in the promises that have already been made by God. Promises such as that made to Noah to no more to curse the ground. There was the promise made to Abraham to make of him a great nation in whom all families of the earth should be blessed. There was the promise to David to continue his house on the throne. There were the promises, made through the prophets, of restoration of Israel, of the Messiah, of the new and everlasting kingdom, of the new covenant and outpouring of the Spirit. In the New Testament these promises are founded on, and regarded as having their true fulfillment in Christ and those who are His. Waiting requires faith. Faith that something, anything, will change our present circumstance into something better. Look at verse 8. “Yet, o lord you are our father, we are the clay, you are the potter. We are the work of your hand.” This implies a relationship of the creator with the created. It implies that we have been formed out of dust and water to be made for a purpose. It implies that the creator can take that which is warped and reshape it for something more useful.
The apostle Paul writes in the book of Romans “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” Our hope is the same of the Israelites. It is in the hope of a God who works for us. But it is also in the hope of a God who seeks us out. After all, we are his people. In this game of hide and go seek, it is God who is “it”. It is God who seeks out those who are hiding in the valley of despair and hopelessness. It is the God who finds us and as potter pours his love into our hearts. And so we wait. We wait for the expected Christ child, Immanuel. We wait to be reformed again to be useful to God and to creation. We wait to be touched again by the God of all salvation who is always with us, now and forever. Amen.
And may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
(Reread Isaiah 64:1-9)
When we were little kids one of the games we used to play was hide and go seek. I am sure that you remember this game. Someone is designated as the person to be “it”. He or she count to 100 while everyone else goes off to find a place to hide. Then the “it” person would go and try to find those that were hidden. If your were “it”, it was always a challenge to find those who were hidden, especially those that were clever in their hiding places. Our first lesson from Isaiah is also concerned with hide and seek. It concerns the Israelites who have just returned from exile and find themselves persecuted by outside forces. For them this was no game and there was despair in not being able to find God. Despite this, there is reflected in these passages the expression of hope.
At this point I am going to do something that the professors at the seminary say that you should not do when preaching. I will be telling you about a time in my life when I too was looking for God. A bit of history. Although I was baptized when I was five years old, our family did not attend church with any regularity. By the time I was a teenager we were lucky if we attended the Christmas and Easter services. When I left home at 18 there was not even the thought of attending church. This changed 15 years later when Deb and I moved out to the Puget Sound area of Washington State and we began attending Pilgrim Lutheran church. Five years later in 1994, I went on a men’s retreat and recommitted my life to Christ. My life for the first year following the retreat was great. I had a good job with a nationally known restaurant chain, relatively low stress and was able to be involved in our church. I was in effect living on the mountaintop. Things changed when I was transferred to a different location, to the place that I called the “Store From Hell”. If anything could go wrong with this store it usually did. This went on for 10 months until I asked for a transfer to another location. And although it was initially a good move to make, it too became a place that became almost unmanageable. My stress levels rose, my frustration increased, and it was all that I could do to try to maintain some semblance of sanity. In all of this I tried to stay involved with the church, to continue to be involved in bible study and to keep meeting with a friend who was my accountability partner. Although I was doing all these things, I still felt like God had abandoned me. I wanted to scream out, “Where are you God ?!?!” “Why am I being punished?!” “What did I do that you are angry with me?” Like the Israelites I wanted to say “O, that you would tear open the heavens and come down so that the mountains would quake at your presence”. Like the Israelites I had returned from exile and had a hope that God would bless that return. Like the Israelites I now felt abandoned and wondered where God was.
Maybe you have felt like that at some point in your life. Maybe you feel like that right now. Maybe you have just been let go from your job and are wondering what is going to happen next. Maybe you are dealing with a chronic disease that saps your energy and will. Maybe you are coping with the recent death of a loved one. Maybe you are stuck in an untenable situation, whether it is with a bad job, or a bad relationship with a spouse, a parent, or a child, and it looks like there is no hope of resolving it. And you wonder, where is God in all of this? You might be asking, “Where are you God, now that I need you? You have done amazing things in my life in the past and now you abandon me?”
When I was in the middle of my restaurant crisis, as I wondered what it was that I had done, the self-recriminations begin to set in. All of the unanswerable thoughts began pouring out. Perhaps it isn’t that it’s God that has abandon me. Perhaps I’ve abandoned God. What was worse, since I thought God was no longer present; I began to act out my frustrations. I became angry at the smallest thing. If something went wrong, either at home or at work, I would get mad and start swearing, yelling and throwing things. My co-workers didn’t know how to react to me. I’m sure my family was at times fearful of their husband and father. To put it charitably, I was not acting like a Christian should act. According to the apostle Paul in Galatians 5, I was displaying some of the traits of those who are under the sinful nature, that is, idolatry, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, and envy,” I definitely was not displaying the fruit of the spirit, which is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control”. As it says in the Isaiah verse 6, I had become like one who was unclean and my righteous deeds were like a filthy cloth.
Patience has never been my strong suit. Frankly I was tired of playing hide and go seek. I was tired of being “it”. I was tired of having to live up to this Christian expectation. I was tired of living in this valley of despair. I wanted this experience to be over and to return to the mountaintop where I could easily find God. The text says in verse 5 that “no ear has perceived and no eye has seen any God beside you who works for those who wait for him”. We are in the time of advent right now. It is a time of waiting. Waiting is an active verb that requires a passive stance. Waiting requires patience. It means persevering in the face of delay or provocation without becoming annoyed or upset. Waiting requires trust. Trust in the promises that have already been made by God. Promises such as that made to Noah to no more to curse the ground. There was the promise made to Abraham to make of him a great nation in whom all families of the earth should be blessed. There was the promise to David to continue his house on the throne. There were the promises, made through the prophets, of restoration of Israel, of the Messiah, of the new and everlasting kingdom, of the new covenant and outpouring of the Spirit. In the New Testament these promises are founded on, and regarded as having their true fulfillment in Christ and those who are His. Waiting requires faith. Faith that something, anything, will change our present circumstance into something better. Look at verse 8. “Yet, o lord you are our father, we are the clay, you are the potter. We are the work of your hand.” This implies a relationship of the creator with the created. It implies that we have been formed out of dust and water to be made for a purpose. It implies that the creator can take that which is warped and reshape it for something more useful.
The apostle Paul writes in the book of Romans “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” Our hope is the same of the Israelites. It is in the hope of a God who works for us. But it is also in the hope of a God who seeks us out. After all, we are his people. In this game of hide and go seek, it is God who is “it”. It is God who seeks out those who are hiding in the valley of despair and hopelessness. It is the God who finds us and as potter pours his love into our hearts. And so we wait. We wait for the expected Christ child, Immanuel. We wait to be reformed again to be useful to God and to creation. We wait to be touched again by the God of all salvation who is always with us, now and forever. Amen.
And may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)