Christmas

One Christmas I got something unexpected in the mail – a shoebox, for women’s pumps, black, size 7-1/2 B.

Inside the box were three half-pound packages of coffee from Old Bisbee Roasters.

There was also a Christmas card. The outside had a cartoon of a little boy, presumably in a Christmas pageant, with a blanket on his head. It was captioned “What Christmas is really about.” Linus, Charlie Brown’s little brother, was reciting from the 2nd chapter of the Gospel of Luke:

“And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them… And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.”

When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us." So they went with haste…

The shepherds are not passive viewers; they take an active part in the story. And this is their action moment, when they speak, “Let us go down to Bethlehem…” and move toward the promised Child.

What did they go into the City of David to see?

Was the Child a nascent hero, like Hercules? Children’s books say that when Hercules was a baby he was already a superhero. He strangled snakes in his cradle. And who knows what he got up to when he began to walk – but:

The Christ Child was not Superbaby—he was a real baby. He was vulnerable and soft. His surroundings, warm and fragrant from the animals, were none of his choosing. He was dependent on those around him. Joseph and Mary looked after him. But as we know from the story of the shepherds, he was already drawing toward him those who sought the peace of God.

There in the City of David the Shepherd-king of old, not in a wayfarer’s inn but in a stable, there the King of all shepherds in a manger lay, offering himself as manna, bread of heaven, bread in the wilderness, bread of life – offering himself in obedience and offering that obedience as savior of all; and offering that obedience, to all, as the way that salvation led.

He was the promised Child, the shepherd-king of Isaiah 40:

“Comfort, oh comfort My people, Says your God….

“Like a shepherd He pastures His flock: He gathers the lambs in His arms

And carries them in His bosom; Gently He drives the mother sheep.”

(Isaiah 40:1,11 JPS)

Long ago and far, far away another shepherd abiding in the fields was keeping watch over the flocks by night: Cuthbert, a young man of 9th century Northumbria in northern England. He used to sing the psalms to the sheep at night.

And then one night, at the age of eighteen, he had a vision, or perhaps a dream, and the next morning he went over the hills to Melrose Abbey, where he became a monk. The story goes that that was the very night when Aidan, founder of Lindisfarne Priory on Holy Island, had died.

After some years as a monk, Cuthbert was sent to take Aidan’s place. And so he traveled, on what pilgrims now call Cuthbert’s Way, over the hills again, to Holy Island. There he found behind the priory a beach and across a small inlet of the North Sea a very small rocky islet. At night when the tide was low he would wade out to it, gaze back across the water to the priory where the monks were sleeping, and as they slept he would sing the psalms. “Like a shepherd he pastures his flock…”

The call to Melrose Abbey and the call to the priory on Lindisfarne were moments of decision for Cuthbert. He took action, and got involved in the story. He became a shepherd of men. In doing so, he recalled to mind the Lord that he served – that we serve: Jesus, the Good Shepherd.

The same Lord calls each of us – from field or from home – to come witness the coming of the Christ Child, to adore him, to receive him into our hearts, to share in his life – the fulfillment of the promise of ages – and to bring to the world hope and peace, joy and love, justice and mercy.

The shepherds of Bethlehem went over the hills and into town to see if Jesus really was the Messiah they’d been waiting for. And they found him:

The Shepherd King,

Who calls each of us by name,

Who watches over his flock,

And sings to them of Paradise.

JRL+ 

"Being called to action," an edited version of this meditation, was printed in the Arizona Daily Star, in the Keeping the Faith feature of the Home + Life section, on Sunday 31 December 2023, page E3... and posted on their website under the heading, "Being called to action by the Lord" (https://tucson.com/life-entertainment/local/faith-values/being-called-to-action-by-the-lord/article_fc6a6ec8-a413-11ee-84b2-033d49e48be7.html).

on the Feast of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist

 

In the Tucson area the feast day of Saint John the Baptist is the beginning of the summer monsoon season. The National Weather Service would tell you differently, and so sometimes would the sky. Traditionally however this is the day to celebrate the relief from the dry days that came before. And as we might note, it is six months before Christmas. The Nativity of John the Baptist comes six months before the Nativity of Jesus. And so we have a little time to prepare. Half a year? Is that enough? Enough to have before you as your world threatens to come apart? We got a little more notice before climate change really struck us between the eyes. And this is monumental. Give ourselves a break: it doesn’t look like much does it? Two kids born far away and long ago, their births barely recorded except that their parents seemed to know what was going on. Listen to the song of Zechariah, as we do so often in morning prayer and in the Eucharistic celebration of John’s feast, and we begin to realize something big is happening. The song itself seems most happy about vindication and freedom from Israel’s earthly enemies. But there is more going on. This child, even this child that is not worthy to untie the shoestring of the next, is powerful. He dresses strangely, like a prophet come out of old, the pages worn and tattered in the holy books: here he is in the flesh. He proclaims the coming of the one that was to come, the one awaited, the one anticipated, the one feared. Herod the Great and his boys knew what was going on. A big threat to the way things were. The way we are now, he seemed to say, is the way things should stay. Are going to stay. If he has anything to say about it. But of course he does not. That privilege goes to an obscure priest, a father, who finds himself saying, “His name is John” - and his tongue is loosened and he is not afraid to give the news. A change is coming: be ready. And his son said it again. A change is coming: be ready. 

We get here through the words of the prophet Isaiah, best known on Christmas, in Handel’s Messiah: Comfort, comfort ye my people… It is a plea, a proclamation, a promise. The one to come is on his way. And we remember it, six months away, the other end of the year, here in the desert on a hot night. 

We remember also something from the Psalms, that the prophecy is real throughout Scripture. It is a plea for light in a time of darkness. I still remember vividly singing a setting of this Psalm (85:10) in choir at my home church: Mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. The composer Armand Russell wrote it in anticipation of the beginning of a conflict, as the US troops began to move into Iraq. I know those tanks rolled more than once. And I know the mourning in the voice of the psalm, that even now and always, there was a better way than armies moving into position. 

We need to celebrate, we need to remember, that with the voice of John in the wilderness the good news, the hard news, the true story, is coming into the light. 

In the tender compassion of our God *

    the dawn from on high shall break upon us,

To shine on those who dwell in darkness and the

                             shadow of death, *

    and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

(Luke 1:78-79)

• Isaiah 40:1-11
• Psalm 85:7-13

A version of this meditation was printed in the Keeping the Faith feature in the Home + Section of the Arizona Daily Star, Sunday June 25th 2023, page E3, under the title “Beyond Saint John the Baptist.” and online on the same day under the headline “The feast day of Saint John the Baptist and what's to come” at https://tucson.com/lifestyles/faith-and-values/the-feast-day-of-saint-john-the-baptist-and-whats-to-come/article_7a109462-0ec1-11ee-82be-0b5d309a997c.html

road to joy

“In times of great change, we can be mourners of the past or midwives of the future.”— 

• Herbert O’Driscoll – January 31, 2010

If nothing else is certain, we know that Isaiah, and Jesus, lived in times of great change. And so Handel’s oratorio Messiah, which many may take as a symbol of triumphalism, actually communicates a response to uncertainty – and insecurity.

Composed, perhaps, or compiled, from 22 August to 14 September 1741, the oratorio came during a period of consolidation of British royal power. The union with Scotland was new but the hegemony over Ireland – where Messiah had its premiere 13 April 1742 – was by now old.

So as we look at the Scriptures selected for the libretto – the book – the words and phrases of this work, we look at something both eternal and unstable – and new.

A new age now begins – Isaiah proclaims, the gospels proclaim – for God who was absent from our lives is now present right in the midst of them. In his first context the prophet Isaiah anticipated the removal of the people from Jerusalem, the Holy City of Judah, and by the 40^th chapter of the book of Isaiah that exile is an accomplished fact – but one about ready to be turned over. In the prophecies beginning “Comfort ye my people” the return of the people to the promised land is just over the horizon – and with confidence the passages we read today (Isaiah 40:1-11) look forward to that deliverance. It is a vindication, not of the people, but of their God.

In the 8^th century before our era, the king of Judah, the southern of the two kingdoms of the Jews, had been under siege from two allied kings: the king of Syria or Aram (Damascus) and – get this – the king of Ephraim, that is, the northern kingdom of Israel. Besieged, he appealed for help to the great power of the north – the Assyrian empire – and as a matter of course became their vassal. (The northern kingdom fell in 721 BCE and its people were deported, enslaved, and dispersed.) In 701 BCE the Assyrian king Sennacherib nearly destroyed Judah. But Assyria faded and the empire of Babylon took its place. In 586 the southern kingdom fell and the Babylonian captivity of the people of Judah began. It was only in 539 that they were able to anticipate returning home. And they anticipated a return of Glory – that is, of the presence of God shining in their midst as of old.

The prophets of the book of Isaiah took a bold stance. They proclaimed that Cyrus II (“the Great”) of Persia would be the instrument of their deliverance. He – a foreigner, an unbeliever; a non-Jew – would be God’s anointed one, chosen for this task. And anointed one means Messiah. Sure enough Cyrus proved tolerant (for the time) and as Persia conquered Babylon he allowed the subject peoples of the empire of the Middle East to return to their home territories. The Jews anticipated a great awakening of faith, a joyful triumph, a procession of mirth and confidence, through the desert wastes of (modern) Iraq and Syria, from Mesopotamia (the land between the rivers of Tigris and Euphrates) right across the hills to Judea, and the recovery of all that they had lost.

It was not so simple, as later sources say: there was much to rebuild. But the point is: God was at work in the world restoring his people to right relationship with himself, and in doing so, establishing a new order of the ages, where God would dwell in their midst and the divine reign of justice and peace would begin.

This all seemed so far away by Jesus’ time. There the kingdom of the north, Assyria, of the east, Babylon – or, following, Persia – and the kingdom of the south, Egypt, had all been swept away, and new powers, of Greece and Rome, had taken their place. Israel – Judah – again was under the boot-heel of a foreign power – and the people again cried out for deliverance.

Some of them even cried out to God. (While others trusted in the strength of their own arms – or the hope of alliance with yet another foreign power.)

The hope that responds to loss and grief was still there, in competition with despair. And some looked for a savior. Now this savior figure could be a nation – or a person. And in the person of various false messiahs they thought they’d found the answer. They expected a deliverer to be a Son of David, political – and military. What they got was a Son of David, obedient, and a shepherd. But we anticipate. What we know today from today’s lesson (Isaiah 40) is that the season of expectation has begun – a season of preparation, of joyful expectation, one in which to make a highway for our God.

Let’s look at the passage as chosen and organized by Handel’s librettist Charles Jennens.

What questions confront us from the text?

How is our own time a time of expectation – and fulfillment?

How are we preparing the way for the Advent of God’s anointed – his change agent – in our own lives?

What does it mean to have a real, deep, grounded faith as opposed to a superficial understanding? Does it mean simply that we have begun to go deeper in our understanding of what was always there – or have we begun to see (God at work in the world) in new ways?

How can we bring this new reality into production in our lives? – as a people, a congregation, a community; as individual persons?

So – what is the good news for us? How is the expectation of Isaiah 40 a message of hope for us?

How can we share it?

Can we see as far as Isaiah saw, that even the most unlikely human could be made an instrument of God’s returning glory?

What does it mean to have GOD WITH US?

A highway for our God: do we make it? do we walk on it? or is it God alone – or his anointed – who travels the way?

How could God allow exile? abandonment? Is it false to hope for salvation?

Does God’s arrival redeem the time?

What do you look for as signs of hope? 


_______________________

Herbert O’Driscoll – January 31, 2010 (sermon at St Alban's Episcopal Church, Edmonds, Wash.)

Union of Scotland and England  http://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/evolutionofparliament/legislativescrutiny/act-of-union-1707/

the long highway

The Seattle Times reports that members of the Freedom From Religion Foundation have put up a sign at the state capitol building in Olympia that reads, in part, "There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds."

(http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008470773_webatheist05m.html)

Just imagine if another group were to put up a sign with this message:

Put no trust in rulers, or in any mortal, for they have no power to save. When they breathe their last breath, they return to the dust, and on that day their plans come to nothing.

Would the state police launch an investigation?
What radical group would dare say such a thing?

It’s from Psalm 146: vv. 2-3 (Please turn, in your prayer book, to page 803.)

It goes on...

Happy are those who have the God of Jacob for their help, •
whose hope is in the Lord their God;
Who made heaven and earth,
the sea and all that is in them; •
who keeps his promise for ever;
Who gives justice to those that suffer wrong •
and bread to those who hunger.
The Lord looses those that are bound; •
the Lord opens the eyes of the blind;
The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down; •
the Lord loves the righteous;
The Lord watches over the stranger in the land;
he upholds the orphan and widow; •
but the way of the wicked he turns upside down.
The Lord shall reign for ever, •
your God, O Zion, throughout all generations.
Alleluia.

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What wondrous love is this? The love that led Israel through the wilderness, that fed manna in the desert, that made straight the highway of our God, that led them home.

The foundation of our hope, that the day will come when steadfastness and faithfulness, righteousness and justice and peace will come together, is Jesus – in whom indeed God’s steadfast love and faithfulness are manifest, in whom righteousness and peace have already met. Good news: God is here among us; welcome the coming of his presence.

“Good news” before Mark got ahold of the term meant the tidings of victory and triumph; the birth of an emperor, a famous victory; it meant Caesar’s peace, the peace of Rome; the peace of empire, of rulers; of the kings of mortal men.

Mark turned it around, and gave the words a new breath of life: “good news” became the glad tidings of the coming of the Savior, of Christ the Lord. It is the good news of God’s power, mercy, and grace; of the peace of Jesus Christ.

John came calling, calling the people into the wilderness, the place where God is close, the place where Israel had always been called, from Exodus to Exile, to be drawn away from its familiar haunts and day-to-day rituals into the desert, the place of intimacy with God.

Just so the Word of God draws us out of familiar paths and ways of living to places where we may encounter strange adventures and find our way home to a place of new beginnings. Through Christ God comes into our lives, making the world new.

This is good news, a voice of comfort, tender hearted in the best of ways: He feeds his flock like a shepherd; he gathers the lambs in his arms; he gently leads the mother sheep.

In the times of John, as in the times of old, so it is now. Much has been lost; there is much to build. Rest assured: God is with us wherever we are.

We have his Word, the sacrament of the food and drink of God, the presence of the Holy Spirit, and the presence of the risen Christ: we have the same gifts that all the people of God have had for ages and ages.

Even when it seemed impossible to go on, God has been with us, like the pillar of cloud in the desert sky, like a quiet voice in the wind, encouraging us, and giving us the bread we need and the grace that fills our hearts.

Deep is the hunger, in each of us, for a life worthy of its maker; deep is the hunger that calls us into the wilderness, to be baptized and prepared for the coming of the kingdom; to hear the Word of God, to take in Jesus and make him the centre of our lives.

Wake up! John cries: Jesus is coming. Rouse yourself from your pastoral torpor.

‘What time would you like your wake-up call?’ the hotel clerk asks. John is not so nice! Nobody asks you—it just comes!

…like grits…

ANTICIPATION & PREPARATION – the themes of Advent

Advent, once thought of as a time of penitence, has become for us a time of watchful waiting.

What of our friend? For him, our old friend Ebenezer Scrooge, in the story so far as we have read it, it is easily both….

(Stave 2: the Ghost of Christmas Past)

A looking back that is not nostalgic, far from it, but a baptism of fire, a burning away of impurities, looking back to Moses and Elijah and the great ones of the past; looking back on our own prides and follies, and on the good times we’ve had in the blessing of God: yearning now for God’s presence; yearning for fulfillment of our lives in God’s promise.

The cry in the wilderness is a cry to the people of God to come out of their houses, out of their common places, to be renewed and refreshed and reborn in the river of Jordan, to enter again into the mystery of the story of the love God has for God’s people:
they are called to take their place alongside Moses and Aaron and Miriam, Joshua and Rachel, and alongside Isaiah and the people as they return from exile in Babylon,
to pass again through the waters of the river where Abraham led his flocks and Jacob wrestled all night,
the mysterious boundary that will lead them, once they turn around, back into the Promised Land;

For their every day common places turn out to be the kingdom of God.

Once they have gone into the wilderness to see— whom? Not a prince in his palace, surely? But a prophet as of old, dressed like Elijah or Moses or a wayfaring stranger.

John has called them and they answer. They come in crowds, one by one, many at a time, to take, each of them upon their own heads – and all of them together as God’s people, the sign of baptism, of repentance: they are turning away from their own sins and folly, they are taking on again the kingdom seal, and they ask him: what’s next?

He tells them: turn around! Repent! Turn around! And see: the Promised Land is stretched before you.

Go forward – not into reverse, not into nostalgia for a lost cause, but into the future of God’s covenant, that he will not abandon you, he will put faith into you, and he will be there with you, present with you, to guide you as you live into your vocation.

You are called to be the salt of the earth, the leaven in the loaf, the light that shines in the dark. You are called—take God’s promise and make it your own.

That should be interesting, when Pharaoh hears about it. That should be interesting, when Pilate hears about it. That should be interesting, when they hear about it in the Capitol.

In the dark of night when the days grow short and cold, there is yet something growing, something stirring, something moving forward: it is the coming of the kingdom of God.

The people of God are making their way, once again, into the story of the love of God, into the redemption song. And what’s next?

What is the crying at Jordan?
Who hears, O God, the prophecy?
Dark is the season, dark our hearts
and shut to mystery.

Who then shall stir in this darkness,
prepare for joy in the winter night?
Mortal in darkness we lie down,
blind-hearted seeing no light.

Lord, give us grace to awake us,
to see the branch that begins to bloom;
in great humility
is hid all heaven in a little room.

Now comes the day of salvation,
in joy and terror the Word is born!
God gives himself into our lives;
O let salvation dawn!

--Carol Christopher Drake (St. Mark’s, Berkeley) #69 in The Hymnal 1982.

Alleluia.
Praise the Lord, O my soul:
while I live will I praise the Lord; •
as long as I have any being,
I will sing praises to my God.
Alleluia.

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Isaiah 40:1-11
Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13
2 Peter 3:8-15a
Mark 1:1-8

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