Advent

A Reordering

shelliwilliams Advent , ,

(part of the “Waiting on the World to Change” Advent Series)

Psalm 72: 1-7, 18-19 (Advent 2A)

1Give the king your justice, O God, and your righteousness to a king’s son.

2May he judge your people with righteousness, and your poor with justice.

3May the mountains yield prosperity for the people, and the hills, in righteousness.

4May he defend the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the needy, and crush the oppressor.

5May he live while the sun endures, and as long as the moon, throughout all generations.

6May he be like rain that falls on the mown grass, like showers that water the earth.

7In his days may righteousness flourish and peace abound, until the moon is no more.

18Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who alone does wondrous things. 19Blessed be his glorious name forever; may his glory fill the whole earth. Amen and Amen.

This psalter is part of a Psalm that was probably read at the occasion of a royal liturgy.  The words are the petition for a leader, a good leader, a worthy leader, a leader that will bring the nation into righteousness and peace, a leader that will answer injustice with hope and promise.  It is a prayer not just for a redeemed people but a redeemed nation.  It is a prayer that the vision of the nation might be reordered into that vision that God holds for all of us.

During Advent, we talk a lot about God’s vision.  We talk a lot about the Kingdom of God becoming what it should be.  And we hope and we dream and we look for it to happen.  But do you think sometimes we’re not looking through the right lenses? I mean, I pray for this to happen.  You pray for this to happen.  And when we live in a time such as this, we wait, we wait for the world to change.  But are we hoping that will happen for us or are we hoping it will happen for the world?  I know that’s a weird question.  What if we’re so shaped right now by the difficulties we are experiencing that our view of God’s vision has become an end to those difficulties, a way of moving ourselves into a better scenario.

Years ago, in one of the large meeting rooms at Lakeview Methodist Assembly in Palestine, TX, hung a huge poster.  When you went up to it, it was this wonderful mosaic of maybe 100-125 pictures of people doing ministry, of the church being the church, of Christians being Christians.  It was inspirational.  But if you went to the other side of the room and looked back at it from a distance, you couldn’t see the individual pictures.  What you saw instead was an image of Christ.  All of those tiny pictures came together into an image of the Holy.  It was powerful.  I’ve spent years trying to find that picture.  But I’ll never forget it.  When you quit looking at the individual pictures, together they become a picture of the Holy.

Another metaphor…have you ever sang in a choir?  I’ve recently gone back to singing in a choir after “doing other things” for about 25 years.  Learning to sing in a choir is not just about learning to sing.  It’s more than that.  It’s almost kind of practice for God’s Kingdom.  Because a choir is not just a conglomeration of individual voices.  At its best (when the choir is truly at its best), you can’t hear the individual voices.  You actually hear what sounds like one multi-layered voice.  There are no individual “solos” sticking out over the music.

That’s it.  The Kingdom of God is not about me or you; it’s about us—all of us.  So, we have to back away from ourself.  We have to back away from those things that make us uncomfortable, those things that make life difficult, those things that we want desperately to control.  The Kingdom of God is not a fulfillment of all the things for which we wish.  God is not Santa Claus.  Rather, God’s vision is a reordering of Creation, a re-creation of everything. 

So, I had an interaction on Facebook yesterday.  (Yeah, I know…)  Anyway, the person wanted to give people money for food but do away with systemic programs, such as SNAP.  In other words, SHE wanted to pick and choose who deserved her money rather than at least attempting to create a system that helps that along.  Here’s where we need to back away.  Here’s where we need to see that outline of Christ.  Here’s where we need to tone our “solo” voices down and become a choral ensemble.  I don’t think God’s vision is one that gives us everything we want; I think it’s a vision that fulfills everyone’s need.  Remember that whole manna thing?  The manna came.  They ate.  And then the manna left.  The Daily Bread is given over and over.  It’s not for us to decide who gets is.  It’s not something that some will be given more.  It’s God vision—a vision where everyone is filled and no one has too little or too much–a picture that we have to sometimes back away to see.

No man is an Island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee. (John Donne)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Pointing Toward the Moon

shelliwilliams Advent ,

(part of the “Waiting on the World to Change” Advent Series)

Matthew 3:1-12 (Advent 2A)

In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, 2“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” 3This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.’” 4Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. 5Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, 6and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

7But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8Bear fruit worthy of repentance. 9Do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. 10Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 11“I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

Oh…John.  We talk about him every Advent.  Sometimes it seems that he’s the one, the gatekeeper, so to speak, that we have to go through to get to Christmas Eve.  As most of you know, I was “late” to this clergy thing.  I’m what they call “second career”.  And on this second Sunday of Advent in 2001, I gave my first sermon.  I was asked to step in at FUMC, Fulshear, where my then-mentor was serving, while she was out of town.  Truthfully, I had no idea what I was doing.  I hadn’t taken a preaching course yet, so, basically, I was just making stuff up.  And the Scripture for the day was this…John the Baptist.  Most people, if they’re given the chance, choose the Good Samaritan story or the Woman at the Well or even The Prodigal Son as their first sermon, things they can easily overly-romanticize into feel-good messages.  But, no, I get John the Baptist!

We all know the story.  He was the son of Mary’s cousin, Elizabeth.  So, he is Jesus’ cousin (or maybe his second cousin) And he is quite the character.  He is a wild wilderness of a man donned in animal skins and a leather belt.  And he eats locusts and wild honey.  And he is REALLY LOUD.  He is always shouting to his hearers to repent and to prepare for the coming of the Lord.  And he baptized them.

Yeah, he’s loud and he’s brash and he doesn’t pay attention to the dress code and what do you do with him?  You listen.  Because, off putting though he may have been, he really did get it right.  He just didn’t fit into our ideal form of what an evangelist should be.  When I gave that sermon, my parents came.  It was 2001.  We had just gone into Afghanistan.  And my dad took the description of John the Baptist and imagined John Walker Lindh, that American that joined the Taliban and was arrested in November of 2001.  So now I can never imagine John the Baptist as anything else.  Like I said, he was wild and bizarre.  And he was Jesus’ cousin.

So, in that sermon, I didn’t get anything wrong.  I mean, John was wild and brash but he was also faithful.  He understood his mission.  He understood what he was called to do. In her book, Called to Question, Joan Chittister tells a Sufi tale of disciples who, when the death of their master was clearly imminent, became totally bereft.  “If you leave us, Master,” they pleaded, “how will we know what to do?”  And the Master replied, “I am nothing but a finger pointing at the moon.  Perhaps when I am gone you will see the moon.”  I think that was what John understood.  He never put himself out there as some sort of evangelist.  He was the forerunner, the one who came before.  He was the finger pointing at the moon.

I actually didn’t get any of that first sermon wrong.  I just didn’t finish it.  We can talk all we want to about John.  But the truth is, John’s story is not just about John.  It’s also about us and how we’re called to be like John (well, maybe without the locusts!).  It’s about what we’re called to do.  As John was waiting on the world to change, he stepped out.  He stepped forward and he spoke.  It wasn’t always accepted.  I mean, he was loud and brash and often off putting.  But he understood what he was called to do—to be a finger pointing at the moon, to point to what was coming, to point to what would be. 

So, here we are…waiting on the world to change.  We are called to glean our mission from John.  We are called to speak, to step out, to point the world to the change that God calls us to do.  John wasn’t just a cousin; he was the finger pointing at the moon, the forerunner to the Messiah, the Savior of the World. 

Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputation and social standing, never can bring about a reform. Those who are really in earnest must be willing to be anything or nothing in the world’s estimation, and publicly and privately, in season and out, avow their sympathy with despised and persecuted ideas and their advocates, and bear the consequences. (Susan B. Anthony)

Something better’s coming
Just you wait and see
Something better’s coming
It’s your job to believe
May not be what you wanted
But always what you need
Something better’s coming
Just you wait and see

To every mother’s daughter
To every father’s son
It may look like it’s over
And the other side has won
But, if there’s any truth to
The greatest prophecy
Something better’s coming
Just you wait and see

Oh, we’ll be dancing on the water
Yeah, where the music has no end
There’ll be no lost and no forgotten
There’ll be no us versus them

So, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people?
Yeah, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people?
Oh, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people?
Won’t you tell me now
Yeah, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people?

Oh, ooh ooh hoo, ooh ooh hoo
Oh, ooh ooh hoo, ooh ooh hoo

And I know it’s easy for our hearts to harden
But, that’s exactly what they want us to do
We’ve got to keep the vessel open
So, the love can keep pouring through

Yeah, ’til we’re dancing on the water
Where the music has no end
There’ll be no lost and no forgotten
There’ll be no us versus them

Oh, we’ll be dancing on the water
Yeah, where the music has no end
There’ll be no lost and no forgotten
No more original sin
No, no, no

Yeah, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people?
Yeah, are you ready? Are you ready, people?
Oh, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people?
Tell me now
Yeah, are you ready? Are you ready?
Are you ready? Are you, people, people?

Oh, ooh ooh hoo, ooh ooh hoo
Oh, ooh ooh hoo, ooh ooh hoo
Yeah
Ooh ooh hoo, ooh ooh hoo
Yeah
Ooh ooh hoo, ooh ooh hoo

Something better’s coming
Just you wait and see

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Darrell Brown / LeAnn Rimes

something better’s coming lyrics © Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

There’s Always Hope

shelliwilliams Advent

(part of the “Waiting on the World to Change” Advent Series)

Romans 15:4-13 (Advent 2A)

4For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope.

5May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, 6so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

7Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. 8For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the circumcised on behalf of the truth of God in order that he might confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, 9and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written, “Therefore I will confess you among the Gentiles, and sing praises to your name”; 10and again he says, “Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people”; 11and again, “Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles, and let all the peoples praise him”; 12and again Isaiah says, “The root of Jesse shall come, the one who rises to rule the Gentiles; in him the Gentiles shall hope.”

13May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

So, we’re still here even as we journey through this Advent season.  We’re still here waiting on the world to change.  But bad news keeps coming.  People keep hurting each other and taking from each other and not listening to each other.  We keep destroying each other.  And, yes, we keep trying to find the things that need to be changed.  We keep waiting for that change.  And then Paul tells us to abound in hope.  Sure, we’ll get right on that!

Hope is one of those words that we throw around a lot.  “Hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ love and righteousness.”  Just have hope.  Always have hope.  But what is it?  We seldom talk about WHAT it is; we just say that we’re supposed to have it. So, we hope against hope that things will change.  (And, I guess, we hope against hope that we’ll have hope, whatever that may be.)

Paul frames this passage around what he sees sparks hope.  Our hope, according to him, begins in the past.  It begins with what is written in the Scriptures, the stories, the history, the acts of faith.  OK, I guess that’s a good enough beginning but it still doesn’t really tell us what it is.  I mean, it would be really easy if hope came in some sort of ancient bottle that Barbara Eden would come out of in a cloud of pink smoke in a genie costume and grant our every wish.  No, wait, that’s wishing.  That’s not hope.  Maybe it’s what we imagine for the future, the “perfect future” that is in our dreams.  No, that’s dreaming.  That’s not hope.  Emily Dickinson said that “hope is the thing with feathers— That perches in the soul— And sings the tune without the words— And never stops—at all—”  (Pretty, but is it helpful?  I mean, it sounds like it’s going to fly away at any moment.) Dante wrote of hell as the abandonment of hope. (Well, that’s dark!) William Sloane Coffin said that “if faith puts us on the road, hope keeps us there.” (Closer…)

The truth is, hope is not just wishing that things would change.  Hope has to do with rising to the challenge before us.  Hope is participation in God’s work.  Hope means saying “yes” to going forward, abounding, as Paul said, in hope by the power of the holy spirit.  Soren Kirkegaard defines hope as the “passion for the possible”.  That passion is what prompts us to hope not for things to be “fixed”, not for things to be easier, certainly not for some sort of lost Garden of Eden in our lives when we remember that things were better.  Hope opens the door to what’s ahead and pulls us toward it, pulls us into it.

In a 2008 interview with Matthew Felling of WMAU radio in Washington, D.C., Dr. Gordon Livingston said that the greatest enemy of hope is nostalgia.  He said that “it tricks people into believing that their best days are past.”  (Which is why, I guess, there are so many people right now that dream of returning to what was and, dare I say, what will never be again.)  He went on to say that “A more realistic view of history envisions the past as a theater of experience, some good and some bad, and opens up the possibility of growth and change. Our best days are ahead, not behind. Hope for the future.” I think that’s what Paul was trying to say.  Hope is here, here for the taking.  It is grounded in the past, in what we know. But hope is what goes forward.  Hope is what makes us keep walking.  Hope is what allows our faith to become realistic, gives us something to grab hold of.  Hope is what enables us to look up and see what is just ahead.  Abound in hope.

Hope holds with it the promise that God always answers our questions by showing up, not necessarily with what we ask for but with remarkable gifts that change our lives and the world. (Mary Lou Redding)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Just a Little Shoot

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(part of the “Waiting on the World to Change” Advent Series)

Isaiah 11:1-10 (Advent 2A)

A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. 2The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. 3His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear; 4but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. 5Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist, and faithfulness the belt around his loins. 6The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. 7The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. 9They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

10On that day the root of Jesse shall stand as a signal to the peoples; the nations shall inquire of him, and his dwelling shall be glorious.

As we’ve many times noted, this season of Advent is a practice in visioning.  It is a time of looking toward what “shall” be (as the use of the word “shall” appears at least sixteen times in today’s Scripture).  It gives us something to look toward, something for which we can purposefully and intentionally wait.  It gives us something to hang onto when the storms toss us about.

And, yet, this passage is set in a time not unlike our own.  The people fear they are losing their way, fear that their world is changing into something that they will no longer recognize, fear that it is all slipping away.  And there, there in the midst of the pain and the uncertainty, in the midst of hopes cut off and loss and despair prevailing, in the midst of empires threatening and power wrecking, God comes to sit with us in the season.  And we are given a vision, a vision of a different way, a vision of righteousness and equity and faithfulness and peace, a vision of what shall be.  There is no promise given that the nation would rise again.  Things are not going to return to the way they were.  Time and space will never sync enough for that to happen.  That never happens.  But the prophet’s vision includes a shoot, a tiny shoot that will appear.  The shoot will not become a mighty cedar.  It will not overtake the earth.  Rather, the shoot will begin what shall be.

A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse.  It will be fragile yet tenacious.  It will grow where no one ever thought it would.  It will push back the stone and become life.  It will rise up and be anew.  That shoot, that tiny shoot that many are sometimes tempted to cut down and clear away, contains everything.  In it is the very DNA, the written story, of what God envisions for Creation.  That shoot contains our story.  That shoot contains your story.

What will you do to tend to this seed, this fledgling shoot?  What will you do as it grows and strengthens?  We often talk about ourselves as the harvesters, those that help bring God’s vision to be.  But in this Advent time, we are called to be those who care and tend, those who see this shoot even as the world around us is often filled with weeds and despair.  Do you see it?  It’s there…there on the dead stump, just beginning to grow.  Life is pushing through.  It is yours, your story, your life.

You must give birth to your images.  They are the future waiting to be born.  Fear not the strangeness you feel.  The future must enter you long before it happens.  Just wait for the birth, for the hour of new clarity. (Rainer Maria Rilke)

Lyrics

Song Like A Seed (Sara Thomsen)

Ay, what to sing about in these days
What rhyme or melody, turn of phrase?
What is your story now, where is your gaze?
Ay, what to sing about in these days

Towers are tumbling, tumbling down
Fortresses fumbling, crumbling crowns
Governments grumbling, as they drown
Towers are tumbling, tumbling down

Plant your song like a seed
Hold your heart like a prayer bead
Give your breath like a tree
Set your soul’s deep love free

I know a woman who walks and prays
Follows the river’s old rambling ways
Eagle flies over and butterflies play
Watching the warrior walk and pray

What is your story now, where is your heart?
This is a one-act play, what’s your part?
In every ending there’s some new start
What is your story now, where is your heart?

Plant your song like a seed
Hold your heart like a prayer bead
Give your breath like a tree
Set your soul’s deep love free

There is a garden that grows at night
Then in the winter it tucks in tight
Drifts off in dreams about birds in flight
That carry the seeds of this garden’s life

Ay, what to sing about in these days
What rhyme or melody, turn of phrase?
What is your story now, where is your gaze?
Ay, what to sing about in these days

© 2018 Sara Thomsen

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Waiting on the World to Change

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Matthew 24:36-44 (Advent 1A)

36“But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 37For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 38For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, 39and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. 40Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. 41Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. 42Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. 43But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. 44Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.

And, so, we begin again.  Today is the first day of Advent and the first day of our Christian year.  We’ve arrived back at the beginning.  And, yes, I know sometimes it feels like we don’t really get anywhere but as we traverse through our faith journey season after season, there really ARE differences.  Perhaps the light seems a bit brighter.  Maybe we are catching on just a little bit more quickly.  But, as the Scripture says, we STILL don’t know what will happen when.  And that, my friends, is what faith is all about.

But this Scripture is always a weird start to the season for me.  This can’t be right!  What happened to Mary?  Where are those angels announcing the coming birth?  And why are we reading about Noah’s ark? That’s just odd.  Come on, we need something joyful and festive to think about.  After all, life is hard right now.  Our world seems to have so many problems. It would be really, really great if some things would change. But why in the world are we beginning at what feels like the end of the story?  We start there because, as we know, the end is always the beginning.

The reference to Noah reminds us that life goes on.  Life is always going on.  The seasons come and go and come again (and, yes, some are filled with wind and torrents and crowds).  And, hopefully, somewhere in there, we become a little wiser and a little closer to God.  Hopefully, we’ll be able to recognize the rainbow when it comes.  But it calls for us to wake up a little and realize that we are even as we sit here being gathered into the arms of God.

Yes, there are those that would take this passage and understand it as predicting our being temporarily or permanently removed from this world.  Some even will try to hold it over peoples’ heads as a way to scare people into believing.  I don’t think that’s what it’s about, though.  Faith is not about doing the right thing or living the right way or being scared into a place that does not feel welcoming and grace-filled.  God doesn’t want us to come to faith kicking and screaming.  God desires a relationship with us and wants us to desire a relationship with God.  And God has enough faith in us to do that. 

So, the writer of Matthew’s Gospel writes about this relationship.  Those who are “taken” refers to being gathered into the Kingdom community at the end of what we know, just as some were gathered into the ark, redeemed in a way that they never thought possible.  So, being a believer means to stay awake so that we will be a part of it even now, awake to the surprises that are to come.  Because, imagine, what if the surprise turns out to be that Jesus was here all along, that ahead of time itself, he has been calling and gathering and enlightening and sanctifying all along?  What if we really ARE called to be the hands of Christ?  What if rather than waiting on the world to change, we are called to make those changes, to BE those changes? What if rather than dozing off or lulling ourselves into a sort of sleepwalking life as we tend to do, we have been called to be awake to everything that God continues to do?  So, are you awake?

So, Advent arrives, abruptly disrupting our comfortable lives.  And we are called to wake up to God breaking through the darkness into our lives—2,000 years ago, in the promised future, and even today if we will only awaken to the dawn.   Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that “people only see what they are prepared to see.”  So, now is the time to prepare.

The curtain on the Advent is now rising.  Jesus is not waiting in the wings somewhere until the play is done; rather, Jesus is standing on the stage itself, inviting us in. “Come, awaken, wait with me.  You do not know when the Glory will come but this waiting is a holy place.  Stay awake so that you won’t miss the inbreaking of the Divine itself, the dawn of the fullness of the Kingdom of God.”  The reason that we begin at the end is because it is the same as the beginning.  God is the Alpha and the Omega.  Birth and death are all wrapped up together, needing each other to give life.  Awaken now so that you do not miss one thing.  Open your eyes.  The baby is coming!  The extraordinary miracle of what is about to happen is matched only by the moment before it does—this moment, this time.  The world awaits!  Awaken that you do not miss the story!  Yes, I know you’re waiting on the world to change.  So, what are you going to do?

You have been telling people that this is the Eleventh Hour, now you must go back and tell the people that this is the Hour. And there are things to be considered…Where are you living? What are you doing?  What are your relationships?  Are you in right relation?  Where is your water?  Know your garden.  It is time to speak your truth.  Create your community.  Be good to each other.  And do not look outside yourself for your leader…We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.  (Hopi Elders)

Lyrics:  “Somewhere to Begin”

People say to me, “Oh, you gotta be crazy!
How can you sing in times like these?
Don’t you read the news? Don’t you know the score?
How can you sing when so many others grieve?”
People say to me, “What kind of fool believes
That a song will make a difference in the end?”

By way of a reply, I say a fool such as I
Who sees a song as somewhere to begin
A song is somewhere to begin
The search for something worth believing in
If changes are to come there are things that must be done
And a song is somewhere to begin

Additional verses: 2) Dream… 3) Love…

© T. R. Ritchie, Whitebark Music/BMI

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

The Light Shining in the Darkness

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Scripture Text: Isaiah 9:2-7 (Christmas Eve text)

2The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness— on them light has shined. 3You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder. 4For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. 5For all the boots of the tramping warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire. 6For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7His authority shall grow continually, and there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom. He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onward and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

I used to live in a neighborhood where I always passed this wonderful old French colonial house with wonderful verandas lining both floors of the house.  For years, the house would outline the verandas with twinkling strings of lights during the Advent and Christmas seasons.  It was beautiful.  Then, for some reason I’ve never completely understood, they began to add more and more lights each year.  They started by stringing lights across the verandas three, five, seven, fifteen times.  Then, the next year, they did the same to the house. What was once a delightful twinkling of lights became what can only be described as a veritable blob of lights.  The house had been overtaken by light. And it was no longer beautiful.  In fact, it was a little off-putting.

So, the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.  This journey toward the Light is coming to an end, so to speak.  We know now that is does not actually end at all.  It’s more of a turn, a tilt, a leaning in.  But as we do that, we need to think about our time in the darkness.  See, light is not pretty or comforting or even helpful alone.  It’s blinding.  You can’t even see anything anymore.  Light is at its best when it illuminates the darkness and creates shadows and contrasts so that we can truly look at the Light.

Much of our lives, much of our existence is about traveling in darkness.  It is a holy darkness.  God created it.  And then God created Light to push back the darkness.  Now notice that it doesn’t say anywhere that the light is meant to dispel the darkness or cover up the darkness or in some way destroy the darkness into utter extinction.  Darkness is.  The Light is.  They live together, woven into a holy mix of light and shadows and clouds and stars and deep darkness.  That is life.  That is Life.  And that is where the people that walk there see the Light.  So, our act of coming out of the darkness into the marvelous Light is not one of leaving but of looking in another direction and finally learning to travel in the dark.  That’s called faith. 

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness—on them light has shined.

It gets darker and darker…and then Jesus is born.  (Ann Lamott) 

Grace and Peace,

 Shelli

The Coming of Light

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Scripture Text: John 12: 44-46

44Then Jesus cried aloud: “Whoever believes in me believes not in me but in him who sent me. 45And whoever sees me sees him who sent me. 46I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness.

I think we often have this sense that the Light is the end-all.  After all, it’s the thing to which we’ve journeyed, the thing for which we’ve searched.  But have you ever looked at light?  (I know.  You’re really not supposed to do that.)  But while I was thinking about this post, I looked up at my kitchen light.  It’s one of those flood lights that you can turn and redirect.  I was in my living room and it didn’t have many lights on so, basically, I was in the darkness looking at a light.  And behind the light, surrounding the light, was a circular rainbow.  See, there’s always more in the Light. And it could only be seen in the dark.

This Scripture comes in the midst of the readings that we use for Holy Week.  Jesus is preparing for the cross.  But part of that preparation was pointing yet again toward God.  Jesus more than once confirmed that he was the “Light to the world” but he never let it stop there.  There is always more to the Light.  Jesus was always quick to remind his followers of that.  He espoused that they were not believing in him as a person, as a man who showed them the Light.  They were rather believing in God.  They were looking toward the Light that Jesus had been sent to show them.

OK, hang with me here…at the risk of going all 4th century on you, I’m going to go all 4th century on you!  In “The Life of Moses”, St. Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335-c. 395) contends that a person’s encounter with the mystery of God comes in three parts—light, cloud, and darkness.  (I know, that sort of sounds backwards.)  He sees the first stage in our quest to encounter God in light, such as Moses’ vision of God in the burning bush, illuminating the darkness of our sin and ignorance about who God really is.  The second stage is a journey into partial darkness where Moses encounters God as the cloud, an intermingling of darkness and light.  The final stage is entering where God really is (not a place, mind you, but a way of being).  And in that, we come to the realization that God IS Light, that God IS Mystery, that God is utterly incomprehensible.  In this place, Moses declared on Mt. Sinai that he had seen God or, in other words, had seen the eternal mystery that is God and had finally begun to understand his part of that Mystery.

The crux of this rather long-winded explanation is that the Light to which we journey is not the end; it is the beginning.  The Light is the beginning of our knowing not God in God’s fullness.  We are not meant to know that.  God IS mystery.  But the Light to which we journey is the beginning of us knowing not who God is but who we are meant to be as we encounter our Creator, our Sustainer, our Redeemer, the One in whom we believe. It’s also the beginning of us finally knowing that the darkness is also filled with Light.  As we come into the Light as it dawns on the world, we begin to see beyond—and it is glorious!

I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness.

In every beginning, there is darkness.  The darkness of chaos seems eternal, Yet form emerges: light dawns, and life is born. (Sixth Service of The New Union Prayerbook) 

Grace and Peace,

 Shelli