Could have been easy: December 25, 2016

Christmas Day                                                                                   
John 1:1-14                                                                            
 

            “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” These words are familiar to us, painfully familiar to those of us who preach on it every year.  As Christians we hear it quoted often enough. We hear it on Christmas Day (for those loyal souls who attend) and then again on the Sunday after Christmas. But the Jews who were hearing John’s words for the first time would have also found it somewhat familiar. 

The very beginning of the Hebrew Bible (The Torah) starts with, “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth…”  Genesis goes on to describe how God created the world with words.  It would appear that the author of John knew what he was doing when he wrote the introduction to his Gospel. He was making a connection for those people who knew the story of the creation of heaven and earth from the Hebrew Bible.  John was trying to fit Jesus into that story.  Jesus was not just some creation of God who came on the scene a couple thousand years into the story.   He was the Word, the Word that created the heavens and the earth. 

            Julian of Vezalay, a Benedictian monk, once said, “At his command, (God said) ‘Let there be a world,’ the world came into being, and when he decreed, ‘Let there be human beings,’ human beings were created.  But the Word of God did not remake his creatures as easily as he made them. He made them by simply giving a command; he remade them by dying. He made them by commanding; he remade them by suffering.” [1]

The story of the creation of the world is dramatic, dramatic in its simplicity.  God created the whole universe in 7 days. God did not have to break a sweat.  Yet something went wrong along the way, humanity turned away from God. Early on, God created a flood to wash the world clean, to start afresh.  Yet being a merciful God, he provided an ark for a couple humans, and of course, the animals. And maybe that was where he went wrong, because the humans he spared managed to sin as soon as they got off the ark.  So God sent prophets, prophets to bring the people back to God, to show them the light.  That didn’t work either.

            Then God tried something crazy, so crazy it just had to work. He came down himself, in the form of the most vulnerable human of all, an infant. Imagine being in paradise, sitting on a mighty throne, then coming down to spend 9 months in a womb, and then 33 years in a world that struggled to accept him.  Jesus lived as a poor man amongst suffering people.   He lived with the knowledge that he would have to be crucified.  Then he died in the most agonizing way possible. 

Sometimes you have to wonder why God did not just start over again—wipe the slate clean and start a whole new world.  All he had to do was say the word.  You might think, well God already tried that with the flood. And then God promised not to do it again.  So that option is out. But let’s be real here. This is God we are talking about. God can do whatever he wants.  In fact, this time God could do it right, destroy the whole thing and start over again, just like in Genesis 1.  It only took him 7 days the first time, wouldn’t that be easier than 33 years? That is what I cannot wrap my head around.  Why take something that could have been so easy and make it long and painful?  “He made (us) by simply giving a command; he remade (us) by dying.  He made (us) by commanding; he remade (us) by suffering.”

Sometimes I’ll start a sermon and write almost the whole thing and then realize that I hate it.  Then I have 2 choices.  I can scrap it completely, or I can work with what I have and fix it.  There are a couple of times when I have taken that first option. Then I have started over and the next one turned out better.  However, most of the time I try to work with what I have. Part of it might be because I really hate the idea of starting over when I have already put in a good deal of time.  But the main reason is that I think what I have is redeemable. What I have written is worth saving.  I think that is what happens when you have something you have created.  You can always find some good in it.  Humanity is God’s creation, and no matter how far we wander, we are God’s.  Because of that, I believe that God always wants to find a way to redeem us, no matter how hard that is for him, no matter what kind of sacrifice he has to make.  God could have started all over again and done it all with a couple of words.  Instead, he took the one word that was hardest to lose, his very own son, God incarnate.  He took that all powerful word and gave It up to redeem his creation. 

---

[1] Sermon 1 on Christmas by Julian Vezalay: SC 192, 45.52.60 http://liturgy.slu.edu/ChristmasC15/theword_journey.html

Who's child is this? December 18, 2017

Year A, Advent 4                                                      

Matthew 1:18-25                                                                   

            One of the things that you have to come to terms with when you have chosen to adopt is that it is unlikely that you will have a child who looks like you.  No one will ever say, “He’s got your smile” or “Wow, look at those eyes…I wonder where they came from?”  It’s a small thing….especially when you see your child smile and you think, “There could be no smile more beautiful than that smile.”  But it’s still something that you need to consider.

            When we talk about the story of Joseph (which we don’t do very often) the focus is usually his reaction to the information that his fiancée is pregnant and it’s definitely not his child.  We usually refer to Mary and Joseph as engaged.  This is not the most accurate translation.  Our understanding of engagement today and what it was at this time period are two very different things. Today there are elaborate proposals and photo documentation of the proposal. Engagements are important.  It is a commitment, but it is also pretty easy to break.  In the time when Jesus and Mary lived, engagements were more than a ring and an extended time to plan the perfect wedding. An engagement (or more accurately a betrothal) was a legal agreement that two families made.  After the betrothal, they were legally wed, but not yet living together.  To break a betrothal, one had to get a divorce.  To have relations with someone other than your betrothed would be adultery.  It had the same punishment for the woman…public stoning.

            One can only imagine what Joseph felt in hearing that his wife was pregnant.  Despite the fact that they did not live together, they were still referred to as husband and wife.  He must have felt betrayed by her and even her family who had arranged this.  Most likely, their marriage had been planned for years, perhaps their whole lives.  Suddenly, his whole life was changed.  Certainly, he could find another wife. Yet even if he could, people would still wonder if the child Mary had was actually his and he divorced her so no one would condemn him for having marital relations before they were officially married.  He could have survived the embarrassment and shame, but it would have probably followed him and his whole family the rest of their lives. These are all reasonable assumptions for his initial reaction to the news.

            What I wonder is what he felt after the angel came and told him, “Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.  She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All we know is that Joseph woke up and followed the angel’s instructions.  He took Mary as his wife.  Let’s assume for a minute that there was no doubt in Joseph’s mind that this had really happened….an angel had appeared to him and told him that the child who would be born to his wife was actually the child of God.  The father of the child was God.  Did he wonder: what is this child going to look like?  Will he look like God?  What does God look like?  Will God give this child the physical attributes of Mary but no attributes of me?  When this child comes out of Mary’s womb and I cradle him in my arms, who will I see….my son or the son of God?

            I like to think that Joseph was asking these mundane and rational questions, because that is what I would be wondering.  Now that we know the whole story, they seem like foolish questions.  But all he knew was that that this child was from the Holy Spirit.  In this time period, the first son was a very important thing in a family.  The first born would very likely acquire all that the father had.  The first son had a position of importance. Yet was this Joseph’s first son?  The questions that were whirling around his head and almost surely the head of Mary must have been unlimited. 

Think about it, everyone wonders what their child will become.  Will he be an athlete…a musician, a scientist.  Those were not the questions Jesus’s parents had.  Their son would save the world.  I am sure that put all their concerns to rest.  After this initial dream with the angel….consider the dreams or nightmares that followed.  Perhaps this child would come out of Mary not as a baby…but as a full grown man.  No baby could save the world.  That is ludicrous.  He would have huge eyes that would see all things and a huge head that would know all things.  The possibilities are terrifying.

            Who knows what he must have envisioned in the dead of night as he lay awake with fear and anxiety? What we know is this:  Joseph took Mary as his wife and he claimed Jesus as his son.  He might have looked at Jesus and seen Mary’s eyes or Mary’s smile. But I bet what he really saw was what we all see when we see babies.  He saw a miracle.  He saw a child of God…someone so precious that God had to be involved somehow. At that moment, it did not matter if he had his DNA…he had God’s DNA. He was infused with the Holy Spirt.  He was love in the flesh.

            People make a big deal of the fact that Mary was a virgin when she conceived Jesus.  For some, it has even become a litmus test for true Christian faith.  For my part, I believe that Mary was a virgin.  I believe that is important not because it makes her pure or holy, but because it makes it clear to all of us, that this child born was no ordinary child, no matter how ordinary he looked.  The virgin birth and Joseph’s acceptance of that story is proof that something special was happening…something beyond our understanding.  We can tell the story over and over again, but we can never make it our own.  We can never tame this story because it is so amazing, so out of this world.   

            When Joseph looked into that newborn’s eyes, he saw pieces of himself…not because this child carried his DNA, but because this child knew him more than anyone else. This child could see into the depth of his soul.  At this time of year, we have an amazing opportunity. We have the chance to imagine the eyes of Jesus, the eyes that know us and loves us….without condition. We have the chance to see ourselves through those eyes, just like Joseph saw himself in Jesus’ eyes. 

Let’s try it. Let’s close our eyes for and take a deep breath.  Then for a moment, imagine that you can see the eyes of Jesus and you see yourself reflected in those eyes. What do you see? Do you see beauty? Do you see pain? Whatever you see, don’t allow yourself to judge what you see. This is not a mirror you are looking at…this is you, through Jesus’ eyes.  What you see is holy.  What you see is your divine image.  Take that with you when you leave this place.  Remember that you are holy and that you too carry the Holy Spirit.  Let that be your Christmas miracle. 

Burning makes us Brighter: December 4, 2016

Year A, Advent 2                            

Romans 15:4-13                                                                    

            Most of us have heard of Sigmund Freud, a famous Austrian Psychiatrist who lived in the beginning of the 20^th century.  He was a Jew and died shortly after WW2 began.  There was another Austrian Psychiatrist who was younger, but considered Freud to be a mentor.  His name was Viktor Frankle and he was also Jewish.  In 1942, he and his whole family were sent to Auschwitz.  He spent three years in various concentration camps.  He was there until the concentration camps were liberated. 

As you can imagine, much of his later work was informed by this experience.  In reflecting on his experience in the concentration camps, he tried to determine what the difference was between those who died in the concentration camps and those who survived. He said that it was not about physical strength. He saw many strong men die and many weaker men survive.  He said that finding meaning in your own life was critical to survival and that sometimes we need to find meaning in the suffering. He concluded that the difference between those who died and those who survived was hope. 

            The Apostle Paul lived through a great deal of suffering.  He was a strong believer in hope.  Our reading for today begins with, “Whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might find hope.” Paul found hope in the Holy Scriptures. You might think, wait Paul wrote the scriptures.  That is true.  Paul wrote a good portion of what we consider scripture, the New Testament.  However, in Paul’s day, the only scriptures were the Hebrew Scriptures, what we refer to as the Old Testament. He believed that the hope the Old Testament promised was embodied in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Jesus fulfilled the prophesies of the Old Testament. 

This did not mean that Jesus brought utopia to earth. He did not bring freedom to the Hebrew people, which is what many expected from the Messiah.  In many ways, he left the earth in the same place it was before he was born---but not in the important ways.  For people who knew Jesus, who experienced his love, the world was forever transformed.  There was also a hope in what was to come, when Jesus came again.  Jesus left this world with a promise to return, a promise that something better was coming.  Paul believed in this promise.  He believed that after death, he would meet God.  He believed that we all have that potential, which is why it was so important to him that he share the good news of Jesus Christ. 

This did not change the fact that people were suffering under the Roman occupation. They were oppressed and hurting.  Even those who knew of Jesus and believed in Jesus were losing hope.  They had assumed that Jesus was going to return in their lifetime. But Jesus wasn’t back.  The Romans were still oppressing the Jews. Their lives were no better.  It is understandable that they were growing weary and losing hope. 

Earlier in Paul’s letter to the Romans, he wrote, “For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”[1]  One of the things we have to remember is that Paul did not know Jesus while Jesus was still living.  Paul heard the voice of Jesus only after Jesus died and ascended to heaven.  He did not even see Jesus--he heard his voice. 

Therefore Paul knew all too well what it was to believe without seeing. He knew what it was to suffer and hope when there seemed to be absolutely no reason to hope.  For Paul, hope was dependent not on the current situation but the ability to believe despite the current situation—to hope when there seemed to be no reason to hope.  

In my life, I have found hope in despair, but only when there was a spark, a spark of light in the darkness. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be to find hope when there is only darkness and a promise of more darkness.  As Christians, we always have a reason to hope, even when all seems lost.  We find that reason in scripture. We find it in this community of faith.  We find it in our worship. 

However, sometimes we do not have the energy to look for hope.  We don’t want to have to find it.  We want it to come to us. Occasionally that happens. Sometimes, hope is easy.  In times of suffering and despair, it is not. It can feel almost impossible.   

After his experience in the concentration camp, Viktor Frankle wrote a lot about humanity’s search for meaning.  He specialized in the study of psychology and religion.  While he survived the concentration camp, both of his parents and his wife died.  There is no way to explain away the murder of 6 million people.  We cannot always explain suffering away by saying there is a reason for it all.  While I doubt that Frankle claimed a reason for the suffering of so many, he found a way to learn from his own.  During his life and career, he was able to help a lot of people because of what we had learned from his own suffering.  He wrote, "What is to give light must endure burning."

In Advent, we talk a lot about light. We light a new candle every week and sing about the light of Christ.  Even in popular culture, there is light. We hang lights on our bushes and trees.  We put up a tree inside the house and cover it with lights.  We put electric candles in our windows.  We do that because it is festive and pretty. We do it because we don’t want to be the only house on the block without lights.  There is also a deeper reason.  We do it because the nights are longer and the days are shorter. We need more light in our lives. 

While Christmas lights are easy to hang (relatively) and candles are easy to light, discovering the light within ourselves can be much more challenging.  In life, we will endure hardship and pain.   Often we find the strength to endure those things because we know they will end.  Sometimes that hope that the suffering will end is not enough.  Sometimes the suffering is so great, the pain lasts so long, we need something else to keep us going.  In those times, we tend to look for a reason for the suffering.  Perhaps we would be better not to look for a reason why we are suffering, but to search for something that we can learn from that suffering. Because in learning something from our own suffering, we might be able to ease the pain of another.  We might be the light of Christ for someone who cannot find it on their own. 

While I do not agree with Frankle that what gives light must endure burning, I do believe that our lights have the capacity to burn a little brighter after we have endured the burning.  And because they are brighter, they will reach even farther into the hearts that need the light the most.

In the end of our reading, Paul provides a benediction.  Benediction is a fancy word for blessing.  We end every service with a benediction from the clergy. This was Paul’s blessing to the Romans and one I share for all of you, “May 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.” 

---

[1] Romans 8:24-25