Where We Belong: The Place of Rest

 

2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16 (Luke 1:26-38)

When Mike and I were in Romania we had the privilege to be able to get to spend one night in a Peleș Palace, well the carriage house. It was the last castle built in Romania having been begun at the end of the 1800s. It is a picturesque castle whose façade is often used in TV and Movies when they want to make an idyllic palace as their setting. I often tease Mike saying that had we eloped while we were in Romania we could have stayed in a Palace for our honeymoon.

Peleș was built to be the home of King Carol I. This palace like so many others was built to be a reflection of the King and the Kingdom he rules. Palaces are often symbols of the values and culture of a nation. When Peleș was built it was the first palace anywhere to be completely powered by electricity (in fact the King had built a separate a power plant just to power the Palace and the surrounding buildings). Peleș being completely powered by electricity was a matter of national pride, and was a symbol of the King leading the Romanian people into the future. It brought Romania in to the modern age and secured them a place of belonging in the future as a stable nation.

It is a common idea that a king’s palace is a reflection of the nation and its people. A king with no palace at all would be seen as a weak king. It would be a signal to the surrounding nations that these people were a people who could be easily conquered. Most kings palaces are symbols to their people and are reflection to the world of the king’s power and authority

This is the thought process of David as he built his palace. He needed a palace to join the people of Israel together as a kingdom and to present to the nations around them that Israel was indeed a legitimate nation whom they could not bully. So once he has established Israel, he immediately begins by building a palace for himself, for the people and for the security of the nation. . David’s palace by providing a home and a place for their King to belong, gave the people of Israel stability and showed the world around them that they belonged here. This was their land, this was their home. As a people, it tied them to this place. They would not be easily chased from the place they belonged.

Once he has finished his palace, he looks around him and sees how far God has brought him, after all when God “found” him he was a boy in the countryside watching sheep. He was so much of “a nobody,” his father had not even bothered to ask him to come in from the field when the prophet asked to see all his father’s sons. He is grateful to God. He wants to show God that he is grateful. He sees how God has blessed him. He sees himself surrounded by all the trappings of a King and he can look out of his palace and see the little tent in which God “lives.” The same tent the Israelites carted around the dessert. The same tent that crossed the Jordan river with them. The same tent which has been God’s house since they arrived in the promised land and it looked mighty pitiful next to David’s fine palace.

This makes David want to build a place where God can belong among the people, a palace where God can dwell, a home for God. He wants to give God what he has. He has found rest, perhaps he should not rest until God also has a place to rest. David wants to give God what he would want if he was in God’s position. He wants to give God a house that befits the God of the universe. He wants to build God a proper place to dwell among the people, so God knows that he is grateful for all which God has done for him. He wants to build a temple where God could belong which would befitting of the God of the universe, so the nations around them will know that their God is the one and only living God.

God says, “No.” God says, “I don’t need a house.” Later the prophet Haggai will run up against the opposite problem, where God got upset with the people for waiting 18 years to rebuild the temple after Cyrus told them they could. In Haggai the problem was they spent time building their own houses while God’s house stood in ashes. But here at this time, God does not want David to build God a house, the tent is just fine. The temple can wait.

What God does want David to do? Right now? David has been busy, setting up the kingdom, expanding its borders, winning peace for the people and now that David has a place where he belongs, God wants David to be still for a while, to rest in the home he now has, to enjoy the place and be at peace in the place he belongs. David has done much work to bring the nation to the place it is right now, but now is the time for rest. From almost the moment David had been plucked out of his rural shepherding life, chosen, by God, through the prophet, to be the next King of God’s people, David’s life has been in chaos. When he was not a warrior fighting in Saul’s wars, he was in conflict with Saul either directly or indirectly and then even once he had gained the throne he had almost continually been at war with one nation or another defending and expanding the borders of the nation, until now they were finally at peace with all the nations around them. God had given David rest from all his enemies.

Now is not the time for building, or the time for more laborious work. Now is the time to be still, to be in one place. Now is the time for rest. Instead of building a house for God, God wants to take this time to build David’s house for him. David has been very busy, his life has been exhausting up until this point. Right now God want to allow David to rest for a bit, let God do some of the heavy lifting. Rest, relax. God can handle this, enjoy this time of peace. God will take this time to build up you and your house.

Calling for David to be still and rest, does not mean God does not have plans for David. Calling for David to rest does not mean God is finished with David. God wants David to be a good Godly king. God wants David to rule God’s people the way they should be ruled. God wants David to be the kind of great king who will be praised throughout the generations, you know the kind of king David continues to be known to have been. putting God first, and the people’s needs and wants ahead of something God does not really “need” anyway, is not what God wants for David or the nation right now.

God wants David to be the “father” of the King of Kings. God has plans for David, they just don’t include building a temple. God has big plans for David. David will be the “father king” of this nation. He will be regarded as the finest king they will ever have. God is still at work with and through David, but God does not want David to build a temple, instead God wants David to take this time to be still and rest.

In the Gospel passage this morning we encounter Mary. Mary is just a girl, she is somewhere between the ages of 13-16. By all modern standards she is not even a grown woman at this time. But she is kind of amazing. Even at her young age, she is faithful and is ready to listen to God. How many of us, full grown adults, are ready to listen to God and has the kind of faith Mary exhibits here in this passage. Who among us, even at whatever age we are right now, is ready to allow God to work in our lives the way that Mary allowed God to work in hers? God tells her that she will have a baby (the Messiah). And she does not even seem to skip a beat. She like, “Oh, wow, ok.”

Can you think about a teenaged girl? Can you imagine how she must have felt in the moment she realized what was going on? Can you think about how her stomach must just fall right out of her, how sick she must feel in that moment (perhaps literally as well as figuratively), how scared she must be? What will she do? What does she need to do first? She realizes first things first, I have to go get a test.

So here is this young lady, sitting there waiting for the test to do its thing. We can imagine those long minutes as she waits. Then she sees that second little blue line that says so much while being so silent. We can imagine her fear and her anxiety. So many young girls who find out this news are alone and scared when they find out. Then there is young Mary, Mary doesn’t find out from an impersonal test, she finds out from the angel of God, but I am sure some of the same feelings had to be brewing inside her; the anxiety, the fear. She was human after all, and she was still very young.

Now, of course finding out from a messenger from God is the ultimate way to find out. The angel has already told her not to be afraid. He has already told her that she is favored by God. Then he tells her that she will conceive and bear a child. She asks a few obvious questions and then just accepts God’s plan for her life. She says, “Let it be for me as you say.”

Not my response:  my response would be. Umm, God, I don’t think this is a good idea. I don’t think people are going to buy the whole virgin birth thing. I am not sure this is a very good plan. Can I think this over and get back to you. I am not quite so sure I am the right person for this job.

No, Mary says, “Let it be for me as you have said.”  ????? What a humble response! What an obedient response! What an absolutely amazing response. If only I could be more like Mary!  If only all of us could be just a tiny bit more like Mary!

Sometimes we have great amazing plans. They are plans to do work for God, plans for the betterment of the kingdom, they are good plans. But sometimes God says, no, and calls for us to be still, for us to just rest. To sit back and let God do some work for a while. This kind of message to God does not usually sit well with us. We are a go, go, go, get it done kind of people. We always have a goal toward which we are striving. We always have somewhere we need to be. There is always a project we want to complete. We live in a culture in which we define ourselves by what we do. We actually take pride in being tired and overworked. It is a badge of honor to never rest, to be so busy you don’t have time for yourself. We live in a culture which sees nothing wrong with having to work 60-80 hour work weeks. So to hear a passage where God says,” no, don’t do this thing for me, even though it is a good thing, rest instead,” is almost complete and utter nonsense to us. We are not a people who rest, who relax, who like sit down in peace.

At this time of the year we, as a congregation, following Christmas we would usually move into what we call Sabbath month; a month in which we par back our congregational activities and slow down following the busy season of Advent. It is a time for us to remember God’s call for us to rest, a reminder that scripture tell us both Jesus while he walked this earth, as well as God following the creation, rested and that we too are to find time, days, and seasons in which to rest. Time for us to let God be in control and to listen intently to God’s voice. As I look at this passage this week, I cannot help but think this would be a great message for the beginning of Sabbath month. But this year Sabbath month seems to be a little redundant as we have already cut down our activities as a congregation during Corona times and are once again moving back to an all online format, as we wait out these colder months for the vaccine.  

Yet, even though this would be a perfect sermon to move us toward Sabbath month, it is probably also a good message for us all right now anyway. These past nine months have been exhausting. As a nation and as a world we have been fighting a pandemic. We have to wear masks anytime we leave the confines of our home, which is not as often as often as we used to. We work from home, while our children are schooled from home. All this is tiring even though we don’t go very many places anymore. We go to the grocery store, to necessary appointments, we may have travelled during the summer when the weather was warm and the cases were down, but not now.

As the cases have gone up, we all realize it is not the best choice to travel to all the places we might at this time of year. So we continue to stay at home and are getting just a bit antsy. We want to do something, something other than just being at home all the time. Wouldn’t a trip to go see relatives, be nice? Can’t we go somewhere, do something, anything? And the voice of God in this passage comes to us as God speaks to David saying, “No, not right now.”

Right now is the time to rest. We may have taken time to venture to other places this past Summer when the weather was warm and the more humid conditions slowed the virus down and made it harder to pass from person to person. But the virus thrives in this cold dry season and now it is the time to stay put. We have the peace which comes with knowing the vaccine is coming but right now we need to rest; to be still, to slow down. We need to stop for a little while and catch our breath. And trust God.

Stopping, resting, relaxing, being still is about trusting God. I really think our antsy-ness right now, our need to go somewhere, do something, something fun, something else, is a byproduct of our inability to be still, to step back, take our hands off the plow and rest. It is a symptom of our continual desire to be in control. Doing all the things is a by-product of our need to always be in control. When we can’t do something, we want to go somewhere, when we can’t go somewhere, we really don’t know what to do with ourselves and we feel out of control. Most of us are conditioned to think, if we aren’t getting things done, then nothing will be done. If we are not working, if we are not striving, if we are not doing, if we are not go, go, going all the time, then what needs to happen will not happen. We do not know the good in being still, in resting. We do not know how to trust God to do some of the work which needs to be done.

I know we all had plans, we had great plans. But right now, we can’t do those plans. They are not the right plans for right now, they are for another time, another year. Right now they are not God’s plans. They are our plans. That does not mean God does not have plans for us, great, amazing plans but they may not be the plans we had wanted or hoped for. For right now, we need to set aside our go, go, go plans, and our need to keep moving and our desire to go somewhere. Right now is the time to rest and let God do what God needs to do right now, to relinquish our need to be in control.

It is time to give over the control we want to have in and over our lives and give it to God. In many ways we need to let God be God. We can’t make plans for God, we have to allow God to make plans for us, even if those plans are for us to be still, to rest, to take this time to slow down and listen to God. Perhaps the things we are wanting to do are fine things to do, greats things which were for the furtherance of the Kingdom, but whatever it is we wanted to do, if it is not what God wants us to do, it is the wrong thing to do. Right now is the time to slow down, to rest, to stop, to be still. Right now is the time to stop, to be still, to wait, and to listen.  So often we are so busy, busy busy, we are making the plans, giving the directions. Perhaps right now is the time to allow God to do the work God needs to do and to allow God to direct our plans; allow God to make the plans to give the directions.

When we are resting, when we are still, and we are able to better listen. When we are listening, that is when we are able to actually listen, we are able to hear what it is God wants from us, what God needs from us. Sometimes it is not simply that God has “other” plans. It is not simply that our plans are different than God’s plans. Perhaps God’s plans for us are so completely amazing that we would never have thought about it on our own because God’s plans would blow our minds – like with the plans God had for Mary.

Now wouldn’t that be cool, to get to be Mary. Sometimes, sometime we get to be like Mary and what God is calling us to do is so beyond our grasp of understanding that we would never think of doing those things ourselves. Sometimes the plans that God is giving us sound crazy and scary and absolutely unobtainable. But they are God’s plans. They are the plans that God is putting before us and we need to respond obediently, as Mary did. We need to say, “Let it be for me as you have said.” But first we need to be still enough to listen. First we need to rest. To allow God to do what God needs to do, so that we are ready to do what we need to do, so we are rested, rejuvenated, relaxed enough, have learned enough to trust God that we can, are able to say, “Let it be for me as you have said.”

 

Where We Belong: Salvation is Coming!

 

Isaiah 61:1-11

As our days grow shorter and our night grow longer, and the darkness around us grows, literally, as we approach the Winter solstice on Jan 21^st and figuratively, as the numbers of COVID cases grows daily, the death rate climbs, our governor has rolled back which step in which phase we are in, and we have as a congregation made the tough decision to move our services back online in two weeks’ time. A person we know can’t get needed a surgery, because the hospital says they do not have beds for non-COVID patients. Another friend of mine had a surgery moved up to this week, so that she does not face this same problem when the surgery was originally scheduled for early next year. There are more fires in California. There continue to be refugee children lost in our system too young to tell us who their parents are. Injustices in our world continue to mount, and yet another black man was shot dead entering his own house bringing sandwiches home to his family.

Then on top of the national and international crises, each of us go home to our own struggles, the crises we are facing within our own families, and within ourselves. The darkness is deep, the darkness is thick and it seems to only envelop and surround us covering us with a thick blanket, like an ongoing winter snowstorm. I know this is not the darkest period of time which has ever been, it is not even the darkest it has been this century, but that knowledge does not change that this is the part of the journey on which we all find ourselves right now, is dark.

As we look at the world around us, we look around knowing this is not the world to which we belong. We are immersed in darkness and we are children of the light. This is the deep of winter and we are spring and summer people, just as assuredly as we are Resurrection and Pentecost people. This is a cold cruel world and we belong to a world of love and warmth. We do not belong here. We do not live here. For now we make our home here, but it is not a permanent home it is temporary and even as we settle in this place, in this time, for now, we are people of longing, who are continually looking to the horizon for the dawning light that will show us where our home truly is.  

But for now, in this time, we find ourselves in the darkness. It is as we face this darkness that we come to the word of the prophet, this morning, as he continues to speak into the darkness the people of God living in exile were experiencing. It is into this darkness, God, through the words of the prophet, plants a dream of a world made right, a world where the oppressed are set free, where fears are assuaged, people are fed and clothed, and have a home, each person is treated with dignity and respect no matter who they are, what they believe, or their ethnic origin, where we are all healed from that ails us, where peace reigns in our lives, in our homes, in our nations and within ourselves and all those captured and enslaved in systems of injustice are released.

We stand in our dark place in this world, surrounded by the darkness of the unjust systems at work in our culture, and in our country, we are enveloped in the darkness created by COVID, hospitals full of people on ventilators, by friends, relatives, co-workers sick, or dying. The darkness is so thick, so deep, that we hold our breath, as if we are underwater. It in is this darkness in this world in which we are exiled one from another, exiled from the touch of others, from hugs, from handshakes from the cheerful smiles of strangers we pass on the street or our grocery store clerk. And in this place we listen and hear this message of freedom, of release, of liberty, justice and comfort. And long for it to be true in our world, in our homes, in our neighborhoods and in our lives, today.

“Oh, Lord God, Yes!”

“Bring your goodness to us this morning!”

“Bind up our broken hearts! Liberate us! Set us free!”

“Proclaim to us a new year! We are finished with 2020; give us the year of the Lord’s favor!”

“Comfort us!”

“Raise us up out of our devastations! Build up the ruins of our lives, of the world which has been demolished since March.”

“Lord, let us see your glory!”

“Come Lord, Jesus come!”

And even as we cry out, do we truly know for what it is we are crying out? What would it mean for the Year of God’s favor to be upon us? What would it truly mean for us, for our world for Christ’s reign to be made manifest all around us? What we are ultimately calling for is God’s justice; for God to come and set all things right, for all that is wrong to be corrected, and all who perpetuate that wrong to face the consequences of their misdeeds. Do we really want all the wrongs to be set right? What about the wrongs from which we benefit? What about the wrongs in which we participate? What would God’s justice flooding this world, our cities, our neighborhoods and each of our lives truly look like?

We all like the idea of justice in our world. But when someone stands up and attempts to do something about it, the reaction is a little less than the celebratory jubilation one would expect. We all want to be treated fairly, we all want there to be no suffering in the world. We want children to live “childlike” lives. We want people to be fed, clothed and housed. We do not want anyone living in slavery. We want everyone to have the “American dream.” We want no one to contract COVID much less suffer or die because of it. As long as them being able to do so does not affect me, as long as I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do to make that happen and it does not cause me to have to change my way of living.

Most of us like the idea of justice. We like the idea of a world where everyone is treated fairly, where we all get what “we have worked for,” where our work is valued and the payment we receive for it is just and fair, will put food on our tables, roofs above our heads and get us the medical care we need when we are ailing, where everyone’s needs are met, where nobody is mistreated, or marginalized, enslaved, or killed.

We all desire justice, but have you ever looked at the lives of people who have worked for justice in our world. Can you quickly in your head put together a list of people you have heard about who worked for bring justice, equality, peace to this world?  You got a list?  How well did their lives go?  Their biographies go like this right. “So-N-So fought for justice and when that justice was made complete, lived a peaceful life and died at a ripe old age surrounded children, and grandchildren and people who loved and cared about them.” No.

  Dr. King had a dream of justice and equality and they killed him. Gandhi fought for independence for the Indian people and they killed him. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, yeah they killed him too. I am sure there are people on your list, and my guess is for the vast majority of them, because of their work and their efforts to bring the kind justice to the world, which God is seeking in this passage, things did not turn out too well for them either.

  Jesus stood up in the synagogue one morning and simply read this passage; a passage in which God declares justice will be and he was nearly thrown off a cliff (not to mention that whole crucifixion thing that happened three years later). Mary quoted it in her song about her unborn son, and her virtue was questioned. Still not the response one would expect. We all want justice; we just don’t treat those who are seeking it, very well.

The problem is, even though most of us are pretty good people, we live in a world where the systems of injustice are the poisoned waters in which we swim. Even when they do not wholly benefit us, we have acclimated to them, the poison does not bother us, perhaps we are immune to it and are completely unaffected by it. We have learned to survive. We may, without our knowledge be benefiting from the way things are. We are aware of the poison, but we are not willing to actually do anything to remove the poison. We may feel powerless, unable to do anything about it. We may even realize that if the poison was removed we would be worse off. The adaptations we have made, unintentionally, would made would be superfluous. We would lose the benefits we are experiencing. We really do not know how to live in un-poisoned waters. We would have to completely change how we live. It would be hard for us to adapt. And so when we are faced with the reality of what that justice looks like, we are paralyzed, we don’t want to take the measures needed; we are unwilling to make the needed changes. Right now, some people are unwilling to wear a mask, because it is too uncomfortable, or simply because they don’t want to. Others are unwilling to stop spending time with people outside of their households, or to forgo traditional holiday travel, to keep this virus from rapidly spreading. We are willing to make some concessions, as long as those concessions do not inconvenience us in ways we do not like. We will make changes in our lives as long as those changes will have the results we want, and will not include any of the consequences we are unwilling to face.

At the same time there are people all around us, they are suffering because of this poisonous water in which we all live, their lives are ruled by the poison, and it dictates even the smallest aspects of their lives. We want to do something about it. We don’t want them to be dying, we don’t want them to be suffering from the injustices we see them experiencing. But we feel unable to move, unable to act, unable to make their lives better. We don’t know what to do.

God speaks to us, though the words of the prophet here in this passage. God sees their struggle, God sees our struggle and God says there will be justice, there will be wholeness, slavery will cease, the hungry will be fed, there will be healing, (dare I say there will be a vaccine which will release us), and all will be set right.

Whenever we see wrongs being set right, wherever we see the hungry being fed, whenever an un-homed person finds a home, whenever, wherever things that were once broken are made whole, whenever someone finds healing and whose health is restored, that is God at work bringing this passage to its completion. Whenever we see justice being done, people being made whole, broken systems being overthrown, that is our God bringing about salvation, not just for you and me, but for the world.

We can rejoice. We can proclaim this passages in the public spaces, we can sing, with Mary, we can cry out with Isaiah, God is at work to “bringing good news to the oppressed, to bind the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners;. . . [and] to comfort all who mourn.” 

We can rejoice with God and all those who belong to God and say, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my whole being shall exult in my God; for God has clothed me with the garments of salvation, God has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations.”

When we acknowledge God’s salvific work in this world we can know that that salvation wherever it is, whoever is experiencing its’ benefits, we can know it is on not simply on their behalf, the one who is receiving the immediate benefits, but it is also our behalf. God’s work is always for me, for you, for us. God is at work bringing redemption, salvation to all the nations, before all the nations, but also for you and for me. So whenever we see justice, peace, hope, goodness, rightness, wholeness we can rejoice because THAT is God at working making our redemption, our salvation a reality in this world; for us and for all peoples.

Wholeness is coming, justice is coming. This is what we remember in Advent. Advent is a reminder that we once waited for salvation to come and now that that salvation has come, we are watching and waiting for salvation to be made complete. We are watching and waiting for redemption to come to fullness. We can see it at work. We can see the darkness around us parting, more and more. There is light, where ever there is light we can see it, breaking the darkness, transforming the darkness from a place of bleakness and to a place of hope.

And so we remember that we are waiting and we remember, this poison in which we live is not where we belong. The world where we belong, the place to which we belong is a place of wholeness and healing, of comfort and fullness, of salvation and justice. It is the place where Jesus is Lord and God is incarnate. One in which the glory of the Lord rings forth and is known from generation to generation And it is for this home for which we are waiting.  Redemption is coming, just as surely as we can see the dawn arriving as that darkness of the night fades, we can see God at work all around us bringing wholeness and justice to our lost and broken world. Let us rejoice with God, let us rejoice with those who are made whole and let us do whatever we can do to join God in God’s redemptive work all around. Let work out our salvation, God’s redemption for us, for our world. Let Advent be!

 

 

Where We Belong: Where the Wild Things are

 

Isaiah 40:1-11

There are times when I am on one of my yearly backpacking trips with Melissa when we come upon a box attached to a tree in the middle of the trail. A sign on the box will read. “Entering a ‘Wilderness Area’ please sign in before entering.” The box when opened will contain a logbook and a pencil, which is to be used to write your name there will be another box at the other side of the wilderness area which is used to sign out, so when the trail rangers come by to check on it, they can keep track of everyone who enters and leaves the wilderness area.

When on the trail, when we are near state or national parks, or even near roads with trail heads, we will often run into other hikers, mostly day hikers hiking to the top of a nearby mountain or a popular loop trail. Something which can be done in a few hours, so they can return home before evening. When we are in wilderness areas, we are certain to not run into other people. Perhaps, occasionally we will pass by someone else who has planned a two to three day trip covering this section of the trail, or a through hiker who is somewhere along their Appalachian trail journey, who have set aside 3-4 months of their lives to hike from Georgia to Maine. But mostly we are alone.

These wilderness areas, are quiet still places. The human influence is minimal. The wilderness is a place where truly the wild things are, and live and call their home. Along these sections of the trail we will often see deer or moose poop. In these wild places where the beauty of God’s creation surrounds us, when we are far from any town, road or trailhead, the only things around us are trees and wild life. And although when we are safe in our kitchens pouring over trail maps and trail books, we might think to ourselves, it might be neat to see some of the local wild life, the last thing we would want actually to do is to startle a deer, or a moose, or a bear, because we have been too quiet.

The wilderness is a wild place, where only wild things live. These are lonely and abandoned places. Visiting such places is aweing and a bit frightening. Losing the trail, wandering too far off of the path, coming up on an animal all of these are real dangers. They are places where humans really don’t “belong”; places which are truly unsafe for humans. When we enter wilderness places we do so carefully and cautiously.

The wilderness, which is a more literal translation for the word “desert,” used in the translation I read this morning, would have been a was similar kind of place as a wilderness would be for us, except the wilderness, the desert, for them, was an even wilder place, more lonely, more abandoned, and even less touched by human presence than almost any place we might find here in the US. The wilderness places, for them, were places without out water, without ready food, teaming with wild animals and any humans who managed to remain there were likely to be bandits and thieves. Wild places, full of wild things and were fraught with dangers. They were places to be avoided and when traveling anywhere all roads would take the long way around them and no traveler would dare to take a “short cut” through.

The people who are addressed in this passage are God’s people in exile. They had wandered away from the kind of lives God had called for them to live. They had not taken care of the widow, the orphan, or the foreigner. God had accused them of swindling one another with dishonest scales, for trampling the poor and the needy, as well as for abandoning God, worshipping other gods alongside God, as well as instead of God. God had instructed them to change their ways through the words of prophets. They had been chastised, they had been warned, but they heeded nothing and no one. And so, as they had been told would happen if they remained living as they were, they were taken away into the exile, where they lived for several generations. And it is to these people who are living so far from their home, from the land of their ancestors, from the place where they belong, which the words of this passage are addressed.

God calls to these people, living in exile, from across the wilderness, from across the barren and desolate places, to these people in exile, and calls them home. These are people who actually have no memory, except cultural memory of the place called home. But like any displaced people they long for a place they have never been. They know they do not belong where they are. We can only image how lost and abandoned they must have felt. Their parents had told them why they were here. God had abandoned them, had allowed them to be destroyed and taken away. As much as they had been taught to long for “home” they did not truly understand what home meant, what it was to actually belong somewhere.

It is to these lost, alone and abandoned people God spoke. “Comfort, Comfort, my people.” God says. Comfort them by telling them they are going home. God will bring them home. They will finally return to the place where they belong. And a voice calls out, “prepare the way!” Make a highway, build a road, plan a route, have it go straight through the desert, don’t let it divert this way or that, make it straight and smooth and even, make it the easiest road to travel which has ever been built. This is the road for my people. This is the road down which they will travel to take them to the promise land.

That is where God is taking them, out across the desert, through the wilderness to the land flowing with milk and honey. God is taking them to the land God had promised to their ancestors Abraham and Isaac. God has heard their cry and once again God is setting them free. God is rescuing them from the repressive rule of their captors. God will once again lead them across the vast wilderness to the land flowing with milk and honey, just has God had done before. But this time, in this second Exodus, God will lead them down out of Babylon and straight home. They will not take a long circuitous 40 year wandering. God will not even divert along the wildly traveled route going around the desert wilderness following the rivers and valleys, the along the “safe,” well-travelled way. God will make a wide, straight, highway, through the desert, across the wilderness, down which they will travel, a way which will take them home via the quickest route possible. God will lead them through the wilderness, watching and guarding them all along the way.

And then God lets them know these words of promise are not like anything else which springs up in this world. God’s words are not like the flowers or the grass, which all will wither and decay. When everything else passes away, God’s promise will stand. God will lead them home, upon this they can rest assured.

The final word they hear is a description of their God. “Here is your God,” the voice cries out. Your God is a shepherd, who will lift you up. Like a shepherd carrying the lambs, God will carry you. You will be held close to the bosom of God, and gently led. “Here is your God,” a loving shepherd carrying for the sheep, gently, kindly, leading you home, where you will be safe. Guiding you to the place where you belong.

In these days, when travel is discouraged, so many of us are perhaps longing for home, but even those of us who do not live far from the places we call home, we can find a deep longing for another time, another place when and where things were different than they are right now. It is December at the end of the year 2020 and we are living in a foreign world, from the one we entered at the beginning of this last year. This is a world where we all wear masks, unless we are inside our own houses. This is a world where there is no singing in our worship services, no handshakes or hugs or the caring touch on our shoulder when we need to be comforted.  Our sanctuaries are unrecognizable with pews taped off and signs telling which direction we must go. And some of us continue to be unable to be here in person and you “watch” church from your living rooms. If you were able to make a recording of even simple visit to the grocery store and send it to your January self, your January self would not believe that it was a recording from life in just a few months’ time. We live in a foreign land; a land of COVID and social distancing. And I don’t know about each of you, but I long to go home, to go back to the place where I belong, back to a world which makes sense and felt so much safer than the world does today.

Although this passage is addressed to the people of God living in exile in Babylon, we too can listen and hear the words of God, as if they were for us. “Comfort, comfort my people.” God will bring us comfort. God is with us in this place, where we are, at this time, even with all that is going on. God has heard our cries. God will make a way for us. A highway which will take us home, a safe way, a straight way and God will lead us down that way. God will bring us Home. God will bring us to the place where we belong.

I don’t know about you all, but I need to hear these words this morning. I need to hear words of comfort from God this morning. It brings me peace to hear and to say, “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.” God will speak tenderly to us this morning and remind us where it is we belong. As God promises a road home, a road back to a more familiar world, a safer world, we can know this is a promise which God is making for us today, just as God made it to those people in their exile so long ago. God will make a way for us too.  God will bring us out of this COVID exile. The place to which we are going may not look like the place we remember from last January, but it will be a better place, a place where God will be our comfort, to which God will lead us, a place where God will care for us and guide us like a shepherd does the sheep.

As we look around at our world in chaos, as we see the fear and confusion in which our nation currently finds itself we can find our rest, our comfort, our peace in God. We will not live here forever. And we know that “Here” was never really home. Even as God promises to lead us out of this troubling time we find ourselves in, we can also know the home to which God ultimately leads is a greater home, a better home. A world where God’s will is done, where God reigns and God’s peace is known throughout the earth. One day we will be home again. Here in our place of exile we can hear the words of the Lord to us this morning. Because the Lord is our shepherd, God will hold us close, will take care of us and will bring us home again. And now in this season of Advent waiting we are reminded even as we are waiting for a vaccine, for a better world, a more stable world, we are really waiting for something which this world cannot provide, the peace we will know when Christ returns and where we will truly and finally be where we belong. We can rest in the peace of God’s promise this morning to bring us comfort, to make a way for us and to finally bring us home.

Where We Belong: The End of the World as We Know It - A Homecoming

 

Mark 13:24-37

We have just come off of what was probably not the Thanksgiving we would have chosen or the one many of us would have wanted. Now we begin to look toward Christmas which will pretty much be the same.  I am sure we all had lovely thanksgiving dinners and enjoyed the ones with whom we were able to spend it. For many the day did not include as many as we would have like. There were vacancies at our tables, some because we had not been able to join those with whom we usually celebrate this meal, some because they were unable to join us, and others were simply vacant because those seats will never be filled again. Not the Thanksgiving we would have hoped for. Not the Thanksgiving we would have wanted.  

We are in the between times. Our national and cultural calendar keeping tells us we are in those strange days which fall between Thanksgiving and Christmas. This is a season when we focus on family. It is the time of the year when so many of us take the journey home. If we manage to make it “home” once a year this is the preferred time to do so. These are “home” going days, when we go to the places and to the people where there are those who joyously wait our “home comings”. This is the season of our year when we traditionally travel the places where we belong, home to “our people.” Not this year. This year we are staying put. Our celebrations this past week were smaller and for some lonelier and we can expect pretty much the same for Christmas as well.

In this year when we cannot “go home” when we are unable to take that annual pilgrimage to the places where belong, we once again as the Church enter into the Advent season.  The Advent, as well as the Christmas seasons are seasons of homecoming, not only in the culture around us, but for us as Christians as well.

In Advent and Christmas we remember that God came and found a home among us, becoming flesh and dwelt with us for a time. As we look toward the manger and the tiny Messiah it holds, we are once again reminded that Christ’s dwelling places are not always the place where we would expect to find the God of the universe. So many times when we are looking for Jesus we look for him in the sanctuaries and cathedrals we have built for him. We search for him in abbeys and monasteries among the men and woman who have given their lives over to worship and prayer. Yet when Chris dwelt among us he came to us in a manger, and slept in stable room among the animals. He grew up among the meek and the lowly. He made his ministry among the outcasts and the sinners, for which he was commonly ridiculed. And when he went into the sanctuaries and holy places of his day, he was not well received and was often cast out. So as we move into this Advent season this year, I ask the question, where do we belong?

The passage with which we are faced this morning does not seem to be very homey. Yet it is a homecoming passage, in which we contemplate Christ’s return. At the beginning of the passage Jesus is using language and imagery which would have been familiar to his listeners, as it was the same as that used by the prophets when they spoke of the great and terrible day of the Lord. “In those days,” are the word the prophets used to describe the days when the messiah would come. They are the words Jesus uses here to describe the coming of the “Son of Man” that is his own second coming.

The great and terrible day of the Lord, the coming of the Messiah is the time when God promised to right all which had gone so terribly wrong. Evil doers would be punished. Those who swindled the poor, who did not seek to help the orphan and the widow, who bought and sold with dishonest scales, who mistreated those around them and hoarded up wealth for themselves at the expense of neighbor, stranger and kin alike, would get what the truly deserved. Justice would finally be found throughout the land.  A terrible day for all these; a great day for those who love and for all those being misused and abused; for those who serve the Lord. It is the ultimate homecoming. It will be the day on which all those who love God will be where they truly belong.

The passage begins with the darkening of the sun and moon and the falling of the stars. Often when we read this passage and those like it, we want to look to this paragraph to give us clues, to serve as a road map or to be an alarm clock which will go off to warn us when Jesus is coming. But, as Christ reminds us here, “No one knows the day or the hour, neither the angels in heaven or himself, only the Father knows when all this will come to be.

What Jesus is describing here is the entire created order losing all “order”. The heavens break open, the cycle of days and seasons fall into disarray. All that makes and measure time ceases as we enter into a new “season” which will no longer be marked by day and night, or the phases of the moon or the positioning of the stars. When the heavens break open and eternity invades finitude, everything is affected and time itself unravels. What Jesus is giving us here are not billboards on the highway letting us know that the next rest stop or gas station will be in three miles, so that we can prepare to get over now. What Jesus is letting us know is that when eternity breaks into our world, all the ways we know to mark the days and the season, to mark time, will no longer matter.

Why do we need warning signs for when Jesus is returning, anyway?  What is it we are hoping for? Would a billboard telling us when Christ will return really change who we are, what we are doing, how we are living? If we knew Jesus was returning in May of 2020 would we work harder, to be the holy people we are called to be? If we knew He would return before the end of the year, would we pray more and longer? What would we do differently with our lives, with our faith? Why would knowing Christ’s immanent return change these things?  

The message Jesus is seeking to convey is not for us to look for the signs so we can hurry up and be ready for his return. The message here can be found in the idea which is repeated several times throughout this passage, that is, “Keep alert;" "keep awake.”

In the parable we are those to whom the master has entrusted with the care and keeping of the estate until his return. As we wait for his return are we doing our best, working to further the kingdom, living lives which are reflecting the love of God and neighbor we saw lived out in the life of Jesus Christ and to which he called us through his teachings? We are the workers managing the estate until the master’s return. As we do so we are to continually be working, doing our best to “hold down the fort” so to speak, until his return, so that we are always awake, always ready for his arrival.

We are not to be like teenagers from TV show and movies, who upon finding themselves home alone for the weekend throw a huge party, only have their parents return earlier than expected and have to hurriedly put everything back in order before they arrive. Instead we are to always be ready for Christ’s return, whether he comes today or 2,000 years from now. We cannot go through our lives expecting to have a warning, so we can hurriedly get ourselves and our lives in order.

We are to live in hope, in expectation, always ready for Christ to return, desiring and longing for the moment when all things will be set right. Yet working and living to make right what we can while we have the time. We are to live into and work for the good, the justice which will be made complete, made full when Christ returns. Each day is to be lived seeking to make God’s will, God’s justice, righteousness, goodness and love a reality in the here and now, all the while hoping for the time when it will all be made manifest with the return of Christ.

Advent is the season when we remember the moment when God came into the world and made a home among us. We remember that Jesus, for a time, belonged with us and continues seek our belonging in him and with him. Right now we are reminded what it is like to be longing for home. In this time when we cannot be where we want to be, we long for the places where we belong. Yet, as Christians we know we will never truly find home, this side of eternity, outside of the home we will make with God in Christ.

In this Advent season of waiting, we are also reminded we continue to wait for Christ’s return, for Jesus to come “home.” We wait for a time when we will come together for the greatest “homecoming” feast the world has ever seen, one in which there will be no vacant seats. We wait for the time when we will all come home, because Christ has finally returned and we can all be home together for eternity. And while we wait, let us not wait like those who are looking for early warning signs, so we can hurry up and get our act together, but let us be alert, and always be ready, living today as if Christ will come today, yet also living prepared to continue to wait. All the while we are waiting, let us wait in hope and not in despair, not waiting for Christ for all things to be set right, but let us work to make things right, to be agents of justice, love and peace as we wait.  

 

Meeting Christ - 1 Thessalonians 4:13-28

 

1 Thessalonians 4:13-18

The saying goes, “There are only two things in life which are certain, death and taxes.” Both seem to be inevitable parts of human existence. Apparently there are ways certain people are able to avoid taxes, but for the average working person, they are pretty much unavoidable. Death is something else entirely. It comes when it comes and anyone who has lived for any length of time on this earth has had to deal with. And the longer I live and the more I experience the death of those around me and most especially those whom I love, I am more and more convinced God did not create the humans to experience death, and the pain, the emptiness, the hurt and loss which death leaves in its wake. If we were truly born to die, the human psyche would have evolved to better deal with it. But we have not, therefore in my mind, it cannot have been an intended part of creation. It is an unwanted intrusion; Death is an uninvited house guest whose presence is harmful all who are living and he disrupts the created order, by creating gaping hole in the interior of our lives where there once a living breathing being who was cherished and loved.

Whenever we come face to face with the death of someone close to us, we ask questions. What has happened to them? Where are they now? What is actually going on with them?  How are they experiencing this separation? Are they conscious, aware of what is going on here on earth? Are they now outside observers, watching everything that is going on from a distance? Can they see us? Do they know how much their death is hurting us? Will we really ever see them again?

Paul speaks into these questions, so that we will “not remain uninformed” and so that we do not grieve “without hope”. There are so many ways to misunderstand this passage. We will begin with this second statement, so that none of us will be misinformed. Paul is not telling us that we are not to mourn, experience grief when we lose someone to death. Grief is a part of what it means to live in a world so full of death. Death cuts us to the core. It halts us as we journey through life, and disrupts our lives in ways which bring turmoil to our wellbeing and which hurt us in ways which we could never have expected before having experienced it. And each new death is a new kind of pain and a new kind of hurt. It is an experience of which we never grow accustomed, no matter how many times it occurs throughout our lifetime and with it comes a hurt which does not grow numb the more often we feel it.

Paul instead tells us that we are not to mourn, “without hope.” And then as the passage continues, he explains, to us, why we have hope and what it is for which we are hoping. But hope, does not push away the pain, nor does it negate our need to grieve and mourn the death of each and every one we lose.

I can remember talking to my Dad one cold winter day, after we had recently buried one his brothers. He told me he knew it was silly but what bothered him most, at that moment, was that his brother was out there in the cold. You see his brother always hated to be cold, and now he was out there on that bitter winter night, and Dad felt, he had to be so cold and there was nothing Dad could do about it.

Death hurts us and affects us in ways we would never have thought. We begin to think things and ask questions of ourselves and of God, which we perhaps would not ask at other times. At others times, the very questions which plague us the most in the midst of our grief,  are questions we think we know the answer to, or might think too silly to ask. But there in the moment of grief we ask them and the answers no longer seem so certain. This was just as true when Paul wrote this letter to the Christians in Thessalonica, as it is today.  It seems following the death of some among them, the Christians had some questions and concerns about their fellow believers who had died and what would happen to them when Christ returned.

As we continue to worship with our remembrance tree here before us, as its presence continues to serve as a reminder to us of those in Christ who have gone on before us,  Paul’s words can be seen as fairly apropos. As we think about these who have died, Paul does not want us to be uninformed about them, and what will happen to them. Paul wants to set straight any misconceptions, or any concerns we might have about whether being dead will put their loved ones at any sort of disadvantage when Christ finally returns.

The Christians of the church of Thessalonica did not know what to think when it came to those among them who had died. Their concern was for those they loved, what would happened to them when Christ eventually returned? For these Christians the community of believers was everything. They were the body of Christ and parts of Christ’s body had died and were no longer a part of the body.  What did this mean? They wanted to be assured not only of the hope of the resurrection, but needed to also be assured in a restoration of community, that they as the body of Christ would be whole again.

Paul tells them, Christ’s coming would not parse the living from the dead. The dead in Christ would rise (just as Christ had) and they would be united with their loved ones. Then together, they would be united with Christ. The resurrection was assured and “needing” to be resurrected was not a failing or something which would put a person somewhere else, or in a different place, somewhere away from those who had remained alive. At the time of Christ’s return, the living and the dead would be alive and united. Paul assures believers, those who are alive will have no advantage over those who had died, and thusly those who had died would not be at a disadvantage because they had died.

Paul then goes on to describe the second coming of Christ with imagery which has capture the imaginations of Christians through the ages and most recently, in the last 100 years or so, the imaginations of many have simply run away with the scripture, (some might even say “away from” the true meaning of the scripture). There are several books, as well as movies which depict this event with Christians mysteriously disappearing leaving clothing, leaving cars, planes and various other vehicles to become driverless means of destruction. Loved ones are secreted away and are simply gone. And all those who are left are shocked and dismayed. I think the song, “I wish we’d all been ready” from that great 70’s classic “A Thief the Night” will forever play in my head when I think of scenarios such as this.

I am not sure about you but I have never found this kind of imagery comforting or encouraging. Yet Paul lays out this passage for us and then says, “Therefore encourage one another with these words.” How can disappearing people, the world in chaos and all that is depicted in the dramatic presentations of the events of this passage be described as “encouraging?” Is it really “encouraging” that we will be caught up in the clouds and will meet our savior in the air. Even at its most benign (when you take away the empty clothes sitting on the couch and a daughter’s night dress all that remains in her bed), what about this passage is a believer supposed to find encouraging?

All these dramatic depictions can be summed up in the English word “rapture,” which you might notice is not actually found in text that I read this morning.  The word rapture does come is from the Latin word, “rapio,” which is used in this passage in the Latin translation of the text (Latin being one of the earliest translations of the Bible and was commonly used by those studying scripture until surprisingly recently).  The Latin word “rapio” literally means, “to take away.” And many take this to mean that the living and the dead will be secreted away to be with Christ for eternity. In the original Greek the word here is, “harpazō” also carries a similar idea of being, “taken away”.  Although the meaning of, “harpazō” when used in conjunction with “apantēsis,” which here is translated “meeting,” takes on a new meaning, altogether. The two words together are the words most often used to describe the way a group of people goes out from a city to go meet an honored dignitary.

When a dignitary came to town, or a hero returned after being away, some would go out of the town and meet him a ways out from the city and lead him into the city in a sort of procession, or parade. This is what the crowds were doing at Jesus’ triumphal entry. They went out to meet him and returned with him, singing and shouting and giving him the praise one would give a honored dignitary or conquering hero. It is because of this kind of historical understanding of the procession we conclude that those greeting Jesus that day believed Jesus was coming into to Jerusalem as a conquering hero who would finally throw off their Roman oppressors. But not only do we find this imagery in the Bible at Jesus’ triumphal entry but we also find this imagery and this exact language in the Matthew passage which was read this morning.

Culturally, at this time, it was traditional, following the engagement, for the bride to be to return to her own home and wait there. The groom would return to his home to set upon the task of either building a house, or an addition to his parents’ home, in which he and his new bride could live. Once the home was finished he would go to his bride’s home (usually this was done in the middle of the night for some reason) and bring her to his home, where they would be wed and a huge wedding feast would ensue.  The bridesmaids here are waiting for the groom to come, so that when he comes they can go out to him, escort him to his bride and then they all can return to his home. The words to describe the bridesmaids going out to meet the bridegroom and escort him to his home are the same words used here in 1 Thessalonians.

The bridesmaids are awaiting the return of the bridegroom and they need to be ready. When he does arrive, they trim the wicks on their lamps and go to light them so they can provide light to the bridegroom. Unfortunately some of them do not have enough oil and are forced to go looking for oil in the middle of the night. Once they are able to procure the oil it is too late, the bridegroom has come and gone and the doors to the banquet are closed. They are not recognized as members of the bridal party because they were not there at the time of the groom’s arrival. These bridesmaids are called foolish and are left outside in the night.

Thessalonian Christians are working to be the believers they know they are called to be. They are ready. Their wicks are trimmed and their lamps are full. The light of Christ is burning brightly in their lives. They are prepared for Christ’s return, but they have one concern, some of them have fallen asleep (which is the metaphor actually used here in the Greek). They are sleeping the sleep from which they cannot be awakened.  What does the return of the Bridegroom mean for them? Are they the foolish bridesmaids? Are these who have had the misfortune to have died the bridesmaids who are unable to get their lamps lit in time?

Paul says emphatically, “No, those who have died in Christ are not the foolish bridesmaids.” Those alive will not precede those who have died. Those who have died will rise first and then together, with all your lamps lit and shining bright you will go to greet the bridegroom and usher him back. Together you will rejoice. It will be like the triumphal entry all over again. But this time Christ will be returning and will remain and you will ALL be with the Lord, together forever! Never to be separated again.  And as our text told us last week, every tear will be wiped from your eyes. The sting and the pain of death will be removed. All will be resurrected and all those who believe will live eternally together with the Lord! Thanks be to God!

In this passage Paul is depicting a joining of Heaven and Earth. Christ will come down, Heaven will come with him and we will go up to meet him, a symbolic gesture showing that all Earth will escort him, in his return. Heaven descends, Earth ascends and they will come together. Earth and Heaven will be reunited in way they have not been since the fall.

Paul here is clearly describing a bodily resurrection. He is telling us that in the resurrection we will all be resurrected as Christ was resurrected. We will be restored to our bodies. At Christ’s return, we will not be disembodied spirits, floating up into the clouds to greet a Spirit Christ. No we will be fully resurrected persons, who greet a fully embodied Savior who is returning just as he was when he left, in his resurrected body.  And together fully alive in ways which are sometimes hard to comprehend, we will live eternally in a new Heaven and a new Earth which are united and inseparable. It will be a new Eden in which there is no death and in which life is abundant and eternal.

And it is with these words, with this imagery, with this promise Paul tells us we are to comfort one another.

 

Manna for Today: Psalm 63

 

Psalm 63:1-11

Key Verse: 63:1-2

“God! My God! It’s you—I search for you! My whole being thirsts for you! My body desires you in a dry and tired land, no water anywhere.” CEB

 When was the last time you were truly desperate for the things of God? When you woke up this morning were you longing to spend time in prayer. Do you thirst to hear the voice of God speak into your life. When you do come to your quiet time with God do you walk away satisfied as you might following a hearty meal? Does the voice of God speaking into your life quench something deep within you? When fostering a dependence on God, pulling away from time spent in the presence of God should feel like fasting. Listening to God, hearing God’s voice, immersing oneself in the presence of God is not an accessory to life, something from which a believe can easily opt out of. These are the food and water in the life of a believer. Skipping out on scripture reading, prayer, talking and listening to God is like skipping meals. You can skip one but doing so for any length of time results in starvation and eventually death. Partake of God as you partake of food and water, do so daily. We come to the feast that is the presence of God, because a good meal is enjoyable does bring pleasure and joy, but also because God’s presence is the nourishment which gives life and sustains us from day to day.

 

Things to Think on

 What would it mean for your to truly hunger and thirst for the presence of God?

How easy is it for you to skip spending time with God on any given day?

Does skipping your prayer time, your scripture reading time, your quiet time listening to God affect your day at all?

How does it affect your life when you skip this time regularly?

What does it mean for God’s presence to be a hearty meal, a feast full of rich food?

A Prayer for Today

Lord, I want to hunger and thirst for you. I want to find that when I avoid you, I am parched, I am empty inside. Let me long for you. You are the food which feeds my spiritual being. You fill me with all that I need. With you I am satisfied. When I am away from you leave me empty, allow me to feel the hunger pains as one who is not eating. Let me come to you not just once a day but throughout the day, as I do for nourishment. Let me find the sustenance I need to make it through each day in you. You are my God and in you alone will I rely.  – Amen