"The Light of the World" (Christmas Eve Sermon)

This year, in Advent and Christmas, we are doing things a little bit differently - instead of a more traditional "sermon," each week our reflection is going to take the form of story-telling, told from the perspective of someone who was waiting for Jesus.

 

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

December 24, 2021 – Christmas Eve

Scripture:  Luke 2:1-20

 

 

I’m an old woman now, but I still remember that night, so many years ago.

 

I’m an old woman now, but I was a young girl when that angel appeared to me and told me that God-whose-name-is-holy had chosen me to carry and birth God’s son.

 

I’ve always loved being in the presence of God-whose-name-is-holy. Even when I was a child, I loved going to the synagogue with my mother, and leaning up against her as our elders and rabbis told stories about how God created the heavens and the earth, as they told stories about how much God loves people, as they told stories about how God has been with us always, as they taught us that we are to love God with our whole heart and soul and might, as they taught us that we are to love our neighbours as ourselves.

 

But I also loved being in the presence of God-whose-name-is-holy when I was out in God’s creation – out in the fields and on the hills and beside the big lake.  When I was a very little girl, I used to go out with my aunties and cousins; and even when I was a bit older and my mother needed my help around the house, I used to find a way to slip away from her.  I always felt closest to God when the water was lapping at my feet, the sun was shining down on me, and the scent of flowers was carried on the wind.

 

That day when the angel appeared, I was out there on the hills.  I didn’t know how much longer I was going to be able to escape outside – my parents and Joseph’s parents had arranged for us to be married, and soon I was going to have a house and a family of my own to tend to.

 

But there I was, bare feet on the grass and the wind bowing in my hair, when suddenly an angel stood in front of me.  You know, no matter how many times I’ve tried, I can’t quite remember what that angel looked like.  What I do remember was how I felt.  I felt scared because I knew that this wasn’t a part of the world I could see and touch, but at the same time I felt awe and wonder, and I knew that whoever this being was, they loved me.  Love just radiated out from them.

 

The angel spoke to me.  The rabbis at the synagogue told me that it must have been the angel Gabriel, God’s messenger.  Gabriel spoke and told me not to be afraid.  And Gabriel told me that God loved so so very deeply.  And Gabriel told me that God had chosen me to carry and give birth to God’s son, if only I would agree to do so.

 

You can only imagine what I was feeling in that moment.  No matter what he said, I was still a bit afraid of Gabriel, but it was more like the awe that you feel in front of something that you don’t quite understand, but that you know is holy.  I was also afraid of my parents and Joseph – what were they going to say?  But I also knew that God loved me, and that God has always protected God’s people.  I was ready to do what God asked me to do.  And so I said to that angel, “Here am I, the servant of God-whose-name-is-holy. Let it be with me according to your word.”

 

From that beautiful moment on the hillside, I had to go tell my parents, then they had to tell Joseph’s parents.  At first, they were going to break our engagement, and I started to ponder raising this child alone, and how I was going to have to love this baby enough for two parents.  But then all of a sudden the engagement was back on again.  Joseph told me later that an angel had appeared to him too, and told him that he had been chosen to be the father of the son of God-whose-name-is-holy.

 

I felt safer after that, knowing that I was going to be married to a person who also loved and respected God-whose-name-is-holy.

 

The months passed, and my belly grew bigger.  I felt the baby start to move inside me.  I sang the baby inside me the same songs that my mother had sung to me.  I told the baby inside me the same stories about God that I had heard in the synagogue.  That baby was loved for many moons before he was born.

 

Then, just when I thought that my belly couldn’t possibly stretch any bigger, we had to make a journey from Nazareth where we lived to Bethlehem.  There was to be a census – a counting of the people – I don’t know why we had to be counted, since we are all known to God-whose-name-is-holy, and surely that is the only perspective that really matters.  But because Joseph was descended from King David, who was descended from Judah, son of Jacob, we had to travel from Galilee south to the land of Judah, to the city of Bethlehem in order to be counted.

 

It was a long journey of many days; and when we got there, the town was so busy with so many people who had traveled from so many different places to be counted.  We finally found a place to sleep, and it was the place where the animals also sleep.  There were so many people coming and going, but this place, surrounded by donkeys and cows – it was like an oasis of peace.

 

And then there, in that strange city in a dark night, it as time for my baby to be born.  There was a sudden pain, and the waters that my mother told me about came, and Joseph went out to fetch a midwife.  Then there was more pain… so much pain… but then it was over.  And there was a little scrap of a baby, shrieking his lungs out at the shock of the air.  I know that your songs like to say, “The Little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes,” but believe you me, he was every bit of a real baby who cried, and who needed to be nursed, and who wet his nappies.

 

But at the same time, there was also something… I can’t quite put my finger on it… but somehow that night had shifted.  It was almost as if a light beam had broken through the ceiling, even though I know that was impossible.  But somehow, I knew that everything in the world had changed in that moment.  The light of my world had been born… the light of the whole world had been born.

 

And as I looked into the eyes of my baby – into the eyes of God-whose-name-is-holy – my heart broke open, and I fell even more in love with him than I ever thought was possible.

 

 

“Lumen Christi”

Eustaquio Santimano

From the Church of St. Mary of the Angels in Singapore

Used with permission.

"The Light of Love" (sermon)

This year, in Advent and Christmas, we are doing things a little bit differently - instead of a more traditional "sermon," each week our reflection is going to take the form of story-telling, told from the perspective of someone who was waiting for Jesus.

 

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Sunday December 19, 2021 – 4^th Sunday of Advent

Scripture Reading:  Matthew 1:18-25

 

 

I have always been a dreamer.  Even though I can trace my family tree back to Judah, the son of Jacob, everyone always told me that I was more like Judah’s brother Joseph – the dreamer.  I was named after that Joseph… maybe there is something to be said for the power of a name!

 

I have always been a dreamer.  I spend my days working as a carpenter – working with my hands on the stones and the wood – but even as my hands work, my imagination wanders far away from the place where my hands were working.

 

I dream of many things as I work.

 

I imagine the stories of our ancestors, as if they were really happening – the story of Joseph, my namesake, and how he ended up as a slave in Egypt who rose to power, and the story of how he rescued Judah, my ancestor, and the rest of their family when a time of famine came.

 

I dream of the story of Moses, and how Moses encountered God-whose-name-is-holy in the middle of the desert, speaking to him out of a burning bush, and how God-whose-name-is-holy told Moses to take off his shoes since he was standing on holy ground, and how God-whose-name-is-holy told Moses that he would be the one to deliver the people from slavery.

 

I also dream of more practical things too.  I used to dream about how some day I would have a family of my own, and how I would love them, and how I would provide from them by the work of my hands.

 

And then one day, that dream seemed to be coming true.  My parents came to me, and told me that they had made arrangements with Mary’s parents, and that Mary and I were going to be married.

 

I didn’t know Mary very well, but I knew who she was.  I had seen her at the synagogue, listening carefully to the rabbi tell stories.  I had seen her slipping away from her mother to wander across the fields.  I suspected that she might be a bit of a dreamer, just like me, and I trusted our parents when they said that they thought that we would be a good match. And so I agreed to the engagement.

 

But it was only a few weeks after that, when Mary’s parents came to my parents with the news.  Somehow Mary had fallen pregnant.  We hadn’t even had a chance to be alone together, so I knew that the baby couldn’t be mine.  She had told them some story about how an angel told her that it was God’s child, but we all knew that she tended to wander the hillside alone, so who knows what had befallen her on one of those wanderings.

 

My parents and I agreed that it was best to end the engagement.  We didn’t want to entangle our family with a family like that.

 

But I told you that I’m a dreamer, didn’t I?  Most nights, I dream ordinary dreams just like you or anyone else.  But occasionally – very occasionally – I have a dream that I know is different.  These dreams feel more real than the real world around me.

 

And just a few nights after we got the news about Mary, I had one of those dreams.  In that dream, an angel appeared to me, but I can’t describe for you what the angel looked like. I couldn’t see the angel because my eyes were completely dazzled by the light that surrounded the angel.  But I heard the angel say to me that we weren’t to break the engagement.   I was to take Mary as my wife, and raise the child that she was going to birth as if he was my own son.  I had been chosen the be the father of the son of God-whose-name-is-holy.

 

When I woke from that dream, I knew what I had to do.  I was being called to care for Mary, so that she could do what God-whose-name-is-holy was calling her to do.  It was hard to convince my parents – they don’t understand my dreams – but in the end they saw that I wasn’t going to be swayed.

 

Over the months that followed, Mary and I got to know each other better.  She started spending her days in my workshop watching me work with the wood and the stone, and when she went away to visit her kinswoman Elizabeth, I was surprised at how much I missed her.  The duty that the angel had given me to love and care for her had started to become something deeper.

 

The months passed, and then we had to travel to Bethlehem for the census.  I didn’t know how Mary was going to make it, with her belly grown so large, but she is so much stronger than she might appear.  And there, on that dark night, the baby came.

 

I can’t describe how I felt.  I went running to fetch a midwife, and it took me longer than I could have imagined, in that unfamiliar city.  As I heard Mary’s cries, I fully realized how much I had come to love her, and I didn’t know what I would do if I lost her.  There was so much crying, and so much blood, but then it was all over.

 

Mary was safe, and the baby was safe.  The midwife cleaned him off, and Mary nursed him, and he fell asleep.

 

Later, that dark night, when the baby began to fuss, I got up to fetch him from the manger where he was lying and bring him to Mary.

 

And when I bent over and looked into his eyes, there in the darkened room, I saw that same dazzling light that had surrounded the angel there in the eyes of that baby.  And I knew that I would do anything I could to protect him forever and ever.

 

 

(I tried really hard to find the creator of this image, without success.

I love how it portrays the reality of the exhaustion that this new family

must have felt that night. Thank you, anonymous creator!

And if anyone knows who the creator is, please let me know in the

comments so that I can credit them.)

"Stepping Out Into Joy" (sermon)

This year, in Advent and Christmas, we are doing things a little bit differently - instead of a more traditional "sermon," each week our reflection is going to take the form of story-telling, told from the perspective of someone who was waiting for Jesus.

 

 

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Sunday December 12, 2021 – 4^th Sunday of Advent

Scripture Reading:  Luke 1:5-25, 39-45

 

 

For so many years, it felt like I was living my life in a deep cave.

 

It wasn’t always that way.  My parents named me Elizabeth which means “God is my oath.”  They knew that I belonged to God-whose-name-is-Holy, and they taught me right from when I was little that God-whose-name-is-Holy loved me.

 

I remember when I was a young girl – that seems like a lifetime ago – I used to dance and sing rather than walking and talking.  My feet always felt like they were flying, as they tried to keep up with my heart.

 

Because my parents knew that I belonged to God-whose-name-is-Holy, when it was time for me to be married, they arranged a marriage with Zechariah, one of the priests who served at the temple.  I still remember that first day when we met… marriages are a solemn affair, and so I was keeping my eyes turned down as is proper, but at one point I dared to look up and our eyes met from across the room.  Even though his face stayed still, there was a sparkle in his eye that told me that his heart was the sort of heart that could dance and sing too.

 

It was a good marriage.  We respected each other and we enjoyed being in each other’s company.  But with each month, with each year that passed and we weren’t blessed with children, it became harder and harder.  My feet didn’t dance any more.  My voice didn’t sing any more.  And worst of all, my heart stopped dancing and singing too.

 

We sought out healers – the sort of healers that women in every village know how to find.  They all suggested different things we could try – different teas we could brew and drink, different amulets we could place under our bed.  But none of them worked.  And with each failed attempt, it felt like I was being dragged further and further into that dark cave.  It felt like I was being buried even though I was still alive.

 

The years passed, until I was long past the age when I could expect to begin a family.  I was existing, but I wasn’t really living.

 

But then the day came… it was one of our high holy days, and Zechariah was away serving in the temple in Jerusalem.  He told me about what happened later – I wasn’t there to witness it, and as you’ll hear, he wasn’t able to tell me about it right away.

 

Zechariah was serving in the temple, and when he entered the Holy of Holies, the angel Gabriel was there.  The angel told Zechariah that our prayers had finally been answered, and that we were going to have our child at last.  It was going to be a son, and we were to name him John, and he was going to have the power of Elijah, the power of the prophets in our history, and he was going to prepare the way of the Lord.

 

Zechariah is a practical man, and he knows how old I am, and so he didn’t believe what the angel told him, and because of his disbelief, the angel took away his voice.  For ten months, he wasn’t able to say a single word.

 

When he came home, he tried to explain to me, without words, what had happened, but I didn’t believe the angel either.  And when my body first started showing signs of the baby I was carrying, I didn’t believe my body either.  You know how it is with women when we reach a certain age… we can’t trust anything that our bodies tell us.  My monthly bleeding had long ago become unpredictable, and my size and shape was shifting as I moved into old age.  I was more likely to be dying at my age, than to be carrying a child.

 

And I was prepared to die.  I had spent so many years living with a heavy heart in the darkness, that death felt like it would be a release.

 

But then the day came when my young kinswoman Mary came to visit me.  Here we were, two women, one too old and too barren to be carrying a child, and the other too young and too unmarried to be carrying a child.  And yet here we were.

 

And as she entered my room, I felt the baby I carried within me give a kick.  I felt the baby give a leap of joy.  And finally, it felt like there might actually be a new life growing inside of me.

 

And with that kick, my song returned to me.  I sang out to Mary, “blessed are you among women, an blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me?  For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy.  And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

 

And as I sang, and as Mary joined in with my song, it felt as though I was leaving my cave at last and stepping out into the bright sunlight.  It felt as though my heart and my voice and my feet could sing and dance again.

 

And when the time came, our baby was born, and we named him John, and he did indeed live a life that was focused on pointing people towards God-whose-name-is-Holy, and for preparing the way of his younger cousin, Mary’s boy.

 

And for as long as we will live, Zechariah and I will continue to sing of the dawn that breaks upon us, and gives light to everyone who sits in sorrow and shadows.

 

 

“Visitation”

From the Church of St. Elizageth / San Isabel (El Sitio, El Salvador)

Photograph by John Donaghy

Used with Permission

"Re-born to a New Way" (Sermon)

This year, in Advent and Christmas, we are doing things a little bit differently - instead of a more traditional "sermon," each week our reflection is going to take the form of story-telling, told from the perspective of someone who was waiting for Jesus.

 

 

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Sunday December 5, 2021 – Second Sunday of Advent

Scripture Reading – Luke 3:1-18

 

My name is Deborah bat Ya’akov.  Don’t go looking for me in that book that you read from every week – you’re not going to find me in its pages.  But I was there.  I was there by the River Jordan.  I met this man, this John that you read about.  I listened to what he had to say, and I was baptized by him, right there in the river.

 

My family lived in Jerusalem, the biggest city that I have ever seen.  But even there in the city, we had heard about John.  We heard that crowds of people were going out to listen to him.  We heard that he was saying amazing things.  It has been so many years since God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy had sent a prophet to our people, we thought that maybe John might finally be the one.

 

And so we decided that we too would make the journey from Jerusalem to hear him for ourselves.  My parents and my two younger brothers and I prepared for the journey and we set out.  From Jerusalem we headed north and east to Jericho, and then from Jericho we continued east until we reached the river where John was preaching.  It seemed like half of the city of Jerusalem was heading to the river to hear John speak!  All along the way, we kept meeting families we know.

 

It took us a couple of days to reach the river – with my younger brothers, we couldn’t travel too quickly.  But when we got to the river, it wasn’t hard to find John, because there were crowds of people around him.  But there was John, standing up to his waist in the river, with the sunlight sparkling off the ripples and waves that surrounded him.

 

But whenever John started to speak, it was easy to hear him because people quieted right down.  My first thought when I saw him was that he was Elijah, one of our prophets from hundreds of years ago.  The scroll of Kings that is read in the synagogues and in the temple tells us that Elijah wore clothes made of hair and had a leather belt around his waist; and here was John wearing clothes made of camel hair with a leather belt around his waist.

 

I started to wonder if this John person was really Elijah, returned to earth.  After all, Elijah never died, but was carried off in a whirlwind to be with God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy.  And the prophet Malachi wrote on his scroll, “Lo, I will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes.”

 

For longer than I’ve been alive, for almost 100 years, our land has been governed by the emperor in Rome rather than by our own people.  And yes, people talk about the “pax romana,” the Roman Peace, but it isn’t really peace.  There isn’t any war these days, but that doesn’t mean much since everyone is living in fear.  If you dare to disagree with the rulers, you will be put into prison or worse.  And there are always rumblings of revolt underneath the so-called peace.

 

But people are talking that maybe God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy is going to send a Messiah to us – an anointed one – anointed like a king – anointed to free us from Rome and free us from the fear that we are living with every day.  If John is really Elijah come back to earth, then this Messiah might be coming next, and then maybe God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy will come to earth!

 

My family and I, we listened to John.  He kept saying that he wasn’t the Messiah; that he wasn’t the one we were waiting for.  But he did tell us that we were to get ready.  He told us that we had to change our ways; that we had to turn back to God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy.  He told us that another one was coming, someone even more powerful than he.  He said that he, John, wasn’t worthy to serve this one who is coming – not fit to be a servant who unties and ties his sandals.

 

Even now, telling you about it, I can feel the fire of his speaking running through me.  I so long for God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy to come to earth, I was willing to change anything, to do anything.  And so I made my way to the front of the crowd, and John asked me if I was ready to repent, to change my heart and mind, to turn back to God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy.  I said “yes!”  I wanted to shout it from the mountaintops!  Yes!  And so I went with the people who were being baptized, and John pushed me under the water, and it was like I was re-born to this new way of living and being.

 

I wonder what God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy has planned for us?  John didn’t tell us how long we were going to have to wait.  He just said that this mighty and glorious one is coming after him.

 

Ever since that day, John has started talking more about this one coming after him.  He calls this one “the light.”  I don’t know what he means by that.  He says that he himself is not “the light” but he has come to tell us about “the light.”

 

I wonder if this light is God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy?  In the beginning, God-Whose-Name-Is-Holy said, “let there be light” and there was light.

 

For now, I’ve told my family that I am going to stay with John and this group of people who are with him.  I want to wait and see who this one to come after him is going to be.  And while I’m waiting, I’ve started telling people around me about this one who is coming; this one whom John is calling “the light.”  I’m so excited about this that I can’t keep it to myself – I have to share it too!

 

Won’t you wait with me?  Won’t you join our group of people who are waiting for the light to come into the world?  Won’t you help me to spread the good news about the light?  John says that the light is coming – let’s wait together!

 

 

“John the Baptist Preaching in the Desert”
JESUS MAFA
Used with Permission.

"(H)Anna(h)'s Story" (sermon)

This year, in Advent and Christmas, we are doing things a little bit differently - instead of a more traditional "sermon," each week our reflection is going to take the form of story-telling, told from the perspective of someone who was waiting for Jesus.

 

 

Sunday November 28, 2021

First Sunday of Advent

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Scripture:  Luke 2:22-40

 

I wonder what my parents were thinking when they named me Hannah, after our ancestor in faith, the mother of Samuel.  She lived a bitter life, longing for a child, weeping and praying in the temple; and then when Samuel was born, the first Hannah handed him over as a young child so that he could live his whole life in the temple.  Maybe by naming me after that first Hannah, my parents doomed me to a life in the temple.

 

Like Hannah’s son, I too am a prophet.  I can’t control when God-whose-name-is-holy speaks to me, but I recognize their voice, and I share it with others.

 

When I was still a young girl, my parents arranged my marriage for me.  He was a kind man, but oh, so old.  He was looking for a nursemaid more than a wife.  We lived together for seven years before he died.  Like I said, he was kind, and he never abused me, but I was so busy caring for him, that I didn’t have time to speak to God-whose-name-is-holy.  When he died, I was sad, but we were still only just getting to know one another.

 

And when he died, I was all alone in the world.  My parents had died by that time so I couldn’t return to their house.  My husband had no other family members.  We had had no children.  I was a widow in the truest sense of the word – I had nobody.

 

And so I went to sit outside the temple to beg for others to help me – after all, God-whose-name-is-holy tells us that we are to care for widows and orphans and foreigners living in our land.

 

But it wasn’t too many days before the temple officials recognized that I was a prophet, and so they offered me a small room to sleep in, in exchange for sharing the words of God-whose-name-is-holy with the people who came there to worship.  From that day on, I never left the temple again.

 

It was a small room, and my routine didn’t vary from day to day, but at last I had time to spend in prayer and fasting.

 

The months slipped by, and then the years, each day the same as the day that came before.  The years passed, more than 60 of them, and now I am an old woman.

 

The day that I’m telling you about, it began the same as every other day.  There was nothing that made it any different in its beginning – there was nothing to tell me that this was going to be a special day.  People were coming and going from the temple, offering their sacrifices, the way that the law of our people tells them that they are to do.  And I was sitting in my room, surrounded by the heavy stone walls, with my heart open to hear whatever God-whose-name-is-holy wanted to tell me.

 

Suddenly, and I don’t know why, I felt a strong urge to leave my room and go out to the courtyard where the people were gathered to offer their sacrifices.  I have lived long enough that I have learned not to ignore these urges.

 

When I got out to the courtyard, there was Simeon.  I think that he was a prophet like I am.  He didn’t live at the temple, but he was there almost every day, offering sacrifices and prayers.  Rumour has it that God-whose-name-is-holy had told him that he would meet God’s Messiah before he died.

 

Well, Simeon is old, just as I am old, and he was running out of time to meet this Messiah, this one who was to be anointed, this one who was promised to lead us to freedom.

 

And this day, there was Simeon in the courtyard, and there was a commotion around him.  He had walked over to a pair of young parents, and taken their child from their arms.  This family was obviously here in the temple to offer their sacrifice of a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons, as is expected for the birth of their firstborn son.

 

And Simeon took this young boy in his arms, and began to cry out:  “Lord, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation which you have prepared in the presence of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel.”

 

And then God-whose-name-is-holy spoke to me more clearly than I have ever heard the holy voice before, telling me that this infant was the Messiah – the one we were waiting for.  And I began to sing, praising God, and my old feet began to dance.  And I told everyone who was there in the temple that day, and everyone who came every day after, that I had met the Messiah, that God’s time had come.

 

And afterwards, as I was walking back to my room, a beam of light shone into the dusky temple, where I had never seen a beam of light shining before.  And I knew that something was different.  I knew that the world would never be the same again.

 

 

“Prophetess Anna”

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1639)

Used with permission.

"King of Kings? And Lord of Lords?" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Sunday November 21, 2021 – The Reign of Christ

 

Reading #1:  Revelation 1:4-8

 

Reflection – Part 1

 

Today’s celebration of the Reign of Christ, or Christ the King is a fairly recent addition to the church year.  It wasn’t celebrated as a special day by our ancient ancestors in faith, the way that Easter would have been celebrated.  Instead, Jesus was recognized as the ruler over our lives each and every day.

 

Throughout the generations, the church has written many different creeds or statements of faith – “We believe…”  Some of the better-known ancient creeds include the Apostles Creed, which some of you may have memorized in your Sunday School years, or the Nicene Creed which is a bit longer and I still stumble over some of the words if I recite it without being able to read it.  Back in the late 1960s, a group of United Church of Canada members sat down to try and express the faith that we share in a new creed, and what they came up with ended up becoming what might be the most familiar creed in the United Church of Canada – the one that begins “We are not alone. We live in God’s world. We believe in God, who has created and is creating; who has come in Jesus, the word made flesh, to reconcile and make new; who works in us and others by the Holy Spirit.”  We still call this The New Creed, even though it is more than 50 years old!

 

But the oldest creed of the church, that seems to have been in existence within years of Jesus’s death, is a very simple creed – easy to memorize – just three words – “Jesus is Lord.”  A basic statement – one that boils faith down to the essentials – a statement of faith that isn’t saved for the last Sunday before Advent, but one that could be said every day of a person’s life.  “Jesus is Lord.”

 

And, despite its brevity, it is also a very radical statement to make; because if we proclaim that Jesus is Lord, then we are also saying that nothing else can be the Lord over our lives.  In the time shortly after Jesus’s death, when the church was first being established, if you were to say that Jesus is Lord, you are also saying that the Emperor isn’t.  The pursuit and acquisition of wealth can’t be the Lord over our lives.  The worship of celebrity can’t be the Lord over our lives.  Worship of the self can’t be the Lord over our lives. If Jesus is Lord, then I’m not.

 

Like I said, the celebration of Christ the King or the Reign of Christ is a relatively recent addition to the church calendar. In 1925, the pope at the time was worried about the increase in secularism in the world – remember that this was the roaring 20s, just after the end of the Great War and the Spanish Flu.  Politically, this was also a time of great instability, with many of the royal houses across Europe crumbling, leaving people searching for anything that would offer stability.  And the pope suggested that the Church should offer an alternative to movements like fascism and communism.  Instead of secularism or fascism or communism or capitalism being the lord over our lives, Jesus Christ is the lord over our lives.  And so this Sunday celebration was established.

 

And what a great reading from the book of Revelation this is for today.  John, the author of this book, is greeting the churches that this book is addressed to – greeting them all with the full power and glory of Christ.  Listen to the titles that John gives to Jesus – the faithful witness. The firstborn of the dead. Ruler of the kings of the earth.  The Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, who is and who was, and who is to come.  The almighty one.

 

This is who we worship – not just a king, but the king over all other kings.  Not just a lord, but the lord over all other lords.  I’m ready to break out into the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel’s Messiah now!

 

But at the same time I am challenged when I think of what a king means.  Kings and Emperors and other royal rules tend to like their power.  They tend to be willing to do whatever it takes to hold on to that power.  Kings in the history of the world have a troubling association with violence and wars.  And so if I think about Jesus as a king, then there are some troubling associations that come to mind.

 

And with that, I’m going to invite ________ to share our second reading with us, which comes from the Good Friday story.

 

 

Reading #2:  John 18:33-38

 

Reflection – Part 2

 

Isn’t this a powerful image?  Jesus, who has been arrested and beaten, is standing before Pilate, the governor, the Roman Emperor’s direct representative in that part of the Empire.

 

By all rights, we should be worshipping Pilate as king.  After all, he is the one with all of the power in this situation.  He hold the decision about whether Jesus lives or dies in his hands.  He is likely dressed in a royal purple robe, and he may have a crown on his head.

 

And yet today, we celebrate Jesus as our King, as our Lord, as the one who reigns over us.  Jesus, from the backwater of Galilee in the insignificant province of Judea, who is bleeding and in chains, who is so very, very vulnerable.  Jesus who is about to be crowned with thorns, and enthroned on a cross.  This is who we say is our King.

 

It is a powerful image.

 

Pilate asks Jesus directly – are you the King of the Jews?  Jesus answers, “My kingdom is not from this world.  If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over.”  Jesus is knows that this is how the world works – kings and kingdoms of this world fight to hold on to power, the do whatever they can, fair or foul, to make sure that their power isn’t taken away.  Jesus is right – if he were an earthly king, with a kingdom from this world, not only would his followers be fighting on his behalf, but Jesus himself would be leading them into battle.

 

But instead, Jesus is here before Pilate, arrested and about to be crucified.

 

Jesus is turning the whole idea of kings and kingdoms on its head – he’s re-writing the book on what it means to be a king.  Being a king no longer means lusting after power.  Being a king no longer means ruling by violence.  Being a king no longer means a hierarchy with a small number on top being served by the majority below.

 

Instead, Jesus the King embraces his vulnerability.  Jesus the King reigns through radical love rather than through violence, even when that radical love and non-violence resulted in his death.  Jesus the King rules over a kingdom where the last and the least of these are seated in the place of honour at the feast.  Jesus the King rules over a kingdom where there is a place for everyone at the table, and where everyone is well fed.  Jesus the king offers healing to everyone who is broken, and community to everyone who is lonely.

 

Jesus is the king, not because he overthrows all other kings, but because he overthrows every concept of what a king should be and replaces it with something that is both new and radically different.

 

And so, to me, the question of the day is how can we celebrate both aspects of Christ the King?  How can we celebrate with both trumpets and fanfares and cries of Hallelujah to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords; as well as the King of vulnerable love and humble service and radical welcome?

 

Because I think that it can’t be an either-or here – it has to be a both-and.  Jesus the King is both the glorious Alpha and Omega, and the one who lies bleeding before Pilate.

 

And this is who we proclaim to the world when we say that Jesus is Lord.  This is the one who is Lord over our lives, so that we can’t have any other lords or kings before him.

 

Jesus is Lord.  Amen.

 

 

“What is Truth?” Christ and Pilate

By Nikolaĭ Nikolaevich Ge

Used with Permission

"The Beginning of the Birth Pangs" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

November 14, 2021

Scripture Reading:  Mark 13:1-8

 

 

How many times has the end of the world been predicted?  In recent years, I think of the Mayan Calendar prediction that said that the world was going to end on December 21, 2012.  Ronald Weinland has also been on the news a couple of times, having predicted the end of the world in 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2019. A bunch of self-proclaimed prophets claimed that the world was going to end in the year 2000.  Going further back in time, John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist church, thought that the world was going to end in 1836, and Martin Luther, the founder of the Lutheran Church, thought that the world was going to end no later than 1600.  In fact, if you were to believe every publicized prediction of the end of the world, the world should have ended almost 200 times in the past 2000 years!

 

But Jesus, in our reading today, tells us that no one knows when the world is going to end.  Not you.  Not me.  Not world-renowned theologians.  Not popular televangelists.

 

The reading that ______ shared with us today falls into the category of “apocalyptic” literature.  In the bible, the best-known apocalyptic writings come from the book of Revelation, but you also find apocalyptic writing in the gospels, and even earlier, in the Book of Daniel.  They tend to be filled with vivid images, and can be confusing or scary.

 

And pop-culture has taken this idea of apocalypse and run with it.  In this genre, something has happened to cause the collapse of society, and often the death of the majority of people.  Margaret Atwood’s Mad-Addam Trilogy would fall into this category, with environmental collapse as the cause.  The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndam is an older example, where humans lose their eyesight and the country is taken over by triffids – murderous walking plants.  The scariest book I have read in recent years was Second Sleep by Robert Harris – this is set almost 2000 years after the destruction of civilization as we know it due to a massive collapse of the Internet.

 

I have mentioned before that I don’t do scary – books or movies – and that I have a very low threshold for what I consider to be scary! And so I generally stay away from these apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic books and movies.  Almost without exception, they portray the world that comes after the apocalypse as more violent, more dangerous, more fearful, than the world before the apocalypse.

 

But that is where pop culture and bible apocalypses are different.  In biblical apocalypse stories, it is the world before the apocalypse that is scary and dangerous, and the world that follows the apocalypse is a good world, a world where God is fully present, a world where all of God’s promises of peace and joy and love are fully realized.

 

In the apocalypse story that we read today, Jesus and his disciples are standing just outside the temple in Jerusalem.  It is just days before Jesus is going to be crucified.  It has been a tense couple of days, as Jesus has been arguing with the spiritual leaders in the temple.  I can just picture those disciples, after the tension of those debates, taking a shaky breath and making a comment in passing, a bit like we might comment on the weather.  “Look at the amazing architecture of the temple here.  I never could have imagined such a huge and spectacular building!”

 

But Jesus isn’t done with the high-stakes teaching; and so in response to their tentative comment, he tells them that not a single stone in the temple will be left standing, there will be wars and rumours of wars, nation will rise against nation, and there will be earthquakes and famines.  This is scary stuff, he’s talking about.

 

But the thing is, these things – the famines and wars and earthquakes – they aren’t part of the world after the apocalypse; they are part of the world before the apocalypse.  They are part of the present day world – the world that Jesus was living in, and the world that we are still living in.  2000-some-odd years after Jesus was talking to his disciples, we are still living in a world where earthquakes happen, where there are famines, where nation rises up against nation.

 

If you look at the word “apocalypse,” it means revelation.  It means that something is being revealed.  It means that the mask is being taken off, and the true face is being revealed.  It means that the superficial world is being peeled back so that the real world can be revealed.  The only thing that should be scary about this is the unfamiliarity.  We lose the familiarity of our broken world with its famines and wars, but in exchange for that, we gain the real-er world that is the world as God wants it to be.

 

Today’s reading ended with Jesus saying, “This is but the beginning of the birth pangs.”  I found that to be a very powerful image.  I have never given birth, I have never been in labour, but I can imagine that it is a scary and painful thing to go through.

 

You may have heard of the TLC television show, I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant.  Each episode follows the story of a person who didn’t know that they were pregnant until they are giving birth.  There is a YouTuber, Mama Doctor Jones, who is an Obstetrician Gynaecologist, who watches episodes of I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant and offers medical commentary on what is happening.  One thing that she frequently comments is that if you didn’t know that you were pregnant and you go into labour, you would probably think that you were dying.  You would think that your world was ending.  Even though there is usually new life waiting for you on the other side of that labour, if you didn’t know that, then labour would be terrifying.

 

And Jesus says that the world as we know it is the beginning of labour, the beginning of the birth pangs.  All of the scary and terrible things in our world – wars, earthquakes, pandemics, climate change – all of this isn’t the post-apocalyptic world – all of this is the brokenness of our current world – the brokenness that will be peeled back so that the real-er world, God’s world, can be fully revealed.  The brokenness will be transformed into a world of love and peace and justice and joy.

 

And so apocalypses, in the biblical sense of things, aren’t things that we need to be scared of.  They are the revelation of God’s world.

 

The psalm writer tells us that “Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes in the morning.”  The pain of the world we are living in, all of this pain is going to end some day.  A time is coming when the labour pains will be over and new life will be here.  A time is coming when the brokenness of all of creation will be transformed into healing and wholeness.

 

When we trust that this revelation is going to happen – when we trust that God’s goodness will have the final say over all of the pain and grief of the world – the name that we give to this is hope.  Hope is the trust that better things are coming.  Hope is believing that the labour pains will eventually end, no matter how long they linger on.

 

And if we believe that a better world is coming, what can we do in the here-and-now to live as if this world was already here?  How can we live in the brokenness, knowing that peace and love and joy will have the final word?

 

Amen.

 

 

Image:  “Beginning the Reveal”

loren chipman on flickr

CC BY-NC 2.0