"Everyone is Special. No One is Special." (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Sunday January 16, 2022

Scripture Reading:  1 Corinthians 12:1-13

 

This is possibly a controversial opinion, but I think that some of the best movies ever are the ones made by Pixar… feel free to argue with me in the comments section if you disagree!  They are animated films, but they have this ability to not only create deeply relatable characters, but the story lines tend to hit you in all the feels.  Movies like Toy Story (and especially Toy Story 3), Finding Nemo, WALL-E, Up, Inside Out, and so many more.

 

One of the earlier Pixar films was The Incredibles.  This is about a family of superheroes who, for reasons, have to hide their superpowers away.  The father, Mr. Incredible, has superhuman strength and stamina.  The mother, Elastigirl, has superhuman elasticity and is able to stretch out any part of her body.  Violet, their daughter, is able to both make herself invisible and generate force fields.  Dash, the middle child, has superhuman speed.  Jack-Jack, the baby, seems to have a multitude of powers by the end of the movie, including shapeshifting.

 

So they are living as an ordinary family, their superpowers a secret known only within their family.  And nobody is happy with this situation.

 

Dash, who is ten years old, is frustrated that he has to hide away his superhuman speed.  His mother doesn’t let him play any sports in case he blows their cover.  He gets in trouble when he uses his speed to prank his teacher.  At one point, he is complaining to his mother about needing to hide his superpower, and he says to her, “I thought our powers made us special,” to which his mother replies, in the way that mothers tend to do, saying, “Everyone’s special.”  Dash rolls his eyes to this response, and mutters under his breath, “That’s just a way of saying that no one is.”

 

Everyone is special.  No one is special.  It’s an interesting tension that I think relates to the reading that Ross shared with us today from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians.  Paul was addressing a very specific concern in the Corinthian church in this passage.  The church was gathering together, but some members of the church were being valued more highly than other members of the church because of the gifts that they had been given.

 

And Paul is trying to correct them, telling them that each person in the church has been gifted, and even though the gifts that one person has might be different than the gifts that another person has, they are all valuable because they all come from God, given to us by the Holy Spirit.  Everyone is gifted; everyone is special.  But no one is more special than everyone else.

 

Last Sunday we were talking about baptism, and how we are baptized into the family of the church.  At the end of this week’s reading, Paul picks up the language of a body – he writes that “we were all baptized into one body.”  And I think that this is important.  The gifts that we have been given by the Holy Spirit aren’t given to us for our own sake – they aren’t given to us so that we can puff ourselves up with pride, or to show off our superhuman speed like Dash wants to do in The Incredibles.  Instead, the gifts that we have been given are for the sake of the whole body, the whole church.  And likewise, the church doesn’t contain all of these gifts for its own sake, but rather contains all of these gifts working together for the sake of loving and serving the world around us.

 

A recent example here at Two Rivers Pastoral Charge might be our Mission and Service fundraiser that happened back before Christmas.  Ross and Josie brought their gift of leadership and enthusiasm to a group of artists in the pastoral charge.  This group of artists were then able use their artistic gifts to translate a vision into an actual design, and then Cathy scrambled up on the scaffolding to create the outline of a tree on the wall.  Another group of people then contributed their gift of conversation and compassion and sat down and made phone calls to everyone in the three congregations; another group of artists shared their artistic gifts to paint all of the leaves, and then all of you shared your financial gifts for the project.  One person alone couldn’t have completed this project alone – it took many people sharing their gifts to make it happen.  And the church – we weren’t doing all of this for our own sake, even though anyone who enters this sanctuary will be able to enjoy the beauty of the mural that was created – instead we were able to raise $5274 for Mission and Service, money that will go to spread love and caring and hope across Canada and around the world.

 

The new mural on the wall of Westfield United Church

 

God has gifted you – you are special.  Maybe you have been given one of the gifts that Paul has listed in 1 Corinthians – wisdom, or knowledge, or faith, or healing, or the working of miracles, or prophesy, or discernment, or speaking in tongues, or the interpretation of tongues.  Or maybe your gifts aren’t listed here – the gift for music or art or leadership or prayer or service or finances or loving others.  Or maybe you are part of The Incredibles and are hiding away your superhuman speed or your ability to become invisible.  But whatever your gifts are, they have been given to you by the Holy Spirit, and they make you special.  But because everyone is gifted, you aren’t any more special than anyone else – everyone is special, as Dash’s mother told him.

 

Right now, we are going through an incredibly difficult couple of years.  I don’t think that any of us asked to live through a global pandemic.  I’m sure that most of us would prefer to be gathered together in-person this morning rather than virtually.  And even for those of us who are introverts, who enjoy our own company, these lockdown restrictions are hard.

 

But rather than thinking of our gifts, and how we can use them for the church once things are back to “normal”, whatever that might mean, instead I might suggest that the gifts that the Holy Spirit has given you, these gifts have been given to you exactly for this time that we are living through.  You have been gifted so that we, as the church, might continue to do the work that God calls us to – the work of loving God and loving our neighbours.

 

In a few minutes we are going to be joining together to share communion, and when we do so, even though we are scattered into so many different physical locations, we will be sharing this meal as one community, as one family, as one body.  The same Spirit who has gifted you and who empowers you to share your gifts with the whole community will be drawing us together through this meal.  We will be reminded that God loves us, and our bodies and our spirits will be strengthened so that we can share our gifts with each other and with the world, even as we have to stay physically separated for now.

 

And so the question that I leave you to ponder today is – how will you share your gifts with the church and with the world in this time that we are in?

 

And may it be so.  Amen.

"Remember Your Baptism" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

Sunday December 9, 2022 – Baptism of Jesus

Scripture Readings:  Isaiah 43:1-7 and Luke 3:21-22

 

Welcome to 2022!  I’m not going to wish you Happy New Year, since if you remember back to the end of November, the church year begins with Advent and so I wished you happy new year back then!  But because I was off last Sunday, this is my first time worshipping with you in 2022, and so we begin a new calendar year together.

 

The season of Advent was a time of preparing and waiting for and anticipating Christmas, and then we celebrated 12 days of Christmas, right through to January 6. Thursday January 6 was the feast of Epiphany like we were talking about in our Story for All Ages, when the Magi followed a star that led them to Jesus and his parents as they brought gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

 

In the church year, it may seem like we are now in an in-between season.  Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany are over, and the season of Lent that leads us to Holy Week and Easter doesn’t begin until the beginning of March.

 

As I was planning out the next couple of months though, the thing that caught my attention was that Christmas isn’t the end – it is also the beginning.  Christmas comes at the end of our Advent waiting – Christmas is the fulfillment of all of the things that we were waiting for and preparing for in the weeks leading up to it.  But Christmas is also the beginning.  Jesus was born at Christmas, but his whole life and ministry was still ahead of him, yet to unfold.

 

As I read though the readings assigned to the next couple of months, that is the theme that jumped out at me.  Not only does Jesus’s ministry unfold in the time that follows his birth at Christmas, but so does our ministry as the church.  Jesus lived and died 2000 years ago, but the Body of Christ is alive and working in the world today, because we, the church – we who are part of the universal church of all times and all places – the church is the Body of Christ.

 

And so that is the theme that we are going to be diving into over the next couple of months – not only will we see Jesus’s ministry unfolding in these weeks following his birth at Christmas, but we are also going to see how our own ministry unfolds.

 

And Jesus’s ministry began with his baptism by John the Baptist in the Jordan River.

 

Baptism is one of two sacraments that we recognize and practice in the United Church of Canada, along with the sacrament of communion.  My favourite definition of a sacrament comes from St. Augustine, 1600 years ago.  He wrote that a sacrament is a visible sign of God’s invisible grace.  A visible sign of God’s invisible grace.  God’s grace, God’s love is always with us always. God is love, and therefore wherever God is, love is; and because I believe that God is everywhere, then love must also be everywhere.

 

But love is invisible.  We can’t see it or touch it or smell it or taste it or hear it.  We are tied to our bodies, we are embodied creatures.  But since Christmas is all about God becoming human flesh and blood, that means that God understands what it is to have a body.  God not only creates bodies, but God chose to become a body.

 

And God gives us these sacraments – baptism and communion – as ways that we can sense God’s love.  We can’t see or smell or taste or touch or hear God’s love; but we can see and hear and touch the waters of baptism; we can see and smell and touch and taste the bread and the wine of communion.  And through these two sacraments, God tells us that we are beloved.

 

We can celebrate the sacrament of communion as often as we want across our lifetime, but baptism is a once and forever sacrament.  God loves us before we are baptized just the same as God loves us after we are baptized.  But baptism reminds us that we are beloved.  Baptism is a covenant, and I wonder if marriage as a covenant might be a good analogy.  When a couple decides to get married, they love each other before they get married and they love each other after they get married, but at the wedding, they enter into a covenant with each other – they make promises to one another that are witnessed by the community that is gathered and by God.  I think that it is a bit the same at our baptism.  We make promises that, with the help of the Holy Spirit, we are going to participate in the life and work of the Body of Christ; and in return, God reminds us that their love isn’t going anywhere.  These promises are witnessed by the community that is gathered, and often the gathered community promises to support the person being baptized and their family.  God’s love for us hasn’t changed, but a covenant has been made.

 

Baptism is a special time, a holy time.  God’s love that is always around us has become visible and tangible in the waters.  And one of my favourite parts about baptism is that we baptize as a community and we are baptized into a community.  This isn’t a private Me-and-Jesus moment – this is a community celebration.  We are welcoming a new member of our church family.

 

One phrase that we sometimes hear around the church is “remember your baptism.”  But, you might be thinking, I was a baby when I was baptized, so I can’t remember my baptism.  But that is the beautiful thing about being baptized into a community – you don’t have to remember your baptism because you have a whole community to remember for you.  This isn’t an individual, singular you remember your individual baptism.  Instead it is a communal remember your baptism.

 

If you were baptized as a baby, think of all of the people in your life and in the church who were there that day, and who remember that moment when the water was poured over you.  And even if those people are no longer on this side of death, the community of the church still remembers your baptism.  And at the same time, think of all of the people you have seen baptized – even if they don’t remember their own baptism, you are part of the collective community memory that remembers their baptism for them.

 

We, as a community – we remember that we are baptized, and we remember our baptism.  We remember that God’s love is always and forever and for all people; and we remember those times when God’s love is made tangible in the waters.

 

Thanks be to God for this overwhelming gift of love made known.  Amen.

 

The Community Gathered Together by the Water

(A Church Picnic from a previous year –

a good time and place to celebrate and remember baptism!)

2021 Reading Summary

Ever since I kept a book blog, I've enjoyed writing an end-of-year post summarizing my reading for the year. For the past two years, I've tracked my reading using an Excel spreadsheet that I designed for this purpose, tracking the things that I want to track (because statistics and graphs are fun).

So before getting in to my favourite books of the year, let me begin with some of those numbers:

Total books read in 2021:  41
Fiction/Non-Fiction/Poetry Ratio:  30/10/1
Paper/E-book/Audiobook Ratio:  27/11/3
Best Reading Month:  March (7 books completed)
Worst Reading Month:  December (1 book completed)
Number of re-reads: 6 (with 4 of them being on the syllabus for a C. S. Lewis course I audited)
Number of books by Canadian Authors:  12
Number of books by LGBTQ+ Authors*:  10
Number of books with LGBTQ+ Characters**:  8 with main characters; 8 more with secondary characters
Number of books by non-White Authors*:  10
Number of books with non-White Characters**:  14 with main characters; 3 more with secondary characters
Book published most recently:  No Cure for Being Human by Kate Bowler (published September 28, 2021)
Book published most distantly:  The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett (published 1911)
Books published before 2000:  6 (with 5 being from the aforementioned C. S. Lewis course)

* Because I am trying to read more diverse authors (especially with books that I purchase rather than borrowing from the library), I have done my best to internet-sleuth out this information. This information wasn't always available, so this data may not be fully accurate.

** Based on how the characters are explicitly presented on the page.

For my 2022 spreadsheet, I think that I am going to add a column to indicate where I got the book (e.g. library, purchased, gift).

And now for my favourite books of 2021! In no particular order...

No Cure for Being Human (Kate Bowler) - this is a spectacular book that everyone should read, along with her earlier book, Everything Happens for a Reason (And Other Lies I've Loved). The two books cover a similar time period, but examine them from a different perspective. This latest is written from the perspective of the author having survived un-survivable cancer and she now needs to figure out how to live an "ordinary" life. As this book was finished after the beginning of the pandemic, in the end she includes some things that she has learned that might apply to all of us now.

Out of the Deep I Cry (Julia Spencer-Fleming) - this is the third book in a new mystery series that I started reading this summer. They are set in small-town upstate New York, and the main characters are the Chief of Police and the local Episcopal priest. I love how theology and the rhythm of the church year are interwoven with the story. I've read the first four in the series at this point - I named Out of the Deep I Cry here, because it was beautifully crafted moving between different time lines.

Five Little Indians (Michelle Good) - this is a book that has been top of the bestseller lists this year, especially after the story of unmarked burials at Residential Schools hit the media over the summer. It is a heartbreaking and haunting and eventually hopeful story of a group of Residential School survivors and how their stories intertwine with one another in the decades after they leave the school.

 

 

 

An Everlasting Meal (Tamar Adler) - this was one of my re-reads this year. Tamar Adler is not only a beautiful writer, but she is also writing about food in a way that resonates deeply with me - food as a joy, as something that should be sustainable, with cooking as something that is accessible. And as I was just finishing this re-read, I (along with many others) managed to sign myself up (through her Instagram) as a volunteer recipe tester for the cookbook she is currently working on.

 

Hana Khan Carries On (Uzma Jalaluddin) - I loved her first book, Ayesha At Last (a Pride and Prejudice re-telling set in Toronto's Muslim community), and couldn't wait to read her newest book that came out this summer. This time around, she set out to write a re-telling of the movie, You've Got Mail (which is, itself, a Pride and Prejudice re-telling... I sense a theme here!), set as a rivalry between two halal restaurants in Toronto. Her characters feel so real to me, the story touches on Islamophobia which is a problem in Canada, and yet the families and the neighbours come together to support each other in the end. (Don't read this book if you are hungry.)

 

And that was my year in books.

Here's to more happy reading in 2022!

"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.