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This Week's Sermon !

December 22,2024 -Advent 4-

Micah 5: 2-5a
Luke 1: 47-55
Luke 1: 39-45

Any Day Now!

I am struck by the opening line of the gospel reading where we are told that Mary went with haste to see her relative, Elizabeth. I have known many women in labour who went with haste to the hospital and I have known some of them who were told to go back home and wait some more. But this was not that! This was Mary who was unexpectedly expecting (but nowhere near her due date) who went to see her much older relative who was also unexpectedly expecting.

Mary knew that Elizabeth would understand. Mary knew that Elizabeth would be able to listen to her story of an angel visitation and not call her crazy. Mary knew that Elizabeth would understand that their children were somehow linked. And they both knew that these marvellous things were God’s doing.

I remember visiting my mother’s much older relative and his wife quite a few years ago. Before our visit, we did not know that she was expecting. She was much younger than he was but it was still a surprise; unlike Elizabeth and Zachariah, they already had 2 children but thought nighttime feedings and diapers were well behind them!. Over the next few years we would comment that they were the only couple we knew that received both an Old Age Pension and a Family Allowance Cheque.

On this last Sunday before Christmas we leap ahead in time to those months just before Jesus birth. Some people tell me that this is what happens with most pregnancies; 9 months seems so long into the future and then, before you know it, the birth will be “any day now!”

The impending birth of a baby often causes a flurry of preparations such as getting a room ready and of borrowing or purchasing many items. The list may include cribs, baby gates, playpens and high chairs, car-seats and strollers, diapers and clothes and lots of stuff Amazon will deliver to your door, with free shipping!

Elizabeth and Mary would have had similar preparations but of a much simpler nature than today’s parents. But according to Luke, that was not likely the topic of much of the conversation between Mary and Elizabeth. Both knew that this was God’s doing and that the time had now come for God’s long promised saviour to be born. I wonder if they speculated what each child would be like and how old they would be before someone else saw in them the fulfilment of the promise? Did they know each one would die for their proclamation instead of being promoted to power and honour. Did they keeping for the day to arrive and did they spend time looking for signs!

It would do no good for the mothers to say anything about their special children to anyone else; after all the mothers are, more or less expected to promote their children as the best and greatest.

I received two pictures of my nephew’s oldest son this past week. One was of his second birthday party - complete with a new outfit, a bunch of balloons, and a themed backdrop. His mother and I agreed that it was hard to believe he was 2 already. The other was an official Christmas picture from day-care wearing the sweater I sent him. The photos will become a scrapbook page; one for my album, one for his mother’s.

I have a box full of pictures I have been sent by the proud parents of children I have baptized, usually in a Christmas card. I have several years’ worth for some children, and yes I do keep them! When you are the parent you just have to share your good news. When I was in my second pastoral charge I baptized 9 and 6 year old neighbours; who requested the baptism themselves. A few years before the girl was ordained, I was back in the community at a church event and her father asked me if I had realized that one of the children I baptized would some day become an ordained minister. I did not at the time, but as I saw her grow and become involved in Conference children and youth forum and in a significant leadership role, I hoped that the Spirit was pushing her in that direction. Yes, I also credit at least one of my successors in ministry and the entire church for supporting her and sending her to youth events, having her serve on the church board and holding her in prayer.

Somewhere in the Psalms section of Voices United is a refrain that was written during a meeting of the hymn book committee - during their lunch break. Apparently, the committee was looking for an appropriate refrain and tune for a certain Psalm but could not find one that seemed to work. One of the musicians on the committee sat at the keyboard and whipped it up - before they reconvened. He refers to it as “a work of the Spirit.” I would venture to say that the vast majority of hymns were regarded by their authors as works of the Spirit. Each one has a story; each one is a faith expression.

There is a YouTube video of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir performing “It is well with my Soul” and the performance is narrated by British actor Hugh Bonneville (think of the 7th Earl of Grantham, Robert Crawley of Downton Abbey fame). He speaks of the hymn as a response to the tragedies in the life of the hymn’s author Horatio Spafford. 151 years ago all of his children were drowned when their ship sank on a transatlantic voyage. This was after he was financially ruined because of the “great Chicago fire” and subsequent downturn in the economy of that city.

The people of Israel had hoped for a messiah, a saviour, for generations. Generally speaking, their hope was for a political leader who would send the Romans packing and who would sit on his rightful throne in Jerusalem. There was no separation of church and state in their hopes and dreams.

The prophesy of Micah casts new light on things. In the beginning, these hopes and dreams were focussed on Jerusalem, but Micah’s prophecy changed it- for those who were listening. Bethlehem may well have been King David’s birthplace, but it was not his capital nor the seat of his power. To me this is a not-so-subtle sign that Jesus would change many other things about his fulfilment of the hopes for the messiah. Jesus would defy all of their expectations.

Micah’s prophecy asked people to look for the fulfilment of God’s reign in an unexpected place - Bethlehem. The trouble is that we know the so-called Christmas story so well that we forget how startling it was to its first hearers. When the news was new, it was new and different. We forget to stay open to the new things that are happening in our time.

(In Nipawin) you saw and heard our Moderator’s Christmas message (for Codette) I will read her message.

I am the Right Rev. Dr. Carmen Lansdowne, 44th Moderator of The United Church of Canada.

In the Christian year, Christmas is the start of change. During the Advent season, we anticipate the possibility of change while we realize that the change is not yet here. At Christmas, with the arrival of the Word made flesh in the Christ Child, change is here.

The Hebrew Scriptures proclaim in Psalm 96: “Sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth. Sing to the Lord; bless [God’s] name; tell of [God’s] salvation from day to day.”

I’ve been reflecting on many things: my first two-and-a-half years as Moderator, anticipating my last six months of my term, commemorating the Centennial of our denomination, preparing for General Council 45 next year, and the seeds we are planting for growth and ministry renewal all across the church.

None of it is easy, but so much of it is good. It has been such a privilege and honour to work alongside you all since the General Council in 2022. So, this Christmas, let’s look around us at the signs of changes and new life.

Let us continue to do the work of deep spirituality, bold discipleship, and daring justice, and to be a blessing to God’s name.

Just like we would look with awe and wonder at the arrival of a child, let us sing a new song to the Holy One.

Like the hymn asks us, “open my eyes that I may see glimpses of truth thou hast for me.” We would not need our eyes opened if we encountered Jesus in the same way and the same place every year. The first Christmas is a long time ago, historically; Bethlehem and Jerusalem are a long way away, geographically. Sadly they are in the news almost daily as the conflict between Hamas and Israel continues. To see such destruction and suffering is very troubling.

But I remember the then moderator the Very Rev Stan Mackay saying that most Canadians talk of the “holy land” being synonymous with Israel or Palestine, but challenging us by saying that the holy land is where we live and move and have our being; IT IS HERE, IN CANADA here in Canada. Our land is holy. The place in which we connect with Creator is sacred. The hope for a world made new is also about life here, not just in some far-away place. So if we have read these promises as already having happened in another place and time we need to listen to Micah again and ask, “what are we missing because we expect it to happen somewhere else to someone else or because we expect it to be in the past? We need to be open to Emmanuel coming to us, here in Saskatchewan in 2024.

Christmas, like Easter, is meant to be a present reality, not just a commemoration of a past event.

I was driving around looking for someone’s house - you don’t have posted civic numbers or mailboxes in rural areas and the picture that formed in my mind was different than the one they intended to convey, when I asked for directions, which made finding their house harder.

Perhaps we are looking for one thing and God’s grace is reaching out to us in other ways. In Jesus’ case the people were looking for a warrior king and Jesus came as the Prince of Peace; he was not rich, but poor; not educated, but self-taught.

Any day now we will celebrate God coming to us.

May we be open to seeing it this year.

Amen.

1995- 2021 The Rev. Beth W. Johnston.

For some good stuff go to:

journeywithjesus.net

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