|
 |
Sermon for Sunday, December 7, 2008
Pastor Sara Kay Olson-Smith
Second Sunday in Advent
Texts: Isaiah 40:1-11; Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13; 2 Peter 3:8-15a; Mark 1: 1-8
Grace to you and peace, from God our creator and from Christ Jesus who has brought us home.
As you may remember from last week, throughout the season of Advent, I will be working on this piece of art while I preach, that with images, along with words, we might experience the promise of what God is doing in the world this Advent. As we watch this painting come together, we hope, wait and trust, watching and waiting to see what God is making new, bringing to life, adding color to our lives. Yesterday at an open forum, our presiding Bishop, Mark Hansen spoke of Advent as being a time when we stand leaning forward on our tiptoes, waiting , watching, hoping, anticipating Jesus’ birth, the coming of Jesus. Last week we talked about Advent as this time when we bring all of our chaos and brokenness, our sinfulness to God, crying out to God... and God responds, by breaking open the heavens and coming down, as Jesus.
This week, we hear a lot about place. Isaiah proclaims God’s word of comfort and hope in the midst of the wilderness of exile, the promise of homecoming from refugee camps and settlements. We hear that despite the impermanence of life, God remains the same, full of power and love. Our psalmist proclaims this place of promise where righteousness and peace will touch one another, where God will dwell in the land and it will yield increase. The writer of 2nd Peter writes of a new heaven and new earth where righteousness is at home. And in our Gospel, John the baptist is out there in the wilderness, on the edge of the city, in camel hair, eating bugs, outside of the systems of power, away from the seat of government, disconnected from the temple. John is in the wilderness.
There is something about this wilderness, out there on the edge of things, that I believe reminds us of where God tends to show up, and where we are called to be. It is not easy to be in the wilderness. We know a lot about it, and it is not a easy place to be. It is a place where we are exposed and not quite as safe, but it also tends to be the place where God shows up. It is a place where we often find ourselves as followers of Jesus, out there on the edge, in nursing homes and with those the world forgets, serving meals to the hungry, eating dinner with the homeless and inviting them into our life and building, among the lonely and grieving and despairing, out there in a community that is changing and full of people who might not look like us, but who have so much to teach us, and who are looking to hear this good news of Jesus.
We, as St. Peter’s and the church, are not, unfortunately, at the center anymore. There are sports games on Sundays and malls are opening earlier and earlier. So much has taken the center of people’s lives, and the church is pushed to the edges, to the wilderness. This place could be scary, and it can be frustrating, especially as we face the real hard conversation about what we are called to do out here in the wilderness, as St. Peter’s.
But the promise to us, as individuals who might know the wilderness of pain and loss, of despair and anxiety, of injustice and struggle and as a community of faith in the wilderness, is that God is coming to meet us there. God shows up in the wilderness. It is here, we, in our vulnerability and our deep trust, experience the power and righteousness of God. It is in the wilderness that God shows up. At the the stable in Bethlehem, the waters of the Jordan, the dusty countryside of Samaria, the hillside of Golgatha on that cross, the wilderness, is where Jesus goes and where we meet Jesus. It is also where we, as God’s people, are called to be. With Isaiah and Peter and John, we are called to be in the wilderness, proclaiming God’s call for repentance and God’s good news of life and hope and promise in Jesus.
However, we are not stuck in the wilderness. There is a road which is prepared, and God will come, and will bring us home. The road that Isaiah spoke of is the road on which the exiles would return, a road where God would come and bring the exiles out of the wilderness and back home, no longer refugees, a road home. It is this road which John proclaims, a road that Jesus takes to bring us – those exiled from God because of our sinfulness – back home to the love and promise of Jesus.
We are not stuck in the wilderness alone, for it is here that God shows up, and here that God finds us to lead us home. It is this message that John proclaims, calling us home to the place of righteousness, of right living with God and with God’s people, to repent and turn back to God, and to come home to the grace and forgiveness we know in God.
It is this road that will lead us home, that will lead us to the new life we know in Jesus. This road will bring us exiles home, into a new future. For us, here at St. Peter’s, as we live in this wilderness of the unknown of our future, we can know that God is here with us and that a way is being prepared for us. The future will be opened for us. God will lead us home. A way will be opened for us. Wherever this path leads us, as we follow with courage and righteousness, we can trust that God leads us, and that we will know new life at the end. God leads us home. The way is prepared!
For our broken world, which knows such pain and brokenness, where violence and injustice are widespread, where the valleys of poverty are low, for this world, a way is prepared. There will be a day when the valleys will be raised up, a new heaven and a new earth where all will be made right, when death and evil will no longer have the final word. This day will come, too. God will lead us – and this world – home into the never-ending love and mercy of God. Jesus will come again!
And we, as God’s people, are called to follow John in proclaiming the good news of Jesus – to go out into the world, the wilderness, and proclaim this message of hope and promise. There is a lot in the world, that keeps the path from out there to in here cluttered and full of road blocks and detours and disruptions. We are called to clear the road, to welcome in strangers and to pay attention to the ways that we, perhaps unknowingly, put up road blocks. We are called to clear the way, to build bridges with people of other generations or cultures who might not fully understand how we worship and who this Jesus is, but are seeking to live authentically, looking for meaning and purpose. We are called to be path-makers so that all people might know the welcome of Jesus.
We, who live in this wilderness, who courageously go out into this wilderness, who clear roads and build bridges, who know so deeply our own faults and failings, hopes and worries, can trust that each week there is a road that has been cleared for us, a way that leads to this table where we – who are exiled from God – are brought home, into the grace and forgiveness we receive in Jesus. From this place, nourished at this table, not with locusts, but with the very body and blood of Jesus, strengthened by song and prayer and fellowship and the power of the Word proclaimed, we can go out to the wilderness and share the Good News, and make clear the path. We can trust and proclaim the promise: Jesus is coming, to lead us home, to bring us exiles back! Jesus is coming!
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
|
