NO SERMON - Tha Hanging of the Greens

NO SERMON - White Gift Sunday

Isaiah 35: 1-10
Luke 1: 47-55
James 5: 7-10
Matthew 11: 2-11

“Are You the One?”

We are in the season of Christmas TV Specials. There are the two versions of “Miracle on 34th Street” in which the reality of Santa Clause and Christmas wishes is both questioned and proven to be true, at least to one judge in New York City and one very certain little girl. There is the classic, “It’s a Wonderful Life” in which small town banker and businessman, George Bailey, learns that life would be much worse for his town if he had never been born. For the more modern set, we have Kevin MacAllister in “Home Alone”, thwarting a pair of thieves known as the “wet bandits”. Then there is “A Christmas Carol” in which one very curmudgeonly businessman in Dickensian England learns how to keep Christmas well. The story has even been re-done by Jim Henson’s “Muppets”. Last of all, on my personal short list is, “How the Grinch Stole Christmas”.

Each of these is what we would call, “a feel good” movie: they promote psoitive values and have a “happy ending”. While we in the church call this “pre-Christmas time” Advent, the secular world has blurred that separation and has made a valiant effort to depict the whole month of December as a time which will solve all of the problems of the world, if you would only “believe”. (Oh yes, I should say, “if you would only believe and SHOP”.

We in the church sing Christmas Carols, either now or during the twelve days of Christmas, that proclaim the holy birth, tell of wonder and joy and glory to our newly born king. After all, we argue, its OUR season, why not? They are some of the most familiar of the hymns in our book and many people, who have never even been inside a church, know the first verse of many of our favourite carols, even the religious ones!

One of our focuses in Advent is to prepare for Jesus’ birth but another focus is to prepare for his ministry and his “reign”. We prepare by reading about the preaching of his cousin John, the baptizer, whose message was “prepare the way of the Lord” and his mission was “to make his paths straight”. Because we have “Hanging of the Greens” and “White Gift” we miss some of that emphasis and those stories. John was speaking in a language which would be universally understood to point to that long-hoped-for, almost mythic figure, the Messiah! The people of John’s day had hoped for a messiah for generations. The Messiah, when he came, would put his plan into action and Israel would be great once again; great like it was under the rule of King David.

So John preached, baptized Jesus in the Jordan, and then seemingly faded into the background. Well, not quite into the background; John ended up in jail because he just had to tell Herod that his marriage to his brother’s wife was wrong.

So, in this third week of Advent we are still 30 or so years in the future, from the manger in Bethlehem. We are at the beginning of Jesus’ short ministry. John is in prison and wondering if Jesus is, in fact, the one he had been preaching about. Perhaps he was waiting for the revolutionaries to storm the prison and release him; perhaps he was hoping for a seat around the cabinet table in Jesus’ government. Certainly he was not a happy camper in prison, he was there for telling Herod the truth; he had done nothing more than follow the prophetic call to tell the truth to power.

In today’s reading, we are told that he send word his own disciples to ask Jesus a question: “Are you the one?”

Jesus’ answer to John’s disciples was neither a “yes” or a “no” but it was a, “What do you see?” kind of answer. His message was one of healing and freeing people from various kinds of bondage.

Once having said that, Jesus then turns to his own followers, who presumably knew of John’s ministry, and said, “what did you find attractive in his preaching”. He praises John’s ministry in a way that called them to take that very seriously.

I wonder what John would have thought when he received the message back from Jesus. I might put words in his mouth and say that he responded with, “Well if he is healing and liberating others, what am I doing in prison”.

In the last two weeks you could not have turned on the news or opened a newspaper without seeing something about the late Nelson Mandela, who died recently. When he waked out of Robben Island prison after being incarcerated for 27 years, we are told, he left behind his feelings of hatred because he knew that he would never be truly free if he did not. His leadership, his inciting the crowds to peace, went a long way to preventing the bloodbath that many had predicted as the country journeyed toward true democracy and he eventually became President of the new unified country of South Africa.

Terry Waite, while working for the Archbishop of Canterbury in the mid to late 1980s was held as a hostage in Lebanon. One postcard that did get through to him, and which sustained him, was a picture of another famous prisoner, John Bunyan, who lived over 400 years previously. Years later, before a return trip to Lebanon, he indicated that he hoped that his captors had done well in the interim and that he did not harbour resentment for his captivity.

This season, whether you call it Advent of Christmas time, or even the holidays, is a very stressful time for many people and families. Sometimes it is a season of increased family violence as the combination of more time off, more alcohol, various expectations that cannot possibly be met, and being cooped up on long winter evenings collide and explode. Often the busyness of staff parties, seemingly endless charity requests, and many, many community activities, removes all feelings of “comfort and joy” long before the evening of the 24th. Children are not very old before they begin to ask why Santa leaves more and better stuff at some houses than others. Many parents wanting to keep up with their own and their children’s expectations of what a “good Christmas” looks like, buy far more than they can afford, mostly on credit card, and wonder why no one is all that happy.

So, we’re back to Advent - to preparing the way of the Lord, not by getting ready for the manger, but by looking at what this baby did when he grew up.

I’m convinced that this is where we need to go in order to get ourselves out of the commercialized maelstrom that has become the Canadian Christmas.

For many, Christmas has become a season of excess: we eat too much, spend too much, drink too much, all with the excuse “its Christmas”. Then, exhausted and glad it’s all over for another year, we pack up the lights and ornaments, make sure our tree is at the road for tree collection week and finally toss out the mouldy leftovers of that 75 pound turkey we thought we needed.

Yet, it is the beginning; it is the beginning of a new way of looking at the world, at life, and at faith. It’s not about just receiving; its about sharing what we have received, so that the “tidings of comfort and joy” continue. In Advent, we prepare by realizing that no baby stays a baby forever, no baby should, and neither does baby Jesus. Interestingly, the gospels tell us only one story of Jesus as a child. The whole point of his birth was so that he could grow up and have the kind of ministry that is depicted in today’s gospel.

Next week we can go back, take out the baby pictures and reminisce, but today we are faced with him full grown and telling his disciples that they too have a ministry of spreading the Good News.

We proclaim the good news whenever we first of all believe that somehow in that baby of Bethlehem, God has entered into human history in a way that almost defies rational explanation. Then we proclaim this Good News when we follow in the Way of this baby, all grown up, making a positive difference in the lives of those with whom he came into contact.

Every time we choose what is right over what is easiest, we proclaim the good news. Every time we share, even just a little, if that is all we have, we proclaim the good news. Sometimes we need to share our food, sometimes it is our story of a smiliar experience, sometimes it is a fully listening ear and heart; every time we do this we are acting as disciples of Jesus, sharing the good news. Every time we go out of our way to put a smile on someone else’s face, we proclaim the good news. Every time we are able to keep a perspective on our own lives we are freed to see what the needs of others are. Some people in our community, perhaps even some of us sitting here today, do indeed have all they can handle, and we have a call to be agents of healing to them, and to one another.

As a people with the privilege of living in a democracy, we are called to look beyond ourselves as we advocate for public policy. Perhaps a certain decision may be the right one, even if it costs us, even if we do not benefit, because it will bring healing and hope to another; because it furthers the cause of justice; because it is the right thing to do.

The Christian life, as a whole, could be compared to a 12 step program. We are not here to tell other people what to do, or how to be, as if we had all the answers, we are here to tell our story of what we have found helpful and sometimes, in telling that story, we have helped someone else far more than we could ever know. In waking together we have a friend on a sometimes very difficult journey.

If someone looked at us and at our community for evidence of the one whose birth we expect, what would they see?

Amen!