Jeremiah 33: 14-16
Psalm 25
Luke 21: 35-46

Tired of Waiting?

What do you want for Christmas? It’s a popular question? A popular song for children of a certain age, “All she wants for Christmas,” presumes that large adult teeth are preferred to an odd gap at the front of the mouth. I think its usually used to tease a child more than anything! However, if you ask a child that child will probably get out a well used copy of the Wish Book! The wish book is designed to increase the child’s wants, and those of adults as well, and therefore improve of the bottom line of Sears Canada! When I was young we also had the Eaton’s catalogue! On the other hand we had only one tv channel and no internet to tempt us and annoy our parents.

We all have our family stories, or have heard them on the radio, about the special Christmas with that special gift that “made the year!” or “made my childhood”!

Sometimes it’s a gift that was hard to get; the Cabbage Patch Kits of the early 180s. A store in town used one to entice people to shop in the store. Buy a toy get a ticket for the draw. The doll was locked in the office safe at night! One year I was looking for a certain hard to find gift and I was in Zellers and spied one just siting in a cart with a bunch of other items. I asked the manager who happened to be walking by at a very fast pace, if that was a “return cart or another customer’s shopping”. Slowing down only slightly he said, “Return cart. It’s the last one in the store, take it and run”!

When we come to church we are told that the real meaning of Christmas is the gift of Jesus who came to bring peace on earth and good will to all. Of course, we all know that!

Yet, the Christmas story CAN sound a bit like a broken record; same message, over and over, and over, with no progress! We’re still hoping for peace on earth and good will to all! The news still tells of war, violence and unrest!

What do WE expect at Christmas? What difference do we expect the birth of Jesus to make in our lives or in the world? Is the story of the birth of Jesus like the fable in which, “the boy who cried wolf”? Have we have ceased to give it any meaning or urgency? Have we really stopped listening? Or expecting anything?

Advent is a church season that, in a sense, invented time travel! In Advent we operate in three time zones at once. We have the ancient stories of the birth of the one who would come to save the people and the church has interpreted those texts to refer to Jesus who was said to have been born in Bethlehem approximately 2000 years ago. That is the “past hope”; an historic observance!

In the annual celebration we put a lot of emphasis on Jesus being reborn again this year, in each heart and life, now. That is the “present hope” of Christmas.

In the genre of literature we clergy call by the fancy and hard to pronounce name of apocalyptic, there is the expression of a future hope in which there will be no mistaking the resetting of the planet, the destruction of evil and the triumph of good. That is the “future hope” of Advent.

What difference does all of this make to life in Hants and Kings Counties of Nova Scotia in the waning days of 2015?

We don’t need many reminders of the things in the world that need fixing. Conflict in many places in the world have created millions and millions of refugees Their stories are being added to those of our ancestors who came across to this side of the pond, fleeing the “potato famine”. I read an article recently which asserted that if the government of Ireland had the will, there was other food for the people to eat but they were forced to emigrate to what became Canada. The “highland clearances” were clearly designed to promote the grazing of sheep over the subsistence of small farmers.

With millions of refugees in the world we sometimes wonder how we can make a difference with so many needy people. We wonder how we can do something meaningful.

We can make a difference for one family or one person. There are many ways to help.

A mosque in Texas was vandalized after the attacks in Paris and a seven year old boy spent some talking with his mother about what churches, synagogues and mosques, are for and how important everyone’s place of worship is to them and how terrible it would be for those people to have theirs vandalized. Afterward he decided to empty his piggy bank and donate the $20 inside to the mosque. A board member’s response was quoted in the press; saying that this small gesture was like a donation of a million dollars because it gave them hope.

Recently I ran into a young woman who was a child when I was her minister. She and her fiancé are very concerned about global warming and social justice. Her engagement ring is made of recycled stones and metals. The wedding rings will not be gold, or at least not newly mined gold because of their commitment to the environment and social justice. That one action will not save the lives or communities where irresponsible mining practices are destroying lives but they are a start.

Human beings have to put their hopes into action; its not like we are going to bring the kingdom about all by ourselves but it is, at least, a sign that we take the promises of Jesus birth seriously. Do we really want the poor to have enough to eat and to have a warm place to sleep? Do we really want people to have safe workplaces and not have that workplace damage the environment for generations, or do we just want that for Canadians?

Some of you have talked to me about helping the last refugee family that came to this area. You acknowledge that it was a great deal of work but it was meaningful and fulfilling as that one family found a home and a new life here in Canada.

I have talked to people raising their grandchildren or foster children because the parents are, for whatever reason, unable to. One set of grandparents I know were so tired and so frustrated with their the needs of their grandchildren and not feeling they had the energy to do it, BUT what kept them going was the knowledge that, at that point in the grandchildren’s lives they felt they could do a much better job than any of the alternatives.

The Christmas carols we will soon sing, sometimes with too little thought as to their power and meaning, speak of the dark and weary world, of sin and error and all of that stuff. Jesus came to address those things. Jesus came to eradicate those things. Jesus was and is the “Prince of Peace” after all.

Do we believe it? Even though it may not be here yet, in all its fullness, are we willing to live that way, anyway?

Let us go from here and resolve to be the change we want to see in the world?

Let us come to the feast of the faithful seeking to be fed on our journey of faith.

Amen.

Malachi 3: 1-4
Luke 1: 68-79
Luke 3: 1-6

Are We There Yet?

Have you ever travelled with a child, or even an impatient adult on a very long road trip? Have you ever gotten totally lost trying to follow someone’s directions and knew you had no time to spare getting lost? It’s frustrating and anxiety producing. The classic story is of being lost in the woods and all you end up going is going in circles!.

Many years ago I was meeting with a couple who had driven to eastern New Brunswick from somewhere in the Northwest Territories with a toddler and an infant. Personal DVD players had just come out and this couple bought one to make the trip easier for the child, and thus, for them. A distracted child who wasn’t whining about the long drive would make it easier on tired parents trying to get to Grampie’s house! Such a trip requires careful preparation and management during the trip. These days it it quite common to see families with children in airports, and instead of mom having an enormous purse, each of the children is pulling a colourful wheeled suitcasem no doubt containing the things needed to amuse them during the flight.

Today’s passages talk about the steps needed prior to a journey, preparing the way and they use the language of road-building. When I think of road-building, I think of the major projects that have taken place in recent memory that involved constructing a road where one never before existed. Two such roads that come to mind are the Cobequid Pass which was seen as a solve-all-problems solution to a treacherous road through the Wentworth Valley and the re-routed Trans-Canada through the “Strathgartney Hills” in PEI to replace a road which was deemed to have too many curves and steep hills . On such a highway you can usually see where the road has been built up or the soil carried away. In many places in Nova Scotia it would be rock that needs to be blasted to bits before it is carried away or pulverized to lay the road bed in that place or in another one that needs “buinding up”! Its hard work even with big machines and I wonder how they did that sort of thing at all before the equipment they have these days!

One day I needed something to watch while I was sorting paperwork at home and happened upon a show about trucking on “ice roads.” Ice roads are just that; seasonal roads in the north made of ice and most of these episodes seem to be filmed in the spring when the road really should be closed because its melted beyond the point of safety. The last episode I watched had footage of expenside equipment that had to be abandoned because it had become mired in the melting ice and muskeg and would never be retrieved. It’s the price of doing business in Canada’s north! I’ll take asphalt any day over those conditions!

Advent is the season of four weeks immediately prior to Christmas; it is a time of preparation, expectation and hope. Yet, we too easily forget that it is not just about waiting for baby Jesus. It is about hoping for and looking forward to the kind of world envisioned by the prophets of old; to the world as God intended it at creation. Baby Jesus is step one, but only step one. The baby Jesus on whom we place so much emphasis has to grow up and have a ministry and followers who have to embrace his vision and live in the light of the God’s power over sin and death that was shown at Easter! Many people hit the church at the high points: Christmas and Easter and that’s good but they are sandwiched between the rest of the year when we find our what those two days of the church year really mean!

So its not only about preparing the way for baby Jesus, it is about preparing the way for the Good News that he came to proclaim. Sooooooooo How do we prepare ourselves to receive the gospel anew? In addition, how do we maintain the road that we may have built last year, or the year before. We all know that roads need maintenance. Some roads, that experience very heavy traffic can develop ruts which catch water and in havy rains can be very dangerous. I wonder what the spiritual equivalent of that is?

John the Baptizer calls people to repent in order to prepare for Jesus. To repent is not, as we might first think, to “feel sorry for one’s sin” but “to repent” is to go in a different direction, to have a change of mind and heart. It is a call to re-evaluate our lives, our values and our priorities.

While it may seem that I am adding something to an already extensive pre-Christmas to do list, I think that the kind of repenting we are called to do will actually make our lives easier! Bear with me!

I suspect you all know the commercial in which the first time mom demands that all people who hold the new baby are fully sanitized with antibacterial wipes before holding the bundle of joy, but by the time baby 2 comes along the same mom is perfectly willing to let the greasy car mechanic hold the new baby while she gets something from her purse. Most really obsessive first time parents slowly and gradually adjust their expectations so that they can focus on what is important while raising their children

When I was in theological school a friend had an expression to refer to people who were stubborn or could not see another’s point of view and it was, “that person needs an attitude adjustment”. In advent God asks us to adjust our attitudes, to reevaluate our priorities and values.

I have a friend who developed a certain routine for sermon writing and adjusted it somewhat when she had children but she REALLY had to change when her child had an extensive bout of illness and she had to spend a great deal of time by his bed in the hospital. She was forced to do only what was essential to a good sermon, not the extras she had been accustomed to doing.

We need to ask the questions: What is essential to our lives? What is important to us? One of the things we need to do is, as much as possible, to try and have the things that are important become the things that take up the most of our time. For example, is having a clean house, or an immaculate car, really as high priority as the time we spend on it shows.

Long ago I was visiting a colleague who welcomed me with these words, “Come in, don’t worry about your feet, we worship the Lord, not the floor”. While wear and tear on the floor from dirty shoes and wet boots is a good thing to keep in mind because it takes extra time to clean dirty floors and extra money to replace worn out and scratched floors, some people can become so obsessed that the house is more important than the people who live in it.

Have you ever noticed that after you buy a new car the first scratch is the most noticeable (and hte most upsetting) but ten and above barely get a second glance.

Looking at Christmas entertaining: some people obsess about the decorations, the menu and outdoing others so much that they don’t enjoy the getting together, which is why they thought they were having the party in the first place!

Much of the marketing these days (and particularly at Christmas) is designed to .show you the newest and best products. It is not about the advantages of having a cell phone over using a pay phone or knocking on the door of a perfect stranger when you have a flat tire; it’s the advantage of this phone over one you bought a few months ago. Cell phone companies will pay you to switch carriers or waive the normal upgrade fees. After all we do not want to become road kill on the wireless information highway!

When we look at our financial choices we need to ask if those choices reflect what is really is important to us, or have we just been swept along with the tide.

I’ll say it clearly: “Keeping up with the Jonses” is not a Christian priority, unless perhaps the Jonses are showing how to live more simply and be more generous toward those in need.

When we hear the gospel we hear about a life of devotion and prayer, a life of serving others and turning the other cheek but we live in the real world of busy, busy, busy; we live and breathe in a world of consumerism, competition and making sure we don’t get walked all over!

The question for the Christian is: do we need to? Do we need to live in that world? Can we stop the merry go round on which we find ourselves and get off. Can we build a different road?

As I said before, repentance is NOT about remorse; its NOT about feeling bad for something you have done. Repentance is about changing priorities and direction in life. Apparently the “soap box preachers” in modern Greece stand at street-corners and utter the same word as Luke’s translator placed on John’s lips - repent- ! In the Greek its not suggestion or a request; it’s in the IMPERATIVE mood; it’s a COMMAND.

The busiest season of the year is perhaps as good a time as any to look at our values and priorities and decide what it is that we need to let go of and the one we need to pick up.

Sometimes our choices are not between good and bad but between good and better.

January is the usual time for New Year’s Resolutions; in the church, we ask you to get a head start. Yet, our focus is directed more to those things the Spirit is nudging us toward; to the things of the faith that have been on our minds but seem impossible because of our particular situation.

We must also remember that we do not do this on our own strength; we have the Spirit guiding and helping us.

We may be more peace and love filled, more generous in this season leading up to Christmas. The trick is to make it lt last all year.

Let us build an all weather, year round road where God can travel to make a better world.

Amen.

NO SERMON. White Gift Sunday

NO SERMON Musical Celebration of Christmas