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Advent 1B RCL December 3, 2017

Posted on December 3, 2017 by Beth Crane

Isaiah 64:1-9
Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18
1 Corinthians 1:3-9
Mark 13:24-37

Advent is here. This is the New Year’s season of the Church. We change from Lectionary A to B. For Morning and Evening Prayer, we change from Lectionary 1 to 2. From the green of the Pentecost season and the white for Christ the King this past Sunday, we move to purple, symbolizing penitence and also the royalty of Christ our King.

Advent is that paradoxical time of penitence, preparation, and joy. We look back to the first coming of our Lord as a baby, and at the same time we look forward to his coming again to complete the work of creation and bring in his kingdom of peace, harmony, and wholeness.

His kingdom has begun but it is not yet complete. As we look around our world, we can see clear evidence of that sad fact. Walter Brueggemann writes, “Contrary to the manner in which it is often celebrated in the churches, Advent begins not on a note of joy, but of despair. Humankind has reached the end of its rope. All our schemes for self-improvement, for extricating ourselves from the traps we have set for ourselves, have come to nothing. We have now realized at the deepest level of our being that we cannot save ourselves and that, apart from the intervention of God, we are totally and irretrievably lost.” (Texts for Preaching Year A, p. 1.)

Our opening reading from Isaiah sounds that note of despair. How often do we wish that God would come down from the heavens and help us set things right, clean up the messes we make. Scholars tell us that this passage was probably written when Isaiah and the other exiles returned from Babylon. They had prayed for the coming of this day. Yet, when they arrived home and found the temple completely destroyed and so much work to do, they began to lose hope.

At this low point, Isaiah wishes that God would tear open the heavens and come down to earth. Isaiah praises God for all the ways in which God has guided and helped the people. Then he confesses that he and all God’s people have sinned. They felt God was hiding from them when the Babylonian Empire conquered Jerusalem, and they drifted farther and farther away from God. In fact, some of the people felt that the military conquest by Babylon was a punishment for their lack of faith.

It is important to note that many of the people kept the faith during the Exile. They studied the scriptures; they increased their sense of worship and community. Isaiah is one of those people, and he is addressing God as a member of that community of the faithful.

Following the confession, Isaiah prays to God as the father of the people. He says that we humans are the clay and God is the potter. He asks God to have mercy on the people. Following this process of acknowledging God’s care for the people, then confessing his and their sinfulness, Isaiah is able to realize that God still cares and that God is a God of mercy.

Most of us have had low points like this in life. There just seem to be too many challenges. We feel as though God is far away. But we know that we really need God’s help. As we look around our world and see all the brokenness, the wholeness of God’s shalom seems impossibly far away. This makes us doubly aware that we need to turn to God.

As someone once said, when we fall far away from God, we need to ask, who moved? Not God. God has been right here all the time. Back in the time of Isaiah, the people realized that God was faithful, God had never left them. They began the mammoth task of rebuilding, but they also focused on rebuilding their sense of community and deepening their faith.

In our epistle for today, Paul thanks God for the life of the congregation in Corinth. God has given them many gifts, and they will be exercising those gifts as they wait for Christ to come again.

In our gospel, Jesus is describing the day of judgment as it is pictured by some of the prophets. But his main message is, “Stay awake. Be ready.”

Walter Brueggemann’s comments strike a wonderful Advent note. As we proceed with self-examination, we come to a screeching halt and realize that indeed, as he puts it, “all our schemes for self improvement… have come to nothing.” Without the intervention of God, all is lost.

Isaiah wanted God to “open the heavens and come down.” As Christians we know that God has done exactly that. God has come to be with us. After his baptism in the River Jordan, Jesus began building his Kingdom. We see it in every event in his ministry. He showed us how to do it. Love God and love people.

During Advent, we are called especially to make room for Jesus in our hearts and lives. This is a season for giving generously to organizations such as UTO and ERD, and other groups which help people in so many ways. It is also a time to take stock of our spiritual lives, to make or update wills, to set things in order.

But, most of all, it is a season to make even more room for Jesus. For each of us that may look different. For some of us, it means taking more quiet time. For others of us, it might mean more time with family and friends. For many of us, it is a both-and.

God did respond to Isaiah, and the rebuilding happened. How blessed and fortunate we are that God has come to be with us. We can walk with the risen Christ. How blessed that we can go and visit him in the manger. How blessed that we can be with him here and every day because he is among us. God has come to be with us, and God’s kingdom is growing even now. And God invites us every day and every moment to help to build that kingdom, that shalom. And he calls us to be ready to meet him again when he comes to complete the creation. Amen.

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Lent 5C RCL March 13, 2016

Posted on March 13, 2016 by Beth Crane

Isaiah 43: 16-21
Psalm 126
Philippians 3:4b-14
John 12:1-8

Our first reading today is addressed to the people of God exiled in Babylon. They have been there for about fifty years. Elders have died, babies have been born. Hope is almost gone. The prophet we call the Second Isaiah speaks the word of God to the people and to us.

The opening portion of the text is reminding us of how God’s people escaped slavery in Egypt. God parted the waters; the people ran with all their might; the chariots of their captors tried to follow but sank in the mud. The people escaped. And God is saying that God is going to do a new thing that is even greater than freeing the people from that slavery.

God is going to make rivers in the desert. God is going to make a path in the desert for the people to follow.  There will be plenty of water and the desert will bloom.  The people are going home.

Our gospel for today is also found in the three other gospel accounts. In Matthew and Mark, the woman who anoints Jesus’ feet is not named. In Luke, she is described as a sinner, and, in one of the greatest misinterpretations of Scripture that has ever occurred, an ancient writer said that this sinner was Mary Magdalene. Nowhere does the text say that.

In John’s gospel, the woman is one we know well—Mary, the sister of Martha. Mary is the one who sits at the feet of Jesus to learn from him. She thus becomes one of the disciples.

It is six days before the Passover. Jesus comes to the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus in Bethany, just a little way outside Jerusalem. Some time ago ago, he had raised Lazarus from the dead. This home in Bethany is one of the few places where Jesus can feel safe. Mary, Martha, and Lazarus are good friends and staunch supporters. He can talk with them and seek advice from them. He can relax with them.

After dinner, Mary brings a pound of pure nard, very expensive because it comes from the Himalayan Mountains. She anoints Jesus’ feet just as he will soon wash the feet of his disciples. She wipes his feet with her hair. Judas raises a point about the expense. Couldn’t that money have been used for the poor? This is the height of hypocrisy on his part. We know that he took money from their common purse. He was an embezzler in addition to being a traitor.

Jesus defends this faithful woman disciple. Mary is actually anointing Jesus for burial. She knows the price that he is going to pay, and she honors him with her love and loyalty. She will be there until the end.

In our passage from his Letter to the Philippians, St. Paul says so much. He has many reasons to be confident according to the world’s values. He holds a very high status. He is a Pharisee and a Roman citizen. But it is as nothing to him. He calls it “rubbish.” All his former prestige is worthless to him. It’s actually a loss on his books because of the “surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord,” he writes.

Because of Jesus, Paul is now in right relationship with God, and he says that he wants to get to know our Lord more and more and he wants to become like our Lord in his death so that he can know the power of his resurrection. In other words, we have to give up all the old worldly stuff as Jesus gave up everything. We have to give up the idea of our power and prestige and empty ourselves of all that so that we can live in Christ and he can live in us.

And then Paul says something that gives us great hope, He says that he has not fully arrived. He has not reached the goal, but “forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.”

Here on the fifth Sunday in Lent, we are looking forward to one week from now, Palm Sunday, when we will be witnesses at the crucifixion of our Lord. We know that we are not 100 percent living in Christ and allowing him to live in us. We are on the road, but we are not fully there. What a comfort it is to hear that Paul is not fully there either. But then he gives us a powerful example. We are runners in a race. We are spiritual athletes.

There is a great deal of the past that we need to forget. Yes, learn from it and remember those learnings so that we do not make the same mistakes again, but then let it go. Let it go because our Lord has taken care of it. We are forgiven. And then put our energies into living in Christ and letting him live in us. No, we are not fully there, but let us let go of the pain and failure of the past, ask our Lord for help, and move firmly, one step at a time, into the future with him.

We are partners with Christ in this journey. We are called to do our part. He has made a great sacrifice. He did it out of love for us. But he can’t run the race for us. We have to do it in partnership with him. That is what Paul is talking about today.

When Mary anointed Jesus’ feet with that priceless nard, she was giving all she had to honor our Lord. We are being called to follow her example. Will we commit ourselves to walking with him? Will we press on toward the goal, counting on his grace but also giving it all we have?

May we follow him with all our heart and soul and mind and strength that we may live in him and he in us.   Amen.

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Advent 2C RCL December 6, 2015

Posted on December 6, 2015 by Beth Crane

Baruch 5:1-9
Canticle 16
Philippians 1:3-11
Luke 3:1-6

Our opening reading takes place in the time of the Babylonian Exile. Jerusalem has been devastated. Many people have been deported. The temple is in ruins. Jerusalem is addressed in this passage. She is in mourning because of this terrible defeat and destruction. The prophet calls her to “take off the garments of sorrow and put on forever the beauty  of the glory from God.” The exiles, her children, are going to come home in safety. God’s mercy and righteousness will fill the land.

Our psalm this morning is Canticle 16, the Song of Zechariah. Let us think about the story of Zechariah for a moment. Zechariah was a faithful priest in the temple of the Lord. He was married to Elizabeth. They had no children, and they were “getting on in years,” as the NRSV says.

One day, Zechariah is serving at the altar and offering the incense when suddenly something very strange happens. There is an angel standing on the right hand side of the altar. Zechariah is terrified. The angel tells him that Elizabeth is going to have a son and that Zechariah is to name him John, meaning “God is gracious.”

The angel goes on to say that John is going to be a prophet who will bring many people to God. Zechariah asks how this can happen, since he and Elizabeth are old, and the angel Gabriel assures him that  this is indeed going to happen. From that day until after John is born, Zechariah is unable to speak. Our canticle for today is the prophecy which Zechariah utters after John was named.

Now we have two powerful bursts of light and hope in the face of darkness and despair: against all odds, the exiles return and John is born.

Let us look at our next reading. Paul wrote this letter to the Philippians from prison.  The community in Philippi was the first church Paul had founded on European soil. They have supported him throughout his ministry, and he thanks God for them every day. They pray for him, and he prays for them. They have a close relationship because they are members and ministers together in the Body of Christ. There is an abundance of love between Paul and these people, and they are looking forward to the day when Jesus will come to complete his shalom. They call the time of his second coming the “day of Jesus Christ.”

What does Paul pray for these wonderful people and for us? He prays that our “love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you determine what is best….” Paul is praying that, in all the love God showers on us, God will help us to determine what is best. God will help us sort out our priorities. God will help us focus on the things that are most important and not focus on things that are less important. God will help us to get into harmony with the values of God’s kingdom.

In our gospel, we focus on one of the great Advent figures: John the Baptist. Luke makes sure that we know exactly when John’s ministry took place. He names all the worldly rulers; he names the high priests. And then Luke tells us what is really important: the word of God came to John the Baptist in the wilderness. Far, far away from all this worldly power and empire, out in the wilderness where God can speak to us, the wilderness where the people of God journeyed for forty years from slavery into freedom, the wilderness where priorities become clear, where there are no distractions. John comes to us. He calls us to repent. He calls us to prepare the way of the Lord. He calls us to do whatever we need to do to get our lives in order so that we can follow our Lord into freedom and wholeness.

John is quoting the prophet Isaiah (40:3-5) when he calls us to prepare the way of the Lord, and John calls us to the vision of God’s shalom in an earlier chapter of Isaiah: “the wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the failing together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” (Isaiah 11: 6, 7a,9.} Peace comes to the world. Former enemies live together in harmony. All creatures and humans and the whole creation can grow and flourish as they should.

How can we prepare the way of the Lord? Some of us work to protect our environment, That is one way of helping God preserve and restore this beautiful creation. Some of us help children and young people to move from abusive homes into safer settings. Some of us work to help people who are trying to free themselves from domestic violence. Some of us work to help people recover from addictions. We have recently sent an offering to help refugees who are fleeing from terrorist attacks. These are all ways to help God build God’s kingdom of peace.

This past Wednesday, fourteen people were killed and twenty-one people were injured when a husband and wife opened fire on a group of people at a holiday gathering in San Bernardino, California. Once again, we are horrified. I ask your prayers for those who were hurt and killed, and for their families. I also ask your prayers for our leaders, local, state, and national, and for all of us, that we may follow God’s leading in finding ways to bring peace rather than violence.

The prayer of St. Paul for us today is that God will help us to determine what is best. Syed Farook went to the mosque and prayed every day. The morning service was at 4 AM. The leader of the mosque said that Syed was quiet and appeared to take his faith very seriously. He also said that a person would have to be crazy to murder people as Farook did. Muslim leaders have condemned this horrible act and are offering prayers and support to the families and loved ones. All of the major religions of the world, including Islam, are religions of peace.

What is God calling us to do—or not do— in this tragic situation? What actions will help to stop this tragic repetition of mass killings?  Several observers have said that we are in danger of becoming so numb to this violence that we might accept it as the “new normal.” I hope and pray that we will not do that.

What actions and attitudes can we take in order to help God to build a world of peace instead of this world of increasing violence and bloodshed? I do not pretend to have an answer. I do think that we are called to ask God for guidance in deep and intense prayer, as individuals, as faith communities, as a nation, and as a world community.

In spite of almost impossible odds, the exiles came home; Elizabeth and Zechariah had a son, who is now leading us to prepare the way of the Lord. Even now, our Lord is quietly building his shalom. Even now, in the face of this horror.

O God our Creator, O Jesus our Redeemer, O Holy Spirit, Heavenly Dove, lead us, we pray. Give us the grace to be agents of your peace and healing. We pray in the Name of Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

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