“Notes for the 1st Sunday in Advent”

These are pieces that I have posted for the 1^st Sunday in Advent (Year A):

29 November 1998 – Neon UMC – Lay speaker

2 December 2001 – Walker Valker UMC – Bishop Lyght presented the message

28 November 2004 – presented the sermon “Time Has Come Today” at Tompkins Corners UMC.

2 December 2007 – posted the message What Is The Guarantee?

28 November 2007 – posted the message “What Season Is This?”

These are pieces that I have posted for the 1^st Sunday in Advent (Year B):

28 November 1999 – presented the sermon “The Light Begins to Shine” at Modena Memorial UMC (pulpit exchange with their pastor who gave the message at Walker Valley UMC).

1 December 2002 – presented the sermon “At What Point?” at Tompkins Corners UMC

27 November 2005 – posted the message “The Time And The Season”

30 November 2008 – posted the message “From The Darkness Into The Light” –

27 November 2011 – posted a summary of messages and posts for Year B – “1^st Sunday of Advent – 2011”

These are pieces that I have posted for the 1^st Sunday in Advent (Year C):

3 December 2000 – presented the sermon “The Hope of Promise, the Promise of Hope” at Walker Valley UMC

30 November 2003 – presented the sermon “The Tree By the Side Of the Road”at Tompkins Corners UMC

3 December 2006 – posted the message “Days of Hope”

29 November 2009 – posted the message “How Can I?” – the meaning of Advent

2 December 2012 – presented the Advent message “In Preparation” at Grace UMC (Saturday morning before Grannie Annie’s Kitchen)

What Season Is This?

Here are my thoughts for the 1^st Sunday in Advent, 28 November 2010. The scriptures for this Sunday are Isaiah 2: 1 – 5, Romans 13: 11 – 14, and Matthew 24: 36 – 44.

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I should have posted this late last week or early this week but things have been rough lately and my focus has been on other things. Maybe I am doing what Paul warned the Romans about; focusing on my day-to-day obligations instead of by obligations to God and Christ.

But lately I have found some of my obligations being what I feel I am being called to do with my ministry. In the most recent issue of Connections, Barbara Wendland speaks of her new book, “Misfits: The Church’s Hidden Strength”. (And by the way, if you are not subscribing to Connections, you are missing some great thoughts about the nature of the church!) It could be that because I see what is happening in this world in such a different light that I am a misfit.

I see what is happening in the world and I wonder if I am seeing the same thing as everyone else. When you look at this planet on which we live; when you look at the society in which we live, and the place of the church on this planet and in this society, you have to wonder what season this is. I have no doubt that winter is coming and that we have entered into the Advent Season. But I also wonder if we understand what this season is about.

Is it the season in which we prepare for the Prince of Peace? Or is this to be another season of war and violence, not just in places where we would rather not be but in places that we once were? How can we, when we now the circumstances that forced Joseph and Mary to travel to Bethlehem, live in a world where we are slowly taking on the characteristics of the Roman Empire and not the Kingdom of Heaven hear on earth?

How do we justify a world of military power, continued warfare, and the possibility of other countries going to war with the passage in Isaiah for this week that tells us that nations will no longer go to war and people will come together with one common view?

Maybe it is because of my own situation but I wonder what happened to Thanksgiving this year. It was as if the only reason for Thanksgiving this year was so that we can have “Black Friday”, to spend our money on items and materials for ourselves. We hear that the economy is going great but why are there still people without jobs or working in multiple part-time jobs to make ends meet. Why is the discussion about making the minimum wage equal to a living wage always made out to be a bad idea, one that will destroy business? If people can’t earn enough to live (and that is what a living wage determines), how can they buy anything?

Is it possible that we have so misconstrued the words of the Bible that we think it is perfectly acceptable in God’s eyes to ignore the poor, the hungry, the sick and homeless because the Coming of Christ means the end of the world? We don’t mind having food drives at Thanksgiving and Christmas so that families and individuals will not go hungry one or two days a year. But why do we even have to discuss food drives, food closets, and similar drives when we say that we are the richest country in the world? Isn’t Christianity a day-to-day thing instead of once or twice a year?

The passage from Matthew speaks of that moment in time that has, I believed, become known as “The Rapture”. I think that Paul’s warning is predicated on that same notion. Too many people today are focused on a point in time that may or may not be coming. If I am not mistaken, Paul spent as much time telling the people to quit thinking about the anticipated Second Coming as he did mending fences and relationships within the various congregations that he helped start.

How can Christians have been motivated to work against slavery, for civil rights, for women’s rights and against war but cannot seemed to be motivated to do anything about these issues today? Is it because we don’t know what season it is?

Our ministry is found, not in the pews or the sanctuary, but in the fields and valleys of our cities and countryside. There are too many unanswered questions that demand a Gospel response for us to be worried about the 2^nd Coming.

Let’s face it. We need to be focused right now on His 1^st Coming, Christmas. We live in a society that seems more interested politically and socially on our cares than we are to what happens to others in the world. And if we don’t start focusing on what happened in Bethlehem some two thousand years ago, if we don’t start focusing on what transpired over the course of the next thirty some years in that area of the country, and if we don’t start focusing on the impact those activities had on the world then and now, this season will have no meaning.

Advent is about changing the course of one’s life. It is about being a misfit in a world that changes the words of the Bible and makes them the words of the uncaring and powerful. It is about being with the weak and the defenseless, the hungry and the poor, the places we often times don’t to be. It is about being with the young baby, born in less than ideal circumstances, certainly not in palace.

As much as we would like to use Advent as a season of preparation for what we want Christmas to be, it is more about how we can prepare for Christ to come into our hearts. Yes, if we do that, the odds are that we will be labeled a misfit in today’s society but it will be a badge of honor, much in the tradition of Paul.

Is this the season in which you continue your life as it has been? Or is this the season in which your life changes? Shall your life be one in which you fit in? Or shall you be a misfit in society but at home with Christ? These are the questions that I leave with you today. I cannot give you the answers but you will find them in your mind and your heart.

“Time Has Come Today”

It seems to me that we are a nation obsessed with time. Were it not the case, why do we have "fast foods"? Why is it so important that we get all of our Christmas shopping done on the day after Christmas? Why is it that one of the best selling books today has to do with a fictional accounting of the end of time, as perhaps first described by Saint John in his Book of Revelations? Why is it that every day, when I pick up Ann at the train station in Beacon, I am overwhelmed by the number of people who have to run off the train and drive like crazy to get out of the parking lot? You would think that people, having spent 70 minutes or so on the train ride from Grand Central Station, would want to take their time getting home as well. But they run off the train and pretend that it is the start of the 24 Hours of Le Mans auto race where drivers sprint to the cars to start the race. Still, with all the speed they put into getting off the train and getting their cars out of the parking lot, these speed demons of Beacon end up waiting in line at the light. In rushing to cut down the time of their commute, they end up gaining nothing.

We are a society that expects things now, not tomorrow. Our politics and news are built around sound bites; short little snippets of information designed to fit every decreasing attention span. We allow others to define what it is we believe so that we do not have to take the time to think things through. Are "moral values" really simple statements of opinion without any thought to consequence or outcome? It seems that our education system spends more time preparing students for a day of testing than a lifetime of thinking. Just as with news and politics, students seem to want the information presented in short sound bites, easily memorized and not requiring any analysis or thought. Could it be that our problems with the education system are not because the teachers are incompetent, bad, or ill prepared but rather because we do not give teachers the time to work with their students?

And when it comes to Sunday morning, there never seems to be enough time, at least for church and Sunday school. Somewhere along the line, we have allowed the demands placed on us in the daily workplace to control the time we spend in church on Sunday. No longer is church a daylong event; no longer are stores limited in what they can sell on Sunday mornings. I am not arguing for a return to the time of horse and buggies or the re-establishment of blue laws limiting the sale of items (especially since most of the items that were limited, I didn’t buy anyway). But as technology gave us more freedom to move about and time became more available, church attendance is no longer an expected thing in the lives of a family. Rather, it has become something that must compete with the other events of the weekend, the soccer, football and basketball games, the dance classes, recitals, housework and yard work.

The services of many churches use many techniques to take advantage of time-obsession. Services are designed to fit your schedule. Music is easy to follow and carries no thought with it. A projector shows the words of the hymn on the screen over the altar (that way you don’t have to look up the words in a hymnal). And you may think I am joking but it seems that one of the criteria for being a successful pastor in the Memphis area is the length of their sermons? The most common comment of satisfaction seems to be that we get out of church before the Baptists. This means that we get to Shoney’s before they do and can get the best seats.

We rush through life, only to get stuck in traffic along with the others seeking to rush through life. We want the answers to our problems, be the mental ones of school and work or the physical ones of food and nourishment, to be quick and easy, so as to spare us the trouble of preparation and effort. We want our church services quick and easy, as if the meaning of the Gospel can be absorbed with quick sound bites and easy visual references.

But did not the writer of Ecclesiastes, the Preacher, say that there was a time for every season and time for every purpose under heaven? Did not the Preacher complain about the quality of life that came when the spiritual needs of the body were not adequately dealt with?

In Thornton Wilder’s play Our Town, Emily dies at the age of 26. She asks the stage manager narrating the play if she can return for a brief visit with her family. He grants her wish but advises her to choose the least important day in her life but will still be important enough. She chooses to return on her 12^th birthday, only to find her father obsessed with his business problem and her mother preoccupied with kitchen duties. Emily exclaims, "Oh, Mama, just look at me one minute as though you really saw me. Mama, 14 years have gone by. I’m dead!" Unable to rouse her parents, Emily breaks down sobbing. "We don’t have time to look at one another . . . Goodbye, world! Goodbye, Mama and Papa . . . Oh, earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you! Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it — every, every minute?" (From "Wake-up Call" by Peter W. Marty in Christian Century, November 16, 2004)

Are we so obsessed with time that we fail to see things coming? Is this society obsession with books on the end of time based on a desire to know what the ending will be without living this life? Was the owner of the house so occupied with the other things that he did not see the thief coming?

That is why we celebrate Advent and why we do it over a period of four weeks. We cannot prepare for the coming of the Lord in fifteen minutes or even a day. Rather, we must be in a state of mind that requires patience and time, qualities not often seen in today’s society. There is no urgency to the celebration of Advent but it almost seems as if society demands that it be done now.

But we have to see that Advent is more than just one Sunday. We sleep through God’s signals of alarm and act as if today is like every other day. And if we are casual with today, what chance is there that we will be careful with our lives? What hope is there that we can live less selfishly and more peacefully? (From "Wake-up Call" by Peter W. Marty in Christian Century, November 16, 2004)

We ask for things now but are unwilling to put in the time and effort to make them happen. Isaiah’s prophecy speaks of a hope that there will be a day when God will get God’s way. Isaiah knew that the hope of which he spoke in today’s passage from the Old Testament would not necessarily come in his lifetime. So he wrote in the future tense and pushed the people to walk in the light. (From "Wake-up Call" by Peter W. Marty in Christian Century, November 16, 2004)

Our hopes for the future must not be dashed because the time it takes is too long. Our hopes for the future must be based on the fact that, today, we begin the process that will make the future a possibility, that there will be peace in the coming days, that people will beat their swords into plowshares.

Walter Brueggemann wrote, in reference to Isaiah’s time and ours, "The key question is whether the promissory possibilities of God have a chance in the face of the entrenched geo-political realities." The book of Isaiah expresses profound confidence that God’s promises will prevail — against, within, despite, and through geo-political realities. But this means that it will take time; this means that it cannot occur overnight. It also means that it will take many people working together. What the words of Isaiah offer are the energy and the sustenance necessary to carry out this long journey. (Adapted from The Soul of Politics by Jim Wallis)

It may seem contradictory for me to say this but this journey cannot begin on some other day. It must start today. The time has come today when we must step forth and say that even though we may not know when the Lord will come, we are preparing for that day, no matter the time and the place. Paul’s words to the Romans today tell us that we can no longer wait and expect a quick solution at some other time. Paul is telling us that this is the time to begin and prepare, to lead lives that more reflect the presence of Christ than the lack of presence.

Isaiah encouraged those that heard his words to walk in the light, with the expectation of seeing God’s will enacted. Paul said that now was the time to cast aside all the aspects of your life that prevents you from being a disciple of Christ. As we sing our invitational hymn this morning, I invite you to come to the altar rail this morning. Take a few moments and ask Christ to come into your heart, if not for the first time, again. Take some time this morning as we sing our invitational hymn to consider how you, in the coming weeks, can best prepare for the coming of the Lord. Time has come today for you to make the choice that will allow Jesus to come, not only into your household but also into your life and into your heart.

A Sense of Reward

This was the sermon/message that I presented at Tompkins Corners United Methodist Church (Putnam Valley, NY) for the 18th Sunday after Pentecost, October 20, 2002.  The Scriptures were Exodus 16: 2 -15, Philippians 1: 21 -  30, and Matthew 20: 1 -16.

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It was, I believe the explorer Sir George Mallory, who was asked why someone would want to climb Mount Everest. His reply is the classic response for all great challenges, “Because it is there.” President John Kennedy, when laying down the challenge to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade said, “We choose not to go because it is easy, but because it is difficult.” He said so knowing that we had yet to even orbit a man and that the equipment for completing the operation was not even on the drawing boards.

But it is very rare to see such an attitude today. For the most part, any new effort is met with skepticism and reluctance. Any challenge put forth to an individual today is often met with the response “What’s in it for me?” Were there still a sense of adventure in the world today, like there was in the early 60′s, mankind would have a presence on the moon and we would be well on our way to traveling to the planet Mars and perhaps beyond. The International Space Station would be have been completed and done so in a major effort of cooperation and collaboration worthy of its name, rather than piece meal and when ever it is possible.

Yes, there are challenges on this earth that need to be faced and priorities must be made so that those who are without have the basic needs. But when you take away adventure and the reason for going beyond the next curve in the road, you offer no hope to anyone.

The Israelites went out into the desert, not knowing what was before them, only that they were headed for the Promised Land. But the moment they became hungry, they began complaining. “Are we to die in the desert at the hands of the Lord when we could have had our fill at the dinner table in Egypt?” they cried, conveniently forgetting the life of slavery that went with that life.

The workers who worked the full day complained that they should have gotten more because they worked the most, forgetting that payment was made at the discretion of the landowner who paid them and it was the amount they had agreed to receive. You cannot complain when what you get is what you were told you would get.

It is hard to determine the reward that we should get for the work that we do. It has always amazed me to read about John Wesley and the early troubles he encountered in the development of the Methodist movement. We wear the badge of Methodist quite proudly, knowing that it was an epithet of slander and hatred.

Wesley openly opposed those who practiced what he called a lukewarm Christianity. He labored to bring every area of his own life into submission to Jesus Christ. His zeal, along with that of the other members of the fledgling Methodist revival, provoked ridicule. The name “Methodist” was given to this group because of their methodical devotion to daily rituals and the discipline they imposed on their lives.

Yet, even with a semi-monastic existence and a devotion to good works, each of these Oxford Methodists could claim the receipt of certainty found in God’s love. Their toil and labors, their strict self-examination, rigorous spiritual discipline, sacrificial good works left them far short of peace and joy promised in the Gospel. Later, Wesley would speak of these times as being in a “spiritual wilderness.”

The meaning that Wesley so desperately sought came only after that momentous night at Aldersgate when he welcomed the presence of the Holy Spirit into his life. It was this Presence which gave both John and Charles Wesley the sense of peace and comfort so often stated in the Gospel. It was the same for Paul; as we read in his letter to the Philippians, it was the presence of Christ in his life that gave the meaning to his (Paul’s) life.

Wesley never sought to create a new church; in fact, he remained a minister in the Church of England all his life. What he sought to do was to bring a sense of purpose to the stated mission of the church, to give meaning to the words of the Gospel. How should we measure the results of Wesley’s work? It can never be said that he understood what he had accomplished, but no less a source than the Cambridge Modern History stated that the most positive influence in eighteenth-century England was “John Wesley and the religious revival to which he gave his name and life.”

But what Wesley sought could not have been accomplished had he not accepted the Holy Spirit into his life that night at Aldersgate. There is no way we can ever seek to gain any rewards if our rewards are tied to earth. Perhaps my favorite Bible passage is Ecclesiastes 3 (“To every thing there is a season”). It speaks of our time under earth; but in chapter 2, the Preacher spoke of the futility of a life spent trying to gain everything there was, as if it would provide the meaning of life. Just as Wesley saw that nothing was possible without the presence of the Holy Spirit, so too did the Preacher point out that life without God was meaningless.

There is nothing wrong with seeking rewards for what we do; it is perhaps only natural. But it always amazes me when I read about some individual who no one knew and everyone ignored who gives a college or university a tremendous amount of money simply because it was the right thing to do. At least one church received the money to build a parsonage because, on one Sunday, the congregation was nice to a stranger passing through. Nothing was said but this stranger was made to feel welcome one particular Sunday. And many years later, a check from the estate was mailed to the church. The reward for simply doing what is right can never be measured in the present time.

Tompkins Corners United Methodist Church is faced with a challenge. If this congregation is to go beyond the present time, there are those who must step up, who must face the challenge without any sense of reward or entitlement. It is not a challenge to do everything by themselves, but rather pick an area of leadership and help the entire congregation move into the future. There are some that will say that it cannot be done and if no one picks up the challenge, that will be the case.

In those days prior to that wondrous encounter with the Holy Spirit at Aldersgate, John Wesley was near death. Because he saw his method as a failure, because he saw his missionary work in Georgia as a failure, Wesley came back to England prepared to die. Yet, he did not die but rather he surrendered his soul to the Holy Spirit. In turning over his life, he gained that which he sought. He may never have understood the reward that came with his work; such rewards are only measured through the pages of time. But he did gain a sense of peace that he had long sought.

So too is it for us. We may never gain a sense of reward for the work that we do now. But that is not why we do it; we do it so that others may gain the reward of having Christ as a presence in their lives. And that may be the best reward we can ever experience.

What Is The Guarantee?

Here are my thoughts for the 1st Sunday in Advent.  May this be a season of happiness and peace for you and your family.

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There can be no doubt in anyone’s mind that the two most important dates on the Christian calendar are Christmas and Easter. But why are they so close together? Wouldn’t it be better to have scheduled the two events six months apart in order to maintain a semblance of balance in the calendar? Wouldn’t it have been better to have scheduled these two events in such a way as to maximize the impact of each date?

Christmas is the day we celebrate Christ’s birthday. It is interesting that when the church was in its own infancy, there was a feeling that we shouldn’t even celebrate His birth. Since the church was living at a time when the birthdays of other gods were celebrated, many felt that to celebrate Christ’s birthday would diminish its meaning.

Of course, the suggestion that the shepherds were in the fields the night of Christ’s birth puts his birth either in the late Fall, say November, or early Spring, say March. The actual date of December 25^th wasn’t chosen until 336 AD, after Emperor Constantine made Christianity the Empire’s favorite religion. It was also chosen to co-opt the pagan celebration of Saturnalia. But prior to that time, January 2^nd, March 21^st, March 25^th, April 18^th, April 19^th, November 17^th, and November 20^th all received consideration. (1) Now, if it had been up to me, I would have picked one of the spring dates.

But, if we celebrated Christmas in March or April, then there would be times when Easter and Christmas are at the same time (and even on the same date) and it would not be right or logical to be celebrating both Christ’s birth and death at the same time.

But why is Easter when it is? And who came up with that wonderful method for calculating when Easter occurs? (2) It seems to me that because the first Easter was held during Passover, Easter and Passover should occur at the same time. And while this does occur every few years, the methods used for the determination of the two dates do not match.

While it seems that Christmas was the decision of a single individual, Easter was decided by a committee. After the Council of Nicea met in 325 AD and settled the Arian controversy, they began debating how to determine the proper date for Easter. Other than stipulating that Easter be celebrated on a Sunday, the council could not resolve the matter and left it for another committee to make the final decision.

In part, the difficulty was due in part to the nature of the church. Churches in the eastern part of the Roman Empire wanted to follow the Jewish calendar because the majority of their members were Jewish converts; churches in the western part of the Roman Empire favored a date that matched the spring equinox because the majority of their members came from pagan roots.

It wasn’t until the beginning of the 18^th century that churches in the west began using the method of Dionysius Exiguus where Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon following the spring equinox. The problem of when Easter is scheduled wasn’t completely resolved because of flaws in the Julian calendar which had the beginning of spring (as determined by the spring equinox) slowly moving back into February.

Even with the development of the Gregorian calendar in 1582, there are still going to be differences between Easter as celebrated in western churches, eastern churches and Passover still exist. The actual date for Easter will vary over a period of some thirty-five days. That is because Easter is essentially based on a lunar cycle and the combination of lunar and solar cycles can get very complicated. (3)

Now, it really doesn’t matter who scheduled Christmas and Easter or when they actually occurred. What does matter is that it is not the day that we hold holy but rather because of who made it Holy. (4)

As it is right now, we spend six months of the year in “ordinary time” and then, when Thanksgiving rolls around, we madly rush through the four weeks of Advent to Christmas. We pause very briefly in January and February in order to set up things for Lent and Easter and follow it with the Easter Season leading up to Pentecost. Then we coast from June to November when we start it up all over again.

We see people who haven’t been to church in six months but who feel that somehow attendance now “validates their parking ticket” or somehow justifies their inactivity during the rest of the year. For so many people, the church and Christianity are these two dates and it is what you do on these two dates that matters most. But Christianity is not set by the calendar; it is set by what is in one’s heart.

So it is that we begin the Season of Advent, a time when we prepare for the Coming of Christ. And despite what some may say about the Gospel reading for today (5) being a description of the Rapture, we are not preparing for the end of the world but for the coming of the one person whose presence in this world can change the world. Too many people speak of these days as being part of the end times and use this passage from Matthew as part of their justification.

But the Rapture and any consideration of the End Times do not come from the Bible but from a single interpretation by a 19^th century minister, John Darby. Granted, the concept of the Second Coming is not new. The people of the churches to whom Paul wrote (6) felt that the Second Coming was close at hand and they had stopped doing the work of the church. That is the basis for Paul’s warning in the Epistle lesson for today.

People were expecting Christ’s return and they had quit doing their own work and the work of the church in preparation for Christ’s Second Coming. But to stop doing what you should and are expected to be doing because you expect to be called into God’s Kingdom at any minute is as foolish as not expecting the Kingdom at all. One of the reasons for today’s Gospel reading is to point out that you need to be prepared at any time for the call.

But this preparation does not mean that you should walk around with an air about you or an attitude that says that you will be going and others won’t. Jesus held his greatest criticism for those who held themselves above others and felt that they were the only truly righteous ones. Having been told on too many occasions that I am doomed because I do not live my life as others dictate that it should be lived, I can understand why Jesus would say this and have such thoughts. If there is any hope in this world, it comes from the promise of salvation through Christ and not what others may say. There is no guarantee in this life other than the one that it is given to us through salvation.

The one thing that can destroy Christianity is the attitude that so many Christians have that they will be the ones who are taken in the moment described in the Gospel. From this attitude comes arrogance and that is not what Christianity is about. We are called to bring people to Christ, not scare them away. But we have to understand what it means when we say we are Christ’s disciples and when we seek to make others disciples..

The word “disciple” does not necessarily mean “a student of a teacher” but more “a follower of somebody.” Discipleship in the New Testament means to be a follower of Jesus, to go on a journey with Jesus. Journeying with Jesus also means to be in a community. Discipleship is not an individual journey but one done in the company of other disciples. While it is a journey on a road less traveled, it is a journey done in company with others who remember and celebrate the presence of Jesus in their lives.

And discipleship also means being compassionate. “Be compassionate as God is compassionate” is the defining mark of a follower of Jesus. Compassion is the fruit of the life in the Spirit and the ethos of the community of Jesus.

The Christian journey is a life lived from the inside out, a life in which the things we experience within — dreams, memories, images, and symbols, and the presence of him whom we encounter in deep silence — are in constant tension and dialogue with all that we experience without — people, events, joys, sorrows, and the presence of him whom we encounter in others. Thomas Merton repeats a suggestion of Douglas Steere that the absence of this tension might well produce the most pervasive form of violence present in contemporary society. “To allow one’s self to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns,” Merton writes, “to surrender to too many demands, to commit one’s self to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything is to succumb to violence. Frenzy destroys our inner capacity for peace. It destroys the fruitfulness of our work, because it kills the root of inner wisdom which makes work fruitful.”

One of the most critical tasks of the local church is to enable people to become “journeyers” rather than “wanderers.” This suggests that the leadership of a congregation needs to be serious about their own journeys, to the point where they are willing to share their experience with others, not as those who have arrived but as fellow journeyers able to receive as well as to give. . . .

In his Markings, Dag Hammarskjold records some of the often agonizing turning points that were the occasion of the deepening of his remarkable journey. One entry in this journal describes with particular wisdom that sense of creative tension which is the mark of wholeness. “The more faithfully you listen to the voice within you,” he writes, “the better you will hear what is sounding outside. And only he who listens can speak. Is this the starting of the road toward the union of your two dreams — to be allowed in clarity of mind to mirror life, and in purity of heart to mold it?” Ultimately, this is the question we all must ask, for it is the question Christ asks of us. (7)

We are faced with a challenge today. In light of the violence that seems to be so much a part of our society today, in light of the poverty and homelessness that seems to be so much a part of our lives today, in light of the injustice and oppression that seems to be the norm rather than the exception, what do we say? What do we do?

We can say that the violence, poverty, and oppression are signs of God’s wrath for the sins of unnamed souls. But when innocent children are killed and other lives are destroyed through senseless violence, will we cry out to God that it is His fault?

Our only answer to war seems to be more war. We hear today that the present administration is moving to fix the housing crisis. But they are not doing so to help homeless people find homes or let people keep the homes that they bought; rather, they are working to help the banks whose policies have helped to fuel the crisis not go out of business. The temple stood when Jesus threw out the money changers but it fell when the people sought war as the answer to oppression.

This is the Sunday we begin the journey that ends with the birth of Christ. We may not know when Christ was actually born but we have the guarantee that He was born and He came to bring peace on earth. The Old Testament reading today (8) speaks of the people turning their swords into plowshares, their spears into pruning hooks, and working with other nations so that war will be no more. If we are part of the community of Christ, then that is what we should be doing. If we are a part of the community of Christ, then we should be working to insure the sick are healed, the homeless have shelter, the hungry have food, the blind see and the deaf hear.

If we decide that we do not want to be a part of the community of Christ, then there is no guarantee as to what comes next. But if we decide to be a part of the community of Christ, then and only then do we have the guarantee.

(1) Adapted from http://www.christianitytoday.com/history/newsletter/2000/dec08.html

(2) The Astronomical Society of South Australia offers a “simple” method for calculating Easter up to and including 4099 AD. They even offer a computer program that will do the calculations for you. Go to http://www.assa.org.au/edm.html.

(3) Adapted from http://www.christianitytoday.com/history/newsletter/2000/apr20.html

(4) See footnote 1.

(5) Matthew 23: 36 – 44

(6) Romans 13: 11 – 14

(7) From Mutual Ministry by James C. Fenhagen

(8) Isaiah 2: 1 – 5