Now, all of this raises a question, an important question, a question that often gets overlooked as we flinch and, with either scholarly precision or blunt literalism, try to protect ourselves from language like this. You see, the question this raises is not the popular and hopeless question of "When will it happen?", or "What will it actually be like?" That’s neither our business nor our concern; and all the best-selling end-times "Bible Studies" or silly religious fiction in the world won’t get us any nearer to those questions. They simply don’t concern us; and they shouldn’t occupy us. We know that whatever lives we are living today will end, and we know that whatever world, whatever culture, we are living in now will pass away. Always has and always will. The details are not our concern. That is not our question.

Our question is, simply, "How shall we live?" Since everything around us, including our own bodies, is temporary and doomed; and since God and God’s kingdom are neither, then what does that say for us? How are we to find meaning and significance in our lives—the lives we are given to live out in this death-destined creation? (By the way, the traditional four themes for Advent are death, the last Judgment, heaven [which is why the third candle is rose] and hell. Which is why Advent always starts out as such a bummer). Anyway, how are we to live in our present, in the mean time, between now and then?

The answer is as simple as it is difficult, challenging, and easy to misunderstand. We just heard one of Paul’s versions of the answer in Thessalonians, where he prays for us, "may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all." That’s how we are to live in a world bracketed by death and finitude—we are to live lives of love, for one another and for all. And if that sounds easy, read the Gospels, and then try it. (If this were a really long sermon, I’d talk about why this is the answer; but you can most likely guess. It has to do with the nature of God.)

Instead, today I want to talk for a bit about one of the ways that our nation, our world, and our Church have given us to increase in love for one another and for all. That way is the Millennium Development Goals—you have a little card about them in your bulletin. They are a plan for impacting significantly extreme poverty in the world. They are a way we can increase in love for one another and for all.

First, some background. When I was born, there were about 2.5 billion people in the world. Growing up, I heard a lot about the population explosion. Today, there are over 6.5 billion people in the world. That’s a lot—the explosion happened. Also, today, just about one billion people (can you really imagine that, one billion people; that is just about 40,000 Big Springs) today one billion people barely survive on less than what one U.S. dollar a day can buy in the U.S. That’s what the MDG’s mean when they talk about people living in extreme poverty. What that involves in human terms is staggering and really beyond our imagining. One small example is that over 200 people will die of starvation, and scores more from preventable diseases, during this sermon. (And I can’t keep that from happening by not preaching this sermon.)

At the same time, something else has happened in my lifetime, something potentially wonderful.

Our world’s technology, agriculture, communications, medical expertise, social and political sophistication, these have all increased, too; and at a rate even faster than that of our population. One of the things this means is that, for the first time in human history, all of the complex and varied resources needed to eradicate these most extreme and destructive forms of poverty actually exist, and they exist right now. There is enough of everything to make a difference, a huge difference, in the lives of these one billion people. And we are called to increase in love for one another, and for all.

In Kenya, there is an old proverb that says, "God gives, but God doesn’t share." Remember that, "God gives, but God doesn’t share". The wonderful, graceful, and live-giving business of sharing, that’s ours; God has saved that for us; and God will not do that for us. For we are called to increase in love for one another, and for all.

So, what does the coming together of this vast sea of human need and this rapid increase in our ability to help look like? Right now, an important part of it looks like the MDG’s. Around the year 2000, 189 nations, including our own, developed these eight goals. They are in front of you. They are realistic, they are possible, and they are starting to happen. A untied humanity can cut extreme poverty in half in our lifetime. Really. And what’s more, the cost to do that has been carefully calculated. It amounts to 0.7%, that’s seven tenths of one percent, of the budgets of the developed nations. All the developed nations have promised to work toward that goal, at least one, Norway, has reached it; and the Untied States, while we still have a way to go percentage-wise, is currently the largest giver toward the MDG’s in terms of actual dollars. We can all be proud of that.

We can also participate in this effort; and untie around it. Our national church, at last summer’s General Convention, designated .7% of its budget to projects that support the Millennium Development Goals; in October, our Diocesan Convention set aside .7% of it’s budget for the same purpose.

Both the General Convention and the Diocese are encouraging every Episcopal church and every Episcopalian to follow their lead. It is my hope, and the hope of our Vestry, that our parish budget will also contain a similar commitment. Kathleen and I have checked out our tax return from last year and are committing 0.7% of our income in this way. It isn’t very much. It’s less than half of what our health insurance costs for one month. We invite you to join us. ||The Adult Class during Advent will focus on the MDG’s, and we will look for some specific ways that we, both as a parish and as individuals, can participate in this effort. Remember, this is not guilt-driven, blind charity, this is not haphazardly putting band-aids on terminal patients. This is possible, it is planned, it can work, and we can help.

After all, Rotary International, with the help of the World Health Organization and others, but pretty much on its own, has all but eradicated Polio from the entire world during this generation. The world has learned from this wonder; and it is precisely this sort of intentional, realistic, carefully planned and executed program that is behind the MDG’s.

Now, do not misunderstand. These goals are realistic, not utopian. They will not solve every problem; and we will have no less to do here in Big Spring than we do now. The poor will always be with us. And this is not a plan to organize a program that will bring in the Kingdom of God. Only God can bring in the Kingdom of God, and God will do that in his own time and in his own way. The MDG’s are only one way (among many); but they are one way, (among many) with which we can begin to answer the question for meaning, and the prayer for love, that our world and our faith offer us. This world, and the concerns of this world, are not ultimate, but they are ours for now, and while we are here, we are called to increase in love for one another, and for all.

And the issues and crises that these texts address are not just national or political; they are also personal. Virtually everyone listening to Baruch, to Isaiah, and to John, was hurting, hurting deeply, and for good reason. Every dream looked dead; most of the people, places and things which had given meaning and purpose to their lives had been torn or destroyed. There seemed no hope, no future, no reason to continue to live.

None the less, in spite of that, and ignoring none of that, they all say the same thing—in different ways, but the same thing. Isaiah, and Baruch, and Paul and even John the Baptist say, "rejoice". They all say that God, who has seemed distant, or absent, or hostile, or furious at you, this God is doing something wonderful for you, and has even greater things in store for you. That must have been almost impossible to believe, impossible to take seriously.

Well, that was then, and this is now. But every Advent carries us back to those promises given in the midst of so much pain. Indeed, this is the very heart of Advent—the unlikely, indeed unbelievable, promise of wonderful and joyful things to come at a harsh and painful time.

We need to hear those promises today, and we need to realize that they are also and always for us—for us in our real lives, for us in our real world.

After all, each one of you knows at least a little of what it feels like to be in exile, and each one of you knows what it is like to hurt, and to wonder where God is, and whether God cares. I count myself among the most fortunate of men, and life has generally been very kind to me. So all the more it is impossible to climb this pulpit every week, and to know you, to know most all of you at least at least a little—it is impossible to do that and not to stand in deep admiration and some real awe of the struggles that so many of you have known, and often still know. In your lives, in your families, in so many ways, past and present, you have known what pain and exile and hurt are like.

And right now, the holiday season, is for many of the people we know, and for doubtless a few of us, a dreadful time and an awful time; a time of exile.

There are lots of reasons for that. This is a time when the unattainable American myth of what it means to be a happy and successful person, and what it means to be a happy and successful family, when this is constantly rubbed in our faces and forced down our throats. So much of what we hear, and of what we see insists that everything is supposed to be so perfect, and everyone is supposed to be so happy. As a result, we can feel most sharply all of the ways our lives do not match up with that myth. This can be a time when our own pains and incompleteness and loneliness and failures and empty dreams haunt us and hurt us the worst.

This can also be a time when we miss the most those who have died, and those who are otherwise absent; and when grief amazes us with its power, and we visit again those old pains.

And if that’s the way it sometimes is for you during this holiday season, well, that’s all right; it’s like that, and you are far from alone. And it might be a good idea to look around for someone to reach out to, and to share with, and to care for. Remember, the promises of Advent are for you, too.

And if that is not the way it is for you this year, then realize that, and appreciate that, and give some very special thanks for that at this Altar this morning. Bring an extra measure of gratitude; for you are richly blessed. And it might be a good idea to look around for someone to reach out to, and to share with, and to care for. And remember, the promises of Advent are for you, too.

In fact, it can be a gift in disguise that Advent comes during our culture’s annual commercial and sentimental feeding frenzy. If we let it, this can allow us to be open and receptive to Advent’s deepest meaning.

Again, the deepest meaning of Advent is not only that we will remember again that birth in Bethlehem—as vitally important as that is. The deepest meaning of Advent is also that God wants to come to us, and that God will come to us. It is that God wants to come to you, and that God will come to you.

In the midst of whatever pains and joys this holiday season brings, God continues to seek you out, and to know you, and to offer you the gift of His presence and of His love. God promises you wonderful and joyful things.

You are not alone, and you are not forsaken, and your life does have meaning, and purpose, and great value. There is reason to hope; and, unless we let it, nothing can take that away.

For it is within us, in the stuff of our lives, as well as around us, that every path shall be made straight, every valley be filled, and every hill and mountain be brought low. God will overcome whatever is standing between us and him. Just as God promises his salvation, his wholeness and his peace, to all of creation; so he promises his salvation, his wholeness and his peace to you. In ways that matter.

We do not know what that will be or how it will appear. We do not know if it will be something we will recognize right away, or notice right away, or even want. It has been ever thus. Those who first heard Isaiah and Baruch and Paul and John the Baptist seldom received what they craved or expected. But if they listened and waited and hope, they found the promises true. Always. We are not in control of what the gift of God’s grace and love will look like. And it might not look like much at first. That’s why we are called to be both alert and patient.

But somehow, in God’s time and in God’s way, His will for us will be made perfect, and we will know the power of that love.

The word of Advent comes to us as the voice of one crying in the wilderness—a promise of wonderful news given at a very bad time. The news is still wonderful, whether this particular time is good or bad.

God is coming to His people to set them free, and all flesh shall see the salvation of our God.

None the less, we hear John the Baptist again today, and I want to look at just one piece of the story about him. John is still preaching repentance, and he’s doing a really powerful job of it. He preaches so well that the people listen, (scary) they believe, and they call him on it. OK, they say, we don’t want the axe laid to the root of us, we repent, really. Now, what should we do; what does this repentance look like. What are the details.

That’s really a good Advent question, both then and now. I still get it—"what are we supposed to do?" I figure folks back then, pretty much like folks today, were expecting from John a sort of official list of ‘repentance things to do’—a bunch of holy busy work to keep them occupied, and to give them a reason to wear their own button: "the messiah is coming—and I’m busy."

What John says to all of that is fascinating. First of all, he doesn’t give any general rules—he doesn’t say, "everybody who repents has to do this, and this, and this, and this, and this, and so on". He doesn’t say that. Instead, he says that what you are supposed to do will grow from your life, from where you are and from who you are. Your duty will be a function of your situation in life.

First of all, John says, if you are a person who has more than you need, you will then have a duty to share what you have with those who don’t have all they need. That’s something repentance looks like. It looks like reflecting on where you are in the world—do you have, literally or metaphorically, two coats.

That situation will give you a moral imperative, it will show you something that you have to do. Since not everyone is in that situation, not everyone has that particular duty. But this is what repentance looks like for people who are in that situation.

John then talks with the two most unpopular groups of Jews in Palestine—tax collectors and soldiers. The tax collectors worked for Rome, the soldiers, most likely, for Herod, the puppet king of Rome. They were, basically, the scum of the earth, as popular as telephone solicitors, and as respectable as mafia hit-men. These are the folks who asked John what they were supposed to do. (Remember, John was an anti-Roman nationalist who was also on the outs (big-time) with Herod and his whole family.) So the folks who asked this probably expected John to say something really drastic (and nasty), like: ‘The best thing you can do is drop dead’, or, at the very least, ‘You gotta quit your job and do something decent people can stomach.’

Instead, John told the soldiers to be good soldiers, to cultivate the virtues, and avoid the temptations, of their profession—and to seek to be content and productive within the finest traditions of that profession. He said essentially the same thing to the tax collectors, who were even less popular than the soldiers.

Again, he didn’t tell the soldiers not to be soldiers, or the tax collectors not to be tax collectors. He didn’t tell anyone they had to become like him, and he didn’t give a single soul a bunch of busy-work. Instead, he said that a life of repentance begins with exactly the real life you have, with exactly the situation in which you find yourselves, with exactly the person you are right now. You begin here—you don’t have to go someplace else to start. The point is not to look busy. The point is to transform the life you have.

This means, among other things, that the Christian life is not somebody else’s life; it isn’t a life that is distant and different from ours. The Christian life we are called to live is not Mother Theresa’s life, or St. Francis’ life, or the life of Peter or Paul.

That was their life to live. The Christian life we are called to live is our life, our present lives—lived differently, and transformed by the intention of living them wholly to the glory of God.

By the way, John’s response suggests that we look at our lives from two perspectives: the first one has to do with what we do—our professions or jobs, those regular tasks and responsibilities we have. Are we educators, or cooks, or engineers, whatever? That’s the first perspective. The second has to do with who we are, with our situation in life. Are we single or married, retired or working, healthy or ailing, (I’ve already mentioned having possessions or not having possessions), parents or children {or both}, young or old {or neither}? Who are we? That’s the second one. It is these two together that give content to what a life of repentance looks like.

Think about it. What are the duties, the temptations, the virtues and the excellences of where you are—of what you do, and of your situation in life? John told soldiers to be good, morally good, soldiers. (They already knew what that meant, but he filled some of it in for them.) What does it mean, what does it look like, for you to be a good you, to be a morally good you, in terms of both parts, of doing and being? What is involved in that? This, John the Baptist suggests, is what you should do if you hear the word of God, and repent.

I suspect that is plenty enough for any of us. I suspect that our present lives are likely to contain all the moral challenges, all the opportunities to discern and develop virtues, all the temptations to resist, all the vices to discover and transform, all the occasions for holiness and for growth, for generosity and for renewal, that we will need.

Again, when it come to the moral life, to living out our Christianity, we don’t have to go somewhere else to start—we start right here. And we don’t have a bunch of new things to do—just what we have always have been doing, laid before us now not as the drudgery of another day, but as the gift of God for our spiritual and moral growth. So, we have no reason to postpone getting serious about our faith until something or another changes. It is precisely in our dealing with something or another that we are to discover what it means for us, now, to get serious about our faith.

That is the moral challenge John the Baptist gives us. It really doesn’t have anything to do with looking busy, and it isn’t about what anybody else is or isn’t doing. There isn’t a single list everybody gets. Instead, it is about us, personally, about who we are and what we do. It is precisely there that we will find the details, and the challenges, of what we ought to—and it is precisely there that we will find the grace and direction to live that out, and make that real.

We find that word in the Visitation. This story of Mary and Elizabeth is a story of hope and of joy—of ancient longings for redemption and security finally fulfilled; of a future that can be faced with confidence and with excitement. Those two impossibly pregnant women—the barren wife of an aging priest, and an unknown virgin with neither royal blood nor an important family—began a song of praise that has continued through twenty centuries: "My soul magnifies the Lord," Mary sings, "and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior." Wonderful words, there is no better Christmas music.

And both the world out there and our own souls desperately need this pure word of joy and of hope. For in the midst of all the Christmas spirit around us, we know, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, that Advent can be an especially difficult time, and an especially empty time. I’ve seen that a lot this month.

But that shouldn’t be surprising. Listen: secular holidays—cultural joy—will always fall short. They always have to be tinseled, or painted with gaudy colors, in order to look solid and impressive. That’s because when the world looks to itself alone for fulfillment, when the world tries to find within itself alone cause for celebration and for joy, it simply can’t. The world can find only emptiness—an emptiness it frantically tries to fill by tossing stuff, things of one sort or another, into itself.

So the culture does not commercializes holidays because the culture intentionally seeks second best. Instead, the culture commercializes holidays because that is simply the best the culture can do.

The same thing is true with each of us. If we look only or primarily to ourselves, only or primarily to who we are, or to what we can do, or to what we can get—if we look only or primarily there for fulfillment, for hope and for joy, then we are doomed to mouths full of ashes. There really isn’t any ultimate, deep and lasting good news in the world all by itself, or in ourselves alone.

It is to all of this that the joy and hope of Mary and Elizabeth speak most loudly. For their joy is aimed directly at the world’s pain—at our pain. Both women rejoice, both sing—yet neither celebrates anything of her own doing. Neither sings because of what she has accomplished, or because of what she deserves, or because of what the world is doing for her, or because it is the time of year people are suppose to sing.

Mary and Elizabeth sing because they have been given a new life to share. Each sings because that which nature and the world have named as barren is suddenly filled with life—life that will, in its own time, shake the foundations of a world that has absolutely no idea what is going on.

These two women rejoice, and we are called to rejoice with them, for one reason and one reason alone: because God loves us enough to act. Their joy, and ours, is deeply rooted and real. Their song, and ours, is sung only because God loves us enough to come to us—to the most barren, the most unnoticed, the very least of us—and to plant in us, and in our world, God’s own life, God’s own hope, and God’s own promises of peace. Our hope is in the name of the Lord.

And that never seems to happen where or how or when we expect it to. Look at the other lessons: the prophet Micah told an Israel in deep trouble to look to a small and insignificant town if it wanted hope—because nothing too important was coming out of Jerusalem, or Babylon, or any big city or important place. The writer of Hebrews insists that the sacrifice that mattered was not any of the beautiful rituals on the High Altar or in the Holy of Holies in the Temple; instead, the sacrifice that mattered was a grubby little execution on a garbage dump outside of town.

And for all the beautiful paintings and glorious music that have been inspired by that scene of Mary’s Visitation to Elizabeth, one thing is certain—at the time, nobody noticed, nobody cared. ||As a rule, it is not the loud noises that carry the Word of God.

Still, what God wants to do to you, to each of you, this Christmas, is exactly what he did for Mary and Elizabeth. God wants to put into your hearts, and into your lives, hope and joy. Real hope—the kind that isn’t for sale and doesn’t wear out; and real joy—the joy that begins deep inside. And God wants each of us, like Mary, to bear within us, and to carry to those around us, no one other than the Lord of life. That’s what God wants.

For that gift to be given to Mary, and to Elizabeth, they didn’t have to go shopping. Instead they had to be still and quiet. They had to listen to voices that no one else could hear; voices that said impossible things. Each had to believe that God would do what God promised, even to her—even to the person she was. And each had to trust that, somehow, the Lord would be faithful.

I think it requires a special vision, and a special discipline, to see signs of hope, to discover cause for joy. In our world and in our lives, it takes eyes that trust and hearts that believe to find real reasons to sing, to magnify the Lord, to give thanks. But it can be done, it must be done, if we are to discover what this season is really all about.

Perhaps what Mary and Elizabeth have to say to our Christmas season is that the hope and joy which the world outside is trying to concoct, or to pretend, or to buy, this month, really is a gift—a gift usually given quietly in the places we least expect it, in the ways we do not believe possible.

For the real business of our deepest preparations for Christmas is waiting, and listening, and trusting that the Lord will regard the low estate of his servants, and that he will give to us what the world cannot give and cannot recognize. And perhaps, as happened to Mary and Elizabeth, some new life will begin to grow within us, new life that can transform us, and renew our world.

The image is from a story that Houston Smith, perhaps the greatest living scholar of comparative religion, tells in his first book about his deepest love. The book is called The Soul of Christianity, and here is the story.

A poignant story, and one especially fitting on this night.

For we must always remember that the Christmas story is the story of how God chooses to deal with a broken, sinful, and alienated world—a world that has ignored, distorted, and co-opted for its own purposes the will, the gifts, and the love of its creator.

Now, if we think about it for even a minute, we can see that there are all sorts of ways God could do this—in fact he tried several, and we still sometimes pretend that God did something different from what he in fact did.

God could have, with perfect justification, come to the world he created through such beauty, goodness and love, a world that had all but abandoned these, he could have come to us with judgment and wrath. Or he could have come to us with rules, regulations, and laws; or with dire warnings about our direction and our fate. God could have rent the heavens with unmistakable signs and proclamations that would have coerced both belief and obedience. God have done that.

But that’s not what happened; that’s not why we are here on this special night. We are here tonight because God choose to do something else, something less obvious, something that could only be see by eyes that were focused differently from the focus of the world, something that could only be understood by a mind that had already embraced the great story of God’s constant search for his creation. We are here because of the tears of God.

We are here because God, loving us and thirsting for our love—for our love for him and for our love for one another—God choose to come to us himself, not in splendor and majesty, but in all the vulnerability, weakness, and dependence of a child. Hardly the actions of someone who wants to be feared; but clearly the actions of someone who wants from us the most we can become.

Really, babies bring out the best in us. They offer, and they call from us, love, not fear; warmth, not anxiety. This is what God did. He came to us in this way.

And in doing this, God forever bound his life to our lives, his fate to ours.

Ten days ago, I was in Judge Moore’s courtroom when the Jensen’s adoption of Michael and Mika became final. It was all very delightful and mostly pro forma (after the Judge finally got there). But one thing in particular struck me. When Debbie and Brian were testifying, the attorney for CPS asked them both the same question; a question he doubtless asks everyone in their situation. It was, in effect, "are you willing to have these children as part of your family no matter what?" And we all know the possibilities, the dangers, the hopes and fears that go with no matter what. With a choice like this, there is no exit strategy, no holding back, no conditions. From this moment on their lives would be forever shaped by the fate of these children. Brian and Debbie answered ‘yes’ to their two new children. I couldn’t see, but I suspect there were some tears. They understood.

And, on this night, God answers ‘yes’ to you and me; indeed God has said ‘yes’ to all of us. Knowing all there is to know, God said ‘yes’. God stood over a disobedient, delinquent, and selfish world, bent on its own destruction, and God wept, not in sadness, not in despair, but in compassion and mercy; God wept from his pain in knowing that we human beings were settling for far less than God would have us be. Those tears fell to earth in Bethlehem. Right then, they fell no where else, only in Bethlehem.

But, just as the coming of Jesus is both an event in the past and a continuing, present, reality, so also is the compassion, the tears, of God—compassion that we see first in that distant place so long ago, but that continues to surround, indeed to drench, us, even, indeed especially, tonight.

This means that, as God was born in that manger, in exactly the same way God longs to be born in us.

The same tears, the same compassion, that caused the angels to rejoice and the heavens to shine with new light, these are always given for us, no matter what. The promise has been made, and the gift of love has been give, and, as far as God is concerned, there is no turning back. No matter what.

May God grant us the eyes to see, and the minds to know and understand, and the hearts to rejoice, to give thanks, and the will to respond.

Come, let us adore him.

All these references to love and God sending his son as evidence of his love are a different approach to the story of Christmas and depart from the manger and shepherds, wise men and such. The other three gospel accounts of Jesus' birth are more closely aligned; more like snapshots; John reads the story of creation of God’s word through the lens of the incarnation like a telescope—not simply Old Testament traditions. He presents the church with its explicit theological vision of the difference the incarnation makes in the life of the world. John stresses the eternal existence of the word of God outside the bounds of time and history; the opening words "in the beginning" recall the first words of genesis—pointing to a time before the creation of the world.

Verse 18 concludes the prologue but it also serves as an introduction to the Gospel narrative. It is central to understanding the fourth Gospel, because it states explicitly John’s understanding of Jesus’ ministry and saving work: to make God known.

The story of the "Word" is the story of Jesus and vise versa. The "Word" becomes the most decisive event in human history—indeed in the history of creation–because the incarnation changes God’s relationship to humanity and humanity’s relationship to God. The incarnation means that humans can see, hear, and know God in ways never before possible. God did not stay distant from us, remote and isolated, rather in Jesus, God chose to live with humanity in the midst of humility, human weakness, confusion and pain. The bond holds for contemporary Christian community as well. To become flesh is to know joy, pain, suffering and loss; it is to love, to grieve and someday die. The incarnation binds Jesus to the "everydayness" of human experience. When the believing community confesses, along with the fourth evangelist, "that the word lived among us" it affirms the link between the incarnation and its own human-ness.

With that said, what about our approach to the "Word"? We just engaged in a Christmas Day celebration which included gifts, food and family communion. Did we really place any emphasis on "the Word" which is love? Did we really give time and attention to our love for one another?

The spirit of Christmas has changed over the years and I am not sure for the best. Families in the past got together for a period of time to tell stories, eat special food which might have brought back memories, and remember the past and members who might not be present. Wrapping paper and ribbons were carefully saved faithfully for another year; and gifts were cherished because they meant love. When I read of the gifts people desire to give now I do not hear any resemblance to love; for example Play-station 2 or 3, I never can remember which is in vogue—a gift that breeds theft, bullying and threats to possess, loses any meaning of the "Word". I am not sure that people today show love through giving—or do they just give to fill a childish demand (no matter the age). Love must be shown through actions not material and we lose the meaning of the Christmas story or God’s gift to the world if we do not ponder on the real meaning of love.

God did not give us the gift of Jesus for one season, he gave it for all time and all persons. When we do not relish this gift and remember why it was given we are the losers. Most gifts break or wear out—this gift will last as long as you treasure it nurture it and reflect its meaning to the world around you.

I want to talk a bit about the Baptism of Jesus, about what it means. Now, and the place to start, or course, is with the story we just heard. We heard the first part of it just a few weeks ago. Remember how John was at the Jordan River, (the place where the people of Israel crossed over into the promised land) and how he preached about repentance and judgment—he promised that the axe was lying at the root of the tree, and that any useless chaff would be burned with unquenchable fire—and remember how he told people what to do if they wanted to live out their repentance?

The Lessons for today: Isaiah 42.1-9; Psalm 89.20-29; Acts 10.34-38; Luke 3.15-16, 21-22

A list of Sunday Scripture readings, with links to the Biblical Text:

A Lectionary Guide to the Sunday Lessons

Holy Week Preaching, 2006


Archive of St. Mary's Sermons from August 15, 2004

 

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Fr. Jim Liggett
P.O. Box 2949; Big Spring, TX  79721
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This page last updated on April 22, 2007

Now, when it comes to theology, this reading contains an embarrassment of riches. In John’s Gospel, one of the things Jesus does is replace the great Jewish feasts with the reality of his presence. Here, it is the Jewish rites of purification that are somehow superseded, and superseded in abundance, by who Jesus is and by what he does. At the same time, there is a very real connection between this scene and the material in Isaiah which likens the return of the Messiah to a wedding, and the joy of God’s people to the joy of a bride and bridegroom. And there is much, much more.

But it’s also a story, and a great one. Mary starts out as the real hero, telling Jesus do to something for these folks who are in serious trouble. (By the way, there’s an ancient legend which says that Mary was the aunt of the bride; and so might have been the person responsible for the wedding. That would certainly explain her interest.)

Anyway, Jesus says to Mary that all of this is none of his business and that he has other plans about revealing himself. His time has not come. Mary pretty much ignores that and assumes that Jesus is going to be a good Jewish boy and listen to his mother—and he does.

Now, the folks who are experts on what society was like in those days make it very clear that running out of wine at a wedding was not a minor social inconvenience. It was not like, "Well, the wine’s gone, so we have to switch to scotch." Instead, this was a major breach of the demands of hospitality; it was a disgrace and it would be devastating for the couple. Everywhere they went, for the rest of their married life, they would be known, ridiculed and pointed to. The strain on their life together would be enormous. (After all, there wasn’t that much to talk about in Cana of Galilee.)

So, something deeply important—at least in the lives of the people who were there—was going on. Jesus has to decide what to do. He has to decide whether or not to change his time-table—whether to wait before making himself known, as he had planned, or to act right then, for that need. Jesus acts, the wedding is saved, and the bride and groom are given a new chance.

Now, this story is not about the bride and groom, it’s about Jesus. It’s about all that theology I mentioned a minute ago. But it is also very important to realize that the first time Jesus made himself known, even to his disciples, he did so, not according to his own plans—but in response to a real and immediate human need.

Think about it. Jesus’ first manifestation of his glory, the first of his signs, was not for or about Jesus. He didn’t throw a great big ‘Jesus of Nazareth Epiphany and First Miracle’ party, invite everyone in the neighborhood, and then haul off and do a miracle—just because he could

Jesus’ identity, the Father’s gift to him of who Jesus is, this was not something that Jesus had or held to for Jesus’ own sake, for his own satisfaction, or for his own fulfillment. Jesus revealed himself, indeed Jesus spent his life, for the sake of others. Who he was and what he had were not for him. It was always and only for others, from the very beginning.

Keep that in mind and turn for a minute to the Epistle. That section from Paul is about some of the interesting and peculiar things that were going on in the church in Corinth in the first century. There was some pretty weird stuff, and some pretty selfish stuff, and some pretty evil stuff. In the middle of it, as is so often true when religion goes bad, there was a strong sense of who is best, and a strong sense of mine. They were having a bunch of different spiritual experiences and encounters with God—which could very well be just fine—but they were getting possessive and competitive about all of that. They were saying things like—this gift is mine, this way of doing things is mine, this spirituality is mine, this special something is mine.

What Paul says to them is what Jesus discovered when the wine gave out. What Paul says to them is "what you have is not for you. What you have is for others." "To each is given the manifestation of the spirit for the common good." This is a fundamental religious truth about the nature and purpose of God—both then and now. What you have is not for you. What you have is not even about you, not really.

The folks in Corinth would never get their religion right, indeed their lives right, until they realized that what they had was not for them or about them. It was given to them so they could use it to give, and to build, and to help, and to create.

What Jesus had, who he was by gift of the Father, what it was that made him special, indeed unique, this was not given for his own sake. It was given so Jesus would have a choice, so that he could choose to give all of himself for others.

What we have is not for us. Not really. All that we have, whatever sort of thing it might be, all that we have is gift—and it is given us so we might be givers, so we might build up, so we might help, so we might be a part of something greater, so we might serve our neighbors and build up the larger body. In one way or another, that is the purpose of our lives, and everything in them.

This is good news. It is good news that we do not live for ourselves alone, that what we have is not for us.

We are not created to live closed in upon ourselves, protective, possessive and defensive. We are not at our best when we try to live that way; we impoverish ourselves when we try to live that way; and we do not have to live that way. When we live beyond ourselves, for others and for the larger whole, then something wonderful can happen, something greater can be created, and there is more of us than there could ever be otherwise.

At the wedding in Cana of Galilee, Jesus chose to abandon his plans and his schedule, and to reach out. In doing that, he shows us what human life can be like.

And there was plenty of wine at the wedding.

Why was Jesus there in his hometown to teach? Why wasn’t he off changing the world; chasing the devil? After all, he WAS the son of God. He could have been turning deserts into seas or visa versa just by uttering a word; he could have been getting rid of all disease with a mere thought. If he would have done all that, sure, we would have been well-entertained and amazed, OOHing and AHHing like watching 4^th of July fireworks but would that have changed us? Do you know why he wasn’t off performing miracles? Because God was showing us he cared. He cared more about us than the devil. It was more important to share with us the good news of God’s love and grace. His ministry was to become our ministry.

When Jesus returned to Galilee, he went there to announce that he was the son of God. How did he do this? First he says, "the spirit of the Lord is upon me."

Second he says, God has anointed me to bring good news to the poor." Thirdly, he says, "today the scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing"—he knew the people would know that Isaiah’s reading would reference the coming of the Messiah and he was saying very clearly that he was the Messiah, the Christ.

Ok, let’s talk about why Jesus was anointed to bring good news to the poor. Why the poor? Why not the rich, they have the power. Because the poor would listen. Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit." Those who are poor in spirit are those who realize that no matter how much money they have it doesn’t amount to a hill of beans from an eternal standpoint. The poor in spirit may have money, but they realize that they really have nothing if they don’t have the Kingdom of God in their hearts. So Jesus went to the poor who would listen and allowed God to change them and use them.

The poor are not only those without money or food; poverty comes in several flavors. Poor refers to people who are held in captivity to their jobs or money; captivity to circumstances beyond their control. The poor also refers to people who are blind—blind in their eyes, blind in their hearts, blind in their souls; of course whose who are physically blind. Another example of poor, are those who are downtrodden; those people whom society steps on and walks all over—those who live on the margins of our world and whose life or death really make no difference to anyone—except God of course.

Are we like the rest of the world? Are we going to ignore the poor and the downtrodden? No—because already the people of this parish, you the congregation, already do more than has ever been done at St. Mary’s. I have been at St. Mary’s for a little over 20 years. When I first came, the pews were almost always full. But you know what? I can’t remember one thing, with the exception of UTO, that was being talked about that was mission-related (helping others rather than just ourselves). Today less than half of back then attend. That being said, this smaller group has done more for the poor in the last few years than the packed house of 20 years ago ever did. This year we as a parish will begin attacking poverty through the fulfillment of the Millennium Development Goals. Several people have volunteered to serve on a task force to determine what projects can be best accomplished by St. Mary’s. (It might be buying a goat, a pig or seed or mosquito netting, or money for clean water). There is no doubt in my mind "we few" will do the work of many in the months to come.

Mother Teresa spent a lifetime among the poorest of the poor in the worst slums of the world, but she once commented that the greatest spiritual poverty she had ever experienced was in America, the richest nation in the world. Gerald Jampolski, a physician and author, tells of an opportunity he -- to spend time with Mother Teresa. As she was about to depart for New Guinea, Jampolski asked if he could fly with her in order to spend more time to learn from her. "You have enough money for airfare to New Guinea," she asked. "Yes," he replied. "Then give that money to the poor," she said. "You’ll learn more from that than anything I can tell you."

We well-off Americans may be fat and sassy, but we’re not free, and we’re not always happy. Jesus promises release to the captives, and that’s good news, because there’s an emotional and spiritual bondage that all too often oppresses our homes and our families. Typical Americans are enslaved to everything from overwork to restless apathy, from television and computers to drugs and alcohol, all in a confused attempt to overcome a pervasive sense of hopelessness, boredom and depression that haunts our comfortable, pampered lives.

That’s the bad news. The good news is that Christ offers us hope. His promise is there’s a power available through his spirit that opens up whole new opportunities for us to embrace—a new and more meaningful life. The best news of all is that even as we open our hearts and ourselves to the presence of his spirit, then the words of this scripture are being fulfilled this very day. Christ has come to set us free. He will be here any day now. Let’s Look busy.

As a result, most of the Israelites were hiding out in caves—at least everyone who was anyone was hiding out in caves. Those who were not much of anyone and didn’t rate a cave, did the best they could out in the open. That’s where we meet Gideon. Gideon is trying to sneak some grain past the Midianites. He can’t thresh the grain openly because that would raise a cloud of dust which might attract the bad guys. So he takes the grain and scurries down into the bottom of wine press, (which was basically a crude hole cut into a big rock).

Here’s Gideon, a pathetic, almost comic character. He is trying his best to get by in hard times without getting caught and without causing any trouble for himself or for anyone else. Not at all an impressive sight.

And it is to Gideon that the angel of the Lord appears and says two totally unbelievable things. Remember, the angel probably had to look over the edge of the wine press and peer down into to corner to see Gideon cowering there, probably convinced that had been spotted by the Midianites. Leaning over, the angel says two things: "The Lord is with you, (that’s one) you mighty warrior. (that’s the other)". If he weren’t so scared, Gideon might have laughed out loud. He takes on the angel one claim at a time.

First of all, Gideon says, the Lord is not with me. And the Lord is not with Israel, either. Just look around at all of this. Now, the Lord might have been with us in the old days. He might have saved us from Pharaoh way back when; but that was before the Midianites came and the air base closed. That was then, this is now. The Lord hasn’t done a thing for us lately.

So the angel says to Gideon, look, the reason the Lord hasn’t done a thing for Israel lately is because the Lord is waiting for you. You’re going to do it. So "Go in this might of yours and deliver Israel from the hand of Midian; I hereby commission you." This moves Gideon to take on the second point.

What’s this mighty warrior stuff, he asks? What "might of mine"? Gideon points out that he is from a little tiny clan in one of the minor tribes, and that he is, if not the youngest, at least the smallest of anyone in that little tiny clan and he was probably voted "the least likely to succeed" of the whole bunch. So where does all of this warrior stuff come from? Gideon didn’t want to be a hero. All he wanted to do was sneak a little grain past the Midianites and hide out a while longer. But God had other ideas.

God saw things in Gideon that Gideon didn’t see. He saw abilities and possibilities that Gideon didn’t know he had. God saw in Gideon a future, a life, a ministry, that Gideon would never have imagined; because God put those things there.

All Gideon saw was a scared little man hiding in the bottom of a rat-hole, trying to scrape up enough to survive without messing with the real players. But Gideon was more than that. God had chosen Gideon to do all sorts of great and important things, and Gideon had to decide whether to believe that or not.

And once he stopped seeing himself through his own eyes only, and started seeing himself the way God saw him, then all of Israel did know, through Gideon, that God indeed was with them.

The same sort of thing happened to Simon Peter in the Gospel. Peter thought he was a rotten fisherman. Maybe in the old days he had been O.K., but that was then and this is now. Peter had fished all night and he was tired and discouraged and all he wanted to do was finish up the day, send the hired help away, and go home.

Besides, he had already cleaned and folded the nets, so going out to the deep water and making another cast would mean not only the wasted effort of the attempt itself, but a bunch of extra work cleaning up afterwards. After all, they had tried it before and it didn’t work.

Peter thought he knew what was going on. Like Gideon, he thought he knew who he was and what he was. Jesus saw something different, something more; and Jesus told Peter to make one more cast, and see what happens. Peter had to decide whether or not he would make that cast. Peter had to decide whether what he did would be based on who he thought he was, or on who Jesus saw him to be. Like Gideon hiding in the bottom of the wine press, Peter had to choose. For God had chosen Peter to do great and important things, and Peter had to decide whether to believe that or not.

And here we are. It is easy to see ourselves—to see ourselves as individuals and to see ourselves as a parish—like Gideon, hiding in a hole, just trying to scrape by without attracting much attention—or like Peter, who had tried it all and come up empty, whose nets were cleaned and folded—or even like St. Paul, the least of the Apostles, unfit to be called an apostle.

And yet God calls us; just as He called them. He calls us individually and he calls us as a parish. He calls us to lives of holiness, he calls us to care for one another, and he calls us to service—to ministry and to mission. And God sees in us great things—because he has put them there. God sees in us the power of the Holy Spirit, and the strength of his own might. And seeing that, God calls us.

What does that look like? What are we called to do? Some of it we know. As individuals, most of us know what God would have us do, what God would have change, what God would have us begin, what God would have us finally complete. It might be something we have long struggled with, it might be a new insight or opportunity. It might be beginning a new task, it might be walking away from an old and familiar sin. Most of us know what God would have us do.

In the same way, as a parish, we know some of what God wants of us; and we are always setting out to learn more.

And keep this in mind, every time God calls us to do something—be that as individuals or a parish—God says to us exactly what God says to Gideon. God says to us, "The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior." That is how God sees us. God sees us as who we are; God sees us as His own people, his own Church.

We might not look like it, and we might not feel like it, but that is how it is. For we are a people blessed by God, a people given the love and the spirit and the power of God almighty; we are a people called by God to do his will and to serve His world.

And as God said it to Gideon, so God says to us. "The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior."

By Deacon John Marshall

Well, it’s the Last Sunday after the Epiphany, this Tuesday is Shrove Tuesday, and Lent begins in just three days with Ash Wednesday. That means, among other things, that we once more hear the story of the Transfiguration. This year, it’s Luke’s version of the story; and there are some special parts to his telling of it that lead us quite nicely into Lent.

The place to begin is with the first few words. Both Matthew and Mark say that the Transfiguration took place "about six days" after Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah. But Luke, who knew Mark perfectly well, says that it happened "about eight days" later. Luke mad this change on purpose, and for a reason. In both Jewish and early Christian thought, the eighth day was seen, not as starting over the old week, but as the day of God’s new creation, his renewal of all things that had grown old. So putting the Transfiguration on the eighth day is Luke’s way of signaling that what comes next will speak of a new order, a new creation. As we all know, the story goes that God made the world in seven days. Here, on the eighth day, something even more amazing and wonderful is about to happen. (By the way, that’s why there are eight sides to most Baptismal fonts, including our own. Something new, amazing and wonderful happens there.)

Anyway, what happens is that Jesus is transfigured, he is shown in glory—but in a new way. Unlike Moses, whose face shown as a reflection of God’s glory, Jesus’ glory is no reflection, but a revelation of who he is. It’s not the old glory of the old ways, but it is something new. Peter was right, here is the Christ of God. But notice that Jesus isn’t just standing there all by himself, glowing like a firefly. He is talking with Moses and Elijah, the personifications of the Law and the prophets—of the whole Old Covenant. And they are talking about his departure—the Greek word is Exodus—that was to happen at Jerusalem.

In other words, this was not the usual mountain-top experience you would write about in a journal, with a beautiful sunrise, gentle breezes, and having a quiet time with God. This is the glory of the eighth day, and the subject of this mountain-top experience, the heart of this glory, was death—death and a command, the only direct command God the Father gives in the whole New Testament. In the Old Testament, God gives, not only the ten commandments, but 603 others. In the New, on the eighth day, there is just one, God speaks of Jesus and says to the disciples, and to us, "listen to him".

It is not the Law of Moses, it is not the words of the prophets, as valuable as these are, but the life and words of Jesus that are to come first, that are to be definitive for those disciples, and for us. It is not Moses and Elijah that are the source of our glory. It is Jesus, and the command to obedience.

That changes everything. It changes everything because of what Jesus says, and because of what Jesus does, and because of who Jesus is. This takes some getting used to. Jesus is revealed in glory on the mountain, then he immediately moves on, on to Jerusalem and what is waiting for him there. Peter—who, as usual, speaks first—gets it wrong this time. He wants to make a memorial, a place where glory can be captured and confined.

But that’s not how it works with Jesus. We don’t find glory by rooting around the good old glory places, the places where neat stuff has happened before. Glory is on the move, it is on the road; it is not to be captured or frozen. It is only to be found by chasing after, by following—not by staying put, or by holding on, or by keeping things the same. And you never know where you’ll end up. Remember, the closest thing to a holy mountain we have in Christianity is Golgotha.

And we are to listen to him; and to follow him. Just as the Father gives one new commandment in the New Testament, so Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, gives one commandment, the key to our journey with the glory of Christ. Jesus says, at the last supper, "a new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you," which echoes his own summary of those 613 commandments of Moses, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind...and you shall love your neighbor as yourself."

And for us, glory, and the eighth day, begin with listening to him. Glory begins with love—not the silly selfish, and destructive substitute for love we see and hear touted all around us both unrelentingly and unreflectively, but with real love, hard love, the love we see in Jesus, the love that drove him off the mountain of Transfiguration and toward that other, holy, mountain. It is love that begins, not with ourselves but with the other; the love that is an imitation of the heart of God, and the life of Jesus.

It is in this that we Christians find our richest glory—not in isolated events or in splendid isolation (as important as these can be)—but in walking the road of love and faithfulness, in moving forward in trust, as we struggle to "listen to him", and to live that out.

No where better are Jesus’ words found in Paul’s mouth than in the reading from I Corinthians we just heard. What does glory mean, what does it look like to "listen to him", what does it mean to follow? Paul takes his cue from Jesus, Paul listens to him, and Paul shows us a more excellent way, a way greater than any other—the true way to glory. For "faith, hope, and love abide, these three, and the greatest of these is love.

We hear this passage most often at weddings, but that’s not what it was originally about. It was originally about how the glory of the Mount of Transfiguration, the glory of the new creation, about how this will continue to shine, and how the glory of God will be made visible in a world that is dying for the lack of that real love which Jesus brings us, and gives to us, and bids us to share.

Again, Lent starts in three days, and the Church always calls the faithful to special disciplines during this special time, our tithe of the year. This year, I want to suggest that your Lenten discipline have as its focus what it might look like for you to grow in love, in real love, in the love Paul is talking about. What can you do, in a regular way, to walk away from stands in the way of love, and to walk towards a deeper grasp of this real love, and a richer life in this real love? Think about that, and see where it leads you.

This Lent, live in the eighth day—seek love, seek glory, seek the very heart of what it means to "listen to him."

Lent II, Year C, March 4, 2007

The Lessons for today: Genesis 15.1-12, 17-18; Psalm 27; Philippians 3.17--4.1; Luke 13.31-35

A list of Sunday Scripture readings, with links to the Biblical Text:

A Lectionary Guide to the Sunday Lessons

Holy Week Preaching, 2006


Archive of St. Mary's Sermons from August 15, 2004

 

Back to St. Mary's Homepage
 

Fr. Jim Liggett
P.O. Box 2949; Big Spring, TX  79721
(432) 267-8201 (phone)

Stmarys@stmarysbst.org 

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This page last updated on April 22, 2007

By Deacon Janice Byrd

 Today’s readings are reminding us that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves; God must direct us; Moses in the first lesson today was turned aside by a burning bush to hear God instruct him and promise him that he would be with him in his endeavors to free his people; the Psalm deals with God and his forgiveness. It is not so amazing that the Bible is full of times when plants were used in parables or to illustrate a point: the trees in the garden of Eden; the burning bush to give the commandments to Moses and to get his attention when he was to lead his people out of bondage; the parable of the vineyard where the owner sends various ones to claim his part of the harvest; and today’s fig tree just to name a few.

What would you do if you had only a year left to live, only a short time in which to make up for wrongs done and opportunities missed? How important that year might be! The lesson of the fig tree is a challenge to live each day as a gift from God. Live each day in such a way that you will have no fear of giving an account for how you have used God’s gift.
           

The Lessons for today: Exodus 3.1-15; Psalm 103; I Corinthians 10.1-13; Luke 13.1-9

A list of Sunday Scripture readings, with links to the Biblical Text:

A Lectionary Guide to the Sunday Lessons

Holy Week Preaching, 2006


Archive of St. Mary's Sermons from August 15, 2004

 

Back to St. Mary's Homepage
 

Fr. Jim Liggett
P.O. Box 2949; Big Spring, TX  79721
(432) 267-8201 (phone)

Stmarys@stmarysbst.org 

The page background is courtesy  of  Windy's Page designs.

This page last updated on April 22, 2007

The parable of the prodigal son is like that.

You see, the whole parable sets us up for a little speech on morality—actually it sets us up for two little speeches on morality, (one for each brother): Speeches about true religion; speeches about duties, rights, family values, generosity, the consequence one’s actions, and the significance of improper behavior. The story is just full of morals. All sorts of lectures on what is right and proper are just sitting there waiting to be given. You can see ‘em coming.

The first time we’re set up for a lecture is with the younger son. He is a veritable gold mine of moral lecture-making material. First, there is the business of asking for the money before his father is decently dead. This raises concerns of right living, and of respecting one’s self, and one’s father (and no one even mentioned what all of this did to mom.) The fact is, the son was really stretching the law even to ask for his inheritance, and the father would have been well within his rights both to refuse and to whip the little brat for asking.

But it was after he left home that the kid was a true disgrace. The fact is, his poor business sense and bad planning were probably considered a much worse moral failure than the carousing the older brother imagined. And no worse a fate could be imagined for a good Jewish boy than feeding pigs for a gentile master. Can’t you see the chances for great lectures here?

And don’t forget the point about doing the right thing for the wrong reason. After all, the son came home because of only one thing: he was hungry.

All that fancy, dramatic stuff about having sinned against heaven and against his father, being no longer worthy, (sigh) and so on, is a made-up, carefully rehearsed, job application. He is much less interested in repentance than in arranging for three square meals a day. First things first. So here the kid is, having violated just about every rule in the book, and regretting the consequences, (but probably not the motivation), of his decisions. The "morals of this story" are sitting there like over-ripe blueberries; fat and ready for the picking.

And exactly the same thing is true in the scene with the father and his older son out behind the barn. This time it is the older brother who treats his father with disrespect—by refusing to use the proper forms of address. (That rude "listen".) He also disinherits his brother ("that son of yours") and generally acts like the east end of a west bound horse. In fact, the older son proves himself to be what Mark Twain called "a good man in the worst sense of the word". He is stiff, stuffy, self- righteous, dull, and mean. He has a dirty mind, a bad temper, a tendency to whine ("you never did that for me") and he probably beats his dog.

What more, in the way of material for a good moral or twenty, could any story possibly offer? You can even do the neat trick of lecturing about which of the two brothers is really the worst, and so have dueling lectures.

Jesus’ original listeners knew this. They knew all of the morals of this story. Just like us, they’d heard them all their lives—and they expected to hear them one more time after Jesus got through with the story. ||Probably most of them got the joke, too.

Do you see the joke? Jesus’ joke is that there is no moral to this story. The joke is that all of that preparation, all of those great lecture themes, they are all for nothing.

What the younger brother did simply does not matter. It’s as if it never were. The father never deals with it, the father never calls the kid a jerk, the father never mentions what happened. He just invites his child, whom he loves totally, to a great party. Everything the boy did, all of that junk, all of that great material for wonderful lectures, all of that simply doesn’t matter.

And as for the stiff, prideful, self-righteous older brother; well, none of that matters, either. The father never dumps on him, never corrects him, never condemns him.

The father does for the older brother exactly what he does for the younger: he invites his child, whom he loves totally, to a great party. Everything that boy did, all of that junk, all of that great material for wonderful lectures, all of that simply doesn’t matter.

The joke is that everything that seems so important, everything that seems so vital, everything that seems so religiously significant in Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son, all of that is unimportant, all of that is ignored. All of that, as Paul says, is refuse.

Listen, and hear: what Jesus is saying is that all that matters is the father’s love, and the invitation he offers.

All that matters is a love so vast, so powerful, so honest and so real, that it can look at the very worst betrayals, the most painful rejections, the most destructive sin, the ugliest pride and the smallest, meanest spirit, and recognize all of that clearly, and still see, really, only the face of the beloved—only the face of the child he loves totally.

All that matters is the father’s love. All that was ever important about those two boys was that their father loved them. They both thought there was much more at issue, but there really wasn’t.

That is Jesus’ punch line: God seems a bit of a fool.

God behaves in a way unbecoming the Lord of the Universe, and uncharacteristic of one whose justice is so well known. And Jesus is saying "bet you didn’t know that", and Jesus is hoping that we see all of that as being as delightful and as hilarious as he does.

All that matters is the father’s love, and the invitation he offers.

Note that it is an invitation. The father could have dragged the younger son home from his journey kicking and screaming, but he didn’t.

The father could have commanded that the older son join the party. But he didn’t. There is no power here as the world knows power; no force, no coercion. There is only an invitation. Of course we don’t know whether the older son actually went inside where there was rejoicing. We don’t even know for sure that the younger one did. That doesn’t matter very much, either—except to them. It’s not an important part of the story.

All that matters, really, is the father’s love, and the invitation he offers.

So, if you have believed that some of the other stuff in the parable of the Prodigal Son, some of the "this is the moral of the story", stuff, was really what is most important, then look again. And if you have ever wondered what God really thinks about you, then look carefully at this story. If you have felt like the older brother, or the prodigal son, or the best (or worst) of both, that’s O.K., but that really doesn’t matter very much.

All that matters is the father’s love, and the invitation he offers. Because God does now what the father did then. God invites his child, (that’s you), God invites his child, whom he loves totally, to a great party.

The Lord is Risen Indeed, Alleluia!

This year, I moved into Easter through those three lessons we just heard. It’s a good way to get there. Those readings talk about the three things Easter is about, and we need to hear them all, all three, if we are going to grasp even the beginnings of a complete vision of this great festival. Let’s look at the lessons, starting with the Gospel, and with Mary.

All four Gospels say it was Mary Magdalene who saw it all, who was at the cross and saw Jesus die, who watched his body carried to the tomb and who came back to that same tomb and saw it empty. Mary saw it all, and what Mary saw makes very clear the first thing Easter is about. Easter is about Jesus. It is about a particular man who really lived and who really died, and who lived and died in a very particular way. Easter isn’t about Spring (especially today, and, by the way, do you realize that, for just about a majority of the world’s Christians, Easter comes in the Fall—they are south of the Equator), it isn’t about seeds coming to life or bunnies or eggs or the immortality of the soul or any such. It’s about Jesus of Nazareth who Mary saw die and whose dead body she watched and touched (and, believe me, folks back there knew dead, they knew it real well; it is kinda hard to miss), and that same person who was alive again—not by nature, but by the supreme action of God the Father.

That’s what Easter is about first and foremost—and we have to begin where Mary began, with the acute and overwhelming particular-ness of the resurrection. God didn’t raise just anybody; God hasn’t raised anybody since.

In raising Jesus, the Father is vindicating just exactly that specific way of living, and of dying, that was Jesus. There is nothing general or all-inclusive in the event of the resurrection (although there is in its consequences). It is about Jesus. That’s what the witness of Mary insists. That is the first thing about Easter that our lessons proclaim. Easter is, above all else, about this man, and no other. It is about Jesus.

That’s the first thing, the part Mary tells us. But if we stop there, all we have is history, and that’s not enough, not enough to matter much at all. So we also have that wonderful section from Paul’s letter to the Colossians, where he tells us the second thing Easter is about. Paul is talking about Easter, and about Baptism, (which is really the same thing as talking about Easter) and he tells the baptized in Colossae that they have died, and that they have been raised with Christ. There is an absolute reality here—through their baptism, the essence of what happened to Jesus has happened to them. (That’s why we try to have baptisms on Easter, to help us remember this).

But today Paul isn’t talking to the people in Colossae. Today Paul is talking to us. He is saying the second thing that Easter is about, the second part toward a complete vision. He is saying that Easter is about us. The past cannot contain it—and that particular life and death and resurrection that happened to one man, this is also ours, not by nature or by merit, but as a pure and gracious gift of God. We have died, we are raised with Christ. That’s who we are.

But this reality can just sit there, waiting—being true, but not making any difference. So, Paul gives us some Easter orders, "seek the things that are above". Set you mind on those things.

Now, this is not about becoming some kind of silly, scatterbrained, head in the clouds, super-pious sort of cartoon character. It’s about paying real and serious attention to the spiritual realities of our world, and of our lives.

It’s about reaching for, and embracing the reality of God’s love, and of God’s gift to you of the same new life he gave to Jesus. To set your mind on, to seek, the things that are above, this means to reach for the resurrection, not as an historical claim about somebody else, but as that reality which defines you, which says who you are first, before you are all the other things you also are. It is about taking it personally, and making it personal. "Seek the things that are above", Paul demands, "set your minds there", notice, and grab on to it as if it matters the most—because it does.

That’s the second thing Easter is about, it is about us.

But even that is not enough, and if we stop there we still haven’t gone near far enough, and our vision remains incomplete. So we hear the first reading, the one from Acts, which is part of a sermon by Peter. Now, Peter was a witness to the Resurrection, he knew that Easter was about Jesus, and, finally and after considerable pushing, he also discovered that it was about him, too. But for a while Peter was pretty much willing to stop there. The resurrection might be about Jesus and Peter, and it might even be about people who were like Jesus and Peter, but that was a far as it went.

Until now; until the time of this reading. Right before this, Peter has learned—again the hard way, (which was just about the only way Peter ever learned anything)—Peter has learned that the Gentiles, the despised others,

the ones outside the covenant and outside the promise and outside the limits of real human decency and discourse, these unclean gentiles are as much the objects of God’s love and concern as were Peter and the people who were like Peter and that Peter liked. So Peter, the faithful, observant, Jew who had never let anything unclean come close to him, is preaching to the gentiles, and telling them that the message sent to Israel was also the message for them, and that Jesus was for them just as much as Jesus was for anybody.

So Peter shows the third thing that Easter is about, if we are going to have a complete vision. First, Easter is about Jesus. Second, Easter is about us. Third, and just as centrally, Easter is about them. Easter is about the others, the ones on the outside, the ones who do not belong. Not just people who haven’t heard about it; but more especially the ones we would never consider telling—because they wouldn’t understand, or they wouldn’t fit in, or they just don’t belong. Easter is for them, also. And if we leave Easter with Jesus and do not make it our own, or if we make it our own and then keep it to ourselves, if we do any of those things then we have been unfaithful to this most glorious of feasts, and we have embraced an defective vision.

It’s all there in those three readings we heard. Easter is about Jesus, it is about you, and it is about them. In other words, Easter is about history, it is about faith, and it is about mission, all of those are needed, all of those, together, just begin to give us the whole picture.

Alleluia, Christ is Risen!

The Lord is Risen Indeed, Alleluia!