We are getting into our stewardship time, and it’s really tempting to try to do a heavy Stewardship spin on this Gospel—some version or another of waving a pledge card and saying ‘what’ll it be, Jesus or the eye of the needle?" But this year the story takes me in a different direction—toward the young man, and away from the camel. This year, I am fascinated by seeing this story as one of Jesus’ failures; as about something Jesus wanted to happen, and tried to make happen, that did not happen. There are a few of these failures in the Gospels; and the rich man is perhaps the clearest.

Jesus is setting out on his journey. He is going to Jerusalem, and he knows that there he will face whatever it is God has called him to face. Suddenly, this guy is all over him—he runs up to Jesus, throws himself at his feet, compliments him in a way so effusive it verges on blasphemy, and ask Jesus to tell him what to do.

If you put together the three Gospel accounts, this man emerges as quite a fellow. He is sort of a first century Yuppie. He is rich, (which was seen then as a sure sign of God’s favor, and is seldom even today seen as a sign of God’s displeasure), he is young, he is some sort of ruler or leader, he is devoutly religious, he is a good man by every possible human measure, he wants to know how to be an even better person, and he thinks Jesus is really swell. There is no hint in him of either pride or hypocrisy—he really is all of these things. In fact, he sounds like the absolutely ideal new parishioner and is clearly Vestry material.

Jesus sees all of that, and he sees something even more, something really special, in this man. "Looking upon him, {the Gospel says} (Jesus) loved him." This is the only person in Mark’s Gospel, in fact the only person in Matthew’s, or Mark’s, or Luke’s Gospel, that Jesus is said to love, in a special, distinctive way. For whatever reason, the Lord is as drawn to him as he is to Jesus. Jesus loved him.

And when the Lord loves, the Lord gives. (It always works that way.) Jesus saw the man and saw that, while he had so much, he lacked something. Notice that this guy’s problem was not with what he had; the problem was what he did not have. So the Lord offered him what was lacking, he offered him the greatest thing Jesus had to give. "Go, sell what you have, and come, follow me." That’s the greatest gift: Jesus calls him to be a disciple, Jesus calls him into relationship with the Lord of life.

This is a big deal; it is special. Jesus did not say "come, follow me" to very many of the people he met; and to some of those who asked Jesus if they could follow him, Jesus gave a very clear "No". ||Also, the Bible records that everyone to whom Jesus said this, everyone he specifically called to "follow me", they all said "Yes". They left their nets, or their family, or their tax collector’s table, or their current Rabbi, or whatever, and they followed. Just like that. Such was the power of Jesus’ presence, such was the force of his call, that they all accepted the gift. They all said "yes". Jesus was batting 1,000.

Until this one. This one, who was most likely the best of the lot, this one walked. He looked at Jesus and knew the pull of Jesus’ promise. He knew the power of Jesus’ personality, the attractiveness of his gift. And then the man looked at what he already had. He looked at his youth, his influence, his bright future and his considerable wealth; and he felt the pull of their power, the strength of their draw. And no doubt he wavered—as Matthew or Peter had wavered. And no doubt he felt torn, as a few before him, and so many after him, have felt torn. And it was a close call.

Meanwhile, Jesus watched, and waited—as he had done before, with Matthew and Peter and the rest. Jesus, with his perfect record, watched as the man weighed, and struggled, and chose.

And for the first time, Jesus saw the choice go the other way. For the first time, Jesus watched the back of one to whom he had offered his greatest gift. He saw the one whom he loved, the special one, turn and walk away. || And I believe that hurt; I believe that cut deeply. And I suspect that there was something familiar about it. The temptations were not that long ago, and there Jesus himself had felt the power of riches, the power of status, the power all the world’s goodies. Jesus knew that power, A power so great that this man whom he loved walked away, however sadly, from Jesus’ gift.

And all Jesus could do was watch. He did not run after him saying, "hey, wait a minute, I was only kidding; we can work something out." Jesus did not offer a no-risk trial period of being a disciple before he really had to sell his camels or his vineyards or whatever. Jesus did not guarantee "double your happiness back" if the fellow would only give it a try. You see, to do anything like that would be to withdraw the gift. Jesus could cast out the demons, he could heal, he could master the wind and the waves, but he could not coerce another human being. He could not force his love on anyone, he could not manipulate or bargain a person into discipleship.

It was doubtless with some awe, and with renewed respect for his adversary, that Jesus said "How hard it will be for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of heaven." How terribly hard.

When he said this, Jesus was not muttering some empty religious platitude. He was not making up rules. He was talking out of the pain and the amazement he felt from what he had just experienced, from what he had just lost. How hard it will be for those with riches: harder than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, harder than for a cow to jump over the moon.

||You see, when Jesus looked at the man and loved him, he saw that what he lacked was freedom, freedom from the world and all the world offered to give and to take away.

That’s why the command to sell everything he had was not an expensive good work for the guy to perform; it was not a hefty tuition to disciple school. The act of divesting himself was, for him, the cost of freedom. As such, it was also a statement—a statement that everything the man had ever relied upon for security, for value, for status, for holiness, indeed for survival—all of that had to be left, and replaced by whatever it might mean to follow Jesus. It was a chance for the man to shed his cocoon, and be transformed into something new. But cocoons, especially luxurious ones, are hard to shed.

This call to freedom, this call to sell, trade, give away or otherwise surrender whatever we rely upon, this continues to be a part of Jesus’ call to "follow me." It is a part of the gift he offers us because he loves us. Now, no one but you and the Lord himself knows for sure what you need to get rid of, what you need to sell, or change your mind or your priorities or your behavior about; no one else knows what stands between you and God. (And if you are not sure, ask God, He’ll tell you, or show you, in a New York minute.)

But at its heart, Jesus’ call is the same for each one of us: go, get rid of that, and come, follow me. It can be very hard. And often we go away sorrowful, feeling the eyes of Jesus burning into our backs, hoping for a deal, a compromise. But Jesus doesn’t offer that. Instead, Jesus both offers his gift of freedom and relationship, and He waits for us to respond. And remember, regardless what we do now, or of what we did in the past, regardless of that, the offer remains, always, the gift is given, and the Lord will neither force us nor forget us.

For, "with men it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God."

Still, there is probably very little that I have to say about stewardship that most of you haven’t heard. At least once. Or more. I’ve spoken for years about such things as gratitude; and the need to live out in our real lives the image of God in us by giving because we love; and the need that we as human beings have to express relationships of love in tangible, indeed sacrificial ways; and about the grand spiritual vistas that tithing, when embraced thankfully, can open up for us. Further, the Vestry and I have for a decade invited you to join with us in tithing, or in our journey towards the tithe.

The world, God’s creation, is magnificent; it is a glorious and wonderful gift—and all of us are alive because of this creation. At the same time, each one of us has a sacred responsibility to care for this great gift, and to care for it reverently and well. What’s more, each one of has our personal little patch of creation that we are to care for especially. This includes our selves, our souls and bodies; it includes our relationships, the people given us, our nation, our physical land and real property, the gift of the present day, and the gift of the stuff, the material blessings, that God entrusts us with.

This responsibility to care for what we have been given is not some sort of price tag the people and stuff in our lives come with—God does not say "Hey, you can have these people to love and to love you, you can live in a wonderful country with freedoms all of human history would envy, you can have more food, more money, better health, better education, better health care, better prospects for your children and grandchildren than any generation that has ever lived upon this planet—you can have all of that; and you can have the Lord Jesus and his Church, but there’s a catch. The catch is that you gotta be grateful, and you gotta take good care of it, and you gotta give some of it back." That’s not what God is saying when he talks to his people about stewardship. Although we all too often act like God is saying this, so we look at stewardship as if it were some sort of tax God puts on our existence; a tax that is fair game for any loopholes we can find, or make up.

Instead, God is really saying "here is this stuff, and these people, and these opportunities, and your body, and all of these gifts. They are yours, free gratis. No charge, no fine print. But if you really want to enjoy them, if you really want them both to be yours and yet not to enslave you; if you want the most you can get out of them, there is another gift I will give you. God says, I will give you the disciplines of stewardship, and by and by I will give you the gifts both of a grateful heart, and of joy and wonder in all my works. We only need to stop a moment, and believe what God is saying, and take him up on his offer.

That’s what God is really saying to us about Stewardship. But we don’t hear that very often. It is a hard thing to hear. It is a challenging thing to hear. After all, it’s our stuff, and we know how to handle our stuff. Which brings me, at long last, to the lessons we just heard; Lessons that are all, really, asking us to do the same thing. They are asking us to be taught by God.

They are asking us to admit that we don’t know everything—and that we might be wrong, and, finally, that God may know a thing or two we don’t know, or that we don’t like, things that none the less are both true and good for us.

In the reading from Isaiah we heard what I believe to be one of those parts of Scripture that most influenced Jesus’ life and sense of mission. The prophet Isaiah speaks, and suggests that everybody knows what it looks like to be great, and to save the people, and to be blessed by God. Everyone knows that it looks like King David at the height of his powers. Everyone knows that, the prophet proclaims, and everybody is wrong. Instead, all of it looks like a suffering servant, some poor shmuck who is hurting and struggling and keeping the faith— and in doing that he somehow saves the world.

Can we believe this? Really? Ever? Can we give up our convictions about success and value and what it means to be on top long enough to look, at least longingly, at the suffering servant of Isaiah? Can we let God teach us? Be honest. Also, if we do listen to this, if we assume that in offering us this vision of life God may know something we don’t know, something that is both true and good for us, if so, how would our lives be different? Can we be taught by God, or do we already know too much?

Then, there is the wonderful story in Mark, where the Zebedee boys ask for special seats of honor. That seems so inappropriate to us now, but it really wasn’t surprising back then. James and John just wanted the most, the best, that Jesus had to offer. They thought they knew what that was, they thought that everyone knew what that was. The most and the best was being special, being honored, getting the best seats in the house because they had made the right choice as to who the messiah was. Everybody knew this.

That’s why Jesus was so gentle with them—why He didn’t fire them on the spot, or let the other 10 tear them into little pieces. Jesus could have done that, but he didn’t Instead, Jesus said to James and John and to the rest, "yes, this is what everybody thinks it means to follow the right leader. You think that, the gentiles think that, everybody thinks that. But everybody is wrong. What it really means to follow the right leader is to serve, and to love, and to follow me whatever that means, even if it means we have to live out things everybody knows is wrong."

Jesus is asking James and John, the other disciples, and us the same question. Can we be taught? Can we take a vision from Jesus that everybody knows is wrong—and stake our lives on that vision because it is from Jesus, and we are drawn to Jesus, and we have chosen to follow him?

That’s what Isaiah asks, that’s what Jesus asks, and that’s what the Christian vision of stewardship asks—that vision where God says to us, "here is this stuff, and these people, and these opportunities, and this body, and all of these gifts. They are yours, free gratis. No charge. But if we really want to enjoy them fully, if we really want them both to be ours and not enslave us; if we want the most out of them, if that’s what we want, then there is another gift God can give us. God can give us the disciplines of stewardship, and the gifts of a grateful heart, and of joy and wonder in all God’s works, all that and more .

We all have our own ideas about our money and our stuff and what we should do with them. Can we be taught? Can we at least begin to listen with the possibility of being taught? This is what God asks; not because God is mean or greedy or indifferent to our real needs, but because God loves us, and God wants for us the fullness of life, and because God knows our deepest needs, and wants to help us find those, and find their fulfillment. That’s what Christian stewardship is really all about.

Today is All Saints’ Sunday. And today we are going to remember all the saints—the way the New Testament talks about Saints. In the New Testament, saints are not just the heavy hitters, those who exhibited extraordinary holiness, or who made extraordinary contributions to the life of the Church in their generations—not just the Mother Teresas, or the four 4^th Century saints whose name begins with A. In the New Testament, a saint is a baptized Christian, a part of a specific Christian community. As Saint is who we are. All of us.

So this is a good day to talk about the Church; and I’ll do that in just a second. It’s also a good day to talk about the lessons, which are about what Moses and Jesus and God all think is the most important—and I’ll get to those in a minute.

Now, the first thing I want to say about the Church is that we have developed an unfortunate linguistic convention. We talk about the Church as if it were the building—we say, "I’ll meet you at the Church at noon", and we know exactly what that means. While this is not a bad thing, it can be misleading. That’s why, during the Church’s first few centuries, Christians referred to the place they met as ‘the house of the Church’. I rather like that, and we need to keep it in mind.

Of course, we all know the truth of the matter. The truth of the matter is that, for St. Mary’s, as for any congregation, the Church is what’s left after all the buildings burn down. That’s the Church. It’s what’s left.

And what is that? What’s left? Well, first of all, we are. That is, the most obvious and visible thing left after the fire is the people. And the Church is very much the people who make it up day by day. That’s a good start.

But that’s not all. On All Saints’ Sunday, especially this All Saint’s Sunday, we are reminded that the Church is made up much more than just those of us who are part of it right now. In a little while, at our Altar, I will read about 200 names, names that make up a part of the weight our hearts bear each day. These folks are saints, too—the ordinary kind, just like we are. And they are part of us. They are part of us by being a part of our hearts, and, for many, they are also part of us by being a part of this place. They, too are what’s left when the buildings burn down. They are every bit as much a part of St. Mary’s as we are.

I am convinced that, if we but open ourselves to it, we will realize that, at no time and in no place are we closer to those who have gone before us than at that Altar Rail—as we share our deepest connections, connections that are oblivious to time and place, life and death.

Just to make this a little bit clearer, our Sunday School students today planted in the Bennett Garden several tulip and narcissus bulbs. One for each member of St. Mary’s who has died in the last year or so. Every year from now on we will continue planting these bulbs, and reminding ourselves of who we really are.

Also, before I read those names, we will gather at our font, and we will baptize seven young people into Christ’s Church, and into our little patch of that Church here in Big Spring. They will become, in a new and powerful way, children of God, members of the Body of Christ, and heirs of the Kingdom of heaven. We will accept and welcome them; and we will promise to help and support them as they join us. They, too, are the Church, part of what will survive any fire.

What’s more, in a mysterious and solemn way, these seven have always been part of us. God’s Church, as it has classically been understood, includes as members saints present, saints past, and saints yet unborn, or newly born. That is another big part of what the Church is, a part we can see especially clearly today.

But of course that’s not all. The Church is much more than any or all of us, past, present, and future. The Church is also the place of God; of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Sprit. This is certainly not the only place where God is (that’s blasphemy) nor, I am sure, is it always God’s favorite place to be. But it is God’s covenanted place to be. Our Lord has promised to be with in a special way as we baptize, as we break the bread and say the prayers, as two or three are gathered together in His name. God is with us. That is what makes us holy, that is what makes us whole, that is what makes us Church. We are the place of one another, and we are the place where God has promised to be. That’s the second part of the Church.

And there is one more piece to this, one more word. That word is found in the lessons—lessons that talk about what is most important. The image I want to hold up here is from Deuteronomy, where Moses tells the people that there is one law that so binds, that so summarizes things and ties them together, that the people are to bind that law—not only into their hearts, but also, physically, tie it onto their hands, and their foreheads, and the doorposts and gates of their homes. That is the law of love, the law to love God because God first loved us.

In the same way, Jesus—adding the words from Leviticus about loving one another—says that these words, the words of love, stand above all other words.

It is words about love, and even more the reality of this love, that binds together all the commandments, all the gifts of God, and that shows us what is really most important.

The Church is not only the people, living, departed, and yet unborn, although we are most certainly that. The Church is not only the presence of God within us and among us as a promised gift of Grace and power—although we are most certainly that. The Church is all of these bound together by love—bound together by our love for God and for one another, especially when that love is neither easy nor natural, because that’s when it’s most real; and, even more, bound together by God’s continuing and never-failing love for us, especially when that love is neither earned by us, nor deserved by us, nor reasonable for us to expect. Because that’s who God is.

Today we remember All the Saints, all of us, past, present and future. Today we remember the promised and continuing presence of God among us—a promise God will keep because God made it. And above all of that, and binding all of that together, we remember the commandment and the gift of love that makes it all real; and give us both hope and direction.

And so, today, above all, we give thanks.

Boy, the Christmas Season has really hit. There was a gradual buildup these last few weeks then, in the two days since Thanksgiving, the thing in all its fullness has truly descended upon us. So, the world around us, and we ourselves, every one, have to get ready for Christmas.

Now, I want to talk about two visions of what preparing for Christmas looks like. One of them is our culture’s. There is no avoiding this; it just sweeps us away. For the next 24 days our culture, and our own lives, will bombard us with a never-ending parade of what we need to get to prepare for Christmas. First of all, of course, we need to get busy. We need to write and mail and decorate and plan and schedule and all sorts of things like that. ||Also, we need to get stuff. Stuff out our ears. We need to get stuff for gifts and stuff for parties and stuff for Church and stuff for doing all the things we need to get busy doing. The goal of all of this is to have everything we need to get, got, by their several deadlines; and if we do that, we have managed, once more, to prepare for Christmas. Another hard fought victory.

This commercial feeding frenzy is something we all know intimately; something that is simply a part of our lives. And it’s not altogether a bad thing, either. After all, there is a real holiness in reaching out to those we love with gifts—it is one way we imitate God. And there are plenty if other wonderful parts of the culture’s Christmas season.

But the Church also has something to say about what it looks like to prepare for Christmas, something very different from culture. This vision does not come to us unbidden, or in commercials or on billboards. We have to take ourselves in hand, and lead ourselves firmly down this other path.

What the Church has to say about preparing for Christmas is Advent. Advent is a time of waiting and expectation—a time when we pay some rather serious attention to preparing the inside of ourselves for what God is doing, and is going to do, to us and to our world. It is a time, not of getting, but of letting go.

How do we do that? Well, in here, in Church, we slow down a bit; we focus on penitential themes that encourage introspection and reflection; our music and our readings and our decorations are not about Christmas; they are about moving toward Christmas. The color is purple, as are most of the Advent Candles, symbols of a solemn and thoughtful time. We are called to look carefully at ourselves, to spend some time (in spite of the season) in prayer and silence, a time to be prepared where it really matters for the great gift we receive at Christmas—the coming of God among us. This is important, this is something we need to consider seriously.

In fact, the Church is quite precise about part of this, and has given us some specific things to think about in Advent—surprising and difficult things. Did you notice how our Gospel reading today is hardly about Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus; nor was it a measured reflection on the meaning of the incarnation. Instead, the Gospel, the Good News, is about the end of all things—about fear and foreboding, about death and destruction. Which is as it should be; because this must come first, before anything else.

Traditionally, there are four themes for the four Sundays of Advent. One for each candle. For us to prepare fully for Christmas, the Church tells us, we need to address the realities of: Death, Final Judgment, Heaven (why the candles is pink) and Hell.

Deal with these four last things, the collective wisdom of traditional Christianity tells us, and then we will be ready for Christmas.

How odd for death to be our topic while the world is counting down fewer than 25 shopping days until Christmas. That seems just about as inappropriate as it can get; but it isn’t.

You see, death, our own death, is really a special word God says to all the materialism, all the frantic activity, all the focus on things, and appearances and suchlike that go on during this season, (and most of the rest of the time.) That special word is "No". Death says "No" to the abiding and ultimate value of everything that can possible go up in smoke. Death reminds us that there will be a time, just a click or two away on the clock of nature, when none of that will matter; when all of that will be gone and forgotten. Of course we know that, but generally in a distant, abstract way. Advent wants us to know that deeply and personally, and with clear eyes.

That is because, in Advent, it is only when we have heard, and heard deeply, the "No" that God says to all of the goodies and treasures and values and glitter of our culture, of our pride, and of our appetites, is only then that we can begin to hear the "Yes" that God offers us.

To hear the "No" of death is to realize that what is of ultimate value and meaning must lie, in some basic ways, outside of this world—a world we will leave, and leave just as we entered it. To hear the "No" of death is to realize that God will come into our lives, and simply destroy everything there except the for person we have, by our own choices, become.

All of this can bring us a useful perspective on what is worth our energy, our attention, and our affection—and what is not. To hear that "No" is to gain mature insight on where our values, our energy, and our hope need to be located.

In the same way, it can be a way to begin to loosen that grip we have on the things and the demands and the priorities of the world and the culture, and to seek another way. And this is where we can find the Good News.

Think about it—we can only receive a gift if our hands are empty. ||If our hands, and our lives, are too full of stuff, or of busyness, or of worries or of opinions, then there is no way to receive. We can only accept what God is offering if our hands, and our heart, have room for that gift.

This week’s theme can help us to remember that what we are really preparing for in Advent is God. What Christmas offers us is God. It offers us God with us, and God for us, and God with and for our world. It offers us the hopes and fears of all the years. But we will only find this if (in addition to the stuff we gotta do) we also take the different road, the road of Advent. After all, too much of the world’s preparation for Christmas tends to obscure God, or to replace God, or to substitute for God. Nothing can make that clearer than a bit of reflection on the power and certainty of death.

Perhaps it can remind us once again that, when we let go of some of competition, our hands and our hearts can have room in them, room perhaps the size of manger, for God, and for God’s gifts.

John preached from the book of the prophet Isaiah, and from one section in particular. (In fact, we connect the words to John so much, we forget that Isaiah first spoke them, and that Baruch quoted some of them.) It was the section we just heard, "Prepare the way of the Lord...make his paths straight, every valley shall be filled and every mountain shall be brought low...and all flesh shall see the salvation of God". The Baptist choose those lines very carefully. He chose them both because of their content and because of their context.

When Isaiah first preached these words, around 540 B.C., he was not talking to a group of happy shoppers flocking to the malls in the Jerusalem suburbs. Israel had very recently been conquered. Isaiah was preaching to exiles whose lives had never been worse and whose dreams had all been shattered. There were some deep valleys to be filled, and some huge mountains to be brought low. God seemed far away, indifferent, even hostile. Every single person, place and thing which had given meaning and purpose to the nation and its people had been destroyed. There seemed no good news, no future, no reason to continue to live. Yet it is at this very moment of hopelessness that God spoke His word of promise—a word about a highway through the wilderness, the lifting up of valleys, the lowering of mountains, and the promise that all flesh will see the salvation of God.

Hope in the midst of disaster and despair; a promise of life when all things are coming to an end. This is the heart of Advert.

When the John the Baptist preached these same words to Israel over five hundred years later, things were strangely similar—deep valleys, huge mountains.

Israel was once more freshly enslaved. This time, it was the invincible might of Rome that bled the land dry and crushed every hope for prosperity, freedom and deliverance. Those who flocked to the River Jordan to see John were, as a rule, miserable and desperate. They wanted something to happen to make things better. They wanted the pain to stop. They wanted God to do something to show that He was around and to show that he cared, even a little, for his chosen people.

Once more, hope in the midst of despair; words of promise and victory from a God who seems to have been napping during the most important of recent events. The word of God came to John, and those who heard it thought it was past about time for God to do something.

And Isaiah was right, and there was cause for hope even by the waters of Babylon. And John was right, and there was cause for rejoicing, even when the best way to tell the date was by who was the Roman Emperor, and who was the Roman Governor.

To be sure, the fulfillment of God’s promises did not look like what anyone expected. Isaiah’s exiles wanted things back just the way they had been before disaster struck. That never happened. Instead, the nation was restored but things were different, and Israel had to reevaluate everything, and so was led to rediscover the meaning of its existence and the nature of its mission.

John’s audience wanted the whole Roman Empire destroyed. Instead, God gave them a child, a child who ended up offering them things very different from what they thought they needed. The promised hope was real, if surprising in form; and God continued to be with His people.

We need to hear those words of hope today, and we need to realize that they are for us—for us in our real lives, for us in our real world.

After all, each of us knows a little bit about valleys and mountains, of what it feels like to be deserted and alone, in exile, or groaning under some sort of yoke. We know a little bit of what it is like to hurt, and to wonder where God is, and whether God cares. We know about that—and we probably know about it with a special sharpness because it’s Advent, and that means that it’s the holiday season.

For many of the people we know, and for not a few of us, this can be a pretty ambiguous time, a pretty difficult time. I think we all have a special vulnerability during these few weeks. It’s a time we find ourselves scrutinizing ourselves, our lives, and our families—usually up against some of the world’s totally unreal standards that guarantee that we will come up short. And it’s also a time where we feel a special sting from the griefs and hurts that make up our own personal valleys and mountains.

I know I do. My dad died one the eve of the Second Sunday in Advent, seventeen years ago—and I always think about him especially this week. But I suspect that I’d miss him most about now regardless of when he died, and I know a lot of us are like that.

All of this is to remind us that, at their deepest levels, Advent, and Christmas—what the world calls the holiday season—at their deepest levels, these are not just for the happy young shoppers and the TV-commercial perfect families. Instead, they are for all of us, and all of our lives. We are missing much of what Isaiah, and John the Baptist, and the Lord Jesus Christ, are all about when we let ourselves forget that the good news is really about the valleys and the mountains.

After all, the best meaning of Advent is not that we will remember again that birth in Bethlehem— as important as that is. The best meaning of Advent is that God wants to come to us, and that God will come to us; that God wants to come to you, and that God will come to you.

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 really do not know what this will look like; and that’s alright. After all, both Isaiah and John the Baptist came bringing hope, not answers; promises, not details. That is what we are offered this Advent, and it is really what we need.

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.

Now, there is something tricky about gifts—especially when the gift is a child. Right? The lessons we just heard do a marvelous job of pointing to this. The first two are all about Gaudette, all about rejoicing. The prophet Zephaniah sings to the people, "the King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst, you shall fear disaster no more." God is going to do great things for his people. All is well. || And "Rejoice", is also the first word we hear from Phillippians. Again we hear the assurance that the Lord is at hand, and this is wonderful.

This is part of what it means to prepare for a gift. It is almost always the very first thing you hear when folks find out you are expecting; you, they say ‘congratulations’, rejoice, this is wonderful news. We know about that.

Rejoicing is also a big part of what it means to prepare for Christmas. The good news of Advent is that God is coming to His people—to you and to me. God’s promises are being fulfilled. And we are to await that, to believe that, to realize that and open ourselves fully to it.

And so we rejoice, as well we should.

Then we hear the Gospel and the image shifts. God is no longer pictured as a victorious warrior exulting over his people; but as a wrathful judge, an executioner who loves his work. We are at the River Jordan, face to face with John the Baptist at his most Baptist.

John doesn’t say to rejoice; John says to repent. Paul told the Phillippians not to be anxious about anything; John tells his hearers to flee from the wrath to come.

Everyone in the Gospel is asking "What shall we do?" What has to change if we are to survive what lies ahead? For the axe is already laid to the root of the trees, and fire is prepared for burning the chaff. No rejoicing here.

And if you think about it, that makes sense, too. That, too is part of our preparation and of our waiting. And it should be heard, and felt, at exactly the same moment we hear, and feel, the call to rejoice. For the Lord we await in Advent is a Lord who makes a difference, who changes things.

He is a Lord who offers both new life and new responsibilities and who offers them together—simultaneously. Part of what new life means is that the old life just doesn’t work anymore. If we receive the gift of the Christ child, everything will change, and the direction and the focus of our lives will shift. It just works that way.

Remember the second thing everybody, (or at least everybody who had been a parent longer than 20 minutes), said when they learned that you are expecting? The first is always congratulations, we’re happy for you, it’s wonderful. The second thing is always one form or another of "boy are you in for it".

We are told often and in a variety of ways that things are going to change, that everything will be different. Nobody uses the word, but everybody tells us we have to repent, indeed that we are going to repent, to change our way of looking and living.

Rejoice/repent: That is the word of all great gifts. Something wonderful is going to happen; and boy are you in for it. You have to change your life, the old ways just won’t work anymore. Life after such a gift is a sort of judgment on life before.

Rejoice/repent: This dual demand in the face of the coming of God is addressed to all of us—it is part of Advent. It is a perfect reflection of the ambivalence that permeates our vision and our experience. We await and try to prepare for the coming of a child—a child who changes everything. So Zephaniah is right, we are to rejoice, and give thanks to God, and sing. And John the Baptist is right, because this wonderful gift will also come as judgment and with a power and a violence all its own. If we are going to take seriously the good news of Christmas, then things in our lives are going to be very different.

For we are called to live comfortably with the child from Bethlehem; as a baby, but more as an adult. And both the joy he offers and the demands he makes cannot be truly ours if we remain exactly the people we are today.

So we are called to repent. Ever wonder about what repentance, turning to a different direction, looks like—it is not something weird or mysterious. Repentance generally looks pretty much like our lives now, but with a difference.

When the crowd at the Jordan River felt this crunch of anticipation and judgment, their cry of "what then shall we do" was met with responses designed to force them into practical decisions. "Look at who you are", John the Baptist said, begin there.

When it comes to sharing, share from what you have. Don’t wait until you have more, or until your offering can be a higher quality—start now, start with what is already there.

Practice justice where you work, build fairness and mercy into your present dealings, your current life. Don’t wait until you have a job where justice is easier—or more noticeable.

Don’t wait to be somewhere else, or to be doing something else, or to be someone else—begin with the road in front of you, walk that, and so allow God to transform the real life you live right now. John did not tell even the despised tax collectors or the hated and feared soldiers that they had to go somewhere else to begin. Just as being a son of Abraham was no exemption from the call to repent, so being a tax collector or a soldier was no barrier to repentance, to change. The business of repenting is much the same as rejoicing. It has to do with transforming the life we are already living.

Repent and rejoice—in all things, with the real life we live in the real world. It is our response to the realities that surrounds us, and to the promise of the coming of the Lord.

Rejoice, for what is happening is wonderful.

Repent, because from now on, everything will be different.

On the level of nature, we are now just past the winter solstice. (In fact, before the present Gregorian calendar, Christmas was always on the solstice.) The darkness of night has reached its point of greatest power. The longest night of the year has passed—and the light is at last beginning to prevail. From now on, each day will be a tiny bit longer, each night a tiny bit shorter.

For our ancient ancestors, who lived by nature, this was cause for rejoicing; this was cause for hope, this meant that creation had smiled upon them—the constant lengthening of the darkness had been halted, light had triumphed.

Throughout the ages, humanity has known, at a level of such depth that it seems to be of our nature, that this retreat of the darkness spoke to life, and to hope. We have known that the return of the light is a fundamentally religious event.

Yet to know this by nature is not to know it clearly, it is not to know fully. That’s why, throughout the millennia, many attempts were made to explain the significance of the return of the light. Countless temples, rites and rituals that go back to the builders of Stonehenge, to prehistoric Native Americans, ancient Tibetans, English druids, these are all attempts to grasp the significance of midwinter and the victory of light. The last of this line, the line of nature, was the Roman holidays that immediately predate our choosing of this time for the celebration of Christmas.|| None of these older celebrations told the full truth, all were inadequate; but all recognized that something important was going on.

The real meaning, the real name, of that light which humanity has always tasted at this time, that light was only made clear later—and not by nature, but by grace.

The prophet Isaiah had the clearest vision of anyone up to his time|| of the full truth; and it remained the clearest vision for another 700 years. We just head it. Isaiah spoke of light, and of hope and of joy—the joy of a people long oppressed and suddenly set free; the joyful sense of God’s abundance in the harvest.

Isaiah knew that the light sought by humanity since the dawn of time had to do with joy, and with great saving acts of God in history, and with the birth of a child of the house of David. That much Isaiah knew—and he also awaited that great light.

Tonight we are gathered, in part, to say that we know the name, and the place, of this true light—promised by Isaiah, prefigured by millennia of seeing through a glass darkly. ||When the Church chose to transform this night of ancient rituals and feasts into the celebration of the incarnation, of the birth of Jesus, it did so for good, solid theological reasons. The church was proclaiming to all the world that the universal religious hunger of humanity which had looked toward the victory of the light with expectation, hope, and celebration—that hunger had finally and truly been satisfied. The hopes and fears of all the years are truly met in him tonight.

Our great, built-in human longing has been met in the birth of Jesus Christ. All that our race has longed for since we first looked with wonder at the triumph of the light in nature; and all that Israel expected in fulfillment of its covenant with God—all of that we name, and all of that we celebrate on this most holy night.

For the true light has come, come both by nature and by grace. The light of which the solstice is but a vague hint, and of which the prophesies of Israel are but an incomplete glimpse, that light has dawned upon our world and upon our souls.

That light comes to us as a child names Jesus; and that light comes from Bethlehem. The name of the light is Jesus—in him is met our great need—and no where else. The victory over the darkness is Jesus—in him is our hope, and nowhere else. All before was a shadow, anything since is a idol. The name of the light is Jesus; and that is good news.

And the place is Bethlehem. Not the City of the great king, not the center of Empire—but Bethlehem; the light first shines clearly in the quiet darkness of a shabby place.

This, too, is good news. It is good news because tonight we need to do more than name the light and celebrate its coming. Tonight we also need to seek for ourselves that light which is the presence of God. Tonight, like the shepherds, like the wise men, we seek that light, we seek to know it, and to worship it.

To discover that light within us, we often need to move through darkness with hope. The shepherd had to go to Bethlehem. That was not a pleasant thought—they were not welcome there. Shepherds had a bad reputation as thieves, and besides they were poor. To them Bethlehem was a dark and frightening place—but they went there in faith. And it was through facing that fear and darkness, that they discovered the true light, a light they would not have found if they had stayed away.

Mary and Joseph also had to go to Bethlehem. For them, too, it began as a dark place. Bethlehem was several days journey on foot or on a beast. It was sleeping by the side of the road—all this during her ninth month and due any day.

Bethlehem was where they had no friends or family and she had to have her first child all by herself. But they went there. They went in obedience and in faith, for they had been promised; and from their darkness and fear the light for all creation began to shine.

It’s still that way, the light still comes to those who in faith face the darkness. The light still comes from Bethlehem—first and always from Bethlehem of Judah, but also from the little Bethlehems within us and around us. Whatever darkness or fears we bring with us—this night assures us that there is a light that is stronger, and more powerful than that darkness and those fears. Whatever loneliness, or hurt, or shadows from our lives that trouble us, or limit us, or seek to overwhelm us—the love of God that comes to us in that manger can, and will, conquer them.

On this night God has shown us that he despises nothing that is human, and that he will make a place for himself, within our world, and within us. No matter how dark it appears.

So tonight we rejoice. With the gift to us of Himself in Jesus, God has assured us that humanity’s long wait has ended, that our own personal long wait has ended—healing, and light, and life are offered freely to all. Emmanuel is come, God is with us.

Those who have walked in darkness have seen a great light. Come, let us adore him.

Which brings us to the flight into Egypt. It’s an important story, and there are all sorts of characters to explore. This time through I am fascinated by Herod the Great, the king of Judah. Let’s think about Herod, and imagine who and how he was: In Judah in the first century, Rome ruled; Rome was the boss; Herod and everybody else knew that. But Herod was still king of Judah, from a long and honorable line; and that meant something. Even though he was very much a client of Rome, he was also the strongest king that Judah had during this period. Rome granted him quite a bit of autonomy, and quite a bit of power. While he is probably best known for rebuilding the temple, he kept quite busy in many other ways, too. Through it all he was the king; he was in charge, and he knew what that meant. Think about him.

Also, remember that while Herod was ruthless, cunning, murderous, obsessive, cruel, somewhat mad (toward the end), and paranoid to the point of having his own children killed—he wasn’t stupid. He knew that there could only be one king; he knew that there could only be one set of loyalties. This is something everybody in Herod’s line of work has always known; and knows today. Herod intended to be that King, and he would put up with no competition.

Now, taking all of this into consideration, what do you think Herod would do when he heard, on good authority, (three guys from out of town with briefcases), that there was a pretender—that another potential king had been born in Bethlehem? It comes as no surprise, really to read that he set out to take care of that little problem with his usual dispatch and efficiency.

Palestine just wasn’t big enough for both of them. There could only be one king. So Herod used the resources he had: he called out the troops, and went to war. The part of Matthew we just heard delicately skipped this part—the story of the Holy Innocents. This is where Herod orders all of the male children of a certain age in Bethlehem and the surrounding area be killed. It sounds really terrible to us, but it didn’t bother Herod. He knew children grow up, and there was one child out there he did not want to grow up. There was nothing personal in it; but there could only be one king for any land.

After all, you don’t stay in control by being nice to everybody. Eternal vigilance and all of that. Let that baby out of the manger, Herod knew, and he will start making demands. So Herod did what he thought he had to do. (Have you ever noticed how children always suffer when kings set out to insure their power.) And while he didn’t succeed in killing Jesus, from Herod’s perspective that didn’t really matter.

The troubling pretender to his throne stayed out his hair. For the rest of Herod’s life Jesus and his family were hiding in Egypt, waiting, ready to return when things were safe. When Herod died, Jesus returned, and God’s great plan of salvation continued. But Herod the Great had no further problems with Jesus. Was that a victory? It probably felt like one.

Now, this little exercise helps me understand the story better, it makes clear that what Herod did has a logic to it, an awful but still familiar logic. But there is more than that. I suspect that each of us knows very well what it is like to be Herod, and to be Herod hearing the news that a new King has been born in our territory. We may not be the official King, or Queen, of very much; but we know what it means to run our own lives; we know what it means to be in control, and to hold on to that control.

We may not have all of Judah, but we have our turf—things like our future, and our time and our families, and our bodies, and our lives, and our money, and so on. All too often we want to rule that stuff, and to rule it absolutely.

We also know what it means to have that control threatened. On one level or another, we know that the cute little baby in the manger will grow up to demand from us total commitment, and total surrender. He will lay claim to everything we name as ours. He will insist that there is no compromise, there is no way to give some and keep some—no matter what parts we want to give, no matter what parts we want to keep. He will seek out and require of us the hidden corners, and the unspoken territories we reserve solely to ourselves. Somehow, we know this of Jesus; we know he will make these demands. He seeks to be Lord of all of our lives. He seeks to topple us from our thrones, and put himself in charge.

You see, we know all about Herod.

The story of Herod’s attack on Jesus, and his slaughter of the innocents, is everyone’s struggle, writ large, and writ especially ugly. That baby in the manger is no less a challenge, no less a threat, and no less a gift to us than he was to Herod the Great. And, like Herod, we can do a pretty good job of keeping him out of our hair. Remember, as far as Herod was concerned, Jesus was as good as dead in Egypt.

We can do that, too. We can muster what resources we have, and chase Him away. It may look as simple as wrapping up the manger scene and putting it away for another year. It may look very different from that. But the result will be the same. He will be out of the way, and we can continue to run our things the way we want to run them. And we will die, and the story will continue.

That is one possibility, but not the only one.

Look carefully at the story. Even King Herod’s best efforts could not really destroy the child, and neither can ours. The Lord waits, in whatever exile we have imposed upon him. He waits, he listens and he longs for us. And, at a word from us, he will come home. He waits for us, and he calls to us.

And, just like Herod, the choice is ours to make.

Identity, a sense if who we are, is necessary. We will find one, or several, for ourselves, and for our church, from somewhere. There is no doubt about that. And if we do not find this identity from our Lord, from his baptism, life and work, then, tragically, we will find it somewhere else, somewhere less—we will find it from ourselves, or from the world, or from somewhere.

For example, we take our identity as individuals from the world when we think of ourselves first and foremost in ways like . . . I am an engineer, or a housewife, or retired, or young, or sick, or poor, or male, or white, or smarter than you are—or any of the world’s other categories. Sure, things like that are important. But who we are, first of all is none of these. Who we are first of all is not given us by the world; who we are first of all we learn at our baptism. Before all else, we are the beloved of God.

So we are called, first of all, to treat ourselves, and to treat one another, as if the most important thing about us, and the most important thing about the other, is that we are created in the image of God and baptized into the life of Jesus Christ. Nothing about us, nothing about anyone else, is more important than this.

And every time we forget this—whether about ourselves or about another person—we have lost something precious. The most important thing about you; and the most important thing about him, or her, or them, is that God created us and Jesus died for us.

The same issues of identity surround a parish, any parish. If we don’t get our identity from the Lord, we will get it from somewhere else. I am always amused at those articles or pronouncements purporting to tell us what the church really is. They change every year; and say things like: The church really is a business; it really is a communications network; it really is a family; it really is for helping the poor; it really is the people, or the preacher or the music or the sermons or whatever. Again, part of that is true. These are elements of who we are; and I am very glad St. Mary’s is more like a family than a corporation. But as for what the church really is—it is the Body of Christ—nothing else, nothing less. That identity comes first, before anything the world has to offer. The fact is, the Church is not exactly like, indeed it is not mostly like, anything else in all creation. We are the body of Christ.

I want to look at two broad parts of what this identity of ours—our identity both as individuals and as the Church—looks like. These are not new things; they are ancient things we always need to remember.

They are both found in one wonderful sentence we just heard from Isaiah. Here God says to Israel, and to us, "I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you, I have given you as a covenant to the people". Remember that. I have taken you by the hand, I have given to as a covenant. There it is. That’s what it is like to be us.

First of all, we are taken by the hand; we are held in the hand of God. This is where we begin. At our baptism we, like Jesus, are named beloved of God. We are baptized into Jesus’ life, death and resurrection; we are adopted by the Father as his beloved child. We are taken by the hand of God, and kept as God’s own.

As a parish, we focus on the first part of this identity when we pay attention to ourselves; when we gather for worship, study, and fellowship; when we reach out to one another in loving concern. Those are all parts of remembering, and acting like we are, each one of us, beloved of God; held in the hand of God. That’s one part of our identity

Then there is the second part of that sentence from Isaiah. "I have given you as a covenant to the people, as a light to the nations." "I have given you." That’s next. To be named beloved of God means, to be called, among other things, to be given to the world. Jesus learned what that means through great struggle. He was driven by the spirit into the wilderness, and he left the wilderness on a journey to the cross.

For us it still means to be sent out, as Jesus was sent out—to be a servant. As Jesus came not to be served, but to serve, so we exist, not for privilege, but for mission and ministry. Our identity is to be, as Archbishop Temple once said, "The only institution that exists primarily for the benefit of people who are not members."

As a parish we live this out when we pay attention to other people. When we reach out to others in evangelism, service, and mission, that’s w