Sermon. Trinity Church, Collinsville, CT. December 5, Advent II. Donald V. Romanik

Transcription

1 Sermon Trinity Church, Collinsville, CT December 5, 2010 Advent II Donald V. Romanik I ll be home for Christmas You can plan on me Please have snow and mistletoe And presents on the tree Christmas Eve will find me Where the lovelight gleams I ll be home for Christmas If only in my dreams When I was seven years old, the only Christmas album we had was one recorded by Perry Como. Every day after school between Thanksgiving and Christmas, I would play this vinyl LP on the walnut cabinet hi-fi in the living room later called a stereo when the record player came with two speakers instead of one. It was a fairly secular selection of Christmas carols. I learned all the words to the Twelve Days of Christmas and Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire and even less familiar ones at that time like I ll be Home for Christmas and That Christmas Feeling which begins with the phrase when the days of December are numbered. This was my seven year old s version of Advent. It was easy, simple and innocent. I didn t even have or use an Advent calendar but merely crossed off the days of December on the paper calendar in the kitchen.

2 2 Eventually, we acquired more Christmas albums which later became eight tracks, cassettes and CD s and, for better or for worse, my life and society in general got more complicated and much less innocent. Naturally, my life experience and belief system developed and matured. Consequently, my concept and experience of Advent has also morphed and progressed beyond the simple holiday message of Perry Como Christmas songs. Of all the seasons in the Church Year, Advent presents us with one of the widest and most complex arrays of vivid and sometimes disturbing images, sharp and confusing contrasts and strong and even harsh language. Furthermore, the time sequence presented is totally out of whack. It starts with a rather scary description of the end of time and the second coming of Christ on the first Sunday of Advent and ends with the birth of the baby Jesus is a stable in Bethlehem on Christmas Eve. Shouldn t it be the other way around? In other words, we are warned and even threatened to be prepared for the final judgment a full four weeks before we hear familiar and comforting words about angels, shepherds, animals, Mary, Joseph and of course Jesus. What is going on here? Why does the Church seem to be playing with our feelings and emotions as well as our intellect during a time of year when the rest of American society is shopping, wrapping, baking and listening to the Little Drummer Boy piped through the box stores and the shopping malls? Today s readings are a dramatic illustration of the confusing, paradoxical and somewhat schizophrenic nature of Advent. In the first reading from Isaiah, we are reminded of the

3 3 coming of the Messiah who will be a shoot out from the stump of Jesse. We are also presented with a vision of a very special place of incredible peace, tranquility and harmony somewhere and sometime in the future. In this place Isaiah describes as a glorious dwelling and often referred to as the Peaceable Kingdom in traditional folk art and music, the wolf lives with the lamb rather than devours him, the lion eats straw like the ox rather than the ox himself and the nursing child plays over the hole of the asp. During this idyllic time the world will be led by a child, that root of Jesse, and the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. In Paul s letter to the Romans, we are clearly instructed that the root of Jesse described in the Isaiah prophecy is Christ. Furthermore, Paul tells us that this Christ came not only for the direct descendants of Jesse and David but for the Gentiles as well, in other words all of humankind. Because of the coming of Christ, Paul tells the Church in Rome that we may now abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. OK, I really like the image of the Peaceable Kingdom, although I m not too crazy about playing with snakes. Also, as a Gentile, I warmly embrace Paul s pronouncement that although a descendant of Jesse and David himself, Jesus came to save me as well. Why not just leave it at that. Why do we have to even bother with that eccentric, dirty, obnoxious and in-your-face fanatic called John-the Baptist? Isn t he just the skunk at the garden party, the loud intoxicated uncle at dinner or the smelly homeless person on the park bench? While I may be ready to confront John the Baptist in January when we

4 4 celebrate the Baptism of Jesus during Epiphany, the last thing I need during this season of joy and cheer is to be insulted by a crazy man who dresses in camel s hair and eats wild locusts and honey. I m afraid, however, that rather than the Peaceable Kingdom., the real message of Advent is that of John the Baptist. Before we can hear the songs of the angels about peace on earth and good well to all of humankind, we need to be told that sometimes we are indeed a brood a vipers and we have to repent. John the Baptist and the apocalyptic images of the end of time are not there to scare us but they are meant to shake us up and provide us with an incredible sense of urgency. Infused with this sense of urgency, Advent is also about waiting and expectancy. We re not talking about passive, tranquil or quiet waiting like my childhood memories of listening to Christmas carols sung by Perry Como while crossing off the days of December on the calendar. Rather, much like my waiting for a delayed plane at the gate at Bradley and in danger of missing my connection at O Hare in Chicago, Advent waiting is active, restless, anxious and even uncomfortable because we are indeed running out of time. The paradox of Advent is that while we are anxiously awaiting the coming of Jesus, we wait with the full knowledge and realization that he is already here. We ve had Jesus for over two thousand years and we re still not quite ready to receive him into hearts, our lives, our communities and our world. In fact, the reason we need to repeat this process

5 5 and cycle of Advent year after year is that we have not yet gotten it right. Hence, we need those images of the end of time and John the Baptist to warn and even threaten us in order to make room for Jesus in our lives and in our world here and now. In reality, Advent is not about the past or the future but about the present our present. We believe and profess that Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead and perhaps, either immediately before or after that judgment, we will have fully realized that Peaceable Kingdom described by Isaiah. But let s not hold our breath. The truth is that for most if not all of us, this is the only world or kingdom we will ever know or experience. And it is a world where the wolf kills the lamb, the lion eats the ox and the baby who plays with dangerous snakes gets bitten. It is a world where nations are at war and people are oppressed and neighbors, both far and near, are hungry, homeless, unemployed, infirmed, lonely and broken. It is the world to which God entrusts us as stewards and into which Jesus was born as a helpless and vulnerable child. It is in this world that we are called to wait, watch and listen with expectancy and urgency but also with hope, trust and confidence because the Lord has come. My friends, I guarantee you that Christmas will come again this year no matter what we do or not do. We will be able to light the lights, eat the cookies, sip the eggnog, sing the carols and enjoy the love and fellowship of family and friends. We will also get to see the star, hear the angels and take a peek at the baby in the manger. Finally, we will, once again, have the opportunity to contemplate and celebrate the wonderful and profound

6 6 mystery of the incarnation, where God, in God s wisdom and love, became one of us born to a woman into our broken and sinful world. But, we have three more weeks to go. In the meantime, let s do a little waiting.