An Invitation to a New Era

Our texts for this final Sunday in Advent are Zephaniah 3:14-20 and Luke 1:46-55, 67-79, which can be read here.

I've been dreading this day since the 9th grade.  I will never forget the day in my freshman World History Class when we watched a video about the Mayans and learned that their calendar very clearly predicted a day for the end of the world:  DECEMBER 21, 2012 flashed on the screen at the end of the video in ominous typeface.

Well, the so-called "Mayan Apocalypse" is here, and so, still, are we (though there are still 10 hours or so left in this day).  It turns out, though, that that scary video I watched in world history class, however, didn't necessarily speak truthfully about what the Mayan calendar really indicates about this particular moment in history.  Here's what I read about this day in an article on CNN.com this week:

"Some believe the world is coming to an end Friday -- on 12/21/12 -- which is when an important phase on the ancient calendar of the Mayan people terminates. Mayans don't buy it. At least the ones living in the city of Merida, Mexico, don't. Neither does anyone in the Mayan village of Yaxuna. They know the calendar their ancestors left them is about to absolve a key phase -- the end of an era and the heralding of a new one -- but they don't think we're all gonna die."It's an era. We are lucky to see how it ends," said wood carver Santos Esteban in Yaxuna, a sleepy village of fewer than 700 Mayans...He feels it is a momentous occasion and is looking forward to the start of the new age. He is not afraid." (http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/20/world/doomsday-coming/index.html)

If today is the end of an old era, and the beginning of a new one, then this week's scripture texts are actually perfect--because in beautiful lyrics, they herald the coming of a new age.  An age where oppression will cease, the proud will be knocked down and the humble lifted up; where God will raise up a savior for us and guide us in the way of peace; where God will personally be present in our midst, and God's people will fear oppression no more.

What if today did mark the beginning of a new era--an era where we begin to finally live into the words of Mary's song and of Zechariah's, of the prophet Zephaniah?  In our broken and battered world, I like the idea of today as a new beginning.  May we, like the Mayan woodcarver, not be afraid, but look forward and live into a new age.

An Invitation to Joy

Our texts for this third Sunday in Advent are Malachi 3:1-4 and Luke 1:57-66, 80 and 3:1-6, which can be read here.  But for this week, I am going to diverge from talking about the texts and instead address a great worship-related question that one of our kids asked during the Children's Sermon when we introduced the Advent wreath a couple of weeks ago:  "Why is one of the candles pink?"

The answer is complex and ancient, as best as I can tell.  Here's the one I found perhaps most interesting and that seems to have drawn together ideas from several places; forgive me as I quote at length, I just couldn't think of a better way to share this!  :

"In the earliest years of the church the only church season was Lent, the seven weeks prior to Easter. Lent was a season of fasting and prayer as the church commemorated the crucifixion of Jesus. The traditional color of banners in the church during this time was a deep purple, signifying royalty, repentance, and suffering. During Lent the church lit seven candles, one for each week of the solemn season. However solemn the season, the story of Lent also has a twinge of hope and joy since the death of Christ prefigured the resurrection. So, on the third Sunday of Lent, the church was encouraged not to fast, but to feast. In ancient times on this particular Sunday the Pope would honor a citizen with a pink rose, and as time passed the priests wore pink vestments on this day as a reminder of the coming joy. When the season of Advent was instituted the church viewed it as a mini-Lent, a time for reflection and repentance (thus the [primary seasonal color of] purple). In so doing, the church adopted the first four candles of Lent and changed the third candle of Advent to pink in honor of the Lenten tradition. This is why we have a pink candle in our Advent Wreaths. --from http://www.hcna.us/columns/pink_advent_candle.html).

Over the years, the four Advent candles have come to represent hope, peace, joy and love--though many think it is the love candle that is pink, it is actually the joy candle, a splash of difference and color in the midst of the season.  In recent years the Advent emphasis has moved from being a season of repentance to being more a season of hope and anticipation--hence the shift in color for the season from purple to blue that is reflected in our worship space this year.  But I am glad that we have still held onto the candle of joy--a sign that even in seasons of darkness, light is on its way; that we are always invited to lean towards God's joy, even when we may least feel its presence.  As we light the candle this week, remember the joy of Elizabeth and Zechariah at John's long-awaited birth, and then the joy of John when he saw Jesus coming out to him at the river, ready to begin his ministry of mercy and redemption for all people.  Even if this is a dark time in your life--perhaps especially if it is--what reason might you have to light a candle for joy?

"Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don't give up." --Anne Lamott

An Invitation to the Visitation

Our main text for this Second Sunday in this Advent season of considering God's Surprising Invitations is Luke 1:28-45, 56, which can be read here.  The first half of this reading is incredibly familiar--the story of the angel Gabriel appearing to young Mary to tell her she will become pregnant by the Holy Spirit and bear the Son of God.  The second half of the story, at least to me, is not as familiar from typical narrations of the Christmas story:  the tale of Mary's visitation to her relative Elizabeth, who the angel Gabriel helpfully mentioned was also pregnant--just 6 months farther along in the miraculous process than Mary.

Why don't we know this part of the story as well?  It is probably true that the story of two women visiting together--even if it does involve a baby leaping in recognition--is not as magical and glamorous as the story of the angel's appearance and announcement.  Yet, when I have visited art museums, I have been amazed to see how frequently this story is told on canvas even when it is more rarely told from pulpits.  It is a story that seems to have captured an undue amount of attention from painters...on www.biblical-art.com, a resource I turn to for images with some frequency, the second half of this week's story--that comprised of those lesser read verses 39-45--has 262 pieces of art ancient and modern associated with it.

The vast number of ways this scene has been brought visually to life amazes me, and so I offer some of my favorites below for your consideration.  Which of these capture your attention?  How do the facial expressions and body language of the two women differ among the paintings?  When other people are included in the images, what do their expressions seem to convey?  What is the mood of these images, and which one do you most connect with?  Reflecting on art is a wonderful way of being invited into the story...so imagine and enjoy!

An Early Eastern Christian fresco

"Visitation" by artist Jim Janknegt (contemporary)

"The Visitation" by Romare Bearden (1941)

Pontormo's "The Visitation" (16th century)

 "The Visitation" by Chinese artist He Qi (contemporary)

"TheVisitation" by Philippe de Champaigne (17th century)

Mary and Elizabeth in the 2006 film "The Nativity Story"

An Invitation to Advent

Our primary text for this first Sunday of Advent is Luke 1:5-25, which can be found here.

Most of the mail I get, I confess, ends up in the recycling bin:  advertisements, unsolicited items from businesses, impersonal pieces addressed to "Current Resident." But there is one type of mail (other than my Thursday arrival of Sports Illustrated) that I always pay attention to:  anything that looks like an invitation.  Something addressed personally to me from someone I know well, someone who has something exciting going on in their lives that they want me to come be a part of and experience alongside of them.

This year, we are going to be looking at the stories of Advent and Christmas as God's personal invitations to us--God inviting us to be part of what God is doing in the world, God inviting us to practice ways of being open to God's movement in our lives.  We will be meeting characters in the first two chapters of the book of Luke--Zachariah, Elizabeth, Mary, Bethlehem shepherds--who accepted surprising invitations to be part of God's story in different ways.  We will be taking time to ask ourselves, what is God's invitation to each of us in this season?  How are we being invited to participate in God's ongoing story in this world in surprising ways?

As part of this season, I want to encourage you to consider who might need a personal invitation from you during Advent.  I recently read a study that said 82% of people who are not part of a church would be at least somewhat likely to visit a church if they received a personal invitation from someone they know.  Broadneck is an exciting place to be right now.  Who in your life needs to share in that excitement with you?  Who might be yearning for the sense of community and opportunity to gather together in God's presence that Broadneck can offer during the holidays?  I want to challenge you to print off the invitation above and personally hand it to someone in your life during this season, inviting them to worship or perhaps to our Christmas Caroling and Chili Supper planned for the evening of December 16.  As God has invited us into God's story, we are called to be inviting others in as well; to whom might you turn this season and say, "Hey, I want you to know you're invited.  Come along with me.  Come and see"?

The Crowning Day of the Year

Our texts for this coming Sunday, which is celebrated as Christ the King or Reign of Christ Sunday, are Psalm 93, Revelation 1:4b-8, and John 18:33-37, which can be read here.

As I was explaining to the Worship Ministry Group a few weeks ago, this coming Sunday is the final Sunday of the "Church Year".  The "Church Year" or "Liturgical Year" that we follow in our worship does not follow a January 1-December 31 cycle like our calendars, nor work on a September-to-June sort of school year calendar; rather, our year begins with the first Sunday of Advent (as we anticipate Christ's coming birth) in early December and ends with Reign of Christ/Christ the King Sunday in late November.  Thus, by worship standards this is the last Sunday of our year before we get a new start for Advent next week and prepare to move through the story of who Christ is together once again!

The end of a year is a good time for looking back and looking forward.  And so I would encourage you to do that with this year of worship we have just been through--and the year of worship that lies ahead.  Perhaps the art pictured above can help you do this.

What have you learned about God through the course of this year?

How have you come to experience Jesus in a new way as you moved again through the story of waiting for his birth, of celebrating the beginning of his ministry through Epiphany and the end of his ministry through Lent?

How did Jesus' resurrection take on meaning for you this year, or how did you come to experience the Holy Spirit lighting your life or joining you to others in a new way?

What have you learned through this long season of Pentecost growth--as we have read letters to ancient churches, prayed together the Lord's Prayer, considered our calls to discipleship, and thanked God for the cloud of witnesses that surrounds us?

How, on this "crowning" Sunday of the year, might you come to see the ways that Christ reigns over all of your life--or, perhaps, invite Christ anew to do so?

These are good things to consider with gratitude during Thanksgiving Week!  And as you reflect on these things, I leave you with these words from a worship website I respect a lot, Liturgy-Link, as a blessing for the coming Sunday:

Jesus Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. He reigns over us and all our world with justice, mercy, and peace.

So as this year comes to an end and a new one begins, may we sing all joy and praise to Christ who reigns now and always.

Amen!

A Family We Can Relate To

My apologies!  I wrote this and thought it published on Friday, but due to a technology glitch it is not appearing until today!  So here are some thoughts around yesterday's lessons:

Our texts this week come from the first two chapters of the book of 1 Samuel:  1 Samuel 1:1-20, 24-28 and 2:1-10, which can be read here.

It is interesting to come to the story of Hannah at this point in the church year.  Odd, I guess, would be more accurate than interesting.  Here's a little lectionary lesson for you:  if we had stuck with the scriptural suggestions of the Revised Common Lectionary all year, our texts through the summer would have come almost exclusively from 1 and 2 Samuel.  We would have already met Samuel, Hannah's prayed for son; the first kings of Israel; and covered the arc of Israel's history through these two books.  So why wait and go back to the start of the story now?  Doesn't that seem a little out-of-order?

I seriously doubt that what I am about to point out is the reason we meet Hannah in late November, but I'll entertain the thought anyway:  maybe this story is one we need to read as the holidays approach.  Because, after all, it is at least in part a story about family dynamics, unfolding during an annual event where all the family was together in a way that highlighted differences and made tensions rise.  Sound familiar to anyone who is approaching holiday family time with a little fear and trepidation?  Every year, this family went through the same destructive cycle:  they'd go up to Shiloh, make the sacrifice, and while Peninnah and her children would receive a large portion of the sacrificial meat, Hannah--childless--would get only one portion, lost and neglected in the family shuffle.  Elkinah, her husband, tried to make her feel better by doubling up what she got--but it was still less than the rest of the family got, and furthermore only highlighted her isolation, her other-ness.  Then, she had to endure the mocking of Peninnah (who apparently was NOT a gracious "winner" in the family childbearing sweepstakes), the confusion of her self-centered husband who thought he should be enough for her, and the emptiness of her arms that reminds her of what she's never had.  In the end, Hannah storms away from the dinner table, refusing to eat.  Ever seen a family circus like this?

So, though I don't think this is what Hannah's story is about at its heart, I think at this time of year we can certainly use Hannah's story to consider how we interact with our families and friends in the coming days of gathering together--how we can be sensitive to the griefs people bear, to the differences in how our lives have turned out and how we view the world.  And, as Hannah slipped away to the sanctuary to fervently pray when she could not take it anymore, we can consider how God might be present as we gather with others, as we deal with those we are missing around the table, as we deal with those we cannot stand around the table.  How does God work through the petty dynamics and story of this one family to begin to bring about something that will transform not just this family story, so they don't repeat the same cycle year after year, but to reorient an entire nation's history? 

Can I Just Sing?

Our scripture texts for this Sunday come from Ruth 3 and 4 (specifically, Ruth 3:1-11 and 4:13-22, but the whole of both chapters--actually, the whole book of Ruth!--are worth reading) and from Mark 12:38-44, which can be read here.

I don't want to write a sermon this week.

Well, that's not true; I just think someone has already written what I have to say in this sermon better than I can.

You see, I often think musically--and as I read the texts for this week, song after song kept flowing through my brain.    This happens a lot, but this week the correlations I made were so strong that I wanted, instead of writing a sermon, to just make an iTunes playlist of three or four songs that I think portray what I hear of God in these stories better than any words I can assemble and speak.

I don't think I could get away with this, though; so I am going for a compromise.  I am going to attempt to play one of the songs in worship on Sunday as part of my sermon; and the other two, I offer to you here for your viewing/listening pleasure.  I encourage you to check out the links below to two remarkable songs:  "Show Up" by Jill Phillips, and "Kingdom Comes" by Sara Groves--the first a fairly new song to me, the other a song I have sung frequently in my head for years.  Read the scripture texts, then listen to these songs.  Why do you think these songs are the ones that came to mind for me out of these stories?  What do these songs spark in you?  How do you see them as connected to the stories of these three remarkable-yet-unremarkable widows, Ruth, Naomi, and the nameless widow with two copper coins?

Ponder, listen, and enjoy!