This week’s lectionary reflection comes from my good friend Matthew Burdette, one of the most talented young theologians I know. Matt is finishing his thesis for a Masters of Theology degree from La Sierra University. He is a high school Bible teacher in Redlands, California, and occasionally blogs at Constructing Theology: The Theological Explorations of a Progressive Adventist. I asked Matt to share the lectionary reflection this week at The Suburban Pastor, it comes from the sermon he preached today at the Highstown Church, in Highstown, NJ. Thanks Matt!

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Today is a day on which we remember an old story that just about all of us know, a story that all of us could probably tell from memory. It is a common story about a baby, some angels, a some shepherds, a pregnant teenage mother, her bizarre account of how she ended up pregnant, her confused fiancé, a few astrologers, a nervous king, a hotel with no vacancy, and the fate of the world. This is, as I said, a story we’re quite familiar with.

One of my favorite things to do as a child was listen to stories. I had several favorites. Two that I remember in particular were called Milk and Cookies and Are You My Mother? I am certain that the only other persons besides myself who remember this are my mother and maybe my teddy bear. Now don’t be deceived by the title of Milk and Cookies. This isn’t so much a story about food as it is about a baby bear visiting his grandparents’ house, terrified of a furnace in the basement that he is convinced is a dragon. Scary stuff. Likewise, Are You My Mother? is a very dramatic story about a newly-hatched bird who strays from the nest, and suffers all kinds of confusion as he attempts to identify his mother. Again, scary stuff.

As a child, I wanted to read these books all the time. Now, have you ever stopped to wonder why it is that children do this? I remember my little sister Lizzie had a favorite book when she was a kid, and my mom would read it to her all the time too. And I know of other kids that do the same thing, so it isn’t just my family. Why is it that children can watch the same movie over and over again, or read the same book every night? It isn’t bad memory. Kids know what’s coming next. They wait anxiously for their favorite parts. They mumble along with the movies, having memorized all the lines. They correct you when you misread the sentence in the book. It isn’t bad memory. It is something else.

Perhaps for those of us who aren’t children, the best analogy to this in our own lives is the music we enjoy. Sometimes we listen to the same songs over and over again. In church, we like to sing the same hymns over and over again. And when we listen to a familiar song or sing an old, familiar hymn, it isn’t because we failed to memorize the words the first few times or because we’ve not prayed that prayer before. We listen to old, familiar songs because the stories and prayers of those songs are our stories and prayers–stories that are for us abiding, prayers that faith, however weak, cannot help but pray. We listen to them for the pleasure of knowing we are not alone, that another has felt as we feel, has seen the world as we see. And we listen for the beauty and excitement of newness found in old places–the subtleties of language or sound that we never heard before but were there all along.

But then we grow up, and the old children’s book that we read so many times becomes boring to us. We forget that old movie that we so loved to watch, and it collects dust on a shelf. We hear the old song that we used to love and it fails to speak to us like it used to, and we forget why we loved it so much in the first place. We move on. And then sometimes, we return, only to move on again.

The human is a strange animal, a tragic beast. With eternity in our hearts we turn our faces towards the future, and welcome the newness of tomorrow. But like the mortals that we are, we run to the past because it is safe. But in that past we find no rest, since, as Ecclesiastes says, he has put eternity in the human heart. So with one hand we cling to what is familiar to us, and with the other we courageously reach for the unknown. Yes, indeed, we are strange animals, caught in the trap between our fear and our hope.

This is, perhaps, what it means to live meaningfully in the present: to make peace between the past and the future, to discover in the past the promises for a future that is genuinely new, that is free from being just the same thing over and over again. And perhaps courage for the future comes from looking back at the past and discovering that the surprises of the present were promised all along, that the past the the future “rhyme,” that God has been faithful all along, even through the surprises along the way.

You see, we do not turn to the past simply because it is interesting, or because we ought to for some unknown religious reasons. We do not celebrate Christmas because it keeps getting printed in the calendar every year. We turn to the past to discover yet again that our present is no surprise to God, that today was once yesterday’s future, and that yesterday God made a promise, and that because God has made a promise we may face tomorrow with courage and hope. We remember the birth of Christ because somehow in this strange story we find the meaning of all history and the promised end of every story. Indeed, in the story of Christ’s birth we are reminded that it really is a story that we’re living in, that the events of our lives, all their successes and failures, all of our hopes and fears, are not random, are not meaningless; that this story is going somewhere.

Of course, there is a problem. There’s always a problem. And this time, the problem is that it’s the past. It is a story that we already know. Every year we come to Christmas already knowing the story. For some of us, it’s the same routine with the kids in a Christmas play, some of them shepherds, some of them sheep, and some plastic doll playing baby Jesus, and this prevents our ears from hearing the story, from seeing its beauty. For others of us, the story is the Pagan origin of the Christmas holiday that somehow was hijacked by Christians hundreds of years ago, and this prevents our ears from hearing the story, from seeing its beauty. Still for others of us, this is a story of rushed shopping, credit card debt, and not knowing what to buy that loved one who already has everything they need. This too prevents our ears from hearing the story and from seeing its beauty.

Our great problem is that we need to turn to the past in order to find strength for the future. We are not freed from the trap that lies between fear and hope unless we can hear the promises that God has made to us in the past, catch glimpses of God’s faithfulness in the present, and so find the courage faith to trust God for the future. But we turn to the past, and find that the old saying is true of us: “Hearing they do not hear, and seeing they do not perceive.”

Thankfully for us, God has provided for our need. We turn to the first few words of our Scripture reading: “In the beginning…”

Saint John the Evangelist, writing this, takes the reader into the past, takes us back to these familiar words, and we are tempted to say, “Yes, John, we’ve heard this story already. We already know. ‘In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.’”

But John says, “Wait.”

“In the beginning…was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.”

And the reader, familiar with Genesis, would say, “John, are you telling us the same story about the history of the world?”

And John says, “Wait.”

“All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.”

And John says, “Yes, see, this is the same story, the story of how and why our world was created, the story of our history. The problem is that you have heard it so many times, but you have not been listening. Listen closely.”

“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.”

“There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.”

Millennia after God said, “Let there be light,” John says that the “true light” was still “coming into the world.” The history that God started at the beginning already had a goal; when God spoke at the beginning and there was light, he was in that act already promising to speak again in the future, and then there would be in the world the “true light,” and this true light would not be overcome by the darkness. Already in this past, there was the promise of God’s future.

The Gospel text continues: “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.”

Millennia after God said, “Let us make humanity in our image,” after God made for himself a son named Adam, John says that there was one coming into the world who would give the power to others to become God’s children. And not children just because of accidental birth or the plans of parents, but because of the promise of God. According to John, when God made that first human, he was in that act already promising the coming of the true human, by whom others would become God’s children. You see, already in this past, there was the promise of the future.

And the text continues, “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.”

This is where history was going all along. From the moment that God spoke creatively at the beginning, this same God spoke his Word of promise. It is because of that promise and absolutely no other reason that we gather today. We remember Christmas because it is the surprise that was promised all along–God’s creative Word will become flesh, will live among you, and all will see his glory, the glory of the Father’s only son, full of grace and truth.

Christmas isn’t just a cute story about a baby lying in a manger, or a time to sing certain songs. When a person says “Merry Christmas,” whether or not that person realizes is, she is saying, “Have joy–God has promised, God has kept his promise, and he will continue to be faithful.”

It is only because of the baby in Bethlehem that we are freed from the trap between past and present, the trap between fear and hope. This trap either tells us that there is no hope for the future, that all that lies before us is danger and death, or it tells us that tomorrow is just going to be the same thing that happened yesterday, that nothing new is going to happen. But we have heard a better promise than that. On Christmas, we remember that the one who created our history did so by making a promise. Because God has promised, tomorrow need not be like yesterday; because he has promised, yesterday need not be forgotten.

The child in Bethlehem, born to single a teenage mother, that child was the very promise that God spoke at creation. He himself, Jesus Christ, the fragile child, a human being like you and me, is the very goal of history. By God’s grace we remember him, and we look forward to him.

To say “Merry Christmas” is to repeat the promise, “You may have peace, since in Christ God’s promise has become flesh; this is grace and truth.”

Some of us spend our lives looking for God, and to hear the words “Merry Christmas,” is to find rest from the endless quest for God. God is not far off, not beyond reach. We love to search for God, to say that we have found him; yet the greater faith waits for him, believes that he has already come near. On Christmas we remember that the one from whom we are, the one among us, the one for whom we hope, this one is intimately involved in our lives. We do not need to call loudly to him so that he can hear us in heaven. No, he comes to us, he comes as a child; he comes as the Word of promise; he comes to share with us at our table fellowship, in common things like a little piece of bread, a cup of wine. And truly, he has indeed invited us to fellowship with him at his table, to call him with Christ our Father, to be welcomed with Christ as his children. And let us not forget, he dares us to welcome one another as sisters and brothers, for in him we have one Father.

This Christmas, let us hear the story as we have never heard it before. Let us revisit that old common story that we already know, and in it find the promises for our future. Let us speak those promises to one another, reminding one another that God is not far off, that, as Saint Paul wrote, the “word is near you, it is in your mouth and in your heart.” This Christmas, we remember Christ, the defenseless child, because in him our story is completed, and in him we find the courage and faith to face tomorrow, to hope yet again for God’s promises.

The Gospel reading for the fourth week of Advent comes from Luke 1:26-38, where the Angel Gabriel visits Mary, announcing that she is chosen to bear God’s Son. In verse 34, Mary is struggling to believe Gabriel’s news, she says to the angel, “How will this happen?’ … ‘I’m still a virgin!’” Gabriel replies, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God.” To which Mary responds in verse 37, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

Mary’s response to the Angel (and in turn to God) are some of the most courageous words in Scripture. Mary was likely aware of what could happen to her. Being a young single pregnant Jewish woman in first century Palestine would not be easy. Yet despite all the risks, Mary responded, “Let it be.”

Mary had courageous faith. She was willing to trust God no matter the consequences. Through the history of the church there have been many followers of Jesus who have said the same thing, even to the point of death. It reminds me of people such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer who said “let it be” to God as he resisted the rise of Nazism in Germany or Martin Luther King who said “let it be” to God as he fought against unjust laws in Birmingham Alabama. They practiced radical courage.

We need that kind of courageous faith today as well. Our “let it be” may not be on the scale of a Bonhoeffer or King, but we need courageous faith everyday, even in small ways–in our home, our work, our school, our church, and our community. God needs women and men who are not afraid to trust him despite the consequences. Mary said, let it be. And because of that she embraced the awesome responsibility of bearing God in her womb. In a sermon about Mary’s response to God, Barbara Brown Taylor once said:

“If you decide to say no, you simply drop your eyes and refuse to look up until you know the angel has left the room and you are alone again. Then you smooth your hair and go back to your spinning or your reading or whatever it is that is most familiar to you and pretend that nothing has happened…. Or you can set your book down and listen to a strange creature’s strange idea. You can decide to take part in a plan you did not choose, doing things you do not know how to do for reasons you do not entirely understand. You can take part in a thrilling and dangerous scheme with no script and no guarantees. You can agree to smuggle God into the world inside your own body.

- From “Mothers of God ” in Gospel Medicine

Thinking about Mary’s “let it be”, reminds me of the classic song from the Beatles by the same title. At one point in the song, they sing: “And when the brokenhearted people living in the world agree, there will be an answer, let it be.” May we alongside Mary, hear with awe and wonder that the God of all the universe has strangely decided to act through us, and with Mary may we ponder what all of this means, and may we have the courage to respond, let it be.

Advent 4, Year B, 2011

Matthias Grünewald's Isenheim Altarpiece (1515 AD)

I have an affinity for the Synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, with Mark’s Gospel being my favorite (as I mentioned a couple posts ago). So I am pleased the Gospel readings for Year B are primarily found in Mark. However the Gospel reading for third week of Advent is from the Fourth Gospel, John. And like last week, we return again to the story of John the Baptist, John 1:6-8, 19-28.

Unlike the Synoptic Gospels, the Fourth Gospel approaches the story of John the Baptist from a different angle. While Matthew, Mark, and Luke emphasize the “Baptist” as an Elijah like prophet, preaching a message of repentance, John has a different emphasis. John (He’s never actually referred to as “the Baptist in the Fourth Gospel) immediately follows a theologically rich prologue, which proclaims Jesus as the eternal Word of God. Similarly, John’s role is one of proclamation. We are told that he was sent by God as a “witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him.”

A few verses later we return to John, this time in conversation with the Jewish leaders. John turns the attention from himself to Jesus, demonstrating what had been said earlier of him, that he was not the light, only the witness to the light. In many ways, John’s role in the Gospel story, is the role of the church and disciple of Jesus today. Yet sadly, more often than not, when the world asks, “Who are you?” our response is filled with pride. Our answers are more about us than about Jesus.

In 1515 AD, Matthais Grünewald painted the Isenheim Alterpiece in the Monastery of St. Anthony near Colmar, France. Considered one of the artist’s greatest masterpieces, the center of the altarpiece is a scene from the crucifixion of Jesus. To the right of the cross Grünewald painted John the Baptist with his finger extended pointing up to Jesus. Many observers of the painting have agreed that the artist wanted to emphasize John’s role as witness to Jesus over and above himself.

In this third week of Advent, may we remember the testimony of John, who in total disregard for himself, proclaimed Jesus as the true Light sent from God. May we like John be able to find the courage to live the same way, letting go of our pride, and faithfully proclaiming Jesus as God’s crucified and resurrected One, over and above ourselves. By God’s grace may it be so.

Advent 3, Year B, 2011

The Santa Ana Winds descended upon Southern California this week with a vengeance—the strongest winds here in thirty years. They remind me of the hurricanes we lived through in Florida years ago. After a calm night the winds were back this morning. My daughters were hurriedly preparing to go outside. In the midst of the commotion I asked, “What are you going to do outside?” My oldest daughter, Madison, replied, “To see the wind!”

The Gospel reading for this week is from Mark 1:1-8. The Markan gospel skips Jesus birth narrative and begins with John the “baptizer”, who’s radical message of repentance and forgiveness is turning the world upside down. As the text says, “And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.” They’d come to see the wind!

In 1991 a Nor’easter off the coast of New England became known as the perfect storm. For that event to occur, three weather systems had to collide—a cold front from the west, a high-pressure system from the north, and a hurricane from the southeast. In his new book, Simply Jesus: A New Vision of Who He Was, What He Did, and Why He Matters (HarperOne, 2011), N.T. Wright uses this “Perfect Storm” as a metaphor to talk about the turbulent times of Jesus’ first century Advent.

According to Wright, as John was preaching in the Judean wilderness, a perfect storm was about to form. Imperial Rome, the cold-front from the west, and Jewish expectations, the high-pressure system from the north, were on a collision course with Jesus of Nazareth, the hurricane from the southeast. This third element, Writes claims, was the “… strange, unpredictable, and highly dangerous divine element. The wind of God.” (p. 38)

Thinking of Jesus’ advent in those terms may make some uncomfortable. A normal, predictable, safe Jesus is preferable. However as Wright observes:

… from the moment Jesus of Nazareth launched his public career, he seems to have determined to invoke the third part of the great storm as well. He spoke continually about the hurricane of which the psalmists had sung and the prophets had preached. He spoke about God himself becoming king. And he went about doing things that, he said, demonstrated what that meant and would mean. He took upon himself the role of a prophet, in other words, of a man sent from God to reaffirm God’s intention of overthrowing the might of pagan empire, but also to warn Israel that its present way of going about things was dangerously ill-conceived and leading to disaster. And with that, the sea is lashed into a frenzy; the wind makes the middle of it all, into the very eye of the storm, announcing that the time is fulfilled, that God’s kingdom is now at hand. He commands his hearers to give up their other dreams and to trust his instead. This at its simplest, is what Jesus was all about. (p. 56)

As I reflect on all these things today, my prayer this Advent season, is that I will have the courage to go out and see the wind, fully embracing the reality that it will blow in ways and places that I am not expecting. By God’s grace may it be so.

Advent 2, Year B, 2011

This weekend marks the beginning of a new year, i.e. the Christian Year. The season of Advent has arrived—a time of expectation and hope, as we anticipate the coming of the Christ in our world. For those familiar with the Revised Common Lectionary, we are entering the Year B cycle. Much of the year will be spent in the Gospel of Mark (my favorite Gospel). Mark is short and full of action, possibly the earliest written Gospel during a time of persecution for Christians living in Rome.

Ironically for Seventh-day Adventists, a people who place much emphasis on the second Advent of Jesus Christ, this should be one of our most celebrated times of the year. In fact the Gospel reading for Advent 1 is Mark 13:24-37, a passage often used by our evangelists to preach about the second coming. Yet not all biblical scholars agree that’s the context. I recall my New Testament Professor in seminary, Dr. Jon Paulien, observing that many of these “end time” events had taken place by the end of the first century CE.

Either way, It’s sad to me how often this passage is used to instill fear in people (granted Jesus’ apocalyptic language can be troubling). However when we consider the context of Jesus’ words in Mark’s Gospel, I find words of hope. Consider that Mark presents us with a picture of Jesus as Prince of Peace who suffers an unjust execution at the hands of religious and political leaders without ever retaliating. This same Jesus is the one who comes to people with love and forgiveness, mercy and grace.

Beth Tanner observes that Jesus “… speaks these words right before he is unjustly betrayed, tried, and crucified. It is absolutely incongruous with his ministry that his last message be one of threat and damnation. In these texts, there is no statement about the wicked, only the gathering of the elect. Jesus’ last words are ones of comfort and assurance and advice on living through tough times to come as wait the second coming.” *

Tanner goes on to point out that what we see here in Mark is similar to the language of hope for God’s coming rescue in the Psalms and other Apocalyptic language of the Old Testament. Tanner writes, “Instead of greeting Jesus’ coming with fear and dread, we are to laugh and leap and welcome it. The coming of God is coming to shape us into the people and communities we should be where all are at peace with each other.” ** By God’s grace may it be so.

Advent 1, Year B, 2011

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* Beth Tanner, New Proclamation Commentary | Advent 1,  Year B | http://www.newproclamation.com

** Ibid.

Here’s an article by Barbara Brown Taylor on the meaning of Lent. I like her take on how the forty days idea took root in Christian faith & practice. It’s from a 1998 issue of Christian Century, titled Settling for Less, based on Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness in Luke 4:1-13:

Do not bother looking for Lent in your Bible dictionary. There was no such thing in biblical times. There is some evidence that early Christians fasted 40 hours between Good Friday and Easter, but the custom of spending 40 days in prayer and self-denial did not arise until later, when the initial rush of Christian adrenaline was over and believers had gotten very ho-hum about their faith.

When the world did not end as Jesus himself had said it would, his followers stopped expecting so much from God or from themselves. They hung a wooden cross on the wall and settled back into their more or less comfortable routines, remembering their once passionate devotion to God the way they remembered the other enthusiasms of their youth.

Little by little, Christians became devoted to their comforts instead: the soft couch, the flannel sheets, the leg of lamb roasted with rosemary. These things made them feel safe and cared for — if not by God, then by themselves. They decided there was no contradiction between being comfortable and being Christian, and before long it was very hard to pick them out from the population at large. They no longer distinguished themselves by their bold love for one another. They did not get arrested for championing the poor. They blended in. They avoided extremes. They decided to be nice instead of holy, and God moaned out loud.

Hearing that, someone suggested it was time to call Christians back to their senses, and the Bible offered some clues about how to do that. Israel spent 40 years in the wilderness learning to trust the Lord. Elijah spent 40 days there before hearing the still, small voice of God on the same mountain where Moses spent 40 days listening to God give the law. There was also Luke’s story about Jesus’ own 40 days in the wilderness during which he was sorely tested by the devil. It was hard. It was awful. It was necessary, if only for the story. Those of us who believe it have proof that it is humanly possible to remain loyal to God.

So the early church announced a season of Lent, from the old English word lenten, meaning “spring” — not only a reference to the season before Easter, but also an invitation to a springtime for the soul. Forty days to cleanse the system and open the eyes to what remains when all comfort is gone. Forty days to remember what it is like to live by the grace of God alone and not by what we can supply for ourselves.

I think of it as an Outward Bound for the soul. No one has to sign up for it, but if you do then you give up the illusion that you are in control of your life. You place yourself in the hands of strangers who ask you to do foolhardy things, like walk backwards over a precipice with nothing but a rope around your waist or climb a sheer rock face with your fingers and toes. But none of these is the real test, because while you are doing them you have plenty of people around and lunch in a cooler.

The real test comes when you go solo. The strangers put you out all by yourself in the middle of nowhere and wish you luck for the next 24 hours. That is when you find out who you are. That is when you find out what you really miss and what you are really afraid of. Some people dream about their favorite food. Some long for a safe room with a door to lock and others just wish they had a pillow, but they all find out what their pacifiers are — the habits, substances or surroundings they use to comfort themselves, to block out pain and fear.

Without those things they are suddenly exposed, like someone addicted to painkillers whose prescription has just run out. It is hard. It is awful. It is necessary, to encounter the world without anesthesia, to find out what life is like with no comfort but God. I am convinced that 99 percent of us are addicted to something, whether it is eating, shopping, blaming or taking care of other people. The simplest definition of an addiction is anything we use to fill the empty place inside of us that belongs to God alone.

That hollowness we sometimes feel is not a sign of something gone wrong. It is the holy of holies inside of us, the uncluttered throne room of the Lord our God. Nothing on earth can fill it, but that does not stop us from trying. Whenever we start feeling too empty inside, we stick our pacifiers into our mouths and suck for all we are worth. They do not nourish us, but at least they plug the hole.

To enter the wilderness is to leave them behind, and nothing is too small to give up. Even a chocolate bar will do. For 40 days, simply pay attention to how often your mind travels in that direction. Ask yourself why it happens when it happens. What is going on when you start craving a Mars bar? Are you hungry? Well, what is wrong with being hungry? Are you lonely? What is so bad about being alone? Try sitting with the feeling instead of fixing it and see what you find out.

Chances are you will hear a voice in your head that keeps warning you what will happen if you give up your pacifier. “You’ll starve. You’ll go nuts. You won’t be you anymore.” If that does not work, the voice will move to level two: “That’s not a pacifier. That’s a power tool. Can’t you tell the difference?” If you do not fall for that one, there is always level three: “If God really loves you, you can do whatever you want. Why waste your time on this dumb exercise?”

If you do not know whom that voice belongs to, read Luke’s story again. Then tell the devil to get lost and decide what you will do for Lent. Better yet, decide whose you will be. Worship the Lord your God and serve no one else. Expect great things, from God and from yourself. Believe that everything is possible. Why should any of us settle for less?