Scripture Readings: Isaiah 63:7–9 | Psalm 148 | Hebrews 2:10–18 | ​Matthew 2:13–23

“Since, therefore, the children share flesh and blood, he himself likewise shared the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death.” (Hebrews 2:14-15).
 
Another Christmas Day has come and gone.
New Years and Epiphany are right around the corner, and soon enough we will be packing up all our lights and putting away our special decorations… and settling into the regular rhythm of winter in New Brunswick: shovel snow, and repeat.
 
On this, the first Sunday after Christmas, it’s hard not to feel a little bit of a letdown. I mean, after all the anticipation… and all of the carols and celebrations, we turn on the news again and see a world still off-centre… still filled with violence, and unrest, and oppression, and wickedness at work. And even after a brief respite of hope, and peace, and joy, it can be really tempting at times to let fear and despair creep back into our hearts… to start to think that our frightening circumstances must mean that we’re somehow out of favour with God… that all the of suffering going on  means either that God cannot do much to stop evil, or that He just doesn’t care enough to do so. 

And if we conceive of Christmas as merely one special day full of hope, and peace, and joy, and love… then it’s kind of easy for us to imagine that it doesn’t have much to say about what happens afterwards… about the days and seasons of deep apprehension, and suffering, that often follow it.
 
But Christmas is not just one special day. It merely marks the start of a whole new movement in God’s unfolding story… a story that holds together the hope and peace and joy of God’s Kingdom even in the face of all of the uncertainty and suffering that we still face in the world.
 
And so, even though we will soon pack up our Christmas lights, and put away our trees and greenery… the great gift of Christmas… the Good News of Jesus Emannuel… God our Saviour here-with-us… remains ours always… and this Good News remains the sure anchor for our faith in our times of suffering. Right from the very beginning, the story of Christmas has been an invitation offered to God’s people to see His loving and saving hand at work setting us free and leading us together through all the darkness and into the light of life. 

In our reading today from the Gospel of Matthew Chapter 2, we are reminded of just how quickly the story of the first Christmas turns from hope, and peace, and joy to darkness and death… as the Holy Family, Joseph and Mary, and the infant Jesus the Messiah are forced to flee their home, and live as refugees in Egypt to escape a tyrant’s jealous rage… and Herod’s subsequent massacre of innocent children. 
 
This part of the story never makes it into our Christmas pageants, and for good reason. It is another horrible but by no means isolated example of how fear and the thirst for control so often leads us humans to do truly hellish things to one another. In recent days of course, we can recall similar stories out of Gaza and Ukraine… alongside atrocities of the past century like the Armenian genocide… the Holocaust… the genocides in the Balkans and Rwanda… and tragically many more besides. And the tyrants of our day continue to toy with the threat of death… wielding this fear and increased suffering over all sorts of innocent people in order to get what they want… to keep their own people in line, and to crush anyone else who stands in their way.

But the whole story of Christmas… the Gospel story about the child born in Bethlehem… reminds us that the tyrants of the world will not have their way in the end… and that against all their bloodshed and scheming, the Living God remains at work remedying the poison of fear with His love… setting us free from its power, to share God’s holy love together. 
 
In Matthew Chapter 2 we heard how Joseph and Mary get swept up into God’s great gift of life: Mary gives birth to a Son, Jesus… the long awaited Messiah, but are suddenly warned to flee… to live as refugees in Egypt, because King Herod of Judea had become just like Pharaoh of the Exodus story… eventually slaying innocent Israelite children… his own subjects… to keep hold of his own power.  
 
But just like Moses escaped from the wrath of Pharoah to one day return to set His people free, Jesus is whisked away out of King Herod’s reach… in order to return one day as the Saviour of His people… and the world! To rescue both Jews and Gentiles alike… breaking the power of the fear of death… and overthrowing our real enemy, the devil.  

But this victory was achieved not by somehow undoing death… by magically waving his hand and keeping its horrors from happening… but by enduring it… by experiencing death for us and with us. Jesus joined us in all the frailty of life in-the-flesh, and faced the full horrors of the grave… sharing completely in our sufferings, in order to save us from death’s grip… dying at the cross, but rising again as One set free from death’s power forever… so that all those who follow Him can also face and come through death too… and live as those sanctified… as a holy people set apart to share in the new life of God’s holy love here and now… transformed by Christ into God’s holy family… as brothers and sisters with One Father over all.
 
This is what the author of Hebrews is getting at, making the case that far from being a sign of God’s displeasure, or failure, it was precisely through His sufferings that Jesus became our Saviour, and united us in God’s family. Hebrews 2:10-11, “It was fitting that God, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For the one who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one Father. For this reason Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters.”

Jesus our Messiah may have been spared Herod’s wrath as a child, but at the proper time He willingly chose the path of suffering for us… taking on Himself not only the worst the world’s tyrants could throw at Him, but also the consequences of all of our sins… dying at the cross to secure our forgiveness, and rising again to break death’s hold over us… offering us through the gift of His own life adoption into God’s holy family… united to God, and to one another through the love of our Saviour, who united Himself to us… first of all at the manger, and then finally at the cross.
 
So today, when we are tempted to spend our days driven by the fear of death, or despairing over the power of tyrants… the story of Jesus that flows out from Christmas offers us the remedy of faith. We are invited to believe the Good News of the resurrection of Jesus the Messiah, and that through Him… through His sufferings and saving love, we can now be called God’s own children… His holy family set free from fear because of what Jesus our brother has done for us, and for our world. A holy family, beloved, and open to all who entrust themselves to the loving arms of God’s Son.

And even long after all our decorations are put away, and the lights are dimmed… and when our days seem to grow dark, may the joy, and hope, and peace, and love of the Christmas and the Christian story… the Good News of Jesus Emmanuel give us cause to rejoice, and resist the power of fear, entrusting ourselves and our world to the saving power of God’s resurrecting love… and doing all we can to share the light of this love with those around us.  Amen. 

And our Songs for this week can be found here:

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 52:7–10 | Psalm 98 | Hebrews 1:1–12 | Matthew 1:1-25

“Break forth together into singing,
you ruins of Jerusalem;
for the Lord has comforted his people,
he has redeemed Jerusalem.
 
The Lord has bared his holy arm
before the eyes of all the nations;
and all the ends of the earth shall see
the salvation of our God.” (Isaiah 52:9-10).
 
One thing my family and I love to do this time of year is to watch Christmas movies… setting aside time together to experience these familiar stories we revisit year after year that stir up all sorts of warm and sentimental memories… while every so often adding a new one or two to the mix… and so, the tradition grows.
 
This morning, Christmas Day, amid all the other activities and busyness of the season, we gather together and set aside time to recount the familiar story of the birth of Jesus Christ… to worship the One born in Bethlehem, to receive the gift of His life gathered around His table, and to remember that, far from being a mere tradition, or a warm, sentimental fable… the Story of Christmas marks the turning point within the whole story of God… the whole human story… and our stories as well.
 
In our reading from Matthew Chapter 1, the Gospel author takes pains to remind us of the origins of the One we celebrate today: that Jesus is the Son of Abraham… a child of Israel, of the tribe of Judah… sharing completely in this people’s story… the story of God’s grace and saving love embracing them, freeing them, and seeing them through countless crises and disasters over the centuries.
 
This list of names calls to mind many characters and episodes in Israel’s story, and locates Jesus squarely in the midst of it… bound to the story of His people’s faithfulness and failures… their moments of glory, and also their ruin and rebellion. This list of names intentionally calls to mind the stories of patriarchs and prostitutes… kings and consorts… reformers and foreigners… and dozens of others whose stories have simply been lost to the sands of time. The story of Israel in the Holy Scriptures is by no means a picture-perfect, Hallmark movie story… but it is one very much at home in our broken and struggling world.   
 
But in the midst of this story, in the midst of Israel’s story… and our whole human story… the Living God chooses to do something new and marvellous: by the power of the Holy Spirit, God brings His Eternal Son into the world through the body of Mary. Not only is He the true Son of Abraham, Jesus is also the true Son of Mary, graciously born into our world to share in its broken story completely… to bear along with us the pains and sorrows of life, and bring hope and joy to those of us still shrouded in darkness… embodying true faithfulness, and God’s saving love up close and in everyday life. 
 
Through someone as ordinary and unknown as Mary, the Son of God took on flesh for us and with us… and so God’s gift of salvation to our world, started off in ages past with Abraham, and promised through God’s prophets takes a massive step forward. As we heard in our reading from Isaiah 52:10, “The Lord has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.”
 
But we know that this gift of saving love… the gift of God’s Son sent to save Israel and all the world… comes at an incredible cost: in faithfulness and self-giving love, the Son of God chooses to take up His cross, and with it all of our failures and shame and brokenness… and He bears it all for us, offering up His life in our place to cleanse us of our sins and reconcile us to God and to one another… dying to set us free, and rising again to conquer death and reign with His Father forever… and to share the eternal life of hope, and peace, and joy, and the love of His Kingdom with us all even now… present with us always through the gift of the same Holy Spirit that was at work in Mary. 
 
The Story of Christmas, though probably well known to us all gathered here today, is far more than a familiar and sentimental story about shepherds, and mangers and angel choirs. It is the great announcement of the Good News of Jesus Emmanuel: the message that the Son of God… God our Saviour truly is here with us… challenging the ways we see our own stories, and the story of our world… no longer focussed on desperately trying simply to hold tragedy and disaster at bay, but rejoicing because we now know that despite all of the darkness at work around us, our Saviour King Jesus has come, He is with us even now… and He will come again in glory to make everything new.
 
So may we all celebrate the story of Christmas today and always by proclaiming in all we say and do the Good News of Jesus Emmanuel: that God our Saviour is with us, sharing the gifts of His hope, and peace, and joy, and love with all those around us. Amen.

In this sacred night we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ,
who is Himself God-With-Us, wherever we may be.

May this service of Lessons & Carols
stir up within us the 
Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love
that God offers to us all
and calls us to share with all
​through Jesus His Son.

Our service of Lessons & Carols and Christmas Eve Bulletin can be found here:

​Here are some links to the Carols listed in our service, found on Youtube:  

Here is our Christmas Day sermon, 
proclaiming ​the Good News of Christmas
that in Christ Jesus,
​God is with us always.

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 7:10–16 | Psalm 80 | Romans 1:1–7 | Matthew 1:18–25

“Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.” (Matthew 1:23).
 
Our journey through the season of Advent is almost at an end. In a few short days, along with our Christian sisters and brothers around the world, we will celebrate the birth of our Saviour King: Jesus Christ, the Son of Mary, and the Son of God.
 
But as we face the final days of Advent together, awaiting not only His birth in Bethlehem, but also His coming again in glory to set all things right once and for all… we are invited to reflect on one of the most important elements of our faith and the Christian way of life: and that is love.
 
Love… offering oneself to another… and not just when it’s easy… when things are going great and we’re all getting along… but when it’s really hard… when tensions and divisions keep pulling us apart… when doubts arise, and dangers threaten, and when we’re really afraid. That’s when love’s needed the most.
 
And in our readings from Holy Scripture this morning we are reminded that even when things seem to be at their darkest, and our tensions and divisions seem to be the fiercest… God shows us that we are not left alone… and that, no matter what, we can trust that God’s saving love is still with us.
 
In our first reading from the book of Isaiah, we hear about a heated exchange between the prophet Isaiah and King Ahaz, the leader of the Southern Kingdom of Judah.
 
At the time King Ahaz was facing a serious crisis: two of his neighbouring nations, the Kingdom of Aram, in what is now Syria, and the Northern Kingdom of Israel… their estranged countrymen… had raised up their armies and allied against him, and were now threatening to conquer Jerusalem. And we can hear their response in Isaiah 7:2, “When the house of David heard that Aram had allied itself with Ephraim [another name for the Northern Tribes of Israel], the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind.” And can you blame him? Judah was facing an invasion from two powerful kings right on his doorstep.

But through the prophet Isaiah, the Living God promises that Judah will not be conquered by the armies of Aram and Israel. And yet, along with these words of encouragement, God also calls Ahaz to do something… to trust Him. Isaiah 7:9, “If you do not stand firm in faith,” God says to the king, “you shall not stand at all.”
 
Of course, the LORD knew that would not be easy. God understood exactly how Ahaz and all his people were feeling. And so, to help strengthen their faith, God offers to give King Ahaz a sign… anything that would help him and his people to stand firm in faith. But instead of receiving this gift of encouragement with gratitude, Ahaz refuses… in what seems to be an attempt to appear pious… but has all the hallmarks of hypocrisy.
 
Exasperated by Ahaz, God decides to give him a sign anyway. In the middle of this war, and their city’s siege, God says that a maiden will give birth to a son, and the child will be called “God-is-with-us”… Immanuel. And this child’s life would become a sign of God’s salvation! Born in the hell of war, God promises that “He shall eat curds and honey [wholesome, rich foods, not war rations] by the time he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, [while still young] the land before whose two kings you are in dread will be deserted.” (Isaiah 7:15-16). In other words, Judah was assured this terrible trial would not last forever: in a few short years, their enemies would be long gone. But in the meantime, the only path forward would be to place their faith in God their Saviour.
 
This episode reveals both the great tension that often existed between God and His stubborn, slow-to-faith people… and also God’s utter determination to remain faithful to them… to encourage, and coax, and urge, and even at times angrily offer them the help and hope they can only receive from turning to Him in faith… loving us, even when it isn’t easy to, and seeking our salvation in spite of our stubbornness. 
 
Turning now to our Gospel passage this morning, we find a very different episode unfolding in the life of God’s people… but one which has its own serious crisis and tensions at work. Instead of an impending war between neighbouring nations, we have a family about to fall apart: a man who feels betrayed by his fiancé, and an innocent woman facing a future of public shame and abandonment.
 
As St. Matthew tells us the story, while she was engaged to a man named Joseph, a young woman named Mary came to be with child through the power of the Holy Spirit alone. Discovering this, Joseph suspects his fiancé of being unfaithful to him. Understandably, he feels deeply betrayed… but rather than give in to the strong impulse to act against her out of spite and seek to ruin her, we hear that Joseph still wants to do right by her… to be as caring and kind as he could, under the circumstances, and break off their relationship quietly… that is, trying to avoid publicly shaming her.
 
How often do we see people like Joseph these days? People who, instead of lashing out at others when they are wounded, can act in love even towards those who they believe have hurt them? People who seek to be as caring and kind as they can be, even when they could easily pursue revenge. I pray we can all become a lot more like Joseph… even though he was plain wrong about Mary.

Thankfully, before he broke off their engagement, Joseph was visited by an angel in a dream, telling him not to be afraid to marry Mary. That she had not betrayed him… and God was at work doing something new in and through her. And this miracle child would be a sign of God’s love, not just for their little family, but for the whole world!
 
And this child will be called “God Saves”… Yehoshua… shortened to Yeshua, or Joshua… or as we know Him, Jesus… “for he will save his people” not from invading armies… but “from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21)… from everything at work in them that keeps them cut off from one another, and from the LORD. He will save them through the gift of forgiveness… offering His life in love at the cross to make atonement for us… reconciling the world to God through the gift of Himself.
 
And St. Matthew sees Jesus in the same light as the child in Isaiah Chapter 7: a sign of God’s saving love for His people… graciously offered when they deserved it the least, but needed it the most. But St. Matthew recognizes that Jesus is more than a sign of God’s saving love. He’s God’s love personified… God’s love embodied and walking around in our midst. In other words, Jesus is Emmanuel… Jesus is God-Himself-right-here-with-us! And in Jesus, we see God’s saving love in action… especially at the cross.
 
In Romans 5:8-11, my favourite passage of Scripture, St. Paul unpacks what Christian love… what the love of God really looks like in action: “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.
 
Much more surely then, now that we have been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life. But more than that, we even boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
 
Jesus is God-with-us… giving Himself at the cross to save us while we were still enemies… in order to reconcile us to God… and to each other. Taking those who were far apart, and bringing them together once and for all.
 
And this is where God’s love gets really hard for us. It’s one thing to believe in and receive God’s saving love at work in our own lives… welcoming Him in to heal our hurts, forgive our sins, and graciously embrace us when we don’t deserve it. As hard as that all can be… and believe me, believing in God’s saving love for ourselves can be really hard at times… it’s another thing entirely to share God’s love… this Christ-shaped, cross-shaped love with those around us… especially when they are the ones who have hurt us… and sinned against us… and when they seem to be our enemies.  
 
But the miracle of God’s saving love that we have come to know in Jesus Christ is given to us for this very purpose! To reconcile us to God, and to reconcile us to each other… overcoming our deepest divisions so we can share in the blessed life of God together. This is a central part of the Gospel, the Good News of Jesus… the one place where we can stand firm in faith. 
 
Turning at last to our reading from the first Chapter of St. Paul’s letter to the Romans, where we are given a glimpse of the incredible scope of God’s reconciling love in action… in the overcoming of the deep divisions between Israel and the Gentiles.
 
Throughout the letter to the Romans, St. Paul is addressing a deeply divided Church… where tensions between Jewish Christians and Gentile… non-Jewish Christians were particularly problematic. This powerful letter works through the implications of the Gospel… the Good News of Jesus Christ, who He is, and what He has done… within the context of a community struggling to find a way forward past all their differences… differences in language, in diet, in cultural practices… in their own understanding of their place within God’s story… in contrast to ‘those people’ over there.
 
And throughout Romans, St. Paul makes the case, again and again, that in Jesus our Saviour King, God is with us overcoming the apparent chasms between Israel and the rest of the nations… embracing everyone through Jesus, and joining them together into God’s family of faith.

From the start… in the opening lines of St. Paul’s letter, which we heard in our second reading today, we see the Apostle tying both Israel and Gentiles together in Jesus.
 
St. Paul begins by proclaiming that he is a servant of Jesus Christ, set apart to share the Gospel, the Good News of Jesus, the Saviour of God’s people… the Messiah of Israel, who is the fulfillment of the LORD’s promises through the prophets, and the whole story of the Old Testament Scriptures… descended from King David, and proven to be God’s own son by His resurrection.
 
And then Paul insists that he has been called by God’s grace to share this Good News with Gentiles too… in order that they too might come to know what he calls the obedience of faith… walking in the holy ways of the Living God, and placing their faith in His saving love.
 
And then, addressing this deeply divided community, he says this simple, but world-changing phrase: “To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
 
To all God’s beloved… both Jews and Gentiles… distinct in part, but now united and embraced together by God’s saving love in Jesus Christ.
 
In Jesus, Paul sees that God is with us all… to save us all from our sins, so that in forgiveness we can all find the way forward to live in God’s love side by side… standing firm together in faith, trusting that as hard as it might be at times, His saving love really will see us through.
 
And so, when we are faced with our own times of great trouble, and find it really hard to love those around us… may we look to Jesus Christ and receive from Him the gift of God’s saving love in all its fulness… so that we can truly share it with God’s messed up but still beloved world, and help them come to know that in Jesus Emmanuel, God the Saviour is with them too. Amen.

​And our Songs for this week can be found here:

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 35:1–10 | Luke 1:46b–55 | James 5:7–10 | ​Matthew 11:2–11

“When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’  Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see’” (Matthew 11:2-3).
 
Well, here we are, already celebrating the third Sunday of Advent, and reflecting on the theme of Joy as we anticipate the coming of Jesus Christ our Saviour King.
 
But right from the start, we’ve been thrown a bit of a curveball… we’ve been given a challenging story to wrestle with today as our Gospel reading confronts us with the suffering and disillusionment of one of Christ’s earliest advocates and faithful witnesses: John the Baptist. 
 
After playing a key role in the exciting beginning of Jesus’ earthly ministry… baptizing the One he had wholeheartedly believed to be God’s Messiah in the Jordan River… John’s story had taken a much darker turn that was seriously starting to shake up his faith. As you may remember, John had been thrown into prison for speaking truth to power: publicly calling out King Herod’s unfaithfulness, and hypocrisy… and like so many of God’s prophets before him, John’s honesty earned him some enemies in high places.
 
But as John expected Jesus of Nazareth to be the Chosen One sent to set God’s people free… sent to overthrow tyrant kings like Herod… to judge all unjust rulers, and vindicate those who stood up for the truth, and walked with holiness and integrity… there should be no problem! If the Messiah had finally come, now was the time for God’s faithful ones to be rewarded… right?
 
And yet, there John was, locked away in prison… seemingly abandoned for fighting the good fight, while Jesus went about eating and drinking with outcasts and sinners. And so, John starts to wonder: did he miss something? Did he misread the signs, and misunderstand the Spirit? Jesus was not at all following the plan that John had in mind. Was Jesus really the Chosen Saviour King after all?
 
Matthew 11:2-3, “When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’”  
 
Have we ever felt like John did that day, when our own expectations and hopes are dashed?
 
Lots of people sign up for Christianity thinking that it will make our lives easier: suddenly offering us more clarity… more hope… and peace… and love… and joy. And yet, we still end up facing great difficulties… sicknesses, injuries, estrangements, isolation, and failures. And as a result, many of us struggle with our faith, wondering if we had missed something… and are tempted to see our painful experiences as signs that Jesus is not really there for us. That we are either on our own, or that we should look elsewhere for the help and the hope that we need.
 
And yet, as strange as it may seem, our Gospel passage today is an invitation to embrace joy, especially for those like John who find themselves in the midst of some really dark circumstances. Our passage today does not deny the reality of the difficulties that we all will face. Instead, it calls us to trust that our times of suffering are not a sign of our abandonment, and that they can be endured faithfully and even joyfully when seen in the light of God’s good Kingdom at work.
​
In short: while the way of Jesus will not always be easy, even in the darkest times it still offers us real hope, and peace, and joy… as we start to see and share in what God has been up to all along.
 
Turning back to our Gospel passage, let’s take a moment to focus on one of John’s major concerns: that unjust and ungodly rulers seem to be calling the shots, while the innocent suffer at their hands. Now I know many of us here at St. Luke’s share John’s concerns… and that tyrants still seem to be running amok in our world. 
 
And just like John, we Christians throughout the centuries have looked to Jesus as the final Judge who will one day bring an end to all injustice and evil… coming again to sort out the living and the dead, as the Creeds call us each week to confess. And all throughout the Holy Scriptures, we see that justice and righteousness are clearly on the God’s agenda.  
 
But He also has far more in store that we tend to lose sight of when we insist that He adhere to our agendas… and closely follow the plans and timelines that we are expecting.

Matthew tells us that John was discouraged and started to doubt when he heard what Jesus was up to. But what was Jesus up to? Not yet toppling tyrants… He was instead giving the world a long-awaited taste of and a glimpse into what the joyful victory of the Kingdom of God is like!
 
Matthew 11:4-6, “Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”
 
In His response, Jesus is pointing John to the fulfillment of God’s promises of salvation spoken of through the prophets, like we heard this morning in our first reading from Isaiah 35:5-6,
“Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
and the ears of the deaf unstopped;
then the lame shall leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.”
 
Far from failing to fulfill His calling as God’s Chosen Messiah, Jesus was doing far more than John had expected… enacting God’s salvation even before the tyrants of the world were overthrown. And Jesus chose to enact God’s salvation in the lives of ordinary, hungry, and hurting people… offering signs of the New Life of God’s New Creation… the beautiful future that Christ came to bring about from amid the ashes of our worlds selfishness and sin. 
 
And Jesus’ healing ministry among the poor, and the outcasts was not just a gift to those who experienced His healing touch first-hand… excluding all others, as if He didn’t care about all those who did not encounter Him face to face… or those, like John, who continued to suffer under the power of unjust tyrants. No, through His acts of mercy, and healing ministry, Jesus was hard at work pointing us all towards the coming victory of God’s Kingdom: the joyful release from all captivity… the ending of all divisions… the healing of all wounds… the forgiveness of all sins… and life in all its fullness. 
 
Christ’s whole time on earth… all that He says and does serves as a sign, a window into what God has in store… and it is so good! And no illness, no tragedy, or tyrant will be able to keep God’s good Kingdom from coming!
 
And it was for this reason… for this joyful future set before Him, that Jesus Himself endured the incredible suffering and pain of the cross… abandoned and betrayed by His friends… falsely accused and condemned by His own people... Jesus freely chose to take the failures and shame of the whole world on His shoulders… the Judge of all accepting the full price of justice on Himself in order to release us all from the power and hold of sin over us… setting us free by His cross so that we might share in the joys of His New Life. 
 
Jesus pursued joy… not just for Himself, but for us all… by remaining faithful to His Father even unto death… and was raised again on Easter morning as the firstborn and first-fruits of God’s New Creation. 
 
And just as Jesus was raised to this eternal joy, so will those of us who remain in Him. His glory becomes our glory… His victory becomes ours… and through faith, we begin to share in the joys of His New Life, even now. 

Jesus shows us that joy does not come from avoiding the darkness and pain of life in our broken world. It comes from believing that all darkness and pain will one day be healed and overcome for good by God. Joy is holding fast to this Good News, and letting it sink in, and take root within us… like a seed buried in the ground, but bursting through the soil to bring new life into being.
 
And this is where our second reading today, from the letter of James, comes into play, calling us to endure even our days of darkness patiently, trusting that in God’s time our joys will be complete.
 
James 5:7-10, “Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains. You also must be patient. Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near. Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged. See, the Judge is standing at the doors! As an example of suffering and patience, beloved, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.”
 
As we await our Lord’s return, to set all things right, and bring us to His eternal joy, James calls us to patience… to remain faithful to Jesus by holding fast to the hope we have been given… even as we face days of discouragement, and our own great difficulties.
 
Our struggles and concerns may not be like John the Baptist’s… we might not get locked up, or lose our lives for standing up to unjust tyrants. But many of us have had to face other dark challenges, like serious health concerns… or tensions in our relationships… or seasons of not having the resources we need… or times of isolation… or destructive temptations… or a whole host of others trials. 
 
And these struggles are all important to God. He’s not ignoring us when we face them, or asking us to smile and pretend everything’s alright when it’s clearly not. But God does invite us to hold our concerns up to the light of what Jesus has done for us and our world… and to trust that in Christ, true freedom and real release from these struggles is on its way… calling us to hold onto Him in joyful anticipation that all of these struggles will one day be resolved and sorted out for good by our Saviour King. 

And while we wait, we are called to become living signs of joy for our world. I don’t mean walking around as if nothing upsets us, or that nothing is wrong… but living as those who are always in touch with the Good News of Jesus, even when everything around us seems to be shrouded in gloom… speaking and acting as those who know that the good Kingdom of God is on its way, and that despite all the troubles we and our world faces today, Jesus our Saviour King really is coming to the rescue, and nothing in all of Creation can stop His complete victory.
 
And so, with the help of the Holy Spirit, may we all become living signs of joy for one another, and for all those around us… offering a taste of God’s New Life at work in us even now… even when things seem their darkest... and patiently anticipating the joyful arrival of His good Kingdom by being Christ’s faithful witnesses in the world, His active hands and feet working to share His Good News with everyone, any way we can. Amen.

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 11:1–10 | Psalm 72 | Romans 15:4–13 | ​Matthew 3:1–12

“In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’” (Matthew 3:1-2).
 
A lot of people are talking about peace these days… probably because it’s one of those things that so many of us are longing for, while so few know how to practice it.  
 
In the headlines, we hear all about the seemingly endless negotiations and politicking at work between nations striving for peace… but where the ‘peace process’ often looks a lot like a bunch of bullies pressuring the vulnerable until they give in to unjust demands… and powerful leaders boasting and posturing to make themselves seem great while others pay the price…  suffering and struggling to put back the pieces of their broken lives.
 
But it’s not just world-leaders who have a hard time practicing peace. It’s a problem for lots of us… in our own communities, and relationships, and even within our own hearts and minds. So many of us are searching for a path to peace… but it still seems to elude us.

And the problem just might be that we keep on searching for peace on our own terms. Imagining that we humans are the best judges of what needs to be done to put things right… either in the wider world or inside of us.
 
I mean, our commercial economy runs on this assumption, and tries to sell us this message, insisting that ‘If I only buy this new produce… or take up this special offer… or share in this once in a lifetime experience… then I’d finally be at peace.’ And yet, these products and programs which can seem so promising… still leave us longing for more. And how much of our conversations about politics… about the shape of our common life, boils down to something like ‘If they would only do this… or concede to that… then we would all be at peace.’ And yet, most of these paths that seem so obvious to us don’t seem to pan out in practice.
 
But thankfully, the second Sunday of Advent which we celebrate today calls us to look for peace elsewhere… to turn around and instead of pursuing peace on our own terms, to find it by coming face to face with the Prince of Peace Himself. 

Someone whose whole life’s work was to prepare the way for and point us towards this Prince of Peace is the man our Gospel passage this morning introduces us to: John the Baptist… a prophetic messenger sent from the Living God to call His people to repent… to turn around… seeking not only forgiveness but also a new way forward… starting over again as God’s people devoted to doing His good will. 
 
And despite being someone who was not at all afraid to rock the boat and disturb the peace of his neighbours, John’s message seems to have been pretty well received! And that may have been because John’s challenge actually rang true. Many of John’s fellow Jews were well aware that things were not exactly going well. Their people were living under the thumb of a powerful and violent Empire… whose leaders proclaimed themselves to be the great bringers of peace… but who did so primarily by silencing all opposition with the edge of a sword, or publicly displaying their ultimate power by hanging trouble makers on a cross. In other words, violence and the threat of death were the Roman tools for clearing the way for the paths of peace. Not unlike some places today.

But in addition to the dangers posed by the Romans, there were also concerns that the leaders of John’s own people were not really trustworthy either. After all, King Herod’s whole dynasty were little more than puppets of the Caesars in Rome. And the High Priests and their backers, the Sadducees, were largely preoccupied with maintaining their own positions and power as those in charge of the Temple, and were seen by many as completely compromised and corrupt.
 
And then there were more grass roots, but deeply influential movements like the Pharisees, who offered their own solutions… confidently offering their own specific interpretations of the Laws of Moses, the Commandments, spending their time disputing and despising those who didn’t go along with them, or who somehow didn’t measure up. 
 
And so, recognizing how deeply divided and broken their communities and their lives had become, crowds of God’s people from all around Judea were open to a better way forward… and they came to be baptized by John… to begin again… placing their hope in the mercy and promises of the Living God spoken of by the prophets… by responding to John’s message about turning around… repenting of their old ways, and sins… and pursuing faithfulness instead. 
 
And as we heard today, John had some harsh words for those who were not sincere in pursuing this new start, singling out large groups of both the Sadducees and the Pharisees… both the Temple elites and the popular pietists… who came to him seeking baptism… accusing them of hypocrisy, and calling them both a “brood of vipers”… a biting allusion to Genesis Chapter 3:15, where God says to the snake in the garden after the Fall:
“I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”
 
This conflict between the descendants of the snake and the descendants of the Woman… that is, those who were devoted to the ways of darkness and sin, and those who were truly faithful to God… would go on until one offspring of Eve, the Messiah… the Chosen One, would crush the snake’s head for good… setting all things right at last… bringing about the ending of God’s enemies once and for all, and establish His peace forever. 
 
And as we heard, John himself was full of anticipation about this coming Messiah, eagerly awaiting and preparing the way for the One who would come to baptize people with the Holy Spirit, and with fire… finally burning away all that’s wrong with the world, and rescuing all those who remained true. “Even now”, John says in Matthew 3:10, “the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” 
 
And John was right… the Messiah was coming to completely sort out our world, and to burn away all of the evil at work in it… but not in the ways that John himself seems to have imagined. And so even God’s faithful messenger, dedicated to calling God’s people to repent and return to Him, would himself have to be turned around… to let go of his own ideas about what God was up to, and what the path to God’s peace actually looks like in practice. 
 
And this is a good reminder for you and I: just because we may have been faithfully trying to follow God and walk in His holy ways for some time now… it doesn’t mean that we are the ones who have all the answers… or that we already understand the whole story of what the Living God is up to. 
 
The Sadducees, the Pharisees, John the Baptist, and even Jesus’ own disciples were in need of a whole a lot of turning around… and we will too, I’m sure. 
 
And often, it can seem like our ways of seeking peace… for our world, our country, our communities, our families, and even ourselves… run completely counter to what we know of God’s ways. And in those times, we must make a choice: Will we keep going our own way, or turn around and take God’s way instead?
 
This is not just a choice we make at the start of our journey as Christians… before our baptism, or confirmation… or whenever we first decide to place our faith in Jesus. It is a choice we Christians must make every day… and maybe many times a day. The choice to pursue God’s path of peace every step of the way, all the way to the end. 
 
And Advent points us forward to the arrival of the One who is the true Prince of Peace: Jesus, God’s Son… the One who reveals God’s good ways to us, and who will return to set our world right once and for all… judging the nations with truth and righteousness… sorting through every lie and act of evil… and exposing all of the corruption that rots and erodes the life of His beloved creation. 
 
Jesus is the One spoken of in our first reading from the book of the Prophet Isaiah 11:2-5,
“A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
 
His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.
He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
or decide by what his ears hear;
but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist,
and faithfulness the belt around his loins.”
 
Jesus came to baptize us with the Spirit of God and with fire… but not quite as John and others had envisioned. Not as an instrument of terror and destruction… as One bent on wreaking revenge against sinners, but rather, as One determined and devoted to refining us… purifying us… burning away all that keeps us from sharing in His holy life and the path of peace… and while we were still sinners reconciling us to God and one another… making peace for us… by shedding His own blood. 
 
Jesus turned the world’s program for seeking peace on its head… not demanding reparations or concessions from those who have been violently overthrown… but paying the price Himself for all of our world’s spiritual and moral bankruptcies. In self-giving love, Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God gave up His life at the cross… suffering and dying for us, and in our place, all to bring us God’s peace:
 
Exposing our failures… but by forgiving them. 
Challenging all our lies… by showing us the truth. 
Bringing our divisions to an end, not through violence, but by embracing us all… conquering God’s real enemies… the devil, the powers of sin, and the seemingly invincible threat of violence and death itself by innocently enduring their full force, dying and rising again for us… breaking the chains of fear and shame forever, and setting us free to move forward together. 
 
At the cross, Jesus reveals the heartbeat and the power of God’s peace as His holy love in practice. And He shows us that the only true path of peace is the commitment to letting His holy love play out in all our relationships. This path doesn’t deny that there are still those who seek to use violence and power and the fear of death to get their own way… but the cross and resurrection of Jesus reveals that these ways don’t stand a chance against the victory of God! And one day, the Risen Lord Himself will sit down and sort out all that’s been done, calling everyone to account for the course of their lives, and answering to Him for what’s been done.
 
But as we await that day, we must actively resist the impulse to look on others as enemies to dismiss or destroy… remembering that the path of peace that Jesus Himself leads us on is the path of reconciliation… bringing those who were formerly foes together into God’s one family.
 
Remember Isaiah’s vision of God’s ultimate peace project, in Chapter 11:6-10, how those who were once completely at odds with one another will one day be completely at peace:
 
“The wolf shall live with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.”
 
And this is much more than noble poetry… this is the story of the Church… the community of those who have received the Spirit of Christ, and have been baptized into His new life.
 
In our second reading today from Romans Chapter 15, we heard the Apostle Paul speaking to a deeply divided Church, made up of both Jewish and Gentile Christians, reminding them of the unity and peace they have with God and one another through their faith in the Messiah, Jesus… overcoming almost impossible social and historical obstacles to create this brand new community dedicated to practicing Christ’s peace together, here on earth. 
 
And in Romans 15:5-7, he says to them, and to you and I today:
 
“May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”
 
With this high calling in mind: What are the ways that Jesus our Messiah is calling us to practice His peace today? What divisions are we to seek to overcome? What prejudices or preoccupations are we to set aside, and even what pains are we called to endure in order to share His holy love with those around us? Those whom God commands us to love, and whom Jesus Christ gave His own life to save?
 
This second Sunday of Advent calls us to ask these kinds of questions, and to place our hope, not in our own ability to answer them, but in Christ’s own power and peace at work in us through His Holy Spirit. So, as we await His coming again to set our world right, and establish His unending peace, in the words of St. Paul: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 15:4-13). Amen.

​And our Songs for this week can be found here: