Scripture Readings: Nehemiah 8:1–3, 5–6, 8–10 | Psalm 19 | 1 Corinthians 12:12–31 | Luke 4:14–21

​“Then he began to say to them, ‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’” (Luke 4:21).
 
When God’s word is spoken, get ready for New Creation.
 
That’s what happens in both our Old Testament reading today from the book of Nehemiah, and our reading from the Gospel of Luke: the people are gathered together to listen to the Holy Scriptures, and what they hear challenges and shakes up the whole story of their lives.
 
In our reading from Nehemiah, we’re witnesses of the rebirth of a nation. Many years after the kingdom of Judah had fallen to the Babylonians, and its people were carried away into Exile, some of them had returned, and had been trying to put back the shattered pieces that had once been their homeland. Nehemiah was a Jewish Exile in the service of the King of Persia (which had by that time taken over Babylon). Nehemiah had heard a report from his homeland that all was not well: “The survivors there in the province who escaped captivity are in great trouble and shame; the wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been destroyed by fire.” (Nehemiah 1:3).

Wrecked by this news, Nehemiah prays to the LORD and seeks forgiveness for the failures of his people… pleading with the Living God to show them His mercy and holy love. Eventually, and surprisingly, Nehemiah ends up returning to Jerusalem with a commission from the King of Persia to rebuild the city, and much of the book of Nehemiah tells of this ongoing drama.
 
But what happens after the walls are rebuilt is where we pick up the story today: now it is the people of God’s turn to be rebuilt. After decades of living far from home, surrounded by strangers and foreign ways of life, they were gathered to hear again the sacred story of their people: the Torah, the Law of Moses was read aloud, and the people wept… broken down by the realization that they and their ancestors had failed. They had not stayed true to the Covenant that the LORD God had made with them, and so they had lost their Temple, their country, their world, and had gone off into Exile.
 
The scholar Timothy Saleska puts it like this: “The story of the life and death of Israel is not just a history lesson to these people. It is their story —their life and their death. The story of God’s infinite love and their own pitiful rebellion brings them to their knees.”[1] But now, it was time for a new beginning.
 
Nehemiah, and Ezra the priest, and the Levites urge all the people: ‘do not weep, rejoice!’ This day was a holy day to the LORD, a day for celebration and song. Yes, the Law had exposed the people’s collective darkness, but not to condemn them… it was so that they may now start to walk in the light! God had given His people a new beginning, brought about by His mercy and faithful love bringing them through the pain of Exile and back into the Promised Land.
 
We follow this pattern ourselves each week in our services, when we confess together, acknowledging our failures to follow in God’s holy ways… and together in Christ we are invited to return to the LORD with all our hearts, and rejoice in His forgiveness and grace… not so we can keep on walking in darkness, but so that we can walk with Him in the light… so that we can grow in His grace, and respond to His faithful love by making real changes.

Rededicated… rebuilt as God’s people once again.
 
What followed after the public gathering to hear their sacred story in Nehemiah was a renewed sense of their purpose, and identity… pursuing a new way forward as God’s forgiven, and now faithful people. It wasn’t easy, and it was far from perfect, but they were beginning again. Their sorrow had been transformed by the hope of finding their place in God’s story.
 
Turning now to the New Testament, St. Luke offers us a different picture of a new beginning. Today we heard how Jesus, filled with the Holy Spirit, begins His mission: He reads from the Holy Scriptures in His hometown synagogue. This is His moment to reveal to us all what He is all about… and what His Heavenly Father has sent Him to accomplish.
 
He reads from the prophet Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed, -
to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” (Luke 4:18-19).
Words of hope for the hopeless… a new beginning for all.
 
This message was more than welcome that day among those gathered in Nazareth… among those eager to be set free from the oppression of Rome, from the rule of foreign nations they had been living under for centuries, eagerly awaiting the arrival of God’s Kingdom. And this message still hits home with many of us today as well: especially those of us who are struggling to find healing and help and hope. We too are longing to be set free… to find freedom and peace. We too are hungry for new beginnings… for Good News to come to us too.
 
And reading aloud the promises the Living God made to His people long ago, Jesus points to Himself as their embodiment: “Then he began to say to them,” (and to us, I would add) “‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’” (Luke 4:21).
 
If we end the story here, as our lectionary would have us do, it all sounds wonderful. But unlike the story of Nehemiah, where God’s people are told to rejoice instead of weep at the word of the LORD, Jesus words continue, and turn the excitement and welcome of His hometown synagogue, into outcries of rage. Luke 4:22-30.

“All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. They said, “Is not this Joseph’s son?” He said to them, “Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, ‘Doctor, cure yourself!’ And you will say, ‘Do here also in your hometown the things that we have heard you did at Capernaum.’”
 
After His opening claim to be the bringer of God’s Good News, Jesus highlights the people’s lack of faith in Him… turning the focus now from the message, to how they receive the Messenger. Just like God’s people in Isaiah’s day had rejected and turned their back on their God, leading them into Exile, Jesus was predicting that His own people would also reject Him as well.
 
But as off-putting as this accusation was (however accurate it would turn out to be), this was not what really set the people of Nazareth off that day. Jesus goes on to completely challenge their understanding, not just of who He is and what He’s about, but who the Living God is, and what God is up to. Luke 4:24-30,
 
 And he said, “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown.  But the truth is, there were many widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a severe famine over all the land; yet Elijah was sent to none of them except to a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.”  When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff.  But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way.”
 
Sidon and Syria were two of Israel’s neighbours, and in days gone by, were often their enemies… warring against God’s people. They represented “those other people” that Israel thought God wanted nothing to do with… those who worshipped idols, oppressed God’s people, and had no future in God’s Kingdom.
 
But Jesus points back to key moments in the story of Israel where the LORD was at work offering mercy to “those other people” too…. rescuing them, and drawing them into the story of His holy love… while at the same time, God’s own people kept on rejecting His ways and turning their backs, again and again, on their covenant promises.
 
N. T. Wright helpfully highlights why the tension and anger was building: “Jesus points out what happened in the days of the great prophets Elijah and Elisha, and in doing so identifies himself with the prophets. Elijah was sent to help a widow —but not a Jewish one. Elisha healed one solitary leper —and the leper was the commander of the enemy army. That’s what did it. That’s what drove them to fury. Israel’s God was rescuing the wrong people.”[2]
 
That day in the synagogue, Jesus makes clear that God’s own people had missed the point of their own story: that God was not only concerned with rescuing the children of Israel… He was calling them to be faithful to Him with all of their heart, and walk with Him in the light… so that God’s mercy, forgiveness, and holy love would extend to every nation… to all the world.
 
“The servant-Messiah” Wright goes on to say, “has not come to inflict punishment on the nations, but to bring God’s love and mercy to them. And that will be the fulfilment of a central theme in Israel’s own scriptures.
This message was, and remains, shocking. Jesus’ claim to be reaching out with healing to all people, though itself a vital Jewish idea, was not what most first-century Jews wanted or expected.” [3]
 
From the beginning, St. Luke tells us that Jesus proclaimed the Good News that God wants all peoples to come and share in God’s good Kingdom.
 
And from the beginning, He knew that His own people would reject Him and this message, just as God’s people had all too often rejected their LORD. But even so, that would not change the Good News He was sent to bring: God’s new beginning, not just for the children of Israel… but for all.

​As we gather to hear God’s word, do we expect to find new creation at work? To have our foundations rocked in order to be rebuilt again? To find our darkness exposed, and then to be called into the light?
 
Do we listen with joy only when the message lines up with our own expectations, and stop our ears and close our hearts when we find ourselves and our views challenged?
  
Through the Holy Scriptures, God’s Spirit is still at work re-creating His people, preparing us to take part in the work of Christ’s Kingdom here and now. To share in the new beginning of God’s rescuing love in Jesus, for all.  
 
May the Lord open our hearts to hear and receive His word to us today. And may the Holy Spirit continue to re-create us in Christ always. Amen.
 


[1] Timothy E. Saleska, “Third Sunday after the Epiphany, Year C,” in The Lectionary Commentary: Theological Exegesis for Sunday’s Texts, Volume One (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2001), 255.

[2] Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 47–48.

[3] Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 48–49.

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 62:1–5 | Psalm 36:5–10 | 1 Corinthians 12:1–11 | ​John 2:1–11

​“Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him” (John 2:11).
 
In this season after Epiphany, our readings regularly invite us to reflect on some of the key moments where Christ’s mission is revealed: reminding us of who He is and what He has come to do. In today’s reading we heard tell of the now famous miracle at the wedding in Cana, where Jesus creates wonderful wine out of water… saving the nuptial party from turning into a social disaster.
 
Of all the wonderful miracles that Jesus performed, why is this one singled out as being so significant? What does it tell us about the bigger story Christ is playing out? Is it just a gracious wedding gift to a desperate couple in need? A unique opportunity to perform a random act of kindness? A display of miraculous power to wow the crowd and help build up a following?
 
The Gospel of John tells us this event was much more than a kind gesture… John calls it “the first of his signs”… and signs point to something… they have a message that is meant to be understood.
​
But who is this sign meant for? Far from a dramatic display of power, this miracle is done in secret. Sure, the benefits are shared by all the guests, but only a few know who is behind it all. This sign is first of all meant to say something to His disciples… including you and I, about what Jesus has come to do. And what He is calling us to take part in… revealing a glimpse of His glory as the One who has come to make all things new.
 
Of course, the image of a wedding runs all through the story of Scripture… especially when it comes to God’s relationship with Israel: a community set apart to be God’s own covenant people… committed to sharing their life with the LORD in joyful celebration. As we’ve looked at before, the covenant ceremony at Mt. Sinai, where God gives the Law to the newly rescued Israelites through Moses, was almost to be like a ‘marriage’ celebration, a new beginning. But disastrously, the people went back on their vows almost immediately… building an idol to worship, and throwing a raucous party for themselves. What was meant to be a wonderful, holy event became a shameful tragedy… one which was replayed, throughout their history again and again.

This faithless path leads, first the Northern Tribes of Israel, and then the Southern Kingdom of Judah, into destruction and exile… cast out from the Promised Land that God had prepared for them. But as tragic as their future seemed, and as hopeless as they may have felt, through the prophets the LORD God reminds His people that He will be true to His word. That His judgment on their sin isn’t meant for their destruction, but to cleanse them… to restore them to His side… to rescue them, even from themselves… so that they can actually, finally share in His New Life.
 
In our reading from Isaiah this morning we hear this hopeful message:
“You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
You shall no more be termed “Forsaken”,
and your land shall no more be termed “Desolate”;
but you shall be called “My Delight Is in Her”,
and your land “Married”;
for the Lord delights in you,
and your land shall be married.
For as a young man marries a young woman, 
so shall your builder marry you, 
and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride,
so shall your God rejoice over you.” (Isaiah 62:3-5)
 
The LORD Himself promised to turn His tragic ‘marriage’ to His people into joy… renewing their life together to share completely in His holy love.
 
Again, we hear this hope of joy-filled life with God expressed in our Psalm this morning:
“How priceless is your love, O God! 
your people take refuge under the shadow of your wings.
They feast upon the abundance of your house; 
you give them drink from the river of your delights.
For with you is the well of life,
and in your light we see light. (Psalm 35:7-9).
 
No matter how hopeless or tragic the story of God’s people turned out to be, the truth is the LORD their God would be faithful to them and rescue them. The desolate would be embraced. The forsaken would share God’s delight. Israel was told to trust in the steadfast love of the LORD, who would cleanse His people, and be reconciled again with them forever.  

Let’s turn back now to John’s Gospel, and the wedding incident in Cana. Here also we find what was to be a joyful celebration turn sour: Not because of any infidelity between the couple, but because of the heartbreaking consequence of not having enough… of not being able to provide enough wine to match the special celebration, which would have been experienced as a great source of shame by those hosting the party. Not just public embarrassment, but outright humiliation… lowering the family’s status in the eyes of the wider community.
 
How often do we find ourselves feeling the same way? Running on empty, while others are depending on us? Feeling like we have let our loved ones down instead of offering joy?
 
The truth is, there are many ways we can find ourselves feeling desolate. Sometimes it’s because of our own choices. Sometimes it’s because of the failures of others that we depended on.  Sometimes life just play out in ways we did not expect, or could not have controlled… and still we find ourselves experiencing shame, emptiness, desolate… without hope.

For times like these, God gives us a sign: we’re offered a glimpse of the glory of Jesus Christ today… not a random generous act, or a magical remedy to take away all our troubles, but a sign to point us to the One who has come to make all things new… to transform even the worst tragedies through His life-giving, saving love.
 
Jesus tells the servants to take the water set aside to be used for purification, water used to make people clean, and turns it into the most splendid wine… bringing delight beyond all expectations. Purity, holiness surprisingly leading into joy. Shame turned into honour. Desperate emptiness turned into abundant celebration.  
 
From the very beginning, Jesus was bringing about God’s promised restoration… not simply of wedding celebrations, but of God’s relationship with His people… and beyond. This sign reminds us that the LORD longs to delight with humanity… to share His everlasting life and all it’s joys with us. And though on our own, we’ve fallen short… God’s re-creating love is never limited by what we can, or cannot, bring to the table. From first to last, Christ has come to bring… to give to us God’s New Life.

And this sign points us ahead to the cross: to the ultimate act of Christ’s mission of rescuing mercy… enduring the most shame-filled, and tragic death to cleanse His people and all nations of the earth from all our sins… to bring full reconciliation between us and the LORD through offering up His own blood; dying to set us free. Yet on the third day, God turned all that tragedy and shame into unending joy by raising Christ again from the grave; God’s New Creation bursting into being in the Risen Lord, who will come again in full glory to reunite Heaven and Earth… setting all things right again, and making all things new.
 
As we are facing our own tragedies… our own moments of desolation, whatever they may be… let us look to Jesus our Risen Lord, and seek a glimpse of His re-creative glory. Let us “do what He says”, as Mary told the servants at the wedding, and find that we too are somehow taking part in His gracious, rescuing work. And let us “believe in Him”, as the first disciples did, responding even to the hidden work of His holy love with the faith to follow Him each day, and the certain, joyful hope that God has saved the best for last. Amen. 
​

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 43:1–7 | Psalm 29 | Acts 8:14–17 | Luke 3:15–22

​​"Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased" (Luke 3:21-22).
 
Today we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord, a moment that marks not only the beginning of Jesus Christ’s earthly ministry, but one that also invites us to share in His ministry too. Baptism is one of the central sacraments, the sacred mysteries of the Church, passed down to us through long generations back to Jesus Christ Himself, who called His disciples to go to every nation on earth and make more disciples, baptizing them in the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that He had commanded them… the way of life He had revealed to them to share with the world.
 
Many of us have been baptized longer than we can remember, but as I have shared with many of you before, I can remember my baptism well. I grew up in the Church, and have believed in God as long as I can remember. The Church I attended as a young person did not practice infant baptism, and I was 15 years old when I was baptized: standing in front of the congregation, many of them my relatives, and publicly owning my faith before being submerged in a tank full of water.  
 
Although most of us think of baptisms as occasions for celebration, to my 15 year old self I saw my baptism as a big problem. As I’ve shared before, the feeling that stands out the most to me about that day is fear… fear of failure, fear of angering God… fear of not being good enough. In my mind, I thought if I sinned before being baptized, I still had a chance to find forgiveness… but if I sinned after being baptised… if I kept messing up after dedicating my life to God, then I would be blowing my last chance with Him. And this thought had me terrified. I had my share of struggles, sins and temptations, and though I tried my best to fight them, or at very least to hide them, and doubted that I could ever measure up in the eyes of the LORD.
 
That day over 20 years ago, I felt like I was facing the end. And in some ways, this was true: Baptism is a kind of end. A death to an old life bound to brokenness, sin, and despair. But more importantly baptism is about what happens after this end! It’s about New Creation, the New Life of the Living God.
 
The Holy Scriptures open in Genesis Chapter 1 with a powerful image of God’s creative impulse at work:
“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” The NRSV translation uses the phrase “wind from God” here, but the word wind is the same word for breath, and also spirit. In ancient Hebrew, these meanings are not easily separated, and are best held closely together if we want to actually get the message. In the beginning we’re told God’s Spirit is moving above the dark, chaotic waters… the abyss of nothingness… the void of un-creation.  
 
Then God speaks, and brings creation into being… a proper place for new life to flourish… filling the earth and all the cosmos with His beauty, glory, and goodness. It is an act of grace; existence itself is conceived of as a gift, springing from the powerful, creative love of God.  
 
Hold onto this image as we now turn to our Gospel passage this morning, to St. Luke’s account of Jesus’ Baptism, and the New Beginning it brings.
 
Luke tells us that crowds of people from around the region of the Jordan River were coming to John to be baptized, seeking God’s forgiveness. In response to John’s teachings, they knew there was something off in their connection to the LORD their God, and so they took on this tangible way to start again and find their own new beginnings. A personal and public way to have the rest of one’s life dedicated to the LORD… seeking to start again with a fresh start as God’s faithful people.
 
Then Jesus comes to be baptized along with them… which in the wider story seems strange for all sorts of reasons. In St. Matthew’s Gospel, even John himself is confused by this and actually tries to stop Jesus from being baptised by him. “I need to be baptized by you,” John says, and do you come to me?” (Matthew 3:14). Why would the Christ, the Messiah, the Chosen Saviour sent from God need to be baptized? Why would He need to start again?
 
Again in the baptism of Jesus we are witnessing a gracious gift being given. Unlike the crowds who came to John, Jesus had not come to restart His own story, but to restart the story of all His people… and indeed the world. Jesus humbly allowed Himself to be baptized by human hands in a way which the Living God worked through to reveal Himself and His mission… to make known His rescuing love… and to bring God’s New Creation to life in the lives of His un-faithful people.
 
Echoing the imagery from Genesis Chapter 1, St. Luke tells us that the Holy Spirit again moves over the waters in the form of a dove, and rests upon Jesus. Then a voice from Heaven, the same which spoke the universe into existence, proclaiming: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22).
 
According to the prophets of old, Israel was called to be God’s beloved son, a community graciously created and rescued by the LORD to share in His holy ways. Our reading today from Isaiah 43 reminds us of how the Living God reached out to Israel in love even as they struggled to stay true to Him: Isaiah 43:1-3…
“But now thus says the Lord,
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine.
 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.
For I am the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.”
 
In line with His holy love, and promises to redeem and restore His chosen people, Jesus, God’s Son was sent to
restart the story of Israel… to relive it faithfully on their behalf with His own sinless life. In Jesus, God had come to be with them as their Saviour.
 
And His baptism was only the beginning of this mission: everything Christ does in Luke’s Gospel carries this work of God forward… bringing the LORD’s healing, hope, correction, forgiveness, and holy love to Israel just as the prophets had long ago foretold. Of course, the cross is where His story comes to a head… where Jesus, God’s beloved Son humbly allows Himself to be brutally betrayed, tortured, and killed in the most public and shameful way possible… dying the death of a rebel… to rescue rebels like us. To put an end to the enmity between us and the Living God.
 
They put His broken, bloodied body in the ground, buried in the abyss of death. But then God’s greatest gift: through death and out the other side, Jesus rose up from the grave, and lives now forever as the first resurrected, re-created human, completely alive in the power of the Holy Spirit… the same Spirit He sent to us believers first at Pentecost, and which we pray to receive as the gift of God’s New Life in baptism.   
 
This gift of New Life in the Spirit Christ shares with us has implications… it promises not only God’s presence with us, but also His re-creative power at work within us as we trust in Him and seek His ways… changing the shape of our lives, not just privately, but publicly too.
 
Our reading from Acts is a great example, revealing that this gift is not just meant for a few insiders, but for all. In the early days of the Church, there were already ancient divisions between the people of Judea and Samaritans, who both traced their ancestry back to the people of Israel, but who looked at each other as heretical outsiders and enemies. At first the Apostles and all of the disciples of Jesus, the Church, had been Jewish, but through the ministry of people like St. Peter and St. John among others, God poured out His Spirit on Samaritans who had believed as well, reconciling two estranged peoples in the new community of Jesus. This would only be the beginning, for Christ’s disciples were tasked to share the Good News of Jesus with all the world… an ongoing calling for every generation, including ours today, drawing us into the mission of Jesus, which Isaiah 43 echoes:
“Do not fear, for I am with you;
I will bring your offspring from the east,
and from the west I will gather you;
I will say to the north, ‘Give them up,’
and to the south, Do not withhold;
bring my sons from far away
and my daughters from the end of the earth—
everyone who is called by my name,
whom I created for my glory,
whom I formed and made.’” (Isaiah 43:5-7)
 
“Do not fear, for I am with you…”
That’s what my 15 year old self was missing: being baptized into Jesus… receiving the gifts of His rescuing death, and resurrection life through the Holy Spirit are not about re-creating myself, saving myself… but about trusting God my Saviour… about His New Creation work in me, and even more shocking, through me. Trusting that as we share in Christ’s life, offered to us as a gift, the Living God our Saviour is with us, at work making all things new.
 
More than 20 years later, I am still far from perfect. I’m aware of many of my flaws and failings, as your priest, a spouse, a parent… as a disciple of Jesus Christ. And there’s plenty more that I’m not yet aware of as well.
 
But as unworthy, or frightened as we may feel, our hope is found in the One who laid down His life to raise us up with Him into God’s New Creation… to rescue us in holy love, even while we were rebels… and to share in the new beginning of Christ’s good Kingdom which will have no end. Amen.
 

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 60:1–6 | Psalm 72 | Ephesians 3:1–12 | Matthew 2:1–12

“In former generations this mystery was not made known to humankind, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit: that is, the Gentiles have become fellow heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel” (Ephesians 3:5-6).
 
I had the gift of growing up in the country in Northern Ontario, where most nights we could look up and see a sky filled with stars. No city lights to drown them out, we could soak the scene in with a sense of great beauty and wonder… along with the sense of our own smallness, and how vast the cosmos really is.
 
Years later, I can remember that one of the many things that made me excited to move to New Brunswick from downtown Toronto was the anticipation of seeing the stars more often again… and sharing this joyful gift with my own daughter… to share in some way that sense of beauty and wonder… as we set out to find our new place in the world. As we all know, in many ways, looking up can help us find our way.
 
Where do we find ourselves looking these days when so many of us are feeling lost, without our bearings… unsure of where to turn?
 
As we try to navigate this ongoing COVID-19 crisis with all the twist and turns, uncertainty, fear, and loss it has brought to our lives? Or as we try to make sense of and work our way through all the conflicts and divisions pulling apart our common life; our country, our communities, our families… even ourselves? Or as we consider the Church: with so many giving up on the Christian faith, or at least giving up on what they know of it, what might the future of Churches like St. Luke’s look like down the road?
 
The author Madeleine L’Engle points out that our word disaster carries the meaning of “a separation from the stars, a fragmenting of creation, the shattering of what God formed as an interconnected whole.”[1] And this seems to illuminate how many of us are feeling these days: longing for that sense of clear direction, that sense of confident purpose that comes from knowing our right place in the universe… where exactly we fit within the grand scheme of the cosmic plan.
 
For dark days like these, Epiphany comes to us as the bearer of Good News… sharing with us a message of hope and joy we easily overlook… or maybe under-look?
 
Our reading today from Matthew’s Gospel tells of the visit of the Magi: the wise men led by a star to worship the newborn king of the Jews. This part of the story fits well with pageants in our imaginations, like the manger scene at Christmas (though the two acts were likely years apart). And as an isolated episode, it’s easy to set it on the shelf of our minds and forget about it, like a favourite holiday movie we only pull out and watch once a year.
 
But in this story, St. Matthew is introducing an important theme of his Gospel account, one which will take time to fully unveil, but always remains central to his understanding of who Jesus is, and what He is up to… and what this all means for those of us who follow Him today.
 
Put simply: the Good News of God’s Messiah is really for everyone… for children of Abraham, yes, but also for all the nations of the earth. These wise men from the East foreshadow all of us outsiders to Israel’s story… those who didn’t know their place yet in the cosmic plan of the Living God. What starts with an unexpected visit from star-led strangers from afar will lead to Christ Jesus offering up His life upon the cross to draw all people to Himself… to reconcile and reunite in Himself all of humanity to each other, and to the Living God once and for all.
 
The beautiful, wonderful mystery at work in Jesus is, as St. Paul puts it, that: “the Gentiles have become fellow heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” (Ephesians 3:6). The Good News isn’t just for a chosen few; Christ is the King of all creation. This is the message that Epiphany reveals to us: that God has come in Jesus Christ to rescue and reclaim His entire world. The same world we see around us even now is the world Christ came to save.

Looking up to see stars filling the sky is a beautiful, wonderful sight… but it is also distant. Remote. Removed from our everyday existence. We can catch a glimpse of them and be lost in wonder for a moment, only to look down again and forget our connection to the vast cosmos around us.
 
The same danger exists with the story of Epiphany; with the Good News that in Jesus Christ God has come to save our world. We can admire the beauty of this message. Feel moved for a moment or two… and simply look away again, and get on with living our lives. Forgetting that this is not just a beautiful, wonderful story… it’s our story! Our reality! God’s gift to us to help us find our proper place, and guide us foreword.
 
Though most of us here in Gondola Point are Gentiles, of non-Jewish ancestry, we’re culturally used to seeing ourselves as insiders in God’s story… as those who play host to strangers from afar, not those who have to strike out on uncertain journeys.
 
But we have all been invited… welcomed… graciously led into Israel’s story: the story of God’s promise to bless one family, and through them, rescue the world. And each of us have in some ways already responded to this invitation: believing in the Good News of Jesus… entering into a Church community created and shaped by Christ’s self-giving love. We may be questioning, curious, struggling, searching… but in Christ God guides us forward to find Him in surprising places… and share His love with surprising people… which is the role of all of us in the Epiphany story.  
 
The bishop and scholar N.T. Wright helps to bring this point to light: “The arrival of the ‘Magi’ (that’s the word Matthew uses for them; it can refer to ‘magicians’, or ‘astrologers’, or experts in interpreting dreams, portents and other strange happenings) introduces us to something which Matthew wants us to be clear about from the start. If Jesus is in some sense king of the Jews, that doesn’t mean that his rule is limited to the Jewish people. At the heart of many prophecies about the coming king, the Messiah, there were predictions that his rule would bring God’s justice and peace to the whole world... Matthew will end his gospel with Jesus commissioning his followers to go out and make disciples from every nation; this, it seems, is the way that the prophecies of the Messiah’s worldwide rule are going to come true.”[2]
 
Go out and make disciples.
Not wait for them to come to us, where we are comfortable, safe, and in control. Go into our world, where we live side by side with our neighbours… and share the Good News that God has not given up on our world… but sent His Son Jesus for everyone. He did not remain at a safe distance, remote from our sufferings and struggles… God came and comes to where we are in Christ, and is with His people forever.
 
Let this beautiful, wonderful truth guide how we respond, and the choices we make each day… how we treat those around us… how we spend our energy, our resources, and our time. Search out and explore the depths of our story, His story, the Good News of Jesus, and all it entails, so that when we feel lost and uncertain, we’ll know where to look to find our way again: to the light of our loving Saviour.

This is the journey of faith that Epiphany opens up for us. The journey that, even though we don’t know exactly where our next footsteps will fall, we can trust that in seeking Jesus… seeking to know and follow Him, the Living God is guiding us… and inviting us to share in the story of His rescuing love. Not just for us, but for the whole cosmos and all who dwell in it.
 
I’ll end now with a Sonnet by the priest and poet Malcolm Guite written for Epiphany, entitled: the magi.[3]
 
It might have been just someone else’s story
Some chosen people get a special king
We leave them to their own peculiar glory,
We don’t belong, it doesn’t mean a thing.
But when these three arrive they bring us with them,
Gentiles like us, their wisdom might be ours;
A steady step that finds an inner rhythm,
A pilgrim’s eye that sees beyond the stars.
They did not know his name but still they sought him,
They came from otherwhere but still they found;
In palaces, found those who sold and bought him,
But in the filthy stable, hallowed ground.
Their courage gives our questing hearts a voice
To seek, to find, to worship, to rejoice.

Amen.


[1] Quoted in C. Christopher Smith and John Pattison, Slow Church: Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2014), 100.

[2] Tom Wright, Matthew for Everyone, Part 1: Chapters 1-15 (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 11.
 
[3] Malcolm Guite, Sounding the Seasons: Seventy Sonnets for the Christian Year (Norwich, UK: Canterbury Press, 2012), 19.

Scripture Readings: 1 Samuel 2:18–20, 26 | Psalm 148 | Colossians 3:12–17 | Luke 2:41–52 

“He said to them, ‘Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?’” (Luke 2:49).
 
Merry Christmas!
That’s one of the things that I love about churches like ours that follow the Christian calendar: Christmas is not just one day, it’s a season of 12 days!
 
And on this first Sunday of the Christmas season we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family: giving thanks for the common life that Jesus, Mary, and Joseph shared together… as God raises up a humble human household to participate in His plan to redeem the world, and draw all peoples into His heavenly family.
 
We don’t have that many stories of the family life of Jesus, and our Gospel reading this morning gives us the only one we have from when our Lord was a child… and it’s kind of a strange episode: the holy family makes a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. When Mary and Joseph leave with the rest of the pilgrims, Jesus stays behind in the Temple.  His parents eventually notice He’s missing, and desperately search for Him for three days. But when they find Him, Jesus does not respond as we might expect. He’s not worried, even though He had been left alone for all that time. And He’s not contrite either, seemingly unconcerned by His parent’s feelings, or their expectations of Him as their son. Instead, He seems confused that they didn’t know where to look for Him. That they didn’t know that He would be caught up in what was happening in His Father’s house.
 
It’s an odd part of His story, but Luke shares it with us because he wants us to understand something about this boy and what He’s all about. And interestingly enough, it might help us if we reflect on the story of another young boy from Israel’s early days: the story of Samuel, which we heard briefly in our Old Testament reading this morning.
 
Samuel was born before Israel had any kings. When they were supposed to be guided by Israel’s priesthood, but time and again we’re told that the people kept turning away from God’s ways, and would “do what was right in their own eyes”, which kept leading them to disaster.
 
In our reading we catch a glimpse of the boy Samuel, being raised by Eli, the priest, who served with His sons in the Tabernacle: the sacred Tent where sacrifices to the LORD God were made, and where, before the Temple was built, God’s presence dwelt with His people.
 
Samuel had been dedicated by his mother to the LORD because the LORD had answered her prayer and had given her a son. Samuel served God faithfully even as a child. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for Eli’s own sons, who blatantly disgraced the priesthood, and took advantage of those who came to worship God. Our lectionary skips this part of the story, but we are supposed to see this huge contrast between the boy Samuel and Israel’s unfaithful leaders: 1 Samuel 2:22-25.
 
“Now Eli was very old. He heard all that his sons were doing to all Israel, and how they lay with the women who served at the entrance to the tent of meeting.  He said to them, “Why do you do such things? For I hear of your evil dealings from all these people. No, my sons; it is not a good report that I hear the people of the Lord spreading abroad. If one person sins against another, someone can intercede for the sinner with the Lord; but if someone sins against the Lord, who can make intercession?” But they would not listen to the voice of their father; for it was the will of the Lord to kill them.”
 
The early chapters of Samuel’s story play out this turn of events: the downfall of the corrupt leaders of God’s people, alongside the rise of a faithful miracle-child who serves by helping God’s people to turn back to their LORD. Through this boy Samuel, who from birth had been caught up in the work of the LORD, the Living God was drawing His scattered people back to Himself, so that they all might walk in the ways of His holy love.
 
Returning now to Luke’s Gospel with the story of Samuel in mind, this strange story of Jesus as a boy in the Temple starts to take on a whole other dimension.
 
The picture we’re given is that this young boy is completely caught up in the things of God… completely at home in the House of the LORD, “sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers” (Luke 2:46-47).
 
Unlike Samuel, Jesus, had grown up far from Jerusalem, and the Temple, but as we know Jesus Himself was the ultimate miracle child… conceived by the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary… and more than that, as John’s Gospel tells us, this child is God incarnate… God in human flesh… this boy is Himself the meeting place of Heaven and Earth, God’s dwelling among us… the reality that the Temple and Tabernacle pointed to.
 
And like Samuel, Jesus was growing up at a time when Israel’s leaders, and in particular it’s priesthood had become corrupt, failing to serve the LORD or His people faithfully. The rise of Jesus, for Luke, will coincide with the failure and fall of the faithless guides of God’s people, who constantly clash with our Lord in later days, and who will lead the conspiracy that brings Christ to the cross.
 
But again, we know that there’s more going on at the cross than meets the eye. It was the way that Jesus broke the power of death, and freed us from the grip of sin… opening up the way of God’s New Life when after being lost to us for three days, Jesus rose again from the grave.
 
And again, like Samuel, Luke wants us to see that Jesus, even as a young boy, is the one through whom the Living God Himself is at work rescuing His people, returning their hearts to Him, so that we might walk in His holy ways. In Jesus, the Living God has come and dwells among us to draw us to Himself… to reconcile us, and restore us as His faithful people… to make us, to make you and I, a kingdom of priests, and holy nation, a faithful family, together with our sisters and brothers from every nation, walking together in the holy love of the Lord forever.
 
We live in a time when we’re all encouraged to just “do what’s right in our own eyes”, but Christ has come to open up for us the way to God’s New Life: so that we too might be caught up in what God is up to… living today as God’s faithful family, sharing in His holy love.
 
In our New Testament reading today, St. Paul tells us what this looks like in practice. Let’s listen again, and let the message really sink in:
 
“As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience.  Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.  Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.  And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”
 
It can be easy to think of Christmas as a story of the promised child, and the holy family gathered serenely around the manger. But our Scriptures today remind us that this promised child has a clear purpose: to bring about the restoration of Israel, and all nations… to draw all peoples everywhere into the family of God… to offer His life on the cross as the sacrifice to deal with all our sins, and set us free to truly be God’s faithful children forever.  
 
As Christians, we have been adopted into the family of God, sharing in the New Life of Jesus Christ through His Spirit at work in us. So, this Christmas season, may we remember that Christ was born into our human family, so that in Him, all of us might live even today as God’s faithful children. Amen.
 
 

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 62:6–12 | Psalm 97 | Titus 3:4–7 | Luke 2:1–20

“But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people:  to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.” (Luke 2:10-11).
 
Merry Christmas. Today’s the day.
All throughout the season of Advent, and for some of us, even longer, we have been looking forward to today with building anticipation. The day we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ our Lord, and all that His birth means for our lives and for our world.
 
But I know if we’re being honest, this Christmas has also been really challenging. We are still in the midst of a global pandemic, with cases in our region rising rapidly… making it almost impossible to celebrate in the ways we long to. All of us are facing a great deal of uncertainty as we try to do our part to protect ourselves, our loved ones, and neighbours… having to make major changes to our everyday lives, not to mention our treasured traditions. Though we still have lots to celebrate today, far more than we likely imagine, it’s safe to say this isn’t the kind of Christmas season that we would have planned.

But honestly, Christmas has been that way since the very beginning: a surprising celebration that none of us would have planned.
 
Take Joseph and Mary: First came the life-changing visits from the Angel Gabriel, telling them that Mary was going to give birth to God’s Messiah, the Christ. But then, just as the baby was about to be born, the Emperor, off in faraway Rome, decides to call for a census and suddenly they have to make the journey to Bethlehem.
 
I’m sure they would rather have stayed at home in Nazareth surrounded by family and friends. And they would never have planned to stay in a stable on the night that Mary was to give birth to her firstborn child.
 
And what about the shepherds?
They had no clue about the promised child… they had their hands full enough with the business of daily life… with simply making a modest living, which was getting harder and harder to do.
 
The shepherds were completely caught off guard by the angels and heavenly choir… but were compelled to drop everything and run to Bethlehem to see this ‘Good News for all people’ the angels spoke of with their own eyes.
 
But even though Mary and Joseph and the shepherds would never have planned it that way… even though it all seemed like chaos, inconvenience, and surprise, that first Christmas was the work of the wonderful plans of the Living God.    
 
God planned for the promised child to be born in Bethlehem, in King David’s city, to bring hope to His oppressed people, fulfilling His promises and telling them that their Saviour King had come at last.
 
And God planned for His Son to be born among those who have no place… among those who are refused welcome… among the outsiders, and all those in need. The Prince of Peace was born as one who is poor, who would Himself know rejection and need, that He might lift up the lowly, and redeem all who place their hope in Him.
 
God planned for the Good News of the birth of the Messiah to be shared first with those whose lives had lost almost all sense of joy. To those ground down by the weight of the world, the LORD gave a glimpse of heavenly beauty, music, and light… lifting their hearts to share in a vision of life beyond anything they could imagine.
 
And God planned for these humble shepherds to be drawn near to Mary and Joseph. To come together with those who had once been strangers and share in this gift of God’s love for our world… that they might then go and share this Good News with everyone else as well.
 
Today we can celebrate even in the midst of our struggles, our disappointments, and our fears, because we remember that the birth of our Saviour Jesus Christ came about through the wonderful plans of the Living God, who shares His love with our lonely world… who shines His healing light in the midst of the deepest darkness… and announces Good News of great joy especially when we need it most.

Jesus Christ is born! The Living God is with us! May we rejoice and celebrate this wonderful truth today. Amen.

Scripture Readings: Micah 5:2–5a | Psalm 80:1–7 | Hebrews 10:5–10 | Luke 1:39–55

“Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.” (Luke 1:48-49).
 
What do you want for Christmas?

If we ask some of our younger members of St. Luke’s this familiar question, we might expect to hear, with some excitement, about their gift wish list… the presents that they’re hoping to receive from those who love them.
 
If we ask this question to some of our less-young Christian brothers and sisters, the answers might get a bit harder to gift wrap, but not at all less longed for… like spending time with family and friends, and other festive traditions.
 
This year, no matter our age, I think we’re all longing for some normality this Christmas… for being able to celebrate this special time of year with freedom and ease. Not anxious about each other’s health… or the stability of our whole community. I think it’s safe to say we’re all longing for those seemingly simpler days we all took for granted.
 
Even so… even now as we head into our second COVID Christmas, we have much to be grateful for, and much to look forward to… especially as we consider the Good News that Advent and Christmas have to share.
 
Today we mark the fourth Sunday of Advent, the last before we celebrate our Saviour’s birth, and today we are asked to contemplate the theme of love… a word that we often associate with giving, and which stands at the centre of the sacred story we Christians believe. In our reading today from the first Chapter of the Gospel of Luke, we hear of God’s gift of love… to Mary, to Israel, and to us all.
 
In today’s passage we heard how Mary travels to see her cousin, Elizabeth, right after a visit from the Angel Gabriel, who tells her that she will give birth to God’s Messiah, the Christ.  Elizabeth herself was expecting her own miracle child, a gift to her and her husband Zechariah in their old age… a baby destined to take part in preparing his people to get ready for God’s salvation, and the coming Saviour.
 
We heard how as soon as Mary spoke, the baby inside of Elizabeth jumped for joy… and how Elizabeth confirmed the Angel’s message to Mary, calling her blessed. And in response, we heard Mary bursts out in praise of God: “My soul magnifies the Lord,” she says “and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.” (Luke 1:46-49).
 
Why would she respond in this way to the words of her cousin Elizabeth? The bishop and scholar N.T. Wright offers us this helpful insight:
“Mary and Elisabeth shared a dream. It was the ancient dream of Israel: the dream that one day all that the prophets had said would come true. One day Israel’s God would do what he had said to Israel’s earliest ancestors: all nations would be blessed through Abraham’s family. But for that to happen, the powers that kept the world in slavery had to be toppled… God would have to win a victory over the bullies, the power-brokers, the forces of evil which people like Mary and Elisabeth knew all too well, living as they did in the dark days of Herod the Great, whose casual brutality was backed up with the threat of Rome. Mary and Elisabeth, like so many Jews of their time, searched the scriptures, soaked themselves in the psalms and prophetic writings which spoke of mercy, hope, fulfilment, reversal, revolution, victory over evil, and of God coming to the rescue at last.”[1]
 
She was still wrapping her head around the story that she was being drawn into, but the beautiful truth had begun to sink in: the Living God was giving to her and her people the gift they had all been longing for… God’s rescuing love was on its way through the child growing in her womb. Though insignificant in the eyes of the world, she now knows she is deeply blessed, “for the Mighty One has done great things” for her, and through her.
 
She didn’t have to see things this way, or to respond with words of praise. In fact, from the outside it might seem like the Mighty One had actually ruined her future. How would she explain her pregnancy to her fiancé, her family, and neighbours? What about all of her own plans for a simple, normal life?

Even so, even with all the complications and upheaval, Mary believed… she trusted the LORD’s word and had faith in His rescuing love, even if it would change everything. And as Elizabeth had said: “blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”
 
None of us will bear and give birth to the Messiah like Mary, but we may all have our lives turned upside down by His rescuing love… raising us up beyond expectation… humbling us as well… experiencing the goodness of God at work within us, and through us in ways we never would have asked for or imagined.
 
That’s because love goes way beyond giving us what we want. Love gives us what we need… even, and maybe especially, when we have no clue what that is.
 
Everything that Mary said in our reading today was true of course, but she had no clue at this point how God’s rescue would actually be accomplished. She knew that her baby would bring about the salvation she and her people longed for, but not that it would completely consume the life of her child.
 
Like her people, Mary had expected God’s Messiah to come and bring victory, to rescue Israel right away from all its enemies. But as the Gospel story goes on, we find that Jesus, God’s true Messiah, actually gives up His life to rescue His enemies… dying not only for His own people, who had rejected and abandoned Him, but also to reach out and rescue all the peoples of the earth… including oppressive and ungodly nations, like the Roman Empire… and places as far away in distance and time as Gondola Point. Jesus, God’s Messiah, gave His own body to be broken, and His blood to be shed to draw us all together in His rescuing love… even when it was the furthest thing from our hearts and minds.
 
In his letter to the Christians in Rome, St. Paul the Apostle wrote these life-changing words:
“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. (Romans 5:6-11). God proves His love for us in that Jesus His Son gave His life to save us while we were sinners… while we still wanted nothing to do with Him, God wanted us to be with Him.
 
This passage from Romans has played a huge role in my own story of receiving God’s rescuing love… which He first made known to me at the moment I felt the least lovely. The Good News of Jesus Christ is that God really loves the real you… the real me… our real family members, and friends, our loved ones, and strangers… the people who hate us, or drive us to distraction… God loves them all too. There’s plenty we all do that He doesn’t love… and He longs to set us free from all that stuff… but none of it keeps Him from loving us all, and offering us New Life.   
​
This may not be what we had expected or asked for, but this is what the Living God has given to us in Jesus… what He knows you and I and everyone around us needs, not just for Christmas, but always.
 
And what does it look like to receive the gift of the rescuing love of God? That’s actually what the whole Christian life is all about: Again and again encountering and believing in the love of God given to us in Jesus Christ our Lord… and empowered by His Holy Spirit, sharing His love with our world.
 
So whatever this Christmas looks like for us… and whatever else happens after it, may we believe and be transformed by the love of God in Jesus Christ. May we be convinced that in Jesus, God has given us everything we truly need. And may we start to see everybody around us as beloved by the Lord, who gave up His life on the cross, and rose again from the dead so that they too can be reconciled to God, and receive the blessed New Life in Him. Amen.
 
 
 
 


[1] Tom Wright, Luke for Everyone (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 15.
​

Scripture Readings: Zephaniah 3:14–20 | Isaiah 12:2–6 | Philippians 4:4–7 | Luke 3:7–18

“John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits worthy of repentance.” (Luke 3:7-8a).
 
Today we mark the third Sunday of the season of Advent, and we also reflect on the theme of Joy: which along with Hope and Peace is so essential… but often misunderstood.   
 
And what a great passage from our Gospel reading to help us contemplate joy, am I right? I mean, what brings ‘joy’ to mind quicker than calling people a “brood of vipers!” But as strange as it may seem, John’s passionate words of warning do have quite a lot to tell us about joy… about the particular understanding of joy that Christians have, and where we can find it.
 
I think it might be helpful to remember right off the bat that we can all to easily confuse joy with happiness. Both words can be used to describe a positive state or experience… a ‘good feeling’, that most of us want more of in our lives. But many people today think about and pursue happiness in ways that have little to do with what the Christian family would recognize as joy.

This time of year, there can be all sorts of pressure to create a ‘happy holiday’… to pour ourselves into pursuing the things that are supposed to make us feel great: special meals, gifts and gatherings, practicing treasured traditions… all the things that pull at our heartstrings, and that bring a smile to our faces.
 
At least for a while. At least until the food runs out, and the dishes start pilling up… ‘til the gifts are all given, and the guests are starting to get on our nerves a bit. Now I’m no grinch. I really love Christmas, and I’m looking forward to sharing in all these good things. But we all know the good feelings they bring don’t last forever. They’re lovely… but temporary. And so happiness has often become connected with feeling good in the moment. With experiencing or holding onto an enjoyable state ‘hear and now’. Which means we have to keep looking for more ways to be happy, or maintain the good times as long as we can. To make our ‘now’ the best it can be, again and again.
 
This pattern goes way beyond the hype around the holidays. We can see something similar in the way people talk about ‘seizing the day’: striving to ‘make the most of each moment’, and to just pursue whatever makes them happy. Again, there’s nothing wrong with looking for fulfillment, or living each day intentionally. It’s probably better than wasting the time and energy we’ve been given. But I think there is often the problem of becoming too focussed on the ‘here and now’… of losing sight of what’s come before, and of where we are headed. When we’re caught up in trying to find happiness over and over again, we can forget or ignore the bigger story, and our own place within it.
 
But what I want to call Christian Joy is not based on our feelings or experiences ‘here and now’… this joy a gift that comes to us from the Holy Spirit, and that is deeply connected to our faith: to trusting in what the Living God is up to, not just ‘hear and now’, but for all of time.
 
This joy can be seen in our first reading today from the Prophet Zephaniah, who calls God’s people to rejoice for:
The Lord, your God, is in your midst,
a warrior who gives victory;
he will rejoice over you with gladness,
he will renew you in his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing
as on a day of festival” (Zephaniah 3:17-18a).
The Living God Himself will rejoice over them with gladness. The prophet proclaims this good news to God’s people, telling of how Yahweh has promised to show mercy, to rescue them, and set everything right. But our reading today is not the whole story: it follows strong words of warning that the Lord would first deal firmly with the sins of His people[1]… that it is being made right with the Living God that will be their path to joy. His good news of rescue, and redemption would also involve His people being remade. No longer pursuing whatever ‘makes them happy’, but finding joy in what is right… in being made right.
 
In this light, John’s words of warning don’t seem so out of place anymore: he stands in the line of Israel’s prophets, calling for God’s people to repent… to turn around and reject the lies that they had come to believe, and turn instead to the Lord who longs to share His joy with them.
 
One of those lies that John brings to light is still a big problem for us today: the lie that human happiness comes from what we can acquire. Whether we’re talking about possessions, relationships, experiences, insights, or whatever… time and again, we’re told to believe: “if I just have…” fill in the blank… “then I’ll be happy”. What ways have we believed this lie? What do we assume will bring us lasting happiness?
 
Right now, I could answer: “if only we stay in Level 1 of our Province’s COVID-19 Winter Plan for Christmas… THEN I’d be happy.” But again, for how long? Until the next challenge? Until the next unmet desire? Until the next heartache? Until the next distraction? How much of our lives do we spend chasing after the things we think should make us happy, only to get them, and find ourselves still longing to be satisfied?
 
John calls us to turn away from this lie… and instead to turn to the Lord: to have our hearts, our desires, our lives realigned with the Living God which opens us up to take part in the joy we were created for… and created to share.
 
When asked what it looks like to “bear fruit worthy of repentance”, John told the crowd to not seek their own comfort and happiness, but to care for those in need: “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” To the tax collectors, who made their livings at their neighbour’s expense, and the Roman soldiers who used their position and power to simply seize what they wanted, John told them to not take more than their due… to be satisfied with their wages. This was all a huge part of what John believed it meant to live one’s life in line with the Lord. For John, living God’s way was inseparable from living well with those around us… with actually loving our neighbours, not just doing what makes us happy.
 
But John does not settle for telling his listeners to take better care of one another. He points them to God, and to the one God will send to ultimately set things right. Looking back to the prophets, John reminds those who had gathered (and us as well) of God’s promise to come and rescue His people… to reclaim their hearts, and restore their fortunes. John looks beyond the ‘hear and now’ to the coming of God’s Messiah, His anointed one, who will bring the Holy Spirit and purifying fire to remake His people once and for all.
 
Jesus is the one John was waiting for… the one he points us to who has come near to save us and our world. To set things right at last between us and God by dying on the cross, and rising again from the grave. In Him, death has been defeated. In Him, we find God’s forgiveness. In Him, we are offered New Life… enduring peace and hope… forever! In Jesus, God has drawn near to us to draw us all close to Himself, and also to draw us into His work of reaching out with His love to those around us.
 
We have been told again and again that if we just had ‘this or that’, then we would be happy. But in Jesus, God has already given us absolutely everything! Not just for ‘here and now’, but for all eternity.
 
When this reality… when this beautiful truth is remembered… when we begin to grasp the scope of the Good News of Jesus Christ, the joy of the Lord can begin to break through to us… no matter what else we’re going through ‘here and now’.
​
When we know and trust in Jesus Christ, and all He has done for us… even as we face moments of grief, of sadness, and pain, we can rejoice. Not because these things don’t matter, but because we know our place in the story. Looking to Jesus, the Risen Lord, we know how our story is going to end. And we know the One who is with us ‘here and now’, and will be with us forever.
 
We can and should be thankful for the things that bring us happiness: for everything that we enjoy, and helps to brighten up our daily lives, and for the special moments and seasons that we eagerly anticipate. But let us remember that in Jesus, we have been given a source of joy beyond compare… one that has the power to sustain us when our ‘here and now’ is hard to bear: the joy of sharing the New Life of God, both ‘now’ and for all time.
 
With this in bigger picture in mind, I’ll close with these words from the Apostle Paul:
“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near.  Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Amen.


[1] Read Zephaniah 3 in it’s entirety.

Scripture Readings: Malachi 3:1–4 | Luke 1:68–79 | Philippians 1:3–11 | Luke 3:1–6

“In the tender compassion of our God the dawn from on high shall break upon us, to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Luke 1:78-79).
 
The season of Advent is meant to stir up our anticipation… our desire for the coming of Christ… of God’s good Kingdom, and all it entails. This week we are invited to reflect on the theme of peace… a precious gift that seems to be in short supply these days.
 
Our communities and society as a whole are wracked by deep divisions, with widespread mistrust and hatred making true public co-operation seem like a dream. This has been a growing problem for years, but the pressures brought on by the pandemic have certainly thrown more fuel on the fire eroding our common good-will. Now all we hear is “it’s us vs. them”, as we circle the wagons, and point fingers… seeking security by looking out for “me and mine.”
 
But as we know, our homes are not necessarily places of solace either, with tensions tearing hard at the bonds of family too. Again, the pandemic has intensified this trend, and cases of domestic violence and abuse, already far too high, are rising sharply.
 
We know as well that so much of these interpersonal conflicts come from our own inner battles and lack of peace... reflected in the veritable tidal wave of mental health challenges. Cases of high anxiety, depression, and suicide are everywhere, but they are especially showing up among our youth.
 
These are all serious reasons for concern… reasons to take seriously our need to pray and work for peace in every area, in every facet of our lives.
 
But as we turn to our Scripture readings today, we are given a vision of a different, deeper kind of peace than we often imagine. A kind of peace that’s going to turn everything upside down.
 
Our Gospel reading today from Luke starts off with a list of names, introducing us to the ‘who’s who’ of political power. First off is the Roman Emperor, Tiberius, successor to Augustus Caesar, then comes Pontius Pilate, the local Roman governor. Next Luke lists for us the puppet rulers, the sons of Herod the ‘Great’ who were put in charge of various parts of his old ‘kingdom’ after his death. And finally, we’re given the names of two of Judah’s High Priests.
 
At one level, by giving us these names, Luke is helping us locate his Good News within the scope of history. The story he’s telling us did not happen ‘once upon a time’, but in our own world, with all of its tensions, challenges, and conflicts. But Luke is also introducing us to a particular group of people: to those who would have been seen as responsible for providing and maintaining peace. One of the primary concerns of those with any authority in the Roman Empire was upholding the Pax Romana… the so called ‘peace’ of Rome: the relative stability of their wider society… often enforced ruthlessly with the cross and the sword.
 
It’s worth noting that Luke lumps together the High Priests, Annas and Caiaphas, with the political Roman rulers. As a High Priest, one was supposed to be the recognized spiritual leader of Judah… the designated liaison between them and the Living God, ensuring that God’s people stood in right relationship with Him… not only in how they worshipped, but in how they lived each day. Long ago, the High Priests would have all descended from Aaron, the brother of Moses… but by this time, the High Priesthood had become highly politicized. The Roman authorities now claimed the right to choose the High Priest, selecting those that knew how to serve the interests of the Empire. Their sacred role for guiding God’s people had become a tool to appease the Emperor, which also put them in the position to find prosperity for themselves as well. Though they had wealth and political influence, Annas and Caiaphas and their crew were seen by many as corrupt… unfit to lead God’s people and guide them into life.
 
In complete contrast to all those powerful people, Luke then points us to John the Baptist: the wild man from the desert calling God’s people to turn around. Through John and his message, Luke is setting the stage for us to see the coming conflict between the ways of our world’s Empires, and the Kingdom of God… which in many ways will be what the rest of his Gospel, his ‘Good News’ story will be about… calling us to place our trust in God’s own Chosen King.
 
Luke tells us John “went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,” (Luke 1:3), which Luke then connects to the ancient prophetic word about preparing the way for God’s coming rescue.
“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” (Luke 1:4-6).
Leveling mountains, hills, and valleys. Making straight crooked ways, and smoothing out the rough paths… all so that all flesh shall see the salvation of God.
 
That doesn’t sound easy. That sounds like disruption. Upheaval. Not to mention, hard work.
 
 And how does this fit with how we tend to imagine peace in our own lives?
 
It can be so easy to equate ‘working for peace’ with ‘keeping quiet’… with ‘not rocking the boat’, and ‘not making a fuss.’ In some ways this makes straightforward sense: it seems unchristian to be contentious, so we try to avoid any conflict. Of course there’s a vital place for patience, gentleness, and longsuffering love in the Christian life, but there’s also a very real danger of distorting peace… of simply seeking to keep things running smoothly, of maintaining the status quo, even when that means allowing crooked ways to go unchecked, covering up abuse… and even enabling injustice. If the price of peace means doing nothing to stop the destruction at work around, and even inside of us, we need to stop and reflect on what kind of peace God really wants for us.
 
So what might God’s peace look like?
We can catch a good glimpse by looking closer at the Hebrew word for peace: shalom, which means far more than the ‘easy, unsteady peace’ that we too often settle for. According to John Goldingay, and Old Testament scholar, “The word shalom can suggest peace after there has been conflict, but it often points to a richer notion, of fullness of life.”[1] And another scholar goes even further explaining what this peaceful fullness entails: “It describes the ideal human state, both individual and communal, the ultimate gift from God.”[2]
And another scholar writes: “The concept of shalom… implies much more than mere absence of conflict. At root shalom means wholeness or well-being… shalom implies absence of conflict due to an absence of those things that cause conflict.[3] The peace that God is after does not come from covering up corruption, or refusing to look at and deal with the difficult things in our relationships, and in our lives. God’s peace calls us to seek wholeness, completeness, fullness of life… not just for me and mine, but for all. For everyone.
 
The Pax Romana, the peace of Rome was about what’s best for Rome. It worked pretty well for their economy, and for all those at the top, maintaining a fairly reliable status quo, with many benefits. But in doing so it perpetuated a society built on slave-labour, and the violent suppression of conquered people, and any who ‘stepped out of line’. It was driven by greed, and fear, and only upheld by bloodshed. But God’s shalom aims to set things right. God’s peace is pure peace.
 
Our Old Testament reading today from the prophet Malachi gives us this image of God’s coming messenger as one who will purify His people:
“For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap; 3 he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the Lord in righteousness. 4 Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years.” (Malachi 3:2-4).
Refining silver requires first melting it down, then removing all of the dross, the non-silver bits, so that all that’s left behind is pure. Malachi’s vision is one of God coming to cleanse and purify His people. Removing everything from them that gets in the way of true life. Fast forward to John the Baptist, who called all God’s people to wash in the waters of baptism… to repent, to turn from their crooked ways and find God’s compassion and forgiveness. To prepare for the coming of God’s Chosen King, the Messiah, who would not simply cleanse them with water, but with the refining, sanctifying fire of God’s Holy Spirit… purifying them inside and out so they can share God’s shalom.
 
God’s shalom, His pure peace is not about avoiding conflict, but being remade… the hard work of having our hills and mountains brought low, our valleys filled in, our crooked ways straightened.
 
What are some of the ways this cleansing work needs to happen in us? Where have we made peace to easily with the crooked ways of our world? Maybe we too have been guided by greed, or driven instead by fear? Maybe we just go along with it all because we simply can’t see any other way?
 
Thankfully, Luke’s whole Gospel shows us another way… the way of the Good News of Jesus Christ, God’s Chosen King, the Eternal Prince of Peace. Luke wants us to see that in Jesus, the Living God
“has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us.” (Luke 1:68-71).
John was to prepare God’s people for the pure peace that Jesus would bring: God’s great rescue, not through hiding our crookedness, but through forgiving us. Not imposing peace by shedding the blood of others with the sword, but creating shalom, cleansing us from all that stands between us and the LORD by taking our sins upon Himself on the cross, shedding His own blood to bring us life.
 
At the cross, Jesus did for us what we could not do: He gives us His own pure peace, so that His saving work can remake us. And continue remaking us more and more as we await His return. St. Paul makes this point in his letter to the Christians in Philippi, “that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” And he goes on to say: “For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the compassion of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God. (Philippians 3:6, 9-11).
 
The pure peace God longs to share with us is His gift of wholeness, of holiness, of fullness of life through Jesus our Lord. It is the result of His Spirit at work in us, remaking us to share in His Kingdom… to rid us of all that keeps us from truly loving and striving for peace within ourselves, with those closest to us, and even with our enemies, just as our Saviour Jesus Christ did for us to set us free.
 
At this time, when so many are finding themselves sitting alone in darkness, may the work of pure peace Christ has begun in us continue to grow more and more, not just for our sakes, but so that through us, God’s compassion and salvation might be known by all, and in all that we do may our Risen Saviour guide us into the way of His peace.
 
I’ll end now with the well known prayer attributed to St. Francis:
 
Lord, make us instruments of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let us sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is discord, union;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
Grant that we may not so much seek to be
consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.


[1] John Goldingay, Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone, Old Testament for Everyone (Louisville, KY; London: Westminster John Knox Press; Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2010), 204.
 
[2] Mark Allan Powell, ed., “Shalom,” The HarperCollins Bible Dictionary (Revised and Updated) (New York: HarperCollins, 2011), 942.
 
[3] Joanna Dewey, “Peace,” ed. Mark Allan Powell, The HarperCollins Bible Dictionary (Revised and Updated) (New York: HarperCollins, 2011), 763.

Scripture Readings: Jeremiah 33:14–16 | Psalm 25:1–10 | 1 Thessalonians 3:9–13 | Luke 21:25–36

​“Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (Luke 21:28).
 
Today we celebrate the first Sunday of Advent: a season of anticipation and preparation… getting ready for the coming of Jesus, first of all at His birth, but even more so His coming again at the end of time to bring God’s good kingdom to completion at last. It is a season meant to get us excited, but also to get us going… to inspire us to act, and remember what it means to share in Christ’s Kingdom today.
 
The Lutheran pastor and theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer puts it well: “The Advent season is a season of waiting, but our whole life is an Advent season, that is, a season of waiting for the last Advent, for the time when there will be a new heaven and a new earth.”[1]
 
Our Scripture readings today also invite us to reflect on what it means to await God’s Kingdom, and to do so in hope.
 
This morning our first reading comes from the prophet Jeremiah, who shared a message of hope for God’s people at a time when things looked pretty bleak. Within Jeremiah’s lifetime, the kingdom of Judah would fall to Babylon. The city of Jerusalem, and the Temple of Yahweh would be destroyed, and its people would be killed or carried off into exile.
 
But even so, the Living God gave these words to His people: “The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David; and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.  In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safety.” The LORD would be true to His word. Though they suffer, God would not abandon His people.
 
Though it was not in our reading today, Jeremiah’s prophecy goes on: “For thus says the Lord: David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel,  and the levitical priests shall never lack a man in my presence to offer burnt offerings, to make grain offerings, and to make sacrifices for all time.
…Thus says the Lord: If any of you could break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that day and night would not come at their appointed time, only then could my covenant with my servant David be broken, so that he would not have a son to reign on his throne, and my covenant with my ministers the Levites. Just as the host of heaven cannot be numbered and the sands of the sea cannot be measured, so I will increase the offspring of my servant David, and the Levites who minister to me… Thus says the Lord: Only if I had not established my covenant with day and night and the ordinances of heaven and earth, would I reject the offspring of Jacob and of my servant David and not choose any of his descendants as rulers over the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will restore their fortunes, and will have mercy upon them.” That was Jeremiah 33:17-18, 20-22, 25-26.
 
At a time when the kingdom of David’s descendants, and the priesthood of Israel were all in serious jeopardy, God was re-affirming His covenant promises, assuring His frightened people that even though they were headed for exile… that would not be the end of their story. They would return, and God’s kingdom and priesthood would never come to an end.  
 
Several centuries later, during the time of our Gospel reading this morning, the people of Judah were back in the land, but things were not yet as they should be: they had a royal family, but not from David’s line. Herod the “Great” and his sons had served as Israel’s rulers for some time, but only under the rule of the Roman Emperors who used them to “keep the peace.” A few weeks back we heard how Herod had rebuilt Solomon’s Temple, but by this time the priesthood had become compromised in the eyes of many… enmeshed in all the political power-games of the day. Though it was better than sitting in exile, God’s people were still waiting for the LORD to fulfill His promises… to bring in His ultimate, and unending Kingdom at last.
 
But Jesus’ words in our Gospel reading don’t seem to offer a hopeful picture. Instead, He’s warning His followers about the hard times to come. The words we heard today mark the conclusion of a much longer passage in which Jesus predicts the downfall of Jerusalem… it’s leaders, it’s Temple… and many of those who live there.
 
Right before our reading today, Jesus says this to His disciples in Luke 21:2-24, “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. Then those in Judea must flee to the mountains, and those inside the city must leave it, and those out in the country must not enter it; for these are days of vengeance, as a fulfillment of all that is written. Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress on the earth and wrath against this people; they will fall by the edge of the sword and be taken away as captives among all nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.”
 
Jesus goes on, as we heard, to speak of “signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations… People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.” (Luke 21:25-26). In other words, chaos. A world where everything that seemed steadfast and sure would suddenly come undone. Where even heaven and earth, it seems can no longer be counted on.
 
Doesn’t exactly seem like a hopeful message… but it’s one we might be able to appreciate a bit more these days, especially after COVID. So much of what we had trusted in has proven to be unsteady, leaving us longing… waiting for this season of fear and uncertainty to end.
 
But here is where Christ tells His disciples, including you and I today, to hold onto hope… to “stand up and raise [our] heads, because [our] redemption is drawing near.” For the Son of Man, the LORD’s Messiah, is coming in power and glory to bring about the Kingdom of God. Jesus calls us to trust, to place our hope, not in our own leaders, or piety, or power… but in Him, whose words are more faithful and enduring than Heaven and Earth.
 
He is the one we’re hoping for. He is the one we’re waiting for. The Son of God and Son of Man who will come again one day to bring God’s glorious redemption… the one who will fulfill the promises God made to His people. Jesus is the King of Kings… the Righteous Branch of David’s family, who as the Risen Lord will never leave His throne empty again.
 
Jesus is the Eternal High Priest, who offered up His own life at the cross as the ultimate sacrifice to save the world. In Jesus, God’s promised salvation has come, but not just for Judah and Israel, but for all nations… all people everywhere.
 
And as we hope and wait for Him to renew Heaven and Earth, Jesus puts His own Spirit within us so we can share in His rule and ministry. In Him, we are drawn together into what St. Peter called: “a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that [we] may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (1 Peter 2:9). As the Church, the body of Jesus, filled and empowered by His Holy Spirit, we are graciously being made a part of God’s promise through Jeremiah for kings and priests without number… called to make God’s kingdom and mercies known in every way we can.
 
In his book, Surprised By Hope, the bishop and scholar, N.T. Wright makes this point: “what we can and must do in the present, if we are obedient to the gospel, if we are following Jesus, and if we are indwelt, energized and directed by the Spirit, is to build for the kingdom.”[2] We’re called to actively participate in God’s mission here and now, resisting the real temptations that can so easily distract us.
 
In our Gospel reading, right after reminding us to place our hope in Him, Jesus tells us to “Be on guard so that [our] hearts are not weighed down with dissipation (that is, indulgence)… and drunkenness and the worries of this life” but to pray for the strength to stand before the Son of Man when He returns. And St. Paul, in our reading today from 1 Thessalonians, prays for these Christians to “increase and abound in love for one another and for all…” that the Lord may “strengthen [their] hearts in holiness that [they] may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.” (1 Thess. 3:12-13). Resisting the traps of overindulgence, and preoccupation with life’s distractions. Living lives of holy love, for one another and for all. These are the hallmarks of what it means to share in God’s Kingdom. This is how we anticipate and prepare for our LORD’s return.
 
Advent offers us hope that our Risen Lord is coming again to redeem Heaven and Earth, but it also invites us to put this hope into practice here and now… even in the midst of our own times of fear and uncertainty… when we are tempted to distract ourselves, and get caught up in other things… or when we are tempted to give up on the work of holy love. But in Jesus Christ, God calls us to take our part in His Kingdom. To place our hope in Him, and put our whole lives in His hands.
 
I’ll end now with another, longer quote from N.T. Wright, encouraging us not to lose heart as we wait for the Lord and get to work: “what you do in the Lord is not in vain. You are not oiling the wheels of a machine that’s about to fall over a cliff. You are not restoring a great painting that’s shortly going to be thrown on the fire. You are not planting roses in a garden that’s about to be dug up for a building site. You are—strange though it may seem, almost as hard to believe as the resurrection itself—accomplishing something which will become, in due course, part of God’s new world. Every act of love, gratitude and kindness; every work of art or music inspired by the love of God and delight in the beauty of his creation; every minute spent teaching a severely handicapped child to read or to walk; every act of care and nurture, of comfort and support, for one’s fellow human beings, and for that matter one’s fellow non-human creatures; and of course every prayer, all Spirit-led teaching, every deed which spreads the gospel, builds up the church, embraces and embodies holiness rather than corruption, and makes the name of Jesus honoured in the world—all of this will find its way, through the resurrecting power of God, into the new creation which God will one day make. That is the logic of the mission of God. God’s recreation of his wonderful world, which has begun with the resurrection of Jesus and continues mysteriously as God’s people live in the risen Christ and in the power of his Spirit, means that what we do in Christ and by the Spirit in the present is not wasted. It will last all the way into God’s new world.”[3] Amen.
 
 
 
 


[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God Is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas, ed. Jana Riess, trans. O. C. Dean Jr., First edition. (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 2.

[2] Tom Wright, Surprised by Hope (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2007), 218–219.

[3] Tom Wright, Surprised by Hope (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2007), 219–220.

Scripture Readings: 1 Samuel 1:4–20 | 1 Samuel 2:1–10 | Hebrews 10:11–25 | Mark 13:1–8

Hannah prayed and said, “My heart exults in the Lord; my strength is exalted in my God. (1 Samuel 2:1)
 
This morning we spent some time attending to the story of Hannah, an oppressed and despairing woman who comes to the LORD in search of mercy. Like all of the people that we encounter within the pages of Scripture, Hannah’s story might seems small, but it is a part of a much greater movement… the Living God’s own mission to rescue and re-create our broken world. Through Hannah’s pain-filled prayer and triumphant song, we can catch a glimpse of that mission at work… and see how it has the power, not just to change the world, but change us too.
 
Her story takes place in the distant past before Israel was a kingdom. Back then the Israelite tribes relied solely on local leaders. The closest thing they had to a central government was their priesthood: descendants of Aaron, Moses’ brother, from the tribe of Levi. And back then there was no Temple. No permanent structure dedicated to YWHW, the Living God. Instead, the presence of God among His people was marked by the Tabernacle,
the sacred Tent set up to house the Ark of the Covenant, which was like a portable throne where people would come and offer sacrifices and pray.
 
And this is where our reading today introduces us to Hannah, as she comes with her husband and his other wife and kids to worship, sacrifice, and pray.
 
Back then, it was not unheard of for Israelite men to have more than one wife, but to my knowledge in Scripture it’s never a recipe for marital bliss. And though Hannah’s husband loved her dearly, his other wife tormented her because Hannah was childless… seemingly unable to be a part of bringing about future generations for her family.
 
Many people have felt the sting of being unable to raise a child, though in her culture Hannah would have experienced deep shame as well. It was often believed that women who had no children were out of God’s favour. As if they must have done something wrong not to receive this blessing. Even the phrase used to describe Hannah’s situation points to God’s hand at work. “The LORD had closed her womb” we’re told… but never the reason why.  

What we are told is what Hannah does one day in her despair. She goes alone to the Tabernacle, to draw near to the presence of God, and bares her heart to Him in tearful prayers, seeking heavenly mercy. She pleads for a miracle… for a son, and then promises to give him back… to dedicate him to the LORD all the days of his life.
 
It’s then that we’re introduced to Eli, the priest in charge of the Tabernacle, who assumes from her strange behaviour that Hannah’s had too much to drink. If we were to read on in the book of first Samuel, we’d find other reasons to suspect Eli’s competence as God’s High Priest. Eli’s own sons were blatantly abusing their role as priests, extorting those who came to worship, and treating God’s holy place with contempt. They were making themselves comfortable and powerful at the expense of those who stood in need of their spiritual guidance and care. Rather than bring an end to their shameful practices, Eli simply scolded them, allowing the priesthood to fall into compromise and corruption. All this is a much longer story, but for now it’s enough to understand that when Eli sends Hannah away, asking the LORD to grant her request, we are not meant to imagine him as an ideal spokesperson for God. It is through a weak and failing High Priest that Hannah receives these words of hope: “Go in peace; the God of Israel grant the petition you have made to him.” (1 Samuel 1:17)  
 
And as the story goes, the LORD does grant her petition… He remembers Hannah’s sufferings and prayers, and gives to her a child, a boy she names Samuel. And true to her word, she gives him back to God, entrusting him to Eli, who raises Samuel to serve in the Tabernacle as well. But unlike Eli’s own sons, Samuel will grow to be a devoted priest, and prophet, who faithfully leads Israel for many years, and one day is chosen by God to anoint David, a humble shepherd boy to be their king, and from David’s family would one day come a king God promised would reign forever.
 
In turning to the LORD in her moment of suffering, Hannah becomes an integral part of the story of God’s kingdom coming. To herself and those around her, Hannah had seemed like a nobody. But the LORD heard her cry, and lifted her up in ways nobody imagined. And so Hannah’s song which we read together today reminds us of the signs of God’s kingdom: the overturning of corrupt rulers; the lifting up of the lowly; the re-creation of all that is broken is what God’s reign will bring.
 
But as both the Scriptures and our own experience makes plain, there are lots of signs that God’s reign is not yet complete in the world. That compromised, self-seeking rulers still hold others under their thumbs. That many who are low remain in very desperate straits. That we’ve built a world for ourselves on broken foundations that still need to be remade.
 
This leads us to our reading today from the Gospel of Mark… to some cryptic words that Jesus our Lord says to His confused disciples.
 
Our Gospel text today takes place at another sacred site… not the tabernacle of old, but the Temple of God in Jerusalem. Actually, this was the second Temple in Jerusalem. The first was built by Solomon, the son of King David, but it had been destroyed several centuries earlier when the armies of Babylon had destroyed the kingdom of Judah. The Temple in Jesus’ day had been built by those who returned from Exile in Babylon, decades later, and was famously and fabulously restored by King Herod “the Great”. Herod was really a puppet-king of Judea, who served the Roman Emperor. This was the same Herod who met with the Magi when they came from the East searching for the newborn “King of the Jews”, and the same Herod who ended up slaying the children of Bethlehem in order to stop this promised King from coming. Murdering innocent children, his own subjects, to hold onto power… Herod was a twisted example rulers who ‘do whatever it takes to get things done’, and the rebuilding of the Temple was one of his ambitious achievements.
 
Centuries after the Exiles returned, the Temple had now fallen into disrepair, and stood in serious need of renovation. As a means of securing his legacy, and the loyalty of his subjects, Herod began a decades-long project to restore and expand it. But as grand and as wonderful as his legacy work with the Temple may have appeared, Jesus reminds His followers that one day all of Herod’s accomplishments would be overturned.
 
Mark 13:1-2 “As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” Then Jesus asked him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.” All will be thrown down.
 
And He was right. 40 some years later, in 70 AD., after years of violent revolt by Judaean nationalists and would-be messiahs, the Roman armies would raze Jerusalem, and lay low Herod’s Temple for good.
 
Of course, Mark wants us to see that much more than a building was being spoken of. Echoing Hannah’s song, all those who were using this Temple to make themselves ‘great’ were being confronted as well… not only Herod, but the politically and spiritually compromised priesthood of Jesus’ day, the pillars of Jewish authority and power were being called into question too. As great as they all might seem, in God’s kingdom even these mighty institutions and rulers will be brought low, and the lowly will be raised to glory.
 
These kinds of words seem safe to us in the distant past, but what about in our own day? What are the mighty ‘buildings’ systems, or people that we can be so impressed with, even as they actually act to oppress others, and oppose God’s kingdom? How have we in the Christian Church become complicit ourselves? Siding with the powers of our day, instead of walking in our LORD’s ways, who teaches us to turn our eyes towards the lowly, whomever they may be, with eyes of mercy? How does God’s kingdom confront you and I?
 
But as important as these questions, and our response to them may be, Mark wants us to hear even more in Jesus’ words than that “all will be thrown down.” For Mark is telling the story of how God’s Son will be thrown down for us all on the cross. How He will endure great suffering and shame, and cry out in pain-filled prayer. How the One who is God’s own presence with us in the Temple of His body will be brought before and condemned by the corrupt kings and priest of His own people. How He will descend to be with and counted among the lowest of the lowly… to raise them up with Him, to share in His eternal Kingdom.
 
Our reading from the Letter to the Hebrews today draws all this out: reminding us that the revolution of God’s good kingdom comes not through proudly building ourselves up, or violently tearing others down, as wicked or compromised, or corrupt as they may be, but through the grace of the Living God, re-creating our world, and us in Jesus Christ, the Risen Lord.
 
Our passage from Hebrews 10 proclaims that Christ is the true and supreme King, the conqueror of the powers of darkness and death, and that He is reigning even now at God’s right hand… a reign which has no end. It proclaims that Christ is the perfect priest and ultimate sacrifice… able to intercede, and offer forgiveness of sins once and for all by His own blood shed… so that God’s law of holy, self-giving love might be written upon our hearts. That we too might be transformed even now… that our failures might be set right… that all that needs to be brought low in us might be leveled, so that God might raise us up to take our own parts in His life-giving story.
 
We can catch a glimpse of what this looks like in our lives in our reading from Hebrews as well. Hebrews 10:19-25. “Therefore, my friends, since we have confidence to enter the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus,  by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain (that is, through his flesh),  and since we have a great priest over the house of God,  let us approach with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who has promised is faithful. And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”
 
What role are we Christians called to play? We’re invited to come before the Living God with our sufferings and pain-filled prayers, along with the sufferings of our broken world with faith… with our lives purified from darkness and sin by what Jesus has done for us. We’re called to hold fast to the hope we confess, not just with our words, but provoking one another, to active love and good deeds. We are urged commit to gathering together so we can encourage each other, to come alongside and support each other as we walk in the ways of our Lord, anticipating the great Day when His Kingdom will be complete.  
 
Intertwined with the story of Hannah long ago, all the way through to the story of St. Luke’s Gondola Point, today, our Christian hope and confidence for the future cannot based on our buildings or legacies.  It cannot rest on seeking influence or power… or even in preserving our religious heritage. Our hope is, and always must be, built upon Jesus Christ: our Risen King of Kings and Perfect Priest, and on what the Living God has done through Him to raise us up. Amen.

Scripture Readings: Micah 4:1-5 | Psalm 46 | Romans 8:31-39 | John 20:19-22

“No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.” Romans 8:37.
 
This week we remember those from our families, our Parish, and communities who served this country during times of conflict and war. We acknowledge their suffering, and their sacrifice for us… laying their lives on the line for the sake of future generations they would never know.
 
We do not honour or glorify war itself. War is hell breaking loose on earth. No, we honour those who endured hell on earth so that others might be spared. We honour and give thanks for their courage, for their commitment, and we pray not to forget or take for granted the high cost others have paid for our lives. We remember them, in the hopes that one day all wars will be no more. Tragically, it’s all to clear that that day has not yet come.
 
Not only are there many places in our world today where brutal warfare continues, putting both military and civilian lives in serious threat, but there are other, less obvious but still destructive conflicts brewing all around us… tearing apart our families, communities, and countries. Over these past few years, especially since the pandemic began, it seems like the pressures to pick sides and turn on each other have only gotten worse. Suspicion, fear, and outright hatred seem to have firmly taken hold in our divided culture. In many ways, we seem to be at war with ourselves.
 
Of course, “If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand” (Mark 3:24). But that hasn’t seemed to slow the spread of this spirit of conflict at work these days. And even worse, some claiming the name of Jesus Christ our Lord are among the most vicious voices, causing all kinds of discord both inside and outside our Church communities. I am not saying there’s no room for tensions, or debates, or even arguments in the Church… but it matters a great deal what kind of spirit is at work in us when they happen. We can be right about the details, and dead wrong about the ways we share them. Especially when we forget the ways of the Living God.
 
Our first reading today from the prophet Micah helps us to remember that the Christian hope is not about “us vs. them”, but rather “God for us all”.
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Micah’s days were no less filled with conflict and bloodshed than our own, and Israel’s powerful enemies were always on the horizon. And yet, like many other faithful prophets, Micah was given a message that spoke of God’s future as one of peace, justice, reconciliation… of waring nations being brought together by the rule of the Living God.
 
Micah 4:3-4 says “He shall judge between many peoples, and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more; but they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken.”
 
Despite the divisions and conflicts marring God’s good world, the LORD has promised to bring His peace… to make “war to cease in all the world” (Psalm 46:9) as the Psalmist says. If this is the heart of God for His world, if this is the goal He longs to bring about, that gives us some indication of what He wants from His people today. But even more clearly, in Jesus Christ His Son, God reveals His heart and ways to us… calling us to trust and follow Him in His way as well.  
 
All throughout His ministry, our Lord laid His life on the line to bring us God’s peace: bringing freedom, healing, and release to those who were held in bondage. Confronting corruption and hypocrisy, in friends and foes alike. Offering God’s forgiveness to broken-hearted sinners. In countless ways Christ worked to end all that divides us from God and each other.
 
But nothing compares to His taking up the cross on our behalf… accepting our sentence of death Himself, all to secure our pardon. He did not shy away from enduring mockery and shame. He did not fight back or flee when they whipped and tortured Him. At the cross our Lord faced hell on earth, to bring an end to it’s reign. To make peace, not only for His friends, but for His enemies. To reconcile this waring world to God, and win it’s forgiveness by His own blood poured out, and His own body broken. At the cross, Christ reveals God’s self-sacrifice for the sake of us all. And in His death and resurrection, God’s Spirit of peace begins to breaks loose.    
John 20:19–21 “Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 20 After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. 21 Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
 
That first Easter Day the Risen Christ greets His frightened disciples by offering them peace and sending them into the world to share it. The Church throughout the ages has received of the peace of Christ as well: commissioned to carry this gift out into our world where it is dearly needed. But to do so, we can’t just talk about it. We actually have to live it. We are called to actively follow the way of Jesus every day… empowered by the Holy Spirit to resist the spirits of this age: fear, division, hatred, coercion… and instead to be led by His peace, generosity, love, self-control, kindness, gentleness faithfulness, patience, & joy.
 
This itself is a serious battle! To truly practice patience when everything seems urgent. To embody gentleness instead of lashing out when we are hurt. To choose self-control and faithfulness when all that is in us wants to run the other way. To walk in love when everyone around us wants us to hate.
 
St. Paul, in his letter to the Ephesians spoke of this ongoing spiritual battle, and how to prepare for it: Ephesians 6:10-17
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. 12 For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on that evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. 14 Stand therefore, and fasten the belt of truth around your waist, and put on the breastplate of righteousness. 15 As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace. 16 With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Truth, righteousness, faith, salvation, the word of God, and the Gospel of peace… this is our Lord’s way,  this is our way too. 

This is the battle Christ calls us to fight, the battle of faithfulness to God’s Kingdom of peace, truth, and love… looking forward to the day the Risen Lord Jesus causes us all to beat our swords into plowshares, and turn our spears into pruning hooks; when our nations shall not lift up swords against nation, and we shall not learn war any more. We are called to prepare ourselves even now for that coming day when the peaceable reign of the Living God will be completed at last.  
 
This week we rightly remember the sacrifice of our veterans, and we have much to be inspired by their courageous examples, especially in their willingness to suffer for the sake of others. But we must also remember our ultimate battle is not against fellow people… it is the battle against the spirit of darkness that’s already been won by Jesus Christ at the cross… His victory, which we are called to share in by the way we live each day… Not taking His sacrifice for granted, but through the Holy Spirit’s power living in the light of God’s peace and holy love.
 
I’ll close now with these beautiful words from our New Testament reading this morning, reminding us that whatever troubles we face, no matter how hard the fight may seem, our Saviour is with us, and will be forever.
 
Romans 8:37–39 “37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Amen.
 

Scripture Readings: Isaiah 25:6–9 | Psalm 24 | Revelation 21:1–6 | John 11:32–44

“Jesus said to her, ‘Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?’”
(John 11:40).
 
Today we celebrate together the feast of All Saints, remembering that in Christ we share in His holy, world-wide communion… stretching not only across the globe, but across all ages as well. Each one of us who belong to Christ… our Parish family… we never stand alone, but belong together in God’s eternal Kingdom.
 
Our Scripture readings today highlight an enduring message of hope for God’s people, empowering us to faithfully persevere even in the face of despair.
 
Our first reading from the Prophet Isaiah came at a dark time in Israel’s past: the ancient empire of Assyria was violently dominating the whole region, and had just overrun and carried off the Northern Kingdom of Israel into Exile. The Southern Kingdom of Judah was now surrounded… hemmed in by hostile nations, and living under the constant threat of losing everything. In this dark time the Living God sent Isaiah, to remind His people to stand firm and be faithful to their LORD, trusting in Him even in the face of their powerful enemies.
 
Today’s reading stands out in Isaiah as a surprisingly hope-filled passage… promising not just Judah’s deliverance, but God’s ultimate victory, not through destruction and death, like the Assyrians… but through the destruction of death.
 
Isaiah paints a picture of universal peace… of the Living God drawing all peoples to Jerusalem to share in a splendid feast. And the LORD Himself will “destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken” (Isaiah 25:7-8). A royal feast for all, death itself destroyed, God wiping away the tears from every eye… this is the future hope of God’s eternal Kingdom.
 
We know this wasn’t the end of Judah’s troubles. Not by a long-shot. But they would hold onto this hopeful promise, for centuries to come… helping them to trust in the LORD, and in His saving love.
 
Our second reading today from the final book of the Bible, the book of Revelation draws on and renews the message God gave to Isaiah. Revelation was written near the end of the first century A.D., at a time when followers of Christ could expect to face serious trouble as well. As the Gospel spread throughout the Roman Empire and beyond, Christians were often the target of official persecution, or rejection from their old communities for embracing this new way of life.
 
In Revelation, John shares an epic vision, rich with symbolic imagery drawing together all of the themes that run throughout the Scriptures… and opening up our eyes to see our world from God’s perspective. It is an intense, startling, and all too frequently misunderstood message, drawing our attention to the ultimate end of the ages. And again, Revelation points us towards the arrival of God’s eternal Kingdom, calling for Christians to remain faithful to Christ even in the face of death.
 
This time though, it’s not just the nations that are being gathered together, but Heaven and Earth are reconciled, united together for good through the victory of Jesus; the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Our reading today is the consummation of God’s great rescue mission… the ultimate wedding feast celebrating His perfect salvation… destroying every obstacle that keeps us from His love:
 
“See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them /as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away” (Revelation 21:3-4).
 
God Himself will be with them. Death will be no more. The LORD will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Again, we are given a glimpse of God’s eternal Kingdom, promised to us by the one who is “making all things new” (Revelation 21:5).
 
We know that Christians continued to face all sorts of persecution over the centuries, and in many places today our brothers and sisters still suffer for Jesus’ sake. But this vision of God’s eternal Kingdom of life continues to carry us through… providing us with the hope that our Saviour will have the final say.
 
These days, of course, we face our own challenges, temptations, and fears. Each generation of God’s people have our own narrow path to tread. Right now, most of us are concerned with the health and wellbeing of our loved ones, our friends, or even ourselves. We’re feeling cut off, and isolated from those we long to be with. We’re uncertain about the future of every aspect of our lives. We’re in need today of a hope that we can truly hold onto.
 
Our Gospel reading reminds us that the Christian hope is not just for some distant day at the end of time… No, God’s eternal Kingdom has already broken into human history in Jesus Christ. Our reading today gives us a hope-filled glimpse of His ultimate victory, as our Saviour comes face to face with the death of someone He loves.
 
There are many miracle stories in the Gospels, accounts of Jesus restoring the broken bodies… and spirits… and families of His people. But today we hear that He comes to bring the restoration of His friends… Lazarus, Martha, and Mary, who had all been torn apart by Lazarus’ death. This is one of the most stirring and striking stories in all of Scripture, pointing us to the climax of the cross that is soon to come, and it is well worth more time and reflection than we can give to it this morning.
 
But as our Saviour, the incarnate King of glory confronts death at the tomb of Lazarus, He reveals God’s life-giving power for us even now… inviting you and I to see where Christ can be found today in the midst of our darkest moments…. bringing His eternal Kingdom near.
 
How does Jesus reveal God’s eternal Kingdom of life in the face of death? First of all, He weeps. Jesus grieves at the grave of His friend.
 
Too often in Church, we have this picture of Jesus untouched by pain or tragedy. We might see Him as merciful, or compassionate, but in a distant, untroubled way. We assume for Jesus to be God’s Son, all-knowing and all-powerful, nothing could really disturb His sense of composure or peace. But what if the fact that Jesus is God’s Son… that He fully shares in the power and knowledge of the Trinity, what if that actually makes Him more open to being moved by the suffering and grief of His people, not less? What if, in taking on our human flesh, Jesus did not hold back, but actually bears our griefs and sorrows like the prophet Isaiah says?
 
“He was despised and rejected by others;  a man of suffering and acquainted with infirmity; and as one from whom others hide their faces he was despised, and we held him of no account.
Surely he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed” (Isaiah 53:3-5).
 
Jesus our Saviour weeps with Mary and Martha at the grave of Lazarus, and He weeps with us, suffering with us in His love. This simple act tells us that it is not wrong for Christians to grieve. That having hope does not leave us unmoved by the pain and loss that we and others face. Rather, it shows us that we are called to share in the suffering of others. St. Augustine once said “Why did Christ weep except to teach us to weep?”[1] As we wait for God’s eternal Kingdom in which He will wipe every tear away, Christ calls us today to mourn with those who mourn, just as He does. To make known God’s unfailing love to the brokenhearted.
 
Our Saviour teaches us to weep, but also to believe. To place our faith in Him, not only to grieve but to give life. Even in the midst of their pain, Jesus invites Martha and Mary to trust Him, and if they do, despite all their fears, “they will see the glory of God.” (John 11:40). Jesus then prays, not for His own sake, but that all those present may come to believe that God the Father always hears the prayers of His beloved Son.
 
We too are invited to put our confidence and trust in Jesus Christ, placing our future hopes and present fears into His loving hands, that He may intercede for us… praying on our behalf… bringing us with all our cares and sorrows to the Father, who so loved the world that He sent the Son to rescue us.  
 
We can all think up lots of reasons not to believe in Jesus, but we are assured that faith in Him is truly the path to life. As the scholar Ben Myers puts it: “At the center of the Christian faith is not an idea or a theory or even a vision of life but the name of a person, Jesus Christ. Our faith centers on personal attachment to him.”[2] And as our Gospel reading today reminds us when we do believe in Him, all sorts of glorious, life-giving surprises await.
 
For Jesus does more than mourn, and invite us to trust in Him… in the words of a beautiful old hymn: “He speaks, and listening to His voice new life the dead receive.”[3] Against all hope… all reasonable expectations… Jesus calls for Lazarus to come out of the tomb… out of death… and he obeys. No longer the undefeatable foe, the grave gives way before the Lord of Life. A foretaste of Christ’s final victory at the cross, and Easter morning.

For that is when God’s eternal Kingdom of life truly began… the first moment when death itself was swallowed up “forever.” N.T. Wright makes this point:  “Lazarus came back into ordinary human life. For him, the process of death was simply reversed. He could still become ill again. One day, he too would die… But the journey Jesus would make would be through death and out the other side into a new sort of life.[4]  One which will never taste death again.
 
This is the same New Life that Jesus offers to those who trust in Him; that passing through death united to Him, we await a resurrection life. Reunited with all the saints all who trust in Christ throughout the ages, gathered together at God’s table for all eternity. Where every tear from every eye is wiped away in His love. Sharing in the eternal Kingdom Christ won for us all at the cross.
 
Christians believe in the Communion of Saints; that in Christ Jesus, all believers are bound together in ways that even death cannot break. Whether we are isolated, or surrounded by our sisters and brothers… whether we feel cut off, or are able to be embraced… whether we died millennia ago, or will live ‘til the Lord returns, we are all one, always, together in Christ with all the saints.
 
So may our fellowship with one another be shaped by this beautiful truth. May we bear each other’s burdens, and support one another in times of sorrow. May we spur one another on to grow stronger together in our faith. May we serve God’s eternal Kingdom today, sharing Christ’s self-giving love. And may we rejoice as we remember that our world ends in life together. Amen.



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[1] St. Augustine, Tractates on the Gospel of John, 49.19. Quoted in Thomas C. Oden and Cindy Crosby, eds., Ancient Christian Devotional: A Year of Weekly Readings: Lectionary Cycle B (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2011), 252.

[2] Ben Myers, The Apostles’ Creed: A Guide to the Ancient Catechism, ed. Todd Hains, Jeff Reimer, and Sarah Awa, Christian Essentials (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2018), 37.

[3] Charles Wesley, O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing.

[4] Tom Wright, John for Everyone, Part 2: Chapters 11-21 (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 15–16.
 

Scripture Readings: Jeremiah 31:7–9 | Psalm 126 | Hebrews 7:23–28 | Mark 10:46–52

“Then Jesus said to him, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man said to him, “My teacher, let me see again.”” (Mark 10:51).
 
A lot has happened to the outside of St. Luke’s Church this past month. After years of hopes and plans, and service, our building restoration work is now almost complete. That said, our restoration fundraising is still very much in progress. Right now we’re about one third of the way towards our fundraising goal. Much has already been accomplished, but we know there’s still much to do. Even so, it’s wonderful to actually see the longed-for restoration actually taking place.
 
There are of course many other kinds of restoration we’re still longing for: pre-COVID-19 rhythms of life… full pews, and a packed Sunday school… reunions or reconciliations with those we love… healings of our bodies, our minds, and our souls.
 
Our Scripture readings today from Jeremiah and the Gospel of Mark give us much to contemplate when it comes to hope of restoration.

Things were looking pretty grim in Jeremiah’s days. Israel’s Northern tribes had already been overrun by Assyria, their people taken away as slaves, and scattered out among the nations. Those left in the Southern Kingdom of Judah, reduced to the region around Jerusalem, had survived Assyria’s onslaught, but were now living in the shadow of another ancient superpower: Babylon.
 
By the time of our reading today from Jeremiah Chapter 31, Babylon had already defeated Judah once, and had taken away it’s royalty and upper classes into exile. This was a crushing blow to Judah’s people, who were on the brink of collapse… so many were trying to come up with plans to regain their nation’s independence… to find powerful allies to help them break free of Babylon. At this crucial time, Jeremiah kept preaching an unpopular message from the LORD God: that there was no way to go back, or to fight off this enemy… because it was God Himself who was sending Judah into Exile.
 
In Jeremiah 29:4-6, the prophet sends word to those already in Exile, dashing their hopes, fed by several false prophets, that Judah’s pain would soon be over, and that things would shortly go back to normal. “4 Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5 Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease.” Settle in, God says to His people. Learn to live in this strange land. The message was clear: they would not be going back to the lives they once had known.
 
But despite this heart-breaking message, the LORD gives His people unexpectedly good news too. Through Jeremiah, God promises that even though Exile seems like an utter defeat for Judah, there’s far more to their story, and their future, then they imagined… and God gives them a mission, a purpose to take part in they would never have expected.
 
Jeremiah goes on to write to the exiles in 29:7
“7 But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” Seek the welfare… of Babylon? Pray to the LORD for their worst enemy? Why? “For in its welfare you will find your welfare.” In this bizarre twist, Judah’s ultimate fate was now bound up with the fate of their Babylonian conquerors. They were to become neighbours, and seek to prosper together, side by side. While in Exile, God wanted His people to focus not on doing whatever it takes to get back to the ‘good old days’, but to play a real part in blessing their new neighbours, who knew nothing about the Living God. This was the surprising work the LORD had prepared for them to do.
 
But the people of Judah were also promised they would eventually return to their land. The LORD had not forgotten them, and was still their loving Saviour.
 
In Jeremiah 29:11-14, God makes this promise to His people: “11 For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. 12 Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. 13 When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, 14 I will let you find me, says the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.” God still had plans for His people… plans for their good… for a future with hope! Restoring, not only their fortunes, but their whole community that had been scattered and lost… and most of all, restoring their communion with their Saving LORD. God was going to restore all that had been broken or lost… He would restore them.
 
With this promise in mind, we can hear much more fully the joyful words of hope found in our first reading this morning from Jeremiah 31. “7 For thus says the Lord: Sing aloud with gladness for Jacob, and raise shouts for the chief of the nations; proclaim, give praise, and say, “Save, O Lord, your people, the remnant of Israel.” 8 See, I am going to bring them from the land of the north, and gather them from the farthest parts of the earth, among them the blind and the lame, those with child and those in labor, together; a great company, they shall return here.” This scared and scattered people will be reunited and restored. Not just the strong and powerful, but even the most vulnerable as well… the blind, the lame, those about to give birth... no one is to be left out of God’s restoration of His people.
 
Let’s turn now to Mark’s Gospel, where we have already seen God’s restoration at work in and through Jesus Christ… even though at this point of the story the ultimate act of restoration at the cross has not yet occurred.
 
Today’s reading takes place as Jesus is on the way to Jerusalem… in fact, this was His last encounter before His triumphant entry on Palm Sunday. He’s passing through Jericho, preparing to confront Israel’s leadership and face His own death, when suddenly Jesus hears the voice of a blind man, named Bartimaeus, crying out for His help: “Jesus, Son of David,” he shouts “have mercy on me!” (Mark 10:47).  It is a cry of desperation… and a cry of hope. Giving voice to his heart’s longing to receive his own restoration.
 
But Bartimaeus’ cry is not welcomed by the crowd surrounding Jesus. Mark tells us that “Many sternly ordered him to be quiet” (Mark 10:48). Cries for help and cries of hope, of course, can be quite disruptive. Disruptive to those who want things to keep on going, just as they are. Disruptive to those who only have their own agendas in mind. Disruptive to those who have no time for people who seem hopeless. Yet Bartimaeus keeps on crying out, and Jesus stops dead in His tracks.
 
Christ turns to those surrounding Him, and says to them: “Call him here.”
 
Imagine this scene playing out. Try to picture it in your head. Picture Jesus, and the crowd, and blind Bartimaeus, loudly crying out. Yet Jesus doesn’t go to him. He stands still instead, and tells those following Him to call the blind man to come.
 
Why does Jesus do this? He could have healed the man from a distance. He could have walked a few steps back to meet him. Why does this scene Mark gives to us play out the way it does? Who knows why? But one thing we can know is what happened as a result: Jesus involved everyone… the disciples, the crowd and Bartimaeus… and restored them all.
 
First of all, the disciples and the crowd. Many of them, Mark tells us, tried to sternly order the man to be quiet. Many of those who were following Jesus had hearts that were closed off to the man’s cries. So Jesus directly involves them… He tells them to change their course completely. Rather than discouraging Bartimaeus, Christ tells them to draw him near instead. Those who had once been an obstacle of grace, getting in the way, were now to become a means of this blind beggar receiving grace.
 
There is certainly a message here for those of us who follow Christ. How often have we Christians acted as obstacles to God’s grace? Discouraging others who desperately need new life by our actions or words… forgetting that our Lord has come to seek and to save the lost… to restore them in His mercy, and reconcile us all by His own blood.
 
Yet, even when we forget, and fail, we are still not without hope. The LORD remembers the plans He has for His people… plans to make us a part of His restoration work… which often needs to take place again and again, within our hearts too.
 
So, Christ restores the hearts of His followers, by calling them to embody His mercy, and invite this blind man to get up and come to Him.
 
Bartimaeus doesn’t miss a beat. He leaps up, throwing off his cloak, and makes his way to Jesus… most likely still relying on others to help get him there. Then Jesus asks a poignant question: “What do you want me to do for you?” (Mark 10:51). Not long before, in Mark 10:36 Christ had asked this very same question of two of His own disciples, James and John, when they had come to Him hoping for places of honour for themselves in His kingdom.
 
Jesus replied to their bold request by saying “You do not know what you are asking” (Mark 10:38). They still could not see what Jesus and God’s kingdom was really about. Then He turns to the rest of the disciples and tries again to drive home the point that God’s kingdom is not about status or power, but service and self-giving love.
 
Jesus says in Mark 10:42-45 “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 43 But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. 45 For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”
 
The disciples still hoped that Jesus was going to offer them their own kind of kingdom. Instead He invites them to offer their lives in service to God’s kind of kingdom… one shaped by humility, and sharing healing, and hope.
 
This is the same invitation that Jesus offers us again today, to put our hopes and plans in the service of God’s hopes and plans for His world. Like the people of Judah in exile long ago, God is calling us to turn with eyes of love towards our own community… to seek to bless our flesh and blood neighbours, many who do not know much about the Living God. We are called to seek their wellbeing and pray for them, knowing that our fates are all intertwined… and trusting that God’s promised restoration in Jesus Christ, the Good News that we the Church have been entrusted with is meant for them just as much as it is meant for you and I.
 
And again, Jesus our Lord is calling us not to disregard those crying out in desperation and hope… those longing for new life, in body, mind, and spirit… to tell them that Jesus is calling for them… that He has heard their cries. That all who are broken and lost have a place in God’s good plan to reconcile and restore His world… God’s re-creation work begun and fulfilled by Christ at the cross.
 
Things may never go back to the way they once were… but our crucified and Risen Saviour has promised us a future with hope as He makes all things new. The question for us is will we believe that the Living God remains at work? That what He had planned long ago and accomplished at the cross will one day be complete? And that even now, His Spirit is drawing us into God’s great restoration?
 
In response to Jesus’ question, Bartimaeus simply says ““My teacher, let me see again.” 52 Jesus said to him, “Go; your faith has made you well.” Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.” (Mark 10:51-52). May the Lord Jesus Christ restore our sight to see and take part in His good kingdom. May the Holy Spirit restore within us all that is broken, lost, and needing repair. May our Heavenly Father draw us together with our neighbours in His eternal love. And may we too have faith to share in God’s great restoration. Amen. 

Gathering with us this Sunday as we marked the Feast of St. Luke was our Archbishop David Edwards and Archbishop Linda Nicholls, the Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada. Archbishop David was the Celebrant, and Archbishop Nicholls offered the sermon. Here is her message for our Parish.

And here are some more photos from Sunday's service.