12/02/2012 ~ First Sunday of Advent ~ Hope ~ Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36 ~ The First Sunday in Year ‘C’ on the Three Year Cycle of Lectionary Readings on the Church Calendar ~ The Sunday on Which the Christian Virtue of Hope Is Celebrated ~ Communion Sunday.
The Promise
“The days are surely coming, says Yahweh, God, when I will bestow on the house of Israel and the house of Judah all the blessings I promised.” — Jeremiah 33:14
I have mentioned my late Uncle, my Father’s brother Edward, on a couple of occasions. He was, in many ways, a consummate native of New York City, a New Yorker to his very bones. Unlike some natives of the city, he did drive. On the other hand, he never traveled too far.
For those of you who have seen the musical Guys and Dolls, I am fond of saying he was the last of the real, in the flesh, Damon Runyon characters. Guys and Dolls could have been easily written about him.
For those of you who don’t know a thing about Guys and Dolls or Damon Runyon, suffice it to say he was the kind of guy who maintained a credit line with his own personal bookie and would place a bet on anything. He was known to gamble on horse races, on football games, on baseball games— how long a pigeon would stay on the ground eating bread crumbs Ed had dropped before taking flight.
And Uncle Ed, true to the idea of not traveling very far from mid-town Manhattan, was fond of saying if you lived in New York City you did not have to travel anywhere. Everything would eventually come to you. He also said if you just stood at the so called the crossroads of the world, Times Square, for twenty-four hours, you were as likely as not to see everything— or at least see everything you ever needed to see.
I was reminded of him saying that this week because I stumbled across proof of the premise that you can see anything in New York City. I read an article in the New York Times about camels walking down West Fifty-first Street in the city, just a little way from Times Square. So, how amazing is it that you can see camels in New York City— on West Fifty-first Street? Strange, right? (Slight pause.)
Now, I know this is very New York City of me, but those of you who have never been to the Christmas Show at Radio City Music Hall, you must go see it. The show is at one in the same time, awful and magnificent, breath taking and tasteless. It often contains every last bad popular Christmas song you can think of. Then, ending on a note of sincerity, it presents a breathtaking nativity tableau with live actors and live animals.
And that’s where the camels walking down West Fifty-first Street come it. It turns out the camels in the show need to be walked every morning.
When I read the article, I was pleased to find out the animals— a sheep, a donkey and the camels— are from a Sanctuary for Animals. Not only that, but the sheep, the donkey and the camels earn enough money with this gig that they, thereby, support the many other creatures who live at the Sanctuary for whole the year. [1]
All of that, of course, comes back to the thesis my Uncle maintained: you can see anything in New York City, even camels walking down the street near Times Square. Based on this premise, you’d have to say it’s not just the place to be. It’s the center of the universe. And that’s what Ed really thought: New York City is the center of the universe.
But please don’t take that idea literally. In fact, I don’t for a second believe when Ed said New York is the center of the universe he was thinking about a place. He was thinking about himself. You see, if you can maintain a fantasy which says you live at the center of the universe, you can maintain a fantasy which says you, yourself, are at least a part of the center of the universe. (Slight pause.)
And these words come to us from the Scroll of the Prophet Jeremiah: “The days are surely coming, says Yahweh, God, when I will bestow on the house of Israel and the house of Judah all the blessings I promised.” (Slight pause.)
Yes, I too am a native of New York City. And yes, I do have a certain passion for it. But no, I do not believe it is the center of the universe. Nor do I believe Jerusalem is the center of the universe. Nor do I believe London or Moscow or Tokyo or Addis Ababa or even Norwich, New York, is the center of the universe. Nor do I believe I am the center of the universe.
But it does seem to me we all tend to ask the question and even like to ask the question about the location of the center of the universe, perhaps in the hope it might be nearby. But I think we mislead ourselves when we put the center of the universe in a location. The center of the universe, after all, is not about ‘where.’ (Slight pause.)
In this passage the prophet Jeremiah says Yahweh, GOD, will bestow all the blessings promised. So, what blessings are these? What blessing are these? And how do they work themselves out? Are they located in a place? (Slight pause.)
If you didn’t notice it already, we have entered the season of Advent. Advent is celebrated to move both individuals and the church out of the season just completed, Pentecost, Ordinary Time. How? Advent refreshes the proclamation of good news and claims the grace of God is impending. This grace insists God is about to present fresh possibilities for wholeness— fresh possibilities for wholeness.
Advent can do this because it has two faces, two orientations. It looks first to the past and offers a recapitulation of the longing with which people of faith live in a bygone era, an era which anticipated the coming of the Messiah. And Advent also looks to the future with an attitude of expectancy— expectancy concerning what God has yet to do in the life of humankind.
That brings me back to the promises of God. I think a promise of God is to walk with us all of our days. It is a part of the covenant God makes with all humankind. And Jesus is the symbol, the sign yes, the embodiment of that covenant. Jesus is the fulfillment of that covenant.
You see, I think that idea— the idea that God walks with us— is a part of the promise to which Jeremiah refers. And certainly one of the blessings of God is the journey we take called life.
The journey is not always easy. Life is not always easy. Only a fool or the truly naïve would say life is always easy.
But the covenant insists God is at our side throughout the journey even when life is not easy. And that— that is where location really comes in: God is at our side.
Which brings me back to Uncle Ed. In one sense, he was right: life can be and most of the time is a gamble. It can be treacherous, even frightening. In another sense, he was wrong. The center of the universe is not located in a place. The center of the universe is not located with us.
The center of the universe is with God. And God walks with us. (Slight pause.)
A friend of mine posted this quote by the Austrian poet Rainer Rilke on Facebook this week. (Quote:) “Be patient toward all that is unresolved in your heart…. Try to love the questions themselves…. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given because you would not be able to live them— and the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answers.” (Slight pause.)
What is the hope we address in Advent? I think the message of hope in Advent, the message of the Prophet is this: God lives. God loves. God walks with us. Amen.
12/02/2012
United Church of Christ, First Congregational, Norwich, New York
ENDPIECE: It is the practice of the Pastor to speak after the Closing Hymn, but before the Congregational Response and Benediction. This is an précis of what was said: “I saw something else on Facebook this week. (The pastor holds up a sign which says this: ‘Be the “IS” in Christmas.’) Be the ‘IS ’ in Christmas. As Christians, we live in hope. Hope is an active word. Hope is constant, real, alive. Hope— an ‘IS’ word.”
BENEDICTION: Let us go in joy and in love and in peace, for our hope is in the one who has made covenant with us. God reigns. Let us go in God’s peace. And may the face of God shine upon us; may the peace of Christ rule among us; may the fire of the Spirit burn within us this day and forevermore. Amen.
[1] NY Times ~ 11/29/2012 ~ A Closely Guarded Secret: When the Camels Go for a Walk By Jim Dwyer
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/30/nyregion/christmas-show-camels-walk-time-a-closely-guarded-secret.html
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