12/23/2012 ~ Fourth Sunday of Advent ~ Joy ~ Micah 5:2-5a; Luke 1:46b-55 or Psalm 80:1-7; Hebrews 10:5-10; Luke 1:39-45, (46-55).

Equity and Equality

These words are from Luke/Acts in the section known as Luke: “You have brought down, / deposed the powerful, the mighty / from their thrones, / and raised the lowly to high places; / You have filled the hungry / with good things, / while You have sent / the rich away empty.” — Luke 1: 52-53.

    Well I suppose I need to start by saying I presume you all noticed the world did not end on Friday.  Did it?  You are all here, are you not?  (Well, I suppose some of you are here, kind of— but— different issue.)  [Slight pause.]
    Next, having at the beginning of the service addressed receiving the Christmas Fund offering, here is a question.  And, by the way, it’s not a question about any kind of apocalypse.  Which is to say, it is a question not to be taken lightly.  (Slight pause.)
    From where do pastors come?  After all, pastors are not hatched nor do they arrive in the beak of a stork.  (Slight pause.)
    In our tradition, pastors start as members of the laity who sit among us, in the pews of our churches.  These prospective pastors, people who are possibly pastors, are identified by other members of the laity who sit with them in those pews.  So, pastors are members of the laity whom other members of the laity identify as having the necessary gifts to do the work of being a pastor.
    And so it came to pass I was identified by members of the laity in First Parish Church, United Church of Christ of Brunswick, Maine.  It was the members of that church, having indicated to me that I might have the necessary gifts for ministry, who plucked me from the pew and sent me to Bangor Theological Seminary.
    Please notice— I said I might have the gifts.  They thought I had the gifts.  Sometimes the process is hard.  You see, the wash out rate of students in Main Line Seminaries is higher than the wash out rate in law school, notorious for its wash out rate.
    Don’t let anyone tell you seminary is an easy road.  If a seminary does not question everything you ever believed about God and everything you ever believed about yourself, that institution is doing it wrong.
    But that’s a side matter.  I’d like to get back to the church who send me to seminary, First Parish in Brunswick.  (And, by the way, since a church is a group of people, not a building, ‘who,’ the word I just used— ‘the church who sent me’— ‘who’ is the appropriate pronoun to use when referring to a church.)
    Needless to say, I still have ties at First Parish.  I still have friends there.  I still get their monthly newsletter.  And, whereas we, in this church, have no plans to send out our January newsletter until January 4th, I already have the January newsletter of First Parish, Brunswick in my hand.
    In that newsletter the pastor, Mary Baard told this story and I’ve asked her permission to use it.  Further, and as a ‘heads up,’ I may even use this story again in our own newsletter.  The story ends with a poem not written by Mary, which I also have permission to use.
    These are the words of the Rev. Ms. Baard in that newsletter (quote): “On January 13, 2013 we will celebrate baptisms with people who range in age from a toddler to adult.  It is a profound blessing to share in this sacred ritual with one another, as we remember God’s love for each person and we promise our love, support and care for the people being baptized.  In the wake of the Newtown tragedy, we realize again how essential it is for communities to support one another.”
    “A year ago, at the beginning of 2012, we celebrated baptism with Caroline Gill, age 12 at that time, who just a few months before that had expressed an interest in going to church.  Soon after her baptism, she wrote this poem.  We printed in it in the March newsletter, but it seems appropriate to share it again,” says Mary.  (Slight pause.)
    This is the poem.  Its title is Baptism.  I’ve placed a copy of it on an insert in the bulletin.  Do read along.  It might help you understand it.

        Baptism

        I am nervous, shaking
        I am tall among taller
        I am one inside one million
        I am taken, taken to the water
        I am amazed, hypnotized
        By its shine its crystal-ness.
        I am asked, answered
        I am standing
        I am blessed
        I am wet with His love,
        soaked in His warmth
        I am still one but now in
        one million loving hearts.
        I am Caroline
        I am ♥ †

    — sign of a heart, sign of a cross— printed on that page.  (Slight pause.)  And these words are from the work known as Luke: “You have brought down, / deposed the powerful, the mighty / from their thrones, / and raised the lowly to high places; / You have filled the hungry / with good things, / while You have sent / the rich away empty.”  (Slight pause.)
    The texts for this Fourth Sunday in Advent capture something of the flavor theologians constantly attribute to the entire Bible, a flavor, an attitude they call “already and not yet.”  The Micah reading appears in a context that reflects difficult times for the people of God.  Many scholars believe Micah wrote around the time of the fall of Jerusalem in 587 Before the Common Era.
    At one point the Prophet suddenly begins to speak in tones of joy.  Little Bethlehem, of small consequence in so many ways, will give to Israel the One who will rule in peace.
    And this is to be no ordinary ruler of the house of David but one whose origins are (quote) “from ancient days” and whose (quote) “greatness” shall (quote) “reach to the ends of the earth.”  This rule and this ruler is yet to come, but the joyful effect is already felt in the hearts of those who are aware of the nearness and the reality of this one.  (Slight pause.)  “Already and not yet.”  (Slight pause.)
    And then there is Luke.  Yes, this story concentrates on Mary and Elizabeth.  But there is so much more.  In the details we find exactly what Luke writes about throughout Luke/Acts and a good deal of it is about “already and not yet.”
    Just like Hannah the spirit of Mary rejoices in God.  These words mirror the song of Hannah.  And the words speak of the redeeming work of God not as in the future but as already having been fulfilled.  Such is the confidence of faith.
    Further, the overthrow of the powerful both has and will come about through the mounting up of the weak in rebellion.  And it will also come to fruition because of the coming of God in the weakness of a child.
    The couplets of the Magnificat, this Scriptural poem, describe the dramatic reversal that is the signature of the acts of God— God on the side of the outcast.  I suspect we have heard the Magnificat of Mary so often we may have forgotten its subversive, revolutionary, dangerous power.  The proud are scattered, the powerful deposed.
    By contrast, the lowly are exalted, the hungry fed while the rich are sent away empty.  Further, the Magnificat, more so than any predictions of what is to come, praises God for the goodness of the nature of God and the redemption Israel.  It is our hope that this the nature of God that we, the church, have experienced.  (Slight pause.)
    That brings me back to the apocalypse which has not happened.  You see, the reality of an apocalypse from the Biblical prospective is exactly as Micah and the Magnificat suggest.  It is “already and not yet.”
    It is already and not yet because there is an important ingredient missing.  And that ingredient, that part, is us.  As the 12 year old Caroline Gill obviously already knows (quote): “I am still one but now in / one million loving hearts.”
    You see, in the work known as Luke Jesus, the Messiah, is clearly born among the poor and lowly and the birth is clearly announced to poor and lowly.  And the call Luke makes to us is a call to all of us to action— action to do the will of God to work toward the dominion of God, even though the dominion is both “already and not yet.”
    Caroline Gill, age 12, clearly knows the birth of the Messiah, the birth we are about to celebrate, is about the covenant between all of us and God.  An the birth of the Messiah, in which that covenant finds its embodiment, is meant to contain a radical message.
    How radical?  This is evident throughout Scripture.  The covenant is about the equity and the equality of all of us— about the equity and the equality of all of us.  Indeed, the covenant is also about the equity and the equality of  each of us.
    And yes, a little child often leads us.  In this case, Caroline Gill, age 12, tells us that we are (quote): “one but now in / one million loving hearts.”  (Slight pause.)  So, we are the children in Newtown, Connecticut.  We are the victims in  Aurora, Colorado.
    Byt you don’t need me to rehearse that list.  What I need you to understand is “already but not yet” is a reality that calls us to action.  Unless we, in the pews, and myself and my colleagues in the pulpits, the ones who have been identified as pastors and teachers— unless we, all of us, do our part, the promises of God about “already” will not fulfilled.
    So, let us, together, celebrate the birth of the Messiah in this way: let this Christmas, this celebration, be a call to us to understand and to act on being (quote): “one but now in / one million loving hearts.”  Amen.

12/23/2012
United Church of Christ, First Congregational, Norwich, NY

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: “The late theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin said this (quote): ‘In the final analysis, the questions of why bad things happen to good people transmutes itself into some very different questions, no longer asking why something happened, but asking how we will respond, what we intend to do now that it happened.’”

BENEDICTION: Let us be present to one another as we go from this place.  Let us share our gifts, our hopes, our memories, our pain and our joy.  Go in peace for God is with us.  Go in hope for God reveals to us, daily, that we are a part of God’s new creation.  Go in joy for God knows every fiber of our being.  Go in love, for we rest assured, by Christ, Jesus, that God is steadfast.  Amen.