Often we might feel hopeless when we look at the state of the world; but throughout time Wisdom has searched for her home and found it amidst similarly hopeful and bleak times. Wisdom has made her home in us and transforms our hearts and minds to see hope where it appears there is none.

Vicar Natalie Wussler
The Second Sunday of Christmas, years A, B, and C
Texts: Sirach 24:1-12; Wisdom 10:15-21; Ephesians 1:3-14; John 1:[1-9], 10-18

Beloved in Christ, grace to you and peace in the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

When we’re faced with hard times, conventional wisdom says to batten down the hatches. To disregard hope for restoration and goodness for all and to focus on what we had control over. 

Right now, that kind of wisdom makes sense. it doesn’t feel like there’s much hope for restoration and goodness. There’s not a lot of faith in our country. And everyday, trust in our fellow humans degrades more and more. Just look at our first few days of 2025 and the war and terrorism, the increasing violence and discrimination we bear witness to. We’re still anxiously anticipating the kinds of terrors our country will endure in the next 4 years and beyond. And each of us are still going through our own pains–like grief, loss, insecurities. We each are constantly being faced with lofty problems with no easy solutions, and we can start to feel powerless. Like the Israelites standing at the banks of the Red Sea, we’re terrified of the roaring waves of chaos and brokenness and sometimes see no way forward. It’s paralyzing and isolating and sometimes we just want to throw in the towel and give up. 

But that’s where God’s Wisdom comes in most powerfully. Because God’s Wisdom gives us the hope to take steps forward when the path is unclear. Wisdom helps us make sense of the world and how we play a role in its healing. Wisdom is a force that pushes us forward when it all feels like it’s too much, that makes a way where there appears to be no way. Wisdom gives us vision to see the world like God sees the world.

So it begs the question–how does God see the world? Going back in Sirach, Wisdom searched high and low to find a home, from the vaults of heaven to the depths of the abyss. No spot was a resting place until Wisdom found the Israelites in the wilderness, an underdog kind of people searching for their home, too, in a time where the threat of empires loomed large. These people were starting to understand who they were as God’s holy people, and getting it wrong more often than not. But Wisdom saw the Israelites as a worthy place to pitch a tent and the Spirit of God rested in the tabernacle, dwelt with the people, and poured out love.

And then, this Wisdom became flesh and dwelt as a person. God put on flesh. God dwelt, literally pitched a tent, amidst us. Tabernacling amongst the people in flesh as God once did in a tent in the wilderness. The Word and Wisdom of God, which existed with God at creation, became a human in a world that was broken, experiencing the crushing grip of the Roman empire, where the poor and vulnerable were marginalized. God saw this world for what it was–all its flaws and all its suffering, all its proclivities toward greed and violence, and still saw a world worth taking on flesh and all it means to be human; a world worth deep and personal love and sacrifice. And through living and dying as a human, Jesus made a way for the Holy Spirit to dwell within each of us. Out of God’s fullness and love for the us, we receive grace upon grace that is the Holy Spirit. Through our baptism, God freely gives us the Holy Spirit, who pitches her tent within us. And this same Wisdom that rested in the tabernacle and was enfleshed as Jesus now abides within each of us. In all our brokenness and suffering, in all the ways we believe we are unqualified bearers of God’s Spirit, in all the ways we believe we don’t measure up, God sees us as worthy homes for the Holy Spirit. We are each tabernacles of God’s Spirit and Wisdom, and everywhere we go, the Spirit and Wisdom of God also goes. 

Instead of giving up hope, Wisdom gives us hope. Despite all the brokenness we witness, Wisdom still sees people who are worth loving and who are worth the risk of living. And Wisdom chooses each of us to do this work. And when we let Wisdom change our hearts and our minds, we see this world, yes, for all its pains and its bleakness, but we also see people worth loving, we see places worth healing, and good work worth doing. As mini tabernacles, we are bearers of healing and love to our weary world. And just as the Word became flesh, each time you act in love, compassion, justice, you are now making simple words flesh. You’re embodying the Wisdom of God in your life, in this community. Wherever you pitch your tent and dwell, you are enfleshing God’s Wisdom and you are bearers of self-sacrificial love. You bring the reign of God we all seek a little bit closer.

And there will still be days that feel hopeless, days where it feels like the powers of evil, greed, and destruction have the upper hand. Days where we believe we aren’t good enough to be bearers of God’s love and Wisdom and days where the love we bear hurts. And on those days, we can rely on the Wisdom that’s made its home in us to carry us, to catch glimpses of hope, promising that the painful things are not the last things.

And in those moments we’ve been given this Holy community. It’s not a coincidence that the writer of Sirach says Wisdom’s glory is found in the midst of her people. We need each other. We need each other’s stories and we need to hear about the wisdom each of us have learned through our individual journeys of faith. These stories are sacred and they are medicine to a tired and weary soul. Our shared wisdom creates resilience. It gives us the vision to see the roaring seas in our way, and the hope to believe that a path will be made and that God will meet us there. And when we as communities full of wisdom come together, share our stories, and spur each other toward love, we become the enfleshed hope we all crave. A hope that can heal a world worth loving.

In the name of the Father, and of the ☩ Son, and of the Holy Spirit.