Incarnation is God in you and me, everyday human people whose only call is to be everyday human people who love and care for the world.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fourth Sunday of Advent, year C
Text: Luke 1:39-45

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

There was a knock at the door.

The elderly woman who looked like a grandmother, except for the very prominent bulge at her midsection pulled herself out of her seat and went to open it. She saw a young girl there, tired and dusty from a weeklong journey.

“Oh, honey,” Elizabeth said, drawing Mary into her arms, “I’m so glad you’re here. Come in and rest. I’ll get you something to eat.” And so began a long time of peace for both women, taking walks, resting, eating, talking, listening. Two women facing pregnancy and the mysteries of their changing bodies, one too old to be doing such a thing, one too young to know what it was going to be like.

At lunch one day, Elizabeth chuckled. “It’s funny how the minute I opened the door my baby jumped. I wonder if he knew who was there.” A little later she added, “I don’t get how its possible I’m sitting here with the mother of my Lord? Never expected that.”

With all due respect to Luke, this feels truer to what this visitation was. Two women, one too old to be doing such a thing, one too young to know what it was going to be like, sharing the experience together. But Luke is so focused on the divine beginnings of these two boys, he coats the story in a gloss of mystery and wonder, polishes up their plain words into lofty poetry. So we see these two women more for the boys growing inside than for what they’re actually doing.

The boys will have their day. But today let these women speak for themselves.

Because they show the heart of this visitation: ordinary human need.

When we think only of Mary’s child, we forget the ordinariness of it all. We get all theological and mystical and wonder, “what was it like to have God’s child growing in you?” For Mary, the identity of her baby is certainly a piece of the puzzle. But what she’s got to face first is simply human: pregnancy.

Her mother must have suggested she visit Elizabeth. She could have coached her daughter through the early days of pregnancy, as she did the last two thirds of it. But Mary goes on a 90 mile journey to Judea to Elizabeth almost as soon as she’s pregnant. Elizabeth must be something like Mary’s great-aunt, and likely the wise one Mary’s mother trusted most in the world. “Go see Aunty Elizabeth,” she must have said. “She’ll help you start sorting this, and then you can come back and face what’s ahead.”

Again, with all due respect to the writer of our Hymn of the Day today, I don’t think Mary ran “to greet the woman who would recognize her boy.” Mary ran to find the woman who would hold her and give her wisdom and space and guidance and love.

This is true incarnation: God is with us in each other in our ordinary lives.

These two spent three months together so they could do what was ahead of them. Mary left just before Elizabeth went into labor. She was ready to face what she needed to do back home. And Elizabeth was ready to face what was likely to be hard at her age.

God’s life is lived in and through you and me. But we need ordinary human care to help us live that life. People with experience who can walk with us and help us see the road ahead, people who can listen to our fears and concerns. Embrace us and invite us in for food and drink and peace.

That’s why so many of us need to be part of a community of faith. Like Mary, we need to be with people who understand, who help and support and love us, ordinary, regular people who know what it is to bear God in the world and to be human.

Today’s story’s not about the divine children. It’s about two human mothers.

Mary doesn’t need to learn to be the mother of the Messiah yet. She needs to learn to be a mother. She needs to learn to care for her body for nine months, to prepare for childbirth, to get ready for rearing an infant and then a toddler and then a child and then a teenager. She needs help with all that anxiety and fear. She’s got plenty of time to ponder the divine implications in her heart, and Luke says she takes that time. Certainly some of her conversations with Elizabeth were about God’s child. But mostly now she needs to face the very human things God needs her to do.

Like you. Whatever God needs of you, whatever love you are asked carry into your life, it’s not a mystery surrounded by angelic light and song. It will be normal, ordinary, human things you do. Loving, reaching out, being kind. Sharing your abundance with others, as Elizabeth’s boy will one day tell people by the banks of the river. Praying for those who do evil, loving even those who persecute and hate, as Mary’s boy will one day tell you.

Amidst all the pain and suffering of the world, the things none of us know how to fix, the oppression and evil that seems to be rising where more often than not we feel helpless, in all of that, God says “I just need you to be a loving human. And that will make a difference.” And so we help each other.

It starts with a knock at the door.

So let’s be good to each other and open up and help each other be loving humans.

God has chosen to work in you, in me, in all people for the life of the world. Just ordinary, living, breathing humans whose love and grace and generosity and courage and risk-taking and kindness can change the world.

Have a seat next to Elizabeth and Mary and they’ll help you figure why that’s such a joy.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

 

 

All these calls to purification and repentance are invitations to let God transform you and me and the whole community into a life of shalom for us and for all things.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Second Sunday of Advent, year C
Texts: Luke 3:1-6; Malachi 3:1-4; Philippians 1:3-11

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

Shalom.

In Hebrew, that means “peace.” But also wholeness and health, completeness, safety, even friendship. To be in shalom is to be in a life-giving and gracious way of life. Little wonder our Jewish cousins greet others with “shalom.” As our Muslim cousins do with the Arabic “salaam.”

Jesus often spoke of such a way of life, and once he used a different word, “blessed,” to envision it. To be blessed is to be gentle, he said, to hunger and thirst for God’s righteousness, to be merciful. To be pure in heart and to be someone who makes peace. Even those who grieve or are persecuted find blessedness in God’s comfort and mercy, he said. Jesus envisions a blessed world radically shaped by shalom.

A world our readings today invite you to find. To live in. To become.

All this talk of purifying, of landscape flattening, of repentance, has a great “so that . . .” at the heart.

These calls all lead to shalom. God’s people need to be purified, Malachi says, so that their worship and offerings to God come from a good heart, from their love of God and neighbor. Before the exile God’s prophets criticized that they did all the worship and offerings but lived corrupt lives, oppressed their poorer neighbors, turned a blind eye to injustice. So for their worship, their offerings, to be pleasing to God again, they need to be purified into their true selves. Brought into blessed shalom again.

John’s call to repentance is about leveled mountains and filled in valleys, massive highway maintenance. God’s people are asked to repent – literally to turn their lives around – to clean off the roads, make sure everything is straightened out. So that they are walking paths of blessed shalom with God.

That feels much more hopeful than we usually feel from John the Baptist’s annual visit.

Purifying sounds frightening. Ore is taken into a blazing furnace and heated until the precious metal is drawn out in its pure state. If God is purifying us, it sounds like it will hurt. Burning away what is broken and bent in us that pulls us from God. But if God is working toward shalom, blessedness, purifying us to be our true precious selves, whole and well and at peace and merciful and gentle, to be peacemakers and makers of safety for others, that sounds really good.

And getting out the bulldozers and graders sounds frightening, too. What massive work does God need to do in me to make me different? But if God wants to straighten what is crooked so I am complete and whole, so I can walk God’s path of shalom as God’s blessed one, that sounds really good, too.

The key is, God is doing all this.

Paul joins John and Malachi together in a huge promise of that hope. God began this work in you, Paul says, and God will continue to complete it in you until the day of Jesus Christ. This purifying and landscaping leading to shalom is God’s gift, and God’s been working it in you from the beginning.

And no surprise, Paul says there’s a big “so that” here, too. God does this, Paul says, so that your love might overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight, to help you determine what really matters.

What really makes shalom. Blessedness.

And remember: Paul says God’s work is a long-term project.

God will continue to complete it until the end of all things, Paul says. But it will take all that time. You’ll be repeatedly turning around on your path. Because you’ll get lost and take false turns. You’ll need God’s purifying of various things again and again. Because it’s going to take time to draw you into the precious beauty God already sees.

And you’ll need God to do roadwork again and again. Roads in the desert sand over daily, and daily need clearing. Just as a shoveled sidewalk drifts over again, and you need to shovel it again. The path of Christ, the path of shalom, is easily blocked, and needs daily attention until your days are done.

God will complete you. But it will take time.

There’s one more thing, the best part: it’s not just on you.

Paul speaks to all the Philippians, so God’s working in their community to bring shalom, together. Malachi sees all God’s people as being purified. John calls all the crowds to repentance. This isn’t an individual thing. Shalom isn’t lived apart from others. Blessedness is only found in life together.

It starts with the individual. It’s hard to find shalom with others without finding it in ourselves. But it can’t exist there alone. So your faith, and my faith, your discipleship and my discipleship, your repentance and my repentance, God works together in this community until we become a blessed community of shalom.

And you see where this is going. When community after community are so turned, purified, transformed, eventually all God’s children everywhere find this joy, this blessed shalom of God.

So this is a day of Good News.

Repentance, turning toward God, is a gift to delight in because in turning you find shalom. God purifying your heart and mind and spirit, though sometimes painful, is a joy to relish because even you start to see the true you arising. Clearing the path for you to walk as Christ is a treat because even though it’s annoying to have to keep at it, when God does you walk in safety and wholeness.

And when we overflow with God’s love and insight into what really matters and act on that, we become part of God’s solution to the brokenness of our world.

God is committed to a world filled with shalom, lived in shalom, drenched with shalom. A world blessed by God’s people in it who know that blessed shalom is what really matters, and in whom God will continue the work of the healing of all things until all know this shalom, this blessedness.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

Our incentive to be faithful followers isn’t our anxiety or fear, it’s the hope of being anointed as Christ to love and bring in the reign of God for all.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The First Sunday of Advent, year C
Text: Luke 21:25-36

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

How do we understand Jesus today if we don’t share the same expectation as the early believers?

Clearly the first to follow strongly expected that Christ would return soon, even that the world would end in their lifetimes. Jesus, Paul, other New Testament writers all speak of it. Today Jesus seems to use that as an incentive, warning us to be faithful because all this could suddenly end, and we don’t want to be caught off guard.

But it’s been nearly two thousand years now. The world’s still here, Christ hasn’t ridden in on the clouds to end it. Sometimes we fear we’re in the end times, but mostly we think the world will be here for a while.

In fact, that’s the source of our anxiety and fear. When we see so many problems, so much suffering, or the way our nation is going and who we are as a people, our fear and anxiety come from wondering if we can change anything. We’re afraid because we think that we’re in this world for the long haul. So climate change and oppression and war and racism and sexism and poverty and xenophobia and everything else really matter. We can’t ignore problems in the world because we think it’s all going to end soon, as some in the past did.

So if the world’s not likely to end any minute, is there an incentive to be faithful?

What other reason do we have to serve Christ, if Jesus’ incentive today doesn’t work anymore?

Maybe we’re misunderstanding Jesus. Today’s warnings aren’t the only ones he made like this. A number of times he talked about staying awake and watchful, because the master could return at any time.

But he also embodied the love of the Triune God for the world and God’s creatures. For you. By far most of his teachings are invitations to bear the same love.

Jesus isn’t about incentives, or even threats. Jesus is about love. And we actually know that. We’re anxious about the world because we love it. We care about the climate, the planet. We care about our neighbors – all of them – because they’re human beings who deserve love and grace. Our hearts have already been shaped into the love of God, and that’s why all this matters to us.

Our fear is we can’t do much. So we need to hear Jesus’ words of hope today, too.

Jesus says this generation won’t pass away until all things have taken place.

But if the world didn’t end in the lifetime of those first followers, what’s he saying? Well, what if “generation” means all who come to trust God through Christ? If Jesus is creating the Body of Christ through baptism and the Holy Spirit, and we’re all part of that Body, then “this generation” includes us.

So this is actually a promise of God’s faithfulness. Jesus is saying “God will keep bringing about these things, this reign of God, as long as there are those who follow me. Who are Christ.”

Because the reign of God in Christ includes us, too.

We’re the second coming of Christ that we’ve been waiting for. That’s always been the plan. Jesus says his words will never pass away, and they won’t, when you and I live into them, abide in them. Embody them. Just as Jesus – the Word-made-flesh – embodied them.

Now you are God’s Word made flesh, and every act of love you do makes a difference. Every hand you reach out changes the world. You are much more important and powerful than you imagine. Because you are Christ, anointed in baptism for what you can do to heal and save the world.

And now Jesus’ warning makes sense.

Not to frighten us into obedience; Jesus is clear that’s not how the Triune God operates. But to give a warning of what can keep us from being Christ in the world, and thus deprive the world of our love.

So Jesus says be on guard not to waste your life away with drunkenness or anxiety or dissipation – which is depleted resources and wasted energy. Because you’re needed, I’m needed, to be Christ in the world.

Of course we can enjoy life, even waste time once in a while. But Jesus warns against letting that become our obsession, or our distraction, to avoid the hard things.

As we consider all that’s going on, feeling helpless to do anything, we could let ourselves go into addictions, whether chemical, or phone and Internet, or entertainment. We could spend our time on wasteful things that drain us without refilling us. Or just wallow in anxiety and fear. All to avoid what’s going on. We’ve all likely been tempted by this.

Be on guard for that, Jesus says. Keep your eyes open. Your love is too important to Christ’s plan to have it wasted away. And we can help each other with this, too, watching each other for signs of anxiety or addiction or wastefulness, and give each other a hand of love.

Jesus’ gift is we can find the urgency to follow not from fear of the end but from hope of the beginning.

You are Christ in this world. You are how Christ is reigning in this world. You and I and all who hear God’s call to love. And this is the beginning of the Good News for the rest of the world.

Because if we are Christ’s second coming, the one we thought we were waiting for, then in us the Triune God is going to make all things new. How that’s going to look in the big picture, God knows. But every act of love makes a difference. Every hand reached out changes the world.

And if we don’t see it all happen in our lifetimes, that’s OK. This generation will last until God gets it all done. That’s a promise. And while we’re here, we’re a part of God’s healing and hope.

And we might even see some of the changes happen. Stand up, raise your heads, Jesus says, and look around. You’ll see redemption coming.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen