Christmas Eve
Isaiah 9:2-7
Titus 2:11-14
Luke 2:1-20

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
 grace and peace to you from the Wonderful Counselor,
the Prince of Peace, Emmanuel. Amen
 
This time of year,
among all the other things that it is,
is a season of names.
 
Everywhere we turn there are names,
at the office drawing for the secret Santa gift exchange
and packages under the trees,
there are the names on or associated with
 some of our favorite holiday recipes and traditions,
 
 names come up as we decorate the tree
 and tell the family stories.
 
Names arise in our memories
 as those who are no long with us
 linger close at this time of year
 
Closely associated with names are stories
 and this is definitely a season of stories,
stories filled with names,
 
 now names can be stories in themselves,
 sometimes all that’s necessary to invoke a story
 is to say a certain name
because our names represent who we are,
 and who we are is revealed by the story of our lives.
 
Behind every name
 is a collection of stories,
 
so it’s little wonder
 that when telling the greatest story
 Luke uses a lot of names,
each mention adding layers of meaning
 to a seemingly simple story
 about a baby born in a manger.
 
 Most of the time when we read the Christmas story
the names are easy to pass over
mostly because
when we don’t know the stories behind names
they are easily dismissed,
they are something we read through to get to the good part,
 the baby in the manger, the angelic chorus and the believing shepherds,
 
but whether we pay attention to them or not
names drive the action of the Christmas story,
 
Emperor Augustus starts things off,
 the one with the most power in the Roman Empire,
 dictating the lives of those with the least power,
 
Augustus calls for a registration,
 a census, a cataloguing of people by name,
 making it easier for the empire to tax its conquered subjects
 and conscript them into the military.
 
 Families must return to their hometowns to be counted
and so that is what Joseph does along with his pregnant fiancée.
 
Joseph we’re told
is a member of the house of King David,
 a huge figure in the story of Israel,
 David is the King
to whom God promised to always raise up ancestors
 as leaders for Israel.
 
Now in the story of the people of Israel
it’s been awhile since they’ve had a great leader,
at the moment Israel is under the control of the Roman Empire
 this after being under the control of the Babylonians
 and then the Persians,
 
 independent rule in the promised land
 is such a distant memory
 it almost feels like a fairy tale,
 
 but unlike fairy tales
this is a promise made by God,
and God keeps the promises God makes.
 so at the mention of Joseph and his family ties,
 our ears perk up,
 could God be about to make good on the promise of old?
 
This suspicion is heightened,
 even confirmed
when Luke tells us that Joseph takes Mary to Bethlehem
where she has their firstborn child.
 
 Bethlehem, is King David’s hometown
 and the prophesies foretelling the messiah,
the anointed one who will save Israel,
say that the Messiah will come out of Bethlehem.
 
We heard one of the prophetic announcements
in our first reading from Isaiah,
 “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
and there is great joy
 at an infant born
through whom God will work out the promise of perpetual peace
with justice and righteousness
 
and here again names appear.
In this case the names or titles are descriptive
of how this sign of hope will accomplish God’s promised future
 and what that future will look like,
 
 it will be a future of peace,
 brought about through the wisdom of God,
and in the wisdom of God,
 the one to bring that about,
 is a baby.
The enfleshed wisdom of God
 
It’s quite a contrast,
 the royal names and accompanying expectations
even the angelic announcements back in Luke to the shepherds
of “a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
 
 all hung on a newborn human,
 the weakest of creatures
 unable to thrive without the care of others.
These are big names for a little baby,
seemingly unrealistic expectations
for one born without even power according to humans,
 wealth and privilege.
 
And yet, the baby in the manger
will live up to the names given him,
 but he will do so in ways that defy human expectations,
 
 he will be the Prince of Peace,
 the Messiah
Emmanuel- God with us
in the same way he started life,
from a place of human weakness,
rather than human strength,
 
 because that’s how God chooses to work in the world,
through the weak and the unexpected,
 through the underrated and overlooked,
 through us.
 
All of us carry several names or titles,
some represent the collective stories of our lives,
 some are more descriptive or name what people expect from us,
 
 some are seemingly unrealistic
 and others we maybe don’t care for so much,
and these names may change over time
 as more stories are added to our collection
 
 but there is one name we have been given
 that will never change,
we have been named Child of God.
 
God identifies us as God’s own beloved,
and nothing we say or do,
no mistakes we make
 will change that,
 
God has named us
 and that makes us part of God’s story,
the story where weakness is wisdom
 and compassion is salvific,
 the story where nothing can separate us from the love of God,
 
 it’s a story with many names
ours included,
each with their own stories,
all connecting back to the greatest story,
of a baby born in a manger long ago. Amen

4th Sunday of Advent
Micah 5:2-5
Psalm 80:1-7
Hebrews 10:5-10
Luke 1:39-55

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
 grace and peace to you
from the one who works through us. Amen
 
We’re almost there,
 we’ve lit all the blue candles on our wreath,
plans and preparations for the Christmas festival
 are finished or nearing completion
 and we’re ready for it all to get here,
 
but before we jump to the baby in the manger,
 angel choruses and shepherds watching their flocks by night,
we spend some time with Mary,
the one who partners with God
to make this wild scheme a reality.
 
God, creator of the universe,
is still active and involved
 in the working of the world,
 
 but since creation
God has taken a more hands off approach,
 choosing to work with partners,
 people in the world,
to bring about God’s agenda for creation
 
and God has a habit of choosing to work with
 the people whose high school yearbook
 superlative would start ‘least likely to’
 
God chooses to work with those other humans overlook,
 underestimate, or write off as not good enough by human standards
 
 Abraham and Sarah,
 well past childbearing years
 are the parents of a nation,
 
 Joseph the youngest brother
 so annoying that his older brothers
 literally threw him in a pit
 and sold him into slavery
 saves the nation from starvation,
 Moses, the exile
who had a stutter and very low self-esteem
led the Israelites out of Egypt,
 
 Jonah the prophet
who kept running the other direction
 and only followed God’s directions
after spending a few days thinking about it
 while sitting in the belly of a giant fish
 and the list could go on.
 
So it really shouldn’t surprise us
that for the grandest plan of all
God chooses the least likely person
to help bring it about,
 
a young unmarried Jewish girl
 living under Roman occupation
in one of the smaller towns
out in the countryside.
 
One who definitely meets
 the qualifications for
 ‘least likely to work with God to save the world.’
 And yet that’s what God proposes
and Mary accepts.
 
Luke tells us that an angel, a messenger,
is sent by God to Mary,
the angel starts off “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you”
 a greeting that we are told perplexes Mary,
 
 she’s wondering just what is going
 on when the angel goes on to tell her the plan,
 she’ll get pregnant and bear a son
who will be called Jesus,
who will take the throne of his ancestor David,
 and of his kingdom there will be no end.   
 
And taking this all in Mary asks a practical question: how?
 How can this happen?
the angel responds,
it will be the work of the Holy Spirit,
 so that your child will be holy.
And then the angel throws in this extra bit of information,
your relative Elizabeth who was said to be barren is now expecting a child,
 “For nothing will be impossible with God.”
 
And considering all this,
 Mary consents,
she says “Here am I, the servant of the Lord;
let it be with me according to your word.”
and with this the plan is set in motion
 
 and the first thing Mary does
is go to visit Elizabeth,
the one person who has a chance of knowing what Mary is going through
 
and when Mary walks through the door Elizabeth cries out
“Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb...and blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”
 
Elizabeth offers affirmation to Mary,
 she sees the value and the blessing
of what Mary has agreed to do on behalf of God,
as crazy as it is
and only then does Mary break into song praising God
 
for every Mary out there,
there is an Elizabeth,
one who God works through
 to offer encouragement
 to keep doing the difficult things God has called for
 because even, or especially if,
it’s a mission from God
 it’s going to be difficult
and we will need all the help and affirmation we can get.
 
In life sometimes we are Mary
 and sometimes we are Elizabeth
and both are critically important roles for working with God.
 
I know when I was figuring out whether God was calling me to be a pastor or not
it was the outside voices, the Elizabeths in my life
that pushed me over the edge,
 
sure I felt that being a pastor was something God was calling me to be,
 but when I thought about it a lot
especially at night trying to fall asleep
 it sounded kind of crazy to me
 
until other people without me bringing up the topic
affirmed that they thought God was calling me to be a pastor too,
their words showed me that it wasn’t a crazy idea just in my head,
and their encouragement gave me the courage
 I needed to embrace what God was asking me to do.
 
Talk to most pastors about their call story
 or anyone who feels called by God
 and somewhere in there,
there will be an Elizabeth.
 
 And actually our denomination
takes so seriously the role of outside affirmation
that people who have prepared to become pastors
are not ordained until a church has called them,
has offered that outside affirmation.
 
I am a pastor today
 because you all looked at my paperwork
and heard me preach
and said yes we can see her as a pastor,
as our pastor.
 
God works not just through individuals
but through the community as well,
 and that means as a community
we have responsibility both to listen to what God is asking of us,
 and to what God is asking of others,
 
and if we see God at work in someone else
we need to affirm them,
 be Elizabeth to their Mary,
because the power that affirmation unleashes
 is far greater than we know.
 
Mary said yes to God’s scheme,
 it’s hard not to when confronted with a member of the heavenly host
who says nice things about you
 like ‘you’re favored by God’
 but we don’t hear her celebrate
 until after Elizabeth has affirmed her.
 
 Only then does she break into song
singing “my soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior...for the mighty one has done great things for me, and holy is his name.”
 
and then she goes on to explain what God is doing through her
--her the least likely to work with God--
by acting through her
 God has scattered the proud,
he has brought down the powerful from their thrones
and lifted up the lowly;
 
God has filled the hungry and sent the rich away empty,
God has turned the world upside down,
 all to fulfill a promise God made to Israel a long time ago,
because God is merciful
and God keeps God’s promises
 
 and God keeps God’s promises
by working through the community.
 
before we jump to the baby in the manger,
angel choruses and shepherds watching their flocks by night,
Mary calls us to consider how God is keeping promises through us,
 
 Elizabeth calls us to affirm God’s work in others,
 and together with Mary
our hearts shall sing of the day God brings,
through God’s justice
 the dawn draws near
 and the world is about to turn. Amen
 

Second Sunday of Advent
Malachi 3:1-4
Luke 1:68-79
Philippians 1:3-11
Luke 3:1-6

Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
 grace and peace to you
from the one who sends a messenger to prepare the way. Amen
 
Growing up my parents liked to take my brother and I hiking,
 usually in the Columbia River Gorge or up at Mt. Hood,
 more often than not these hikes were to a waterfall
and they always involved a change in elevation,
usually up on the way into the forest
and down on the way back to the car.
 
 Sometimes my brother and I did not share our parents’
overwhelming (it seemed) enthusiasm for hiking
and had to be cajoled along with these trails
 with something other than the promise of seeing a beautiful waterfall,
chocolate usually worked
or the promise of the rare treat of a soda when we got back to the car,
 
and many times my parents had done these hikes before
 so they had a good gage of when to leverage this external motivation
 so that we could all have a mostly pleasant time together in the beauty of nature.
 
But sometimes we tried new trails,
and then they had to make educated guesses
 on how the hike would go
and sometimes they guessed wrong.
 
One hike in particular goes down in family memory,
 Dad had heard about this great waterfall
 that we just had to go see
 so we decided to try the trail,
 
after what seemed like a long time of hiking
 we began to wonder just how much farther it was to the falls,
 Dad insisted they were “just around the next corner”
 
 several corners later we asked again
and again Dad insisted it was “just around the next corner”
 
 and again several corners with no waterfalls later
we inquired again and again Dad insisted it was “just around the next corner”
 
I think it was at this point we began to wonder out loud
about the possibility of turning around
 without seeing these waterfalls
 because we were clearly misinformed about the length of the hike
 
 but Dad insisted that we’d come this far
and that- you guessed it- they were just around the next corner.
 I don’t know how many corners later we did eventually reach the falls,
and they were nice enough as far as waterfalls go
 but it was definitely a longer hike than we were anticipating,
 and we’ve never let dad forget about his repeated insistence
 that the waterfalls were just around the next corner.
 
Sometimes,
waiting for Jesus can feel like that hike,
 the way includes many curves
and it starts to feel like the wait is far longer than we anticipated,
 
on our own it is all too easy to give up before the end,
shrug our shoulders and say
I’m sure it’ll be great
 but I’m turning around and getting on with my life,
 
which is why we need people
 to encourage us along the way,
people who insist with vigor
 that it really is just around the next corner
and that we should keep going,
 
in the Bible, these people are called prophets,
in the wait for Jesus this person is called John the Baptist.
 
Luke tells us in our gospel for today
 that in a particular time and place
“God came to John son of Zechariah”
 
Luke emphasizes the particular time and place
all those names at the beginning of the gospel
 for a couple of reasons,
 
Luke approaches his gospel as a historian,
 he’s investigated everything
and sets out to write an orderly account,
 
and listing the names of the rulers and the high priests
locates this story in historical time,
 sometimes it can feel like the story of Jesus
 is a bit of a fairy tale,
out of time,
 
no Luke says,
this happened at a particular time and place,
 a time and place a long time after God’s promise to David
that there would always be a descendant of his on the throne,
 
in that time many people had given up on waiting,
 they’d given up hope of seeing the waterfall
and turned back down the trail
and gotten on with their lives
being ruled by the Babylonians, and Persians and finally the Romans
 
the people needed some encouragement,
and that came in the form of John the Baptist,
 whose miraculous beginnings
 parallel Jesus’
 
an angel announces his birth and his name,
his father has some doubts
and because of those doubts is rendered mute
for the length of his wife Elizabeth’s pregnancy
and is only able to speak when he confirms John’s name,
 
 and in response to the loosening of his tongue
 Zechariah sings a song of praise,
the song we had as our psalm for today,
praising God who has acted in the past on behalf of the people of Israel
and who will act again,
 through his son who is the one to prepare the way
by “giving people knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of sins”
 
and then we are told that John “the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day he appeared publicly to Israel.” (Luke 1:80) proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
 
Repent-
 literally to turn around,
 ‘hey,’ John calls to the people,
‘the messiah is just around the next corner,
turn back to God,
you’re going to want to see this.’
 
And people flock to John
 and mark their repentance
 by being baptized,
a bath signifying a fresh start
and all this happens in the wilderness.
 
Why the wilderness?
 We think of the wilderness as a place of scarcity,
 and it is,
 but it also is consistently a place where God is at work,
a place of safety and divine provision.
 
 God brought the people out of slavery in Egypt to the wilderness,
 where God provided food and instruction
 on how to live in freedom,
 
 many prophets escaped to the desert
when their message from God
caused rulers to seek their lives,
 
 the wilderness,
harsh though it may be
is where God provides us with what we need,
 even if we can’t see around the next corner,
or it feels like we’ve been walking up hill forever,
 or over boulders constantly twisting our ankles.
 
 God, through John
promises salvation-
and what that will feel like
 is the hills and valleys being leveled,
 and the path made straight
 so we can see where we’re going,
 and it’ll be smooth too,
no twisted ankles.
 
In the wilderness John prepares the people for the salvation of God,
Jesus, who comes and teaches a simple way of life-
 love of God and love of neighbor-
who lives out that way of life all the way to the cross,
for the love of us,
for our salvation,
 to give us life everlasting.
 
Jesus came,
in a particular time and place,
 but what he did stretches beyond that time and place
and now We are waiting again,
 for Jesus to come again
 
and once again the wait has become long
and the promise of around the next corner seems laughable,
 
sometimes during this wait we end up in the wilderness
going up endless hills
or around corner after corner
 
and yet in Advent each year
 John calls out to us to repent,
to turn back to the path toward God,
 
 and Zechariah sings of how God has acted
 and God will act again
 
and in his letter to the Philippians
Paul adds his two cents “I am confident of this, the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ...and this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you determine what is best”
 
The messengers of God preparing the way
Pointing to Christ,
 and the wait becomes easier to bear,
 for we have seen the salvation of God. Amen
 

First Sunday of Advent
Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25:1-10
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36

Advent 1
Dear fellow ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ,
 grace and peace to you from the one who keeps all promises. Amen
 
Welcome to Advent
 and the beginning of the new church year,
this year we’ll be spending time with Luke
 and his gospel account of Jesus’ life,
and as always we begin
 by anticipating the coming of Jesus,
 
and not just in the sense of waiting for the baby in the manger
but for Christ to return as he promised he would,
a return we confess each time we say the apostle’s creed,
 “he will come to judge the living and the dead”
 
His coming will bring about a time of peace
such as the world has never known
 and that sounds like a very good thing,
 especially when we look around us
 we are moved to pray
come Lord Jesus,
 
come so that we no longer have to live in a world
 where children starve to death because of war in Yemen,
 come Lord Jesus,
come so that people will no longer have to flee their homes seeking safety,
 
come Lord Jesus,
 come so that if people decide to travel to a new land,
when they arrive they will be met with open arms,
 come Lord Jesus,
 come so that plants and animals, sea and sky are healthy and cared for,
 
 come Lord Jesus,
come quickly
 
God has promised to return,
 and God keeps God’s promises.
 
But God keeps God’s promises
on God’s time, not ours.
 
We heard God speaking of promise
through the prophet Jeremiah
in our first reading,
 
 the prophet recalls the promise God made
 to King David that there would always be a descendant of his
as ruler of Israel,
 
listen to God’s words of promise from 2 Samuel 7:14-15a
“I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me. When he commits iniquity, I will punish him with a rod such as mortals use, with blows inflicted by human beings. But I will not take my steadfast love from him”
 
God chooses David to be in special relationship with God
But of course there will be consequences
for those kings who fail to trust God
and lead the people astray,
 and there are plenty of examples of that in the history of Israel,
 
but God also promises
that even though there may be times of suffering
God loves the people
and will provide once again
 a good and faithful leader from the house of David,
 
a branch will spring up from what seems like a dead stump
and life will grow once more.
 
And we believe that God kept God’s promise, in Jesus,
descendant of David.
 
And while hundreds of years passed between the words of Jeremiah
 and the arrival of Jesus.
 God kept God’s promise.
 
 on God’s time, not ours.
 
And so we wait
trusting in God,
 
Much of faith it seems,
 is about waiting.
 Advent.
We begin our year with waiting.
 
Jesus in our gospel for today
 is teaching the disciples about waiting,
he describes the prophesies of the prophets fulfilled,
 and frankly they don’t sound pleasant,
 signs in the sun, distress among nations,
 the powers of the heavens shaken,
heaven and earth will pass away,
nothing is permanent,
 
except Jesus’ words,
his promise.
 
“Heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away” Jesus says,
and we cling to these words,
 in the midst of the chaos that surrounds us,
 chaos that wears us down,
 political scandal after scandal,
report after report on climate change,
news of the next hurricane, forest fire, earthquake,
all highlighting the impermanence of this life,
constantly reminding us
that in this world nothing lasts forever
except death.
 
In this we are to wait,
 Waiting is difficult,
 and Jesus doesn’t pretend that it isn’t.
 
“be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life”  Jesus says,
 and It seems an impossible task,
to be alert at all times praying,
 
the disciples certainly struggled with this
 in the garden of Gethsemane,
constantly falling asleep
while Jesus talked with his Father
before going to the cross.
 
And it was on the cross
 that Jesus died for those sleepy disciples,
 who constantly failed to follow Jesus’ teachings,
because ultimately
 whether we are alert and prepared
or have fallen asleep with exhaustion
God is going to follow through on God’s promises.
 
We know that we get distracted,
weighed down, fall asleep even.
 So we begin each year
with a call to wake up,
 to return to active waiting,
to attend to the promises of God
and renew our hope in the words that will not pass away
 
and what are those words?
The Word of God promises
 that after death comes resurrection,
 the promise that Jesus kept in his life, death and resurrection
 that means there is life on the other side of the chaos,
everlasting life.
There is hope.
 
So we wait
We watch
We pray
 
and we have hope
 knowing that God has already acted,
 and in God’s own time,
God will act again
because God keeps God’s promises. Amen