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Advent
Sermons from Commons Church. Intellectually honest. Spiritually passionate. Jesus at the centre. Since 2014.
As you can tell from this picture, I love religious imagery in the church. This is a picture of me after I preached at First Baptist Church in Edmonton during the summer. I got to wear a robe. I got to wear a stole. I got to be a part of the processional and the recessional.
Speaker 1:It was this minister's dream come true. Today, I'm wearing another fancy stole. It may even be recognizable to you. I'm not trying to be Jeremy Duncan. I'm quite happy being Bobby Sockled.
Speaker 1:But as you can see, this is Jeremy's I'm wearing Jeremy's stole stole. Or the Commons Liturgical Stole to highlight a few things, namely advent. Stoles are beautiful pieces of liturgical vestment worn by priests and pastors. They function kind of like spotlights on the sacred. They shine light on sacraments like communion and baptism.
Speaker 1:They shine light on community celebrations and memorials like weddings and funerals. Stoles shine light on the seasons in the church year like Lent and like Advent. The church year is an alternative way to mark time. It has been mapped out for us through the seasons since the earliest Christian fasts and feasts. When we keep step with the cyclical story of the church year, we are more observant of the narrative of the life of Jesus, like the top half of this diagram, and the story of the church, like the bottom half of the diagram.
Speaker 1:These symbols and rhythms are important because they invite us to see old stories in new ways. We bring to these seasons all that we've encountered in the year that has passed, passed, all the ways that we've changed. The stories may be the same, but we are different. Welcome to Advent week one. Together, we begin we've a new church year.
Speaker 1:It is a brand new beginning. This year has been full of new beginnings for me. I've been married for eleven short months. I've lived in your fabulous city, Calgary, now my city as well, for that same amount of time I moved from Vancouver. And I started this commons gig, this calling, just three months ago.
Speaker 1:Looking back over the last eleven months, I noticed that many new things now feel strangely familiar, and some old things feel surprisingly new. Here's what I mean. It's hard to believe that I haven't always been married to the lovely mister Jonathan Bateman. It's hard to imagine that I haven't for more than eleven months lived with his support, his wisdom, and his companionship. We're still so new to this thing called marriage, but it feels way more comfortable than I thought it would feel.
Speaker 1:It's just a little bit older when I got married, so it took me a bit. Our marriage is like a brand new home in some ways, but it's also so comfortable and feels kind of old. I kinda feel the same about my relationship here at Commons. You all have welcomed me so well. Working with Jeremy and Joel and Kevin and Jeanie and Scott and Devin and Alicia and Martin and so many amazing volunteers, it's hard to believe that I haven't been on this team for much longer than a few months.
Speaker 1:It's so fun. It's challenging in all the right ways, and it feels really supportive. But again, along with the transitions of new relationship, new city, new job, there have also been some old things that feel quite new. Like my friendship with Sarah Bateman. Sarah's the older sister of my good husband, and she is the key to how I know him in the first place.
Speaker 1:I've known Sarah for over twenty years, since my first year in bible college. And being in the same city as Sarah for the first time since then has shown me so many new things about this old friendship, like how sturdy it is, how refreshing and creative she is. I'm seeing Sarah in new ways. The other old thing that's felt new to me is my relationship with the prairies. Living on the West Coast for fifteen years really made me miss them.
Speaker 1:The sky, the light, the drier cold, the night. Oh, the night. Now, as a Calgarian, I feel like I can drive out in any direction from the city and be truly in the dark, in the kind of prairie dark that pushes up against you and it's kind of like it passes right through you. Having grown up on a farm in the prairies, but living my adult life in vast metropolitan areas where darkness is a dull orange glow, I have missed the prairie dark. Spiritually, I have missed the way the darkness of this landscape helps me pay attention to my own soul.
Speaker 1:Christmas Christmas is a season that celebrates the light, but Advent. Advent makes space for the darkness. And without making our way through a dark landscape of waiting, longing, and even a bit of quiet, we will arrive at amped up Christmas a little less complete, a little less celebratory, a little less hopeful. Christmas can be so hard for some of us, and I'm sorry if that's you. But I believe that taking time to wait and to pay attention to that dark within and without.
Speaker 1:That will serve us so well. Because Christianity is a faith of both the dark facing the sting of death and the light waking up to resurrection. So today, let's contemplate how to best start our Advent journey. This journey of waiting for the arrival of Christ, The turning point in history and our hearts. The hope of all darkness and gloom.
Speaker 1:Let's pray together. Advent god, you are the one who comes. It is your approach that we prepare for. We take cues from creation. Trusting that you are present in the night and the light.
Speaker 1:We enter a spiritual rhythm of anticipation this Advent season. Advent offers us a new start, a new beginning, and a time to be really honest with ourselves, with our longing, and our hope. If we think we know this story well, will you come and make it new? If this story is new, God, will you come and make it home? In the name of Jesus who comes to us through the dark, we pray.
Speaker 1:Amen. During Advent, texts from the prophet Isaiah get quoted a lot. Almost every Sunday, in fact, and that is great. We can depend on Isaiah to comfort us in the Advent season of waiting. The book of Isaiah covers a messy section in the history of Judah, a once thriving nation alongside ancient Israel, later reduced to a city state in Jerusalem.
Speaker 1:Isaiah of the eighth century and the prophets and redactors who spoke and wrote in his name, they spoke truth to power and hope to failure by walking the people of God through the threat of exile, the actual occurrence of exile, and the hope of restoration post exile. Put another way by the theologians Todd Linneafeldt and Walter Bruggemann, whom I like to call while I'm studying the Brugues. They said it like this. The book of Isaiah in its turn is a meditation, albeit a complex configuration about the destiny of Jerusalem into the crisis of exile and the promise of Jerusalem out of exile into well-being. Through the messages of Isaiah, the people of Jerusalem are told, they're invited to take a long honest look in the mirror, to trace their disobedient actions and go further their motivations, to consider the true means of rescue from their deep dark mess.
Speaker 1:It's helpful to remember in our interpretation that there's nothing the people of Jerusalem can do on their own. There's nothing that they can do to rescue themselves. It is God who will come to them in their darkness. It is God who will shine the light. Isaiah chapter nine holds a surprising reversal, and we are going to get there.
Speaker 1:There will be more light. But before the light, Isaiah gives us this snapshot concerning the cause and the commotion of the darkness. When someone tells you to consult mediums and spiritists, he said, who whisper and who mutter. Should not a people inquire of their god? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?
Speaker 1:Consult god's instruction and testimony of warning. If anyone does not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn. Distressed and hungry, they will roam through the land. When they are famished, they will become enraged, and looking upward will curse their king and their god. They will look toward the earth and see only distress and darkness and fearful gloom.
Speaker 1:And they will be thrust into utter darkness. Isaiah chapter eight verses 18 to 22. I feel for the people of Jerusalem. I mean, sometimes it is so hard to trust God, a God we don't often think we can see or hear, even if the scriptures are right in the middle of our lives. Sometimes it's so easy for the old story of God's renewing love to be quite lost on us.
Speaker 1:Sometimes our longing, our very human longing drives us to seek fulfillment in shadier, shallower forms of connection. Sometimes our fear can spin us away from our identity as being God's beloved eternal children and distract us with super superstitions borrowed from the world around us. This lostness, this longing, this fear can keep us from living as the God trusting blessings we were intended to be. It all sounds pretty human to me. And this is what off this is what Advent has to offer.
Speaker 1:A time to tell the truth about our longing and our life. A journey that begins in the night, whatever the depth of our darkness may be. I love, I love Advent for these things, for making space for the darker times in our spiritual journey because they are there. I think opportunities like this are so important that I spent an entire week at summer camp telling teenagers about the dark in 2014. The camp setting was Keats Camp on Keats Island in BC.
Speaker 1:I was there for a week with high school kids and the staff. As I was preparing my camp talks, I kept thinking that I wanted camp to feel like the most real thing, not like an escape, but like the most real experience of life. In my prep for these talks, I read a sermon by Fredrik Beekner called Adolescence and the Stewardship of Pain. It's a whole sermon in a title right there. Adolescence and the stewardship of pain.
Speaker 1:In it, he suggests there is no higher calling than for the teacher to teach gently the inevitability of pain. That pain has value. In fact, it can be one of life's richest treasures. The staff and the campers I met with that week, they were a little bit confused. Isn't this pastor, speaker, Christian person supposed to talk about the light?
Speaker 1:At the beginning of the week, we tied black strings around our wrists, and we did what I liked to call a little darkness check-in. I asked this room of campers and staff a question and guided them through four areas of reflection. Where have you experienced darkness in this year between the summers? Have you experienced darkness as distance from yourself? Have you experienced darkness as brokenness in relationships?
Speaker 1:Have you experienced darkness as disconnection from creation? Have you experienced darkness a silence from God? Then I asked these kids to choose one area that felt the darkest, that felt the heaviest, and I instructed them to get up from their seats and to move to one of the four corners of the room, the one they most identified with. Without even a moment of hesitation, this group of young people shot up and moved into a corner of darkness. I mean, they were so young.
Speaker 1:Their faces were just so perfect. It almost broke me in two to see that kind of darkness that they didn't have to think long about and experience. I spent the rest of the week teaching teenagers and young adults that we are all marked by darkness in life, and it can feel incredibly chaotic. But God, God hovers over it and brings new creation. I taught them about the beauty of the night and that in the darkness, we are invited to feel like Abraham and Sarah, the ache of all that we long for.
Speaker 1:I taught them that for Moses, God existed not only in the light and the fire, but also in the dark and the thick fog. I taught them that if they are experiencing any kind of tormenting darkness, that they should seek help. They should they should talk to someone they trust and that doing that is the only way to bring light. I taught them that, yes, some darkness is terrifying and silent. But even there, God can be found in the middle.
Speaker 1:I'm sure that for moments in your life, in this year between the advents, you have felt the darkness of loss, of longing, or fear. Hear this encouragement from Barbara Brown Taylor in her book, Learning to Walk in the Dark. The way most people talk about the darkness, you would think that it came from a whole different deity. But no. To be human is to live by sunlight and moonlight, with anxiety and delight, admitting limits and transcending them, falling down and rising up.
Speaker 1:To want a life with only half of these things in it is to want half a life. Shutting the other half away where it will not interfere with one's bright fantasies of the way things ought to be. Barbara Brown Taylor. It wasn't until the final morning at camp when we tied a white string around that black string, symbolizing the light that we cannot always see. We are marked by darkness and light.
Speaker 1:It's just the way it is. So we emerge from Isaiah's description of the dark to this. Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who are in distress. In the past, he humbled the land of Zebulun, the land of Naphtali. But in the future, he will honor Galilee of the nations by way of the sea beyond the Jordan.
Speaker 1:The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned. Isaiah chapter nine verses one to two. In the Hebrew translation of Isaiah, verse one of chapter nine is the final verse of chapter eight. Scholars say it looks forward to ominous judgment as well oh, sorry, back to ominous judgment and forward to promised well-being.
Speaker 1:Even these two verses, no matter the exact chapter break, exist side by side. They hold together the darkness and the light. The Old Testament scholar Christopher Wright talks about the layers of old meaning which change in new times like this. He calls them horizons of fulfillment. Horizons of fulfillment.
Speaker 1:Looking at Isaiah with these horizons invites us to see the coming of Christ as so much more than simple check the box predictions. So the first horizon is the horizon of ancient Israel. It holds the long longing of Israel and the coming messiah. And we can imagine in this first horizon what it was like for them to wait for restoration of land and purpose. At the second horizon, the horizon of Jesus, we appreciate how these often obscure ancient texts get reinterpreted by Jesus and the writers of the New Testament, like this exact Isaiah text in the gospel of Matthew.
Speaker 1:When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he withdrew to Galilee. Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah. Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people living in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of the shadow of death, a light has dawned.
Speaker 1:And from this time on, Jesus began to preach, repent for the kingdom of heaven is near. In this second horizon in Matthew, the geographical references don't map on perfectly to Isaiah. But the New Testament writer reimagines the mission of Jesus, launched and propelled from Galilee to extend far beyond Israel. Finally, the third horizon. The horizon of future fulfillment.
Speaker 1:During Advent, we traditionally pay attention to the longing for Jesus' return, the time when he will come again and bring lasting peace. Advent reflection holds all three of these horizons. There's something so complete in it. We remember that God came with promise through the prophets. We prepare for God's coming as the infant Jesus born to Mary, and we wait with longing for the ways Jesus will come again.
Speaker 1:Or maybe we sharpen our insight to see all the ways that God is always coming. Yes, even now through the body of the church and even the wildness of creation. When I was a kid growing up on a farm in Saskatchewan, my grandparents lived in a farmhouse next two hours. It's a pretty great way to grow up. I spent a lot of time at their place.
Speaker 1:And on cold winter nights, when it was time for me to go home, I had a choice to make. I could run the long way home along the road, which was lit with yard lights. The road was brighter, but it was longer and much colder. Or I could run the in between path along the garden and through an opening in the trees. And this path had some ambient light, so it felt pretty safe.
Speaker 1:Or I could run home along the shortest path, the path we called the Smokehouse Path because there was a legit smokehouse, which was so thick with trees, yes, even in Saskatchewan, that often in the night, you could hardly see your hand in front of your own face. Of course, in the day, the Smokehouse Path, the shortest path, was the most traveled one between our houses. But in the night, even with all that familiarity, it was terrifying. I remember taking all three paths for lots of different reasons while I was growing up. But the feeling of taking the darkest path, that's the feeling that stays with me the most.
Speaker 1:There'd be this moment on the darkest path when I'd break into a run, having to trust that my feet knew the old path. I'd say mantras like, please no bears, please no bears, please no bears. And then, I'd emerge from the trail. My foot would hit the front porch and the light would always be on. Maybe in those nights when I felt most brave, it was like the voice of the prophet saying, if you really wanna experience the fullness of the light, brave the darkest path of them all.
Speaker 1:When Jesus stepped out of his own dark experience, the temptation in the wilderness earlier in Matthew four, I wonder if he felt alive like this. He had come through a terrifying experience and certainly there were more to come. But now, he was even more sure of his mission and he began to declare it. He took up the mantle of John the Baptist and he invited repentance. And he told everyone, not just Israel, that the kingdom of heaven was near.
Speaker 1:In a collection of advent readings called God with us, the poet Scott Cairns says, repentance is the turn of the heart and the mind. Repentance is the turn of the heart and the mind. Not so much away from sin, but towards the savior. And the kingdom of heaven, it's going to feel like it's harvest all the time. It's going to be like the end of war, the end of violence, and the end of death.
Speaker 1:And the light? The light is going to shine on and shine on through the radiant prince of peace just like Isaiah said. Advent is a time when the old paths can become new again, where darkness and waiting are honored and given space to speak. Maybe for you in this season, if you pause to consider the prophetic voice of Advent, you can share an honest moment with yourself, with your waiting, with your longing, and even your grief. Maybe in this invitation, you'll choose to run hard through the darkest path of advent.
Speaker 1:The path where you face your biggest wildest fears. And by the time your foot hits that front porch, you will arrive at Christmas with the light of God all around you. I hope that we witness in one another the surprising ways that Jesus comes to us in Advent and Christmas. He's innocent and vulnerable with smiling eyes that see the universe and a heart that never stops welcoming us home. And if you don't feel the darkness this year, then know this, we will roll back through it again next year.
Speaker 1:An advent will be here for you like a prophet or a friend, giving you space to be with your darkness and promising light all over again. Let us pray. Advent god, we've lit one candle on this first Sunday of Advent. This is the dark season that gets brighter from here. Guide us along this path right through to Christmas where we'll celebrate what was told to us by the prophet and by those who have worshiped you long before and ever since.
Speaker 1:You are Jesus, son of God, the lasting prince of peace. Your work to bring peace is our work too by the guidance and strength of your holy spirit. So we pray an advent prayer into any darkness we name and know. Come, Lord Jesus, come. Come, Lord Jesus, come.
Speaker 1:Amen. It's been so fun beginning Advent with you. If you'd like someone to pray with you, there is a prayer volunteer up at the front immediately after the service. And now we'll end as we always do. Love God.
Speaker 1:Love people. Tell the story. See you again next week for Advent Advent week two. Peace be with you.