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Advent
Sermons from Commons Church. Intellectually honest. Spiritually passionate. Jesus at the centre. Since 2014.
Mary is the container of the uncontainable. And if all you do is write those words down in your journal, the container of the uncontainable, then you are already winning at Advent.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the commons cast. We're glad you're here, and we hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Head to commons.church for more information.
Speaker 1:Welcome to commons. My name is Bobby. I am one of the pastors on the team here. I spent as much time writing this message last week as I did making sure that I wouldn't get sick like Joel Braun. Sick, sick Joel Braun.
Speaker 1:So far, so healthy, which means no flu sermon part two for you. You're most welcome. We're super glad to have you here on the second Sunday in our Advent series Theotokos. And last week, we lit the Advent candle of hope, and this week, we lit the Advent candle of love. In the glow of the season, it just gets brighter and brighter from here.
Speaker 1:But I know full well that just because the candles are lit, it doesn't mean that we feel all that glowy hope and love. That's why as a community of faith, we cling to signs and symbols, and they remind us of the bigger story of God at work in the world. If symbols could speak, they'd say, I know you feel sometimes sick like Joel Braun. That's okay. Maybe you feel sore or lost or confused, but there is a mystery at work in all things.
Speaker 1:The world is held together by God. Light and love and hope will outlast all that falls apart. And maybe we need signs and symbols more now than ever. Signs and symbols are also the reason we wear a stole through the Advent season. It's not just a fancy scarf to make me look prettier.
Speaker 1:I don't know. It has meaning. This purple stole, it highlights that even though we might feel the crunch of the season, we are in God's time. So slow down. Take some deep breaths.
Speaker 1:Pay attention. Carve out time for quiet. Let anticipation build. Prepare your world for all of the ways that Christ comes to you. Last week, Joel in Kensington and Scott in Englewood introduced the Advent series.
Speaker 1:This year, we're rocking through Mary's stories backwards from the cross to the manger to take us to Christmas. And Mary had a front row seat to the incarnation, the coming of the divine into our midst. And so we cozy up beside her, maybe with our cup of cappuccino or hot cocoa, and we take a long loving look at her stories and see them as advent invitations. And one of the beautiful things that Joel and Scott did was they anchored Mary's stories in her very human nature. Mary as mother like the mothers we know.
Speaker 1:Mary as woman like the women we know. And they helped us to connect to this earthly Mary, but my own experience of Mary is a bit more heavenly. The first part of my faith was formed in a small Catholic parish in rural Saskatchewan. I was surrounded with hail Marys and all kinds of statues of the holy mother. Marys with halos and Marys on top of heavenly clouds.
Speaker 1:And I would not trade any of that for the world either even though I'm a good Protestant now. Well, maybe that's a bit debatable. But today, I want to walk us through two images of Mary. Not two actual images actual Marys, but, of course, just two images to imagine and explore the story of Mary as Theotokos. And we borrowed the Greek word Theotokos to guide us through Advent, and it is formed from two words, Theo meaning god and Tokos meaning bring forth.
Speaker 1:Mary is the god bringer forth one. That's a bit of a mouthful. So she is the god bearer. And theotokos is more than just a tricky word to say. Believe you me, I worked on it this week.
Speaker 1:Theotokos is theology. In other words, it teaches us how to think about God. And when a bunch of godly old guys in the fifth century chose the word, they said that Mary is not only the Jesus bearer. She is the God bearer. Through her, we get Jesus whom we confess is fully God and fully human.
Speaker 1:And in Jesus, we see everything. We see what happens when the dust is infused with the divine. We see the mundane with the sacred. We see the flesh with the spirit. And before we pray and dive into the story where Jesus turned water into wine because his Jewish mama told him to, I want to show you the first Mary.
Speaker 1:This is one of the images of Mary that I connected to as a Catholic kid. And in this picture, Mary is simple, and she's plain and traditional in her blue belted tunic. And the picture I had in my bedroom growing up was in a kitschy blue frame. It had little plastic shutters that opened like a window, and eventually, they fell off. And I remember trying to put my Mary trinket back together with plain old Scotch tape.
Speaker 1:And as much as I loved her for a time, she lacked dimension. And eventually, I outgrew this picture of Mary. It fell apart, so I just let it go. And my childhood love of Mary, it also faded in adolescence. I was more concerned with fitting in and keeping friends and distancing myself from my family like any snooty little punk teenager.
Speaker 1:And, you know, that's fine. It's fine that I let this Mary go. It meant that she could be replaced with something more. And letting go of old ideas so that new ones can show up is a key part of human development, and it's also a big part of faith. And in the story we read today, we will see how Jesus is replacing the old to make way for the new.
Speaker 1:And maybe as we start this Mary story, you can think of old ideas of God or even of yourself that you want to let go so that new ones can begin to surface and take up a clearer space in your heart. And maybe you've grown tired of an image of God as a parent who just keeps getting after you, a distant God who only shows up to point out your shortcomings. Maybe you're totally done with that voice in your head that says you're not enough. You don't have enough to ever be enough. And maybe some ideas you hold about God in yourself, they're flat, and they're pale, and they are boring.
Speaker 1:They're falling apart and beyond repair. Maybe you're ready for the voice of love to coax you out of the sidelines and say, yes. You can do this. You have everything you need. It's time to set out and offer yourself to the world because that is what Mary does with Jesus her son in John chapter two, and it's a very good time.
Speaker 1:So let's pray and then get into it. Loving God, as we gather around the story of Jesus turning water into wine, will you remind us of all of the ways you come to make things new? This is a story and a work that you do from the inside out, from the sidelines of the party, in and through the people you call to help realize your shalom in our midst. And as we consider how you loving God come to us as a child and grow in us as savior and show us how to share your love with others, Will you quiet the noise of the season? Will you still the anxiety of the world?
Speaker 1:Oh god, will you still it? And will you draw us into your safe embrace and send us out with deep compassion and with grace upon grace. Amen. So Christmas is about incarnation, and there's no better way to get connected to the sacred experience of being in our bodies than to jump into the story of Jesus at a wedding turning water into wine. So here's the first half of the story.
Speaker 1:On the third day, a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus' mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, they have no more wine. Woman, why do you involve me? Jesus replied.
Speaker 1:My hour has not yet come. His mother said to the servants, do whatever he tells you. Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from 20 to 30 gallons. So here we are at a wedding in Cana, a poor rural wedding at that. And if you've been to a small town wedding, you might know that things haven't changed too much in two thousand years.
Speaker 1:Everybody shows up. Neighbors, strangers, drunk uncles, weird kids from high school. And in this case, the Messiah and savior of the world along with his band of misfit disciples. It starts off as an ordinary scene that's about to burst with all kinds of extraordinary meaning and two points about language to clear up right away. First, here, woman means no disrespect.
Speaker 1:In the ancient world, the word for woman, it was a polite title. It's less woman, where is my super suit? And more, woman, I see you and respect you. In a patriarchal culture, Jesus always addresses Mary and other women with total respect. And second, in John's gospel, hour means the end.
Speaker 1:Jesus' hour is his death and his resurrection and ascension. And this little exchange between Mary and Jesus, it has backstory that is impossible for us to access. We're talking about a mother and her son after all. But if we were to listen in on the negotiating of this moment, of this hour, it would sound like this. Mary, she turns to Jesus and she says, they don't know it yet, but the wine is almost gone.
Speaker 1:And Jesus turns to Mary and he's wide eyed, and he says, if I do something about it, you and I both know that we're starting a clock that we can't stop and I I'm not sure that I'm ready to face all of that. And Mary, she gives this knowing nod and she pauses to consider what she's about to say and then she says it. I know it's not that end, son, but it is a new beginning and you need to go now. The world needs you more than ever. It's time for you to be who you are, fully Jesus, my son, but also fully God, the divine.
Speaker 1:Where some commentators dismiss Mary's knowing, I trust it. Remember, is the woman, the angel Gabriel hails with the words, greetings, favored woman, the lord is with you. As in, before I put this divine slash human embryo mystery in you, you're already favored. And I'm not alone in trusting this way of Mary's knowing. Caroline Lewis' interpretation is most compelling.
Speaker 1:She writes in her commentary on John, Jesus' push into ministry is not his baptism or his testing in the wilderness, but the coaxing of his mother. There is a sense here that the mother of Jesus is the one who is encouraging Jesus to be who he is as if she is saying to him, as a mother would say to her kindergartner getting on the bus for the first time, come on. You can do this. Get on the bus. You're gonna have a great day.
Speaker 1:And she demonstrates trust in Jesus. She says something to her son and it takes her initiative to move Jesus into ministry. It takes her initiative. And I love this picture of Mary's confidence. She's on the brink of a wedding faux pas.
Speaker 1:And who knows why she feels all this responsibility for the wine running low, but she certainly is not afraid to step in and to take care of business. And in John's gospel, Mary gets this new story started. We have so much to learn from her. If you sense that it's time for a new story in your life, one with new ideas about God, new expressions of trust in yourself and the people you care about and the people who care about you, new encouragement to step in and take care of what needs to be taken care of, then this Advent, may you find the confidence to trust yourself like Mary. And there's one more thing I wanna say about Mary's knowing.
Speaker 1:Mary knows what to do when she's faced with this moment of scarcity, and this is the best place to start in a pinch. Just paying attention, knowing when something is up and asking good questions. Like, what is missing in my life and in the world truly? Like, what feels scarce? And Mary said to Jesus, they have no more wine.
Speaker 1:Even though Mary's words are about wine, they're always about so much more than wine. And even if Jesus isn't quite ready for this moment himself, Mary knows it's time. And how often do we face scarcity in a situation and turn to God inviting Jesus' action? Don't roll your eyes at me. I mean it.
Speaker 1:How often are we, a, even aware enough when we're feeling threatened or empty or incomplete or just scared, and b, able to get out of the way of our pride and of our shame, of our self preservation to say that we need help. It can be hard to face scarcity in the folds of our life, places of inadequacy and poverty and just impatience. But we most certainly recognize scarcity in the world that we live in. Right? Like, recognize it.
Speaker 1:We see it. Our world, it feasts on a steady diet of not enough. Not enough peace in the world. Not enough love to go around. Not enough power to share.
Speaker 1:And as human beings, we work all of our lives to construct order in a way that no other humans do. We shape all kinds of systems to order our world, except we don't shape these systems perfectly. We inherit systems and contribute to systems that are right messed up. Systems that are steeped in racism and sexism and ageism and privilege and greed. In the construction of our human system, it leaves us vulnerable to threat.
Speaker 1:If we're not on the top, if we don't have it all, we feel threatened. And when we're threatened, we are closed, and we're silenced, and we're rigid and afraid. And another way to say this says theologian Sally McFagg is that when faced with threat, a person will be more literalistic, absolutist, dogmatic. And she might be talking about theology here, but we can certainly see threat turned into violent action in the world, especially of late. Let's take, oh, I don't know, the, great reckoning on men who have abused their power for far too long in high profile places by sexually harassing and assaulting women who work for them.
Speaker 1:You know? Just as, one example. If you're like me, you've talked with friends and family, both women and men, good men, and wondered what the heck has been going on in these halls of power and in this weird celebrity culture to allow behavior that abuses another human being for so long. And what the heck are we supposed to do about it? What are we supposed to do about the depravity of these abuses and even more the depravity that we might find within ourselves?
Speaker 1:And I wonder, what would happen if we took a page out of Mary's book and let God in? In fact, I think the women of the Me Too movement also know how this is done. What if we find genuine ways to name scarcity and how it makes us feel? What if these men, the Weinstein's, the Franken's, the Lowers, the CK's were able to do that? Just say, oh, you know what?
Speaker 1:I am feeling empty here. I feel like I've lost my way. I'm obsessed with all kinds of fantasies about which I can't name. I'm afraid of my shame. I'm stuck in a loop of scarcity.
Speaker 1:And what if, like Mary, we all just look around at the party of our workplace or our family context or our own inner world and say, oh, I see what's going on here. I feel like I don't have enough pleasure or power or connection or understanding or emotion or joy. And instead of reinforcing a system that hides and steals and denies, what if we face the needs in our life? Like Mary faces the needs at the party and turns to God. And sometimes it really is as easy as turning to a friend.
Speaker 1:Mary knows what's up. And she shows us the way forward by moving towards the divine and speaking the need out loud. She flips the script on scarcity and trusts in the abundance of God. Okay. Here is the second part of the story.
Speaker 1:Listen for what John says is the point of the whole thing. I'll give you a hint. It's about the signs. Here it is. Jesus said to the servants, fill the jars with water.
Speaker 1:So they filled them to the brim. Then he told them, now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet. They did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside and said, everybody brings out the choicest wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink, but you have saved the best till now.
Speaker 1:What Jesus did here in Cana Of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory and his disciples put their faith in him, believed in him. It is helpful to remember the power of Jesus' action here. Jesus doesn't preach a message. He doesn't go off on the nature of the divine. He doesn't even take up this central place in the scene.
Speaker 1:He works from the sidelines. He moves the players around to be instruments of this water to wine sign. And so the story goes like this. Over on the sidelines of the party, Jesus bows to the maker and turns to the servant and says, hey, you. I know you're a behind the scenes kinda guy, but will you just do me a little favor and fill these big jars with water?
Speaker 1:Fill them right to the brim. And maybe for this servant, there is just something about the request that felt like the most important thing he'd ever been asked to do. So he carefully sets down his stuffed mushroom platter and does what Jesus requests. And after he fills the jars, he asks Jesus, what's next, boss? And Jesus says with that twinkle in his dark eyes, draw some out and take it to the head waiter.
Speaker 1:And the servant says, the water? And Jesus says, just trust me here. And the next thing you know, the head waiter is sipping the wine and he is baffled by the quality of the beverage asking the groom, did you get the bottles mixed up? You're supposed to serve the good stuff first and the cheap stuff last. And by then, the servant who is in the know, he looks over at the man who made this water into wine and he sees that he's already tied up in another conversation about who knows what.
Speaker 1:Whatever it is, he is giving it his total attention. He's talking with his hands. He's throwing his head back in laughter at another person's joke and he's sipping that wine. The wine that he made out of water and some kind of sacred science. Remember the text it read, you saved the best till now.
Speaker 1:And little did they know that had almost run out altogether, but maybe with the son of god at the party, they were never as close to disasters they thought they had been. The source was in their midst. And the thing we need to be mindful about in John's gospel is that all of these everyday objects are symbolic. They are like icons in the way that we're familiar with icons in our online world. We click on them every day and they take us somewhere else.
Speaker 1:I touch the Instagram icon on my phone countless times a day, countless times a day, and I am transported to the world of 812 friends and followers. Mary is in a big symbolic story, one where the old way is being bypassed for the new, where the wedding represents the messianic days and the stone jars, which now hold the best wine represent the fruitfulness of Jesus' ministry after barren centuries of religious practice. The water to wine sign is about abundance. It's about the best arriving just when you thought you were running out of wine, of patience, of time, of reserve, of wisdom, of control, of provision, of hope, of joy, of love. And it's so easy at this time of year to think that abundance is about accumulation, not simple celebration.
Speaker 1:And it's so easy to think that abundance is about new things rather than things being made new. And it's so easy to think that abundance is about getting what's yours rather than giving it all away. And the prophets, talk about this time when the Messiah would come and abundant new wine would drip from the mountains. It would flow from the hills. And it's never just about the wine.
Speaker 1:It is a sign of God's abundance. God is the one who is abundance, not the stuff we sip or purchase or crave. God is abundant. And John was obsessed with telling the world that Jesus is the savior who shows God's love for all. And the gospels tell story after story to say, you used to have to work so hard just to reach up to God, but now God has come to reach out to you.
Speaker 1:While Mary doesn't appear in the middle section of this story, there is this picture of Mary that draws out this kind of scene so pregnant with God's abundance, and it's my second picture of Mary. It's an icon called Our Lady of the Sign. And if you're not in the room but listening online, I encourage you to Google image search that icon, Our Lady of the Sign. And I love this icon because it portrays what the story in John chapter two is telling us that when we let God in like Mary did, we'll see that God is taking up space right in the middle of our existence. That there are all kinds of signs pointing to God's abundance.
Speaker 1:Remember an icon, it invites us in. We pass through it into a deeper reality. And here in this icon, Jesus is depicted within Mary as a grown man. He is clothed in glory to signify in gold to signify his glory. He holds a scroll to signify that he's the teacher.
Speaker 1:He's the one that guides the way. And in facing us directly, Jesus and Mary invite us into the story. And the vanishing point of an icon, it moves outward to draw us inward. Heaven and earth are together here. The God man sits within.
Speaker 1:And in the prologue to the gospel of John, we read Jesus's words, you will see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending on the son of man. And some of these ancient icons of the Virgin of the Sign have a Greek inscription that is almost impossible to translate due to some wacky Greek grammar. But the closest to understanding what it says, how it describes what you see, is that Mary is the container of the uncontainable. And if all you do is write those words down in your journal, the container of the uncontainable, then you are already winning at Advent. There's so much in them.
Speaker 1:And in an essay called the space for god, Robert w Jensen writes, it is of course the heart of Christian faith that god's presence in Israel is gathered up and concentrated in Emmanuel, god with us. And in this, one Israelite's presence in Israel, he is in person the temple Shekinah, the glory. He is in person the word spoken by all the prophets. He is in person the Torah. And if that is so, then the space delineated by Israel to accommodate the presence of God is finally, get these words, reduced and expanded in Mary's womb, the container of Emmanuel.
Speaker 1:In other words, God will use a woman's womb to grow the Messiah. God will use old ceremonial containers to hold new wine, and God will use the human story, yours, mine, ours to hold the divine. The water to wine sign revealed the glory of Jesus, and the disciples put their faith in him. So what is the glory if that's the whole point? Well, the Greek word for glory is doxa, and it draws from the Hebrew word kavod.
Speaker 1:And one way to understand kavod is to think of something or someone that is heavy with God's presence. Where glory was doled out in small doses in the past in Jesus, the glory is overflowing like new wine, and we can still taste it. We taste this new wine of God's glory in a moment when creation's beauty just brings us to our knees. Then we taste it at a party when we feel included and loved. And we taste it when we have someone behind us to encourage us on.
Speaker 1:We taste it when people stand together despite their differences to take good care of real need. And you can also taste it in a new beginning that might mean an inevitable end. And you can taste it in a season of intense longing. And you can taste and experience God's glory as it's waiting for you in your unmet needs. In Jesus, the ordinary is transformed into glory and scarcity is replaced with abundance.
Speaker 1:So this Advent, may you believe it is true. May you believe. Let us pray. And the story ends. After this, he went down to Capernaum with his mother and brothers and his disciples.
Speaker 1:There they stayed for a few days. And I love that you, Jesus, didn't get in the center of this wedding and just take up all the attention. And I can imagine you sitting back and enjoying the party knowing that this story would have its time. And for those of us aware and able to name the scarcity that we feel and know, will you show us your abundant love? Help us to let go of that which no longer serves us, to make space for the new ways that you will come to us this year.
Speaker 1:Today, we lit this advent candle of love a sign. We all feel places in our lives and in the world where your abundant love needs to flow. We need your love. Will you give us eyes to see how those around us are containers of the uncontainable? Like Mary, helping to bring your love and presence near to us.
Speaker 1:And as we go from this moment into our own Capernaum, into the places you call us, may we see an abundance of images and hear an abundance of stories that remind us how you are close in the stuff of creation. You are always close. Amen.