12.1.24 "Hope!" Advent 1 - Westminster Presbyterian Church, Pasadena, CA

 Isaiah 64.1-8; Mark 13.24-37

Welcome to the Season of Advent … four Sundays to Christmas.

Four Sundays to remember the foundations of our faith.

Four Sundays to ask the big questions of life … 

Four Sundays … four words … hope, peace, joy, and love.

Today, the First Sunday of Advent: Hope!

My hope is built on nothing less 

Than Jesus' blood and righteousness

I dare not trust the sweetest frame

But wholly lean on Jesus' name

On Christ the solid rock I stand

All other ground is sinking sand

All other ground is sinking sand

Hope!

I hope our world will solve some of its terrible problems … 

I hope for good health and good times … 

I hope the best for my family, my friends, the church of Jesus Christ … I hope for our government, and the leaders of the world … 

All of us share many of the same hopes:

Good health, good work, sufficient income and safety … food on the table, and a roof over our heads … the material things of life, because we’re material creatures.  

And hope that pushes a little deeper.

We hope to discover ourselves - who are we? … what are we to do with our life? 

What kinds of goals shall we set, what kinds of work shall we do? Who am I at 15 … and then 30 … what am I at 50 … 70 or 80 … or older?

We want to be worthwhile … more than just consumers of life … we want to be contributors to life … we want to build, we want to press our hand onto the clay of life, we want to leave our mark, we want to be remembered … remembered as people of good will and good ideas …

Few of us will be remembers beyond a few generations, but that’s enough, isn't it?

When I was a child, our family had a picture of my great-grandfather, seated on a chair, outside the home, his wife beside him, and a large family gathered around him … he was a veteran of the Civil War.

Everyone said of him: He was a kindly man. Folks said I looked like him.

I remember the picture - he had a gentle face, and a beard … sort of like General Grant … I remember so vividly, saying to myself, When I grow up, I’m gonna have a beard, just like him … and in my own childish way, I wanted to be kind, as he was.

I remember that picture … and maybe my children will remember me remembering him … but in time, memories take their place in the halls of eternity … time moves on … in time, no one will remember my great grandfather.

I hope for many things - material things, spiritual things … 

Hope beckons us to put our shoulders to the wheel … put our hand on the plow and not look back.

Hope rolls up its sleeves, and goes to work … Jesus on the road to Jerusalem … Paul on the Road to Athens … Elizabeth Elliot in Ecuador … Martin Luther King, Jr. at the Edmund Pettus Bridge … every time any of us cross the threshold of this church, we’re engaged in the work and power of hope! 

Without hope, we’re lost …

My first ministry fresh outta seminary - the West Virginia Mountain Project - in one of the nation’s poorest counties … I saw what hopelessness does, but especially what hopelessness does to young women and men, the youth … children always have hope, children are born with it, but life can knock it outta ‘em - persistent poverty, lack of opportunity, ill-health, poorly equipped schools, parents too sick to help, drugs, alcohol … when hope is gone, there’s nothing more than a fast car on Friday night, with a six pack … 

Religion can help people ward off the worst of it … religion holds body and soul together … but if religion is used to gaslight the poor, while withholding the needed legislation and economic policies essential to general prosperity, God judges those nations without mercy:

Thus says the Lord: For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not revoke the punishment; because they sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals— they trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth, and push the afflicted out of the way.

Woe to those who destroy another person’s hope.

Here in this place, and places like this all around the world … it’s all about hope, because it’s all about God …  

What we want, what we need, what we must do, comes only from God … only God can do the ultimate … we wait upon God … we do so, with hope, because God does not disappoint us … the God of the Cradle, the God of the Cross - the God of eternal hope!

If God judges a nation without mercy, that is mercy at the extreme …  

The judgement of God is never to harm, but only to heal … and sometimes the healing is painful … but painful or not, the work of God is always filled with mercy.

No matter the crowd size, no matter the hunger, when all have been fed, there are still twelve baskets left over … the mercy of God never ends.

 

When we need guidance, we have it in Jesus … 

when we need encouragement, we receive it by the Spirit.

when we’re lost, we’re found by the Good Shepherd, 

when we’re blind, our eyes are opened by the truth, 

when we’re burdened with cares and weariness, God comes to us … 

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope …

Because the creator of the heavens and the earth is faithful … the God and Father of our LORD Jesus Christ is at work in all things for good … when the world chooses the worst, God offers the best … when the world decides to hate, God calls upon a people within that world - you and me - to remember the goodness and the ways of love … to never forget, to push ahead in faith, hope, and love … to the the salt of the earth and the light of the world.

And so it is, for us, the First Sunday of Advent:

Lift every voice and sing   

Till earth and heaven ring, 

Ring with the harmonies of Liberty; 

Let our rejoicing rise 

High as the listening skies, 

Let it resound loud as the rolling sea. 

Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us, 

Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us.   

Facing the rising sun of our new day begun, 

Let us march on till victory is won.

Amen and Amen!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I am doing something I learned early to do, I am
paying attention to small beauties,
whatever I have – as if it were our duty to
find things to love, to bind ourselves to this world.

–Sharon Olds

 

December 2, 2012, "Stand Up and Raise Your Heads"

Jeremiah 33.14-16; Luke 21.25-36

How very interesting …

Jesus talks of things ending.

Just like Jeremiah talked of things ending.

And nobody liked Jeremiah very much … threw him in jail they did … tried to hush him up - Keep quiet Jeremiah - you sound like a traitor - those are seditious words Jeremiah … no true patriot would talk like you do.

No one liked Jeremiah when he talked about the end of things.

And apparently, no one liked Jesus, either … it wasn’t long before the plot to kill Jesus picked up steam and got going … folks didn’t like Jesus, the way he talked about their beloved temple, their wonderful city, full of beautiful architecture and massive buildings, bright and shining, powerful and big … a place of wealth, pomp and circumstance … don’t talk about our city that way, Jesus, you make us feel bad!

This beautiful temple, says Jesus - it won’t last very long. Time is coming when the temple will be demolished; not one stone left upon the other … everything upside down and gone crazy … some of you will be thrown into prison; some of you will die … but don’t be fearful, says Jesus to the disciples.

All of this will give you opportunity.

Opportunity to testify … to speak words of truth … and don’t worry what you’ll say at that moment … I’ll give you the right words to speak, when the hammer falls, when the sword strikes, when you’re on trial, and the world hates you because of me … I will give you the right words!

As for Jerusalem, Jerusalem will come to end.

Don’t hang on to it … let it go … flee to the hills … get out while you can … nothing lasts, and don’t for a moment think it will.

And when it feels like the world is ending, when everything is lost, when violence and death hold great power, stand up straight, raise your heads, your redemption is near.

Heaven and earth will pass away, or at least, that’s what it will feel like, but my words will endure.

Stay alert at all times.

Pray that you are strong.

Strong enough to escape what is about to happen.

Strong enough to stand before the Human One, the Son of Man, the LORD God Almighty.

Wow!

Sounds serious, doesn’t it?

But that’s Advent for you.

The old must pass away in order for the new to arrive … new beginnings require old endings.

Last Sunday, we ended a series of messages about “end times” … I find it fascinating that our Advent Season begins today with readings from Jeremiah and Luke … readings about “end times” … things coming to an end … important things, beautiful things, powerful things … things we cherish and love and defend … even religious things, spiritual things … holy buildings and sacred places … 

For Jeremiah and Luke, it’s all about Jerusalem … the temple … the center of the world as some thought … the most important city on the face of the earth as some thought … not Rome with all its political power … nor Alexandria with all its learning … but Jerusalem.

The City of David … the city set on a hill … Jerusalem the Golden … the fabled city of the ark, the hopes and dreams of God’s people centered in the music and drama of the temple … it was everyone’s dream to visit the city, especially during a holiday season - like Passover … 

Jesus says: It’s all going to end …

But don’t be afraid, says Jesus … your redemption is near.

A challenge to us … what our eyes see and what God is doing do not easily align for us … 

To our eyes, things may look bad … but in God’s ways and times, the outworking of God’s great purpose is sure and certain.

Stand up straight! says Jesus.

Don’t slouch around like a wet rag … don’t give in to the negative … don’t be Eeyore.

Eeyore is a wonderful little character in Winnie the Pooh stories … Eeyore is a soulful little grey stuffed donkey who is mostly gloomy, depressed, pessimistic and discouraged … 

Eeyore has his ways:

When someone says how-do-you-do, just say you didn’t.

"It's snowing still," said Eeyore gloomily.

"So it is."

"And freezing."

"Is it?"

"Yes," said Eeyore. "However," he said, brightening up a little, "we haven't had an earthquake lately."

Eeyore walked all round Tigger one way, and then turned and walked round him the other way.

"What did you say it was?" he asked.

"Tigger."

"Ah!" said Eeyore.

"He's just come," explained Piglet.

"Ah!" said Eeyore again.

He thought for a long time and then said: "When is he going?"

The Season of Advent - Stand up straight! says Jesus.

Don’t slouch around like a wet rag … don’t give in to the negative …

Yesterday, December 1, the day Rosa Parks said “Enough!” - on that bus in Montgomery, Alabama, 1955, when the bus driver asked her to give up her seat in the “colored” section of the bus for a white man, Ms. Parks said, “Enough!”

Stand up straight, says Jesus … don’t slouch around like a wet rag … don’t give into the negative.

Good things, godly things, are happening … and you can grow and change and evolve, and learn anew the wonders of God’s great love.

“I am what I am” we sometimes say … as if nothing could change … but we can always change … an old dog can learn new tricks … 

Sometimes it feels as if it’s too late … but it’s never too late for God, and it’s never too late for love … it’s never too late to learn more about Christ and grow in his grace.

It’s never too late to be wiser and smarter and kinder and more loving … it’s never to late to learn more about justice and the care of the earth, and how to be generous, and how to think large thoughts and have great ideas driven by the best in humankind’s history, and by the best that God has given to us in Jesus Christ.

I have a friend who always says, “God will provide!”

There’s a certain beauty to this kind of faith … it has the feel of a child’s faith, doesn’t it? “God will provide!”

Mazzy Little Rose, my new granddaughter, knows that Mom and Dad are there, that Mom and Dad will give to her what she needs, when she needs it.

When Jesus tells us to be like a child, Jesus tells us to trust …

My Father in heaven will provide … I don’t know how … I don’t know when … but my Father in heaven will provide.

I think of Huell Howser who recently announced his retirement … his TV program, “California’s Gold” told us stories of the commonplace in an uncommon way … Howser found beauty and fascination in out-of-the-way places, with folks we’d never otherwise see or talk to, in the backwaters and byways of California … 

Howser had good eyes to see how grand people are, and how good is everyone’s gifts … he celebrated everyone, and found delight in all things great and small.

In times such as ours, to have good eyes … eyes to see goodness and hope and beauty and strength … the courage to live in goodness, the faith to believe that God is at work in all things, strength to endure when adversity hammers us on every side, and the greatest strength of all - when we side with God, God stands at our side - yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me!

Hold on and be brave; be smart, be creative, be bold and daring … stand up straight and raise your heads … your redemption is near.

In the midst of adversity, hope.

When walls are falling down, God is drawing near.

When the end comes, there is always another beginning.

My Father in heaven will provide … I don’t know how … I don’t know when … but my Father in heaven will provide.

Amen and Amen!