Advent III - Year B
Sunday, December 14th, 2008 - The Reverend Jeffrey W. Mello, Assistant Rector
Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11; Psalm 126; 1 Thessalonians, 5:16-24; John 1:6-8, 19-28
John the Baptist is, for me, a powerful model of what it means to testify to the light of Jesus Christ; to stand knee deep in the river and make room in our lives for Christ to be born, once again. John's ministry was powerful. It took courage. It took passion. It took clarity. I am always amazed by John's prophetic words.
And his prophetic actions. Claiming his place in the wilderness, he invites those who would follow to come into the river with him. To get ready. To take stock of their lives and make room for the one who was to come. This time in the river is a powerful symbol. I imagine these lives that John touched being cleared out; the river
Today is the third Sunday in Advent. We lit the third, pink candle on the Advent wreath. The candle is pink to turn our attention toward the joy that is before us. Historically called "Gaudete Sunday," Gaudete meaning "rejoice," we take time this morning to focus on the joy that awaits us at the birth of Christ. We rejoice, this morning, in our hope that the words of Isaiah's prophecy might be fulfilled, for us, in Jesus' ministry.
This morning we sit at the official "half-way" point until Christmas. The pace is picking up - only one more Advent candle to light before we light the white Christ candle. Only 10 shopping days left. I certainly hope you've sent your Christmas cards out. There are only 10 more days of decorating, baking, traveling, wrapping, and unwrapping. The snowball is rolling, increasing in speed and momentum, faster and faster, and I'm trying to stay just a few feet in front of it. I'm not ready. I'm not fully prepared.
I want to shout, "Wait! Stop!" But not because I haven't finished shopping (which I haven't), or because I haven't emotionally prepared to spend time with my family (which I haven't). I want to call everything to a screeching halt, if just for a minute, because it is finally hitting me. Christmas is almost here. And it comes, as we heard in the scriptures this morning, with profound consequences for our lives. If we allow Jesus to be born in us again this Christmas, our lives will be transformed beyond our imagining. Yet we urge it on. We pray, "Amen. Come, Lord Jesus". But are we really ready for what Jesus' arrival in our lives might mean? Have we really thought this through?
This year, I have decided to see the pink candle in the advent wreath as an invitation to pause and, even in our pausing, to consider what it is we think we are preparing for.
I wonder if we know what we're getting ourselves into.
What if Jesus does come? What if everything we are hoping for, longing for, actually arrives? Are we ready for that?
When Paul and I adopted our son, we took months getting ready for his arrival—mentally. We spent hours talking about names. We dreamed about being dads and all the romantic notions that accompanied that. We dreamed together about life with our new son. We dreamed about graduations, proms, and weddings. Those winter months were spent in eager anticipation, hope, and expected joy. I spent far too much time peering into the windows of Baby Gap. There were paint chips collecting in a pile for when we would, someday, make a decision about the room filled with our TV room furnishings—our soon-to-be son's bedroom. With months before his arrival there was no pressure, only blessed time to dream.
Imagine our surprise when, one evening, while we were sitting in the TV room that was to be the nursery, the phone rang and we were told we would be traveling to bring our son home in just three weeks. He would be coming home two months earlier than anyone had expected. Suddenly, the tone of our conversations turned from day-dreams to panic. The house wasn't ready, our minds weren't ready. He had no place to lay his head. We needed a crib. We needed a car seat. What kind of a dad was I going to be? What kind of a family would we become? When he grew up, would he like me? These were now the questions that ruled my thoughts.
What did we think we were doing? Our lives were already so full. How were we going to pull this off? We led active lives, loved to travel and have company over. Our work lives kept us busy, our apartment was full. How would this child fit into our lives? And now, it was actually going to happen. Our lives were about to change forever. We had no idea how much.
The ultimate truth of our new life as a family, though, came the first night he slept in his new crib in his new nursery, in his new home. As we stood over him, watching him breathe, reveling in the miracle in our lives that he was, Paul turned to me and said, in all seriousness, "You know, we have to keep him alive ... for a really long time." Regardless of what toys we did or didn't get him, what schools he would or wouldn't attend, our task was to keep this precious gift from God alive—for a really long time.
So far, we've managed to do that. But it took getting ready. It required we move some stuff out, stuff we really liked and had grown comfortable having, to make room for him. We had to move some stuff out of our lives to make room for his life with us. And our schedules changed over night. We stopped seeing some friends who couldn't quite make the shift to having a kid around. Other friends became family.
Having a child changed our lives in ways we could never have imagined or prepared for.
And we can be certain that by welcoming the infant Christ into our hearts once again, this Christmas, our lives will be changed in ways we cannot begin to imagine. And our task will be to keep the Christ child alive, in our lives and in our hearts, truly alive—for a really long time.
But we'll have to get ready. Our lives feel so very complicated and full. How can we possibly make room for yet one more thing? We are already overscheduled. During this time of year we cram even more into our already overcommitted lives.
I was reminded recently that the incarnation of God, Jesus' birth, is, ultimately, a matter of hospitality. Of making room, of preparing a place at the table for a new guest. This guest we call Love. We wait, looking for this guest in joyful expectation. This guest who longs for a place to dwell within each of us, who waits for each one of us to make room so that he may have a place to be born.
And so, this morning, John the Baptist invites us into the river. He calls us to pour out the containers of our lives, to watch as everything that stands in the way of our relationship with God is carried away, downstream. He calls us to make room for Jesus to be born in us, to live forever in our hearts.
AMEN. Come Lord Jesus!
© 2008 The Reverend Jeffrey W. Mello