A sermon preached on the first Sunday of Advent 2015 at United Presbyterian Church in Lone Tree, IA. The texts were Isaiah 9:2-7 and Luke 2: 39-52 . Special thanks goes to Walter Brueggemann for his fine study from the Thoughtful Christian on the four messianic titles for Jesus.
We are in that time of our political
cycle when I wonder why it is that I ever moved to Iowa.
As we head into January and the first
in the nation caucuses to be held on Feb 1st, for months now we've
been inundated with:
political advertisements,
daily news about the going ons of each
candidate as they criss-cross the state,
facebook posts applauding or decrying
what controversial thing this or that candidate has said,
and phone calls asking us to support,
to caucus, or do volunteer work for candidates.
I have to say I'm so looking forward to
February 2nd when we can all get on with our lives...at
least for a few months...until things ramp up again in the late
summer and early fall in anticipation of the general election.
In American politics, we have this
phenomenon where we place all sorts of hopes and dreams on our
incoming Presidents. It doesn't help that candidates and new
Presidents always over sell themselves.
They promise all sorts of things that
they simply will not be able to deliver. Their speeches as candidates
and as new presidents hold out hope:
for a new era of optimism and promise,
a new deal bringing progress and
prosperity,
broad sweeping hope and change,
the return of American strength and
power,
or the dawning of a new time of peace
and liberty.
They intend to clean house,
to solve all our foreign policy issues,
to take our country to war or to get
our country out of it,
to bolster the economy and create a
plethora of jobs,
to build bridges between political
parties,
to make decisions that are transparent
in the political process.
You name it. They promise it.
But we all know....
That while some good things can
certainly happen during the term of almost any President, the stark
reality is that - more often than not, across the board, and no
matter what political party is in power - things hardly ever turn out
as we hoped they would.
Yet we still seem to hope and long for
a better, more ideal America, for a better safer world, and as a
result we continue to place all sorts of highfalutin expectations on
each incoming President.
Each and every time.
Our text from Isaiah is set in a
particular political context, in a particular geographical place and
time. It highlights the same sort of hopes and dreams we place on our
own leaders. It is full of the same sorts of lofty expectations and
high ideals.
This 9th chapter of Isaiah might be
referred to as “Royal Liturgy of the Kingdom” used in Jerusalem
by the Israelites for the coronation of their new King.
The liturgy ascribes to the king
honorifics bestowed on him when he comes to power. It anticipates a
new regime of endless peace and a reign of justice and righteousness
forever.
In particular, it ascribes to the new
king four different titles: “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace.”
This liturgy is set in the 8th
Century before Christ during the reign of King Hezekiah honoring him
with flowery language and lofty slogans to celebrate and anticipate
the days of his glorious reign.
The reality, however, was quite
different.
King Hezekiah enacted some remarkable
policies. Most notably he forestalled the assault of the Assyrian
army. In the end, though, Hezekiah was a disappointment as his reign
ultimately capitulated to the rising power of Babylon.
Perhaps it is inevitable. Perhaps it is
always so. Such high expectations can never be realized. Yet that
does not keep the same sort of ambitious expectations from being
applied to and longed for in the next coming king.
Over and over again.
For the first three weeks of Advent and
the first Sunday after Christmas we'll take a look at the four
honorific titles found in verse 6. Titles which have long been
ascribed to Jesus.
Early Christians took these titles from
Isaiah and readily applied them to Jesus. In him they saw the
fulfillment of the longing, hopes, and expectations of the Jewish
people who were waiting for the coming of a Messiah.
One thing that is easy to overlook is
that Christ's coming is set within a geographical location and time
and in a particular political context. Rome rules over the Jewish
people with absolute power through a coercive military presence and
an oppressive tax system.
Jesus inaugurates a new regime of peace
and well-being meant to displace the old Roman order of violence and
extortion. He opposes the power of Rome and by extension each and
every power that claims to be ultimate and absolute.
That's one reason why so many of our
Christmas carols abound with royal imagery. In them Jesus comes as a
long expected king. He is born to set his people free.
In particular, stories in the gospel
abound of how Jesus can be seen to fulfill the title of “Wonderful
Counselor” and how his life, ministry, and teachings confront the
powers that be.
At the age of twelve, he astounds his
parents and the leaders and teachers in the synagogue with his
uncommon wisdom and with the divine and human favor that was upon
him.
Those who heard his teaching and saw
his miracles are astounded by how he taught with unusual authority,
far beyond the authority of all other religious leaders. His
teachings contradicted the usual assumptions. He confounded the
political and religious authorities.
And his teachings continue to challenge
Christians today – as they challenged us this year in our study of
the Sermon on the Mount.
I've not had enough time to mull over
and unpack these words from Walter Brueggeman. They are a mouthful.
But I think there's something vitally important in them. He writes,
Jesus' kingdom will not come by supernatural imposition or by royal fiat but only by the daily intentional engagement of his subjects, who are so astonished by his wonder that they no longer subscribe to the old order of power and truth, that turns out to be, in the long run, only debilitating fraudulence.
I need to think about that some more
but here is one way I see that play out...
Each and every day I'm becoming less
and less convinced that our political leaders and rulers can affect
the kinds of meaningful changes that can ever bring about a better
world for all.
I don't know what took me so long.
Perhaps I too was caught up in the hope that this or that President
would somehow deliver on such lofty promises. Maybe I too easily conflated our country with the Kingdom of God.
Rather, I'm becoming more and more
convinced that the answer lies with folks like you and me who are
willing to simply follow and to live in the ways of the Wonderful
Counselor. And who will commit themselves to the upside down work of
his Kingdom.
Imagine how we could shape and change
the world if we only thought this to be absolutely true. If each and
every day we were so astonished by Jesus' teachings that we made
intentional and deliberate efforts to apply them to how we live as he
called us to.
I think of a retired friend of mine who
began to hear God's call to be with the marginalized. He is not
seminary trained, but he loves Jesus. He began hanging out at a
church in a poor neighbor in his city on Wednesday evenings. It
wasn't really his thing, the preacher was a bit more conservative
than he liked, but he came to love the pastor and the folks in that
church.
Recently, he committed himself to be
part of a ministry in which five or six well resourced people are
trained to meet weekly in a group with a person who is working to get
out of poverty. It's a ministry of mutual encouragement and support
as each gives to the other in unimaginable ways.
I think of churches I've read about in
recent weeks that are not giving into the overwhelming rhetoric of
fear and who are committing themselves to connect to refugees from
Syria. They are trying to take God's call to hospitality seriously by
financially and in other ways assisting those our government has
committed to re-settle.
Can one be a secret or potential
terrorist? I suppose so, but I'm impressed with those willing to take
the gamble that ministering to one in need in Christ's love may do
far more to mitigate such danger than will mistreating them out of
fear.
I think of the shooting in Colorado on
Friday and how almost every week an event like this is in the news.
I think of how I long for Christians on
all sides of the gun debate to sit down with one another, to put
aside our agendas, to study together the teachings of Jesus, and to
rise up before our leaders with substantive commitments to finally do
something for the well being of our communities and for the good of
our children, who should not have to live in fear of a world full of
lock-down drills.
And, I think of each one of us, who
each and every day, in all sorts of quite and unassuming ways, go
about Jesus' ministry in our families and our communities, faithfully
loving and caring for those God has placed in our lives. Maybe not
perfectly, but still, trying to extend forbearance and forgiveness.
Or taking a meal to someone in need, or sitting down over lunch with
someone they disagree with, or just taking the time just to offer a listening ear.
I believe in such big and small ways,
we can be a part of answering that age old question, first posed in
Genesis, “Is anything too wonderful for the Lord?” Just as Jesus
– the wonderful counselor - did, we too can attest to the great
possibility of God in what often seems like such an impossible world.
Thanks be to God, the one who sent
Jesus – the Wonderful Counselor - now and forever, Amen!
