Thursday, December 19, 2019

Blessing in the Darkness

Sermon for Dec. 15, 2019
Isaiah 35:1-10; Matthew 11:2-11

It’s almost Christmas, so that means we’re supposed to be merry and bright.  Right?  But for many of us, this is a tough time of year.  If you look at WebMD or the Mayo Clinic’s website, you find resources specifically to help people cope with holiday stress and depression because it’s an actual public-health concern.  
That stress and pain can come from the intensity of our schedules, our expectations of ourselves, and our expectations of others – the folks we can’t change but sure want to.  It can also come from having lost someone you love, or having lost a relationship, or struggling with depression generally.  It can be hard to keep on smiling through what’s supposed to be “the most wonderful time of the year,” even for those of us quite talented at proclaiming, in the midst of our struggles, “It’s all good!”  Well, sometimes it’s not.
Anyway, we all know life can be tough and that the holidays don’t necessarily help.  Maybe more surprising is what we heard in today’s Gospel reading – that life became tough enough even to shake the faith of John the Baptist.  Just last Sunday, we heard John in all his prophetic certainty, railing against the Romans and the Jewish religious leaders, calling them to recognize the presence of God’s true king, to practice justice, and to get ready for the judgment to come.  This morning, eight chapters later in Matthew’s Gospel, we find John languishing in King Herod’s prison with no hope of justice for himself.  John’s in prison because Herod’s afraid.  Herod has his ear to the ground, and he hears the rumbling of a coming rebellion.  Herod’s one job, as Caesar’s functionary in Palestine, is to keep the peace; so, he throws John in prison.  We don’t know how long John’s been there at this point, but it must have been quite a while. 
Why?  Because we hear John say the last thing we’d expect from the one who was announcing the coming of the Messiah last week.  From prison, he sends his friends to ask Jesus, “Are you [really] the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?” (Matthew 11:3).  So much for prophetic certainty.  Whatever has happened to John in prison, his spirit is broken.  At this point, he’s not sure whether Jesus is the king or not.  
So, if you’re feeling a little less than merry and bright this time of year, don’t feel badly because you’re in good company.  Even for John the Baptist, the curtains of darkness were closing over hope. 
But here’s the thing.  We can’t let fear and sorrow have the last word. 
Go back to the Old Testament reading this morning.  Last week, the reading from Isaiah was from the time of the defeat of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, when the once-great empire of David and Solomon had been cut to a stump.  Today, the Isaiah reading comes from a few decades later, from the period of the exile in Babylon, when God’s people were languishing in a foreign land and aching to come home. 
In that time of desperation, when the people must have thought God had abandoned them, the prophet offered hope once again:  “Here is your God…,” Isaiah says, “he will come and save you” (35:4).  God will bring the people home by a road opened across the desert, a way made straight through the trackless wastes of what’s now Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan.  No one in his right mind would travel there on foot.  But don’t worry, the prophet says, because waters will spring up in that desert, and you won’t die of thirst along the way.  The wild beasts won’t harm you, “but the redeemed will walk there,” those whom God has liberated from the despair of exile (35:9).  And in the power of that liberation, the prophet says, God will heal the spiritual disabilities of the exiled people:  “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.” (35:5-6)  The people of Israel sit in captivity in Babylon, asking God, “Are you really going to come and save us?  And God says, “Despite what you see – yes.  I am your deliverer.  I am your healer.  I am your king.  Just watch.”
Jesus picks up the same refrain with the followers of John the Baptist.  When they ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we wait for another?” Jesus says, look around.  “Go and tell John [the Baptist] what you see and hear” (Matthew 11:4). 
And what would that be?  Well, for the last seven chapters of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus has been curing all kinds of diseases, teaching huge crowds, performing miracles, and giving his followers the power to heal, and cast out demons, and proclaim the kingdom of God at hand … despite the persecutions this work brings.  So, Jesus says, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news preached to them.” (Matthew 11:4-5)  Yes, he says.  Despite what you see –  despite persecution, despite John rotting in prison, despite the cost that will come to Jesus himself – yes, he says.  I am your deliverer.  I am your healer.  I am your king.  Just watch.  And, don’t let fear have the last word.
Of course, that’s hard to pull off in the world we know, from our national life to our personal lives.  There’s plenty that keeps us up a night.  The news tells us that not only do our leaders seem unable to work together, they don’t even seem to be living on the same planet.  Even in a strong economy, millions of people struggle to feed their kids or risk losing their homes.  Illnesses afflict us; and death comes knocking, even at Christmastime.  
But in our all-too-real strife, Jesus says, choose what you’ll pay attention to, for God is at work even in the hardest times.  Let me share a couple of examples.
As you know, parishioner Bill Meeker died a couple of weeks ago with no warning, a day after coming here for worship.  In a sense, going suddenly is a great way to go; but on the other hand, it doesn’t leave time to tie up loose ends.  And I’m not telling any secrets in saying that Bill could be a challenging person to relate with.  But I have been struck, in the past couple of weeks, at the number of people who’ve said something along the lines of, “You know, I’d just had a great conversation with him” or “We were really making progress” or “We’d finally been able to clear the air.”  That’s blessing, even in the darkness.
Here’s another.  I know a family struggling with grave illness.  Death will come soon, and they know it.  But in the midst of trying to make peace with that, the person who’s sick was focused on being sure a message of thankfulness got to his friends, letting them each know how important they’d been to him.  That’s blessing, even in the darkness.
Here’s another.  I know someone struggling with the prospect of losing his home.  He’s been fighting to keep it, but the odds aren’t good.  Yet in that drama, he noticed that someone on the other side of the legal issue had actually taken a step in his interest, trying to give him every chance to resolve the issue favorably.  That’s blessing, even in the darkness.
And here’s another.  I can predict something that will happen this Saturday, when we offer the Free Store at Grace & Holy Trinity Cathedral.  There, hundreds of people will be served Christmas dinner, and then they’ll have the chance to shop from a variety of coats, hats, boots, and gloves to help them stay warm this winter.  And I can tell you how several of those conversations will go.  People from St. Andrew’s will be sitting at tables with them during lunch, or helping them shop through the Free Store afterward.  And we’ll ask guests this question: “How are you doing?”  And I guarantee that we will hear this response:  “I am blessed.”  I am blessed.  Even in poverty.  Even in the darkness.
A big part of getting ready for the coming of our Savior and King is deciding what we’ll hear and see.  So, look for the thirsty ground that God is watering to bring you out of spiritual exile.  Pay attention to what you learn from reporters of hope, rather than those who profit from driving us further apart in fear.  Seek the healing presence of people around you in those moments when life brings you pain. 
And then, be that reporter of Good News yourself.  As Jesus says to John’s followers, go and tell others what you’ve heard and seen.  The blind receive their sight.  The lame walk.  The lepers are cleansed.  The deaf hear.  The dead are raised.  And those who are poor, in so many senses, have good news brought to them.  Yes, we find ourselves in exile sometimes.  But death doesn’t get the last word.  For “the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come [home] with singing … and sorrow and sighing shall flee away” (Isaiah 35:10).


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