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REJOICE: It's Advent - Sermon, December 11, 2011

2011-12-13T14:53:00.000-08:00

Sermon December 11, 2011 Third Sunday of Advent, Year B

John 1:6-8, 19-28 and Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11

Today’s Gospel reading features John attempting to explain to the Jewish religious leaders by what authority he was testifying about the coming Messiah. It is important to know that, according to historians of the time, John the Baptist had developed quite a large following among the people. The Roman historian Josephus even wrote of John as being a more important figure that Jesus. Quite clearly, John’s pronouncements got the religious leaders wondering if he was claiming to be the Messiah himself. So they sent some officials to ask him. John told them that he was not.

The officials then correctly perceived that John was announcing that the Messiah was near. Now the Jews believed that the Messiah would be preceded by a return of the prophet Elijah. If you know your Old Testament, you would know that Elijah did not die, but was taken up into heaven by God, and the Jews thought that his return would presage the coming of the Messiah. So they ask John if he is Elijah, but John denies that also. Well this perplexes the officials and they finally just ask “Who are you?” They want to know what John’s credibility is.

The reason for their confusion is that the Jews had a very fixed idea about what the Messiah would be like. I came across one Jewish website describing what Jews expect to see in a Messiah. According to this site, the Jews believed that the Messiah would be a great political leader descended from King David, well-versed in Jewish law, a charismatic leader, a great military leader who will win battles for Israel, a great judge, and above all, a human being, not a god.

So think about it. The Jews were expecting the Messiah to be preceded by one of Israel’s best known prophets, Elijah, returning to earth announcing his coming. And surely, it would be pretty hard to miss a great charismatic political and military leader. People like that don’t just appear out of the woodwork. Just think if someone began to declare to Republicans that their long awaited 2012 presidential candidate had finally arrived. Most pundits would be asking themselves who this person was – would it mean that one of the star candidates who had previously declined to run, changed their mind? Or perhaps, a successful general, businessperson or Senator had decided to run after all. Most pundits would be able to draw up a list of 25 people tops, and they would know that the mystery candidate would have to be one of those people.

Well, you can imagine why the Jewish leaders of the time were puzzled by John and why they wanted to know who he was. They must have thought that John was either a dangerous fraud or else that John knew about a potentially very powerful rebel leader that they didn’t know about. Of course, neither was true.

John replied by claiming Old Testament prophecies to substantiate his claims. Specifically, he refers back to the prophet Isaiah, who authored many prophecies that looked forward to the Messiah’s coming. However, the Jewish religious officials ignored this response by John and continued to press him for his identity. Then John makes a truly remarkable statement. He says to them “among you stands one you do not know. He is the one who comes after me…” In other words, John tells the religious officials that the Messiah is among them, but that they don’t recognize him.

As we learned, it would have been impossible not to have known a Messiah who was going to be a charismatic political and military leader. Such leaders don’t just appear out of thin air. If such a person was reputed to exist, you would have had to either know the person, or know of them. But John declares that the Messiah is among them but that they don’t recognize him. How can this be? The problem is that the Jewish leaders ignored John when he pointed them back to Scripture. Had they been willing to go back and re-read Isaiah with fresh eyes, they might have realized how mistaken they were. So if we want to learn about who Jesus really is, we need to follow where John is pointing – back to Isaiah’s prophesies. What does Isaiah tell us about Jesus Christ, the coming Messiah?

Well, I could stand here all day and talk to you about this subject, but we only have a few minutes. So let’s just look at a couple of passages. First, let’s look at John’s actual quote from Isaiah – “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’” This comes from Isaiah chapter 40. Chapter 40 begins saying “Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for.” Then the words that John speaks are included as the voice of the Lord’s herald, after which Isaiah writes “the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” Thus, what John was declaring was that he was indeed the herald to the Messiah’s coming, but that the foretold Messiah would come to pay for Israel’s sins.

Isaiah chapter 53 tells how the Messiah will pay for our sins. This chapter tells us how Jesus will accomplish the great promises that we will hear about in chapter 61. And it is in chapter 53, that we see how it was so easy for the Jewish officials not to see the Messiah when he was right in their midst. They were looking for a dashing and charismatic leader, while Isaiah tells us that the Messiah “had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by others, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.” People like that typically don’t get noticed. But Isaiah doesn’t stop there – he continues beginning at verse 4 “Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

The final passage in Isaiah that we will look at is today’s Old Testament reading. We read from Isaiah 61, a passage that Jesus made a point of selecting to read from in Luke chapter 4, after which he declared “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” Jesus was identifying this passage from Isaiah with himself. This passage tells us that Jesus came to proclaim good news to the poor, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives, and to comfort all who mourn. He has come to bestow on those who grieve a “crown of beauty instead of ashes”, the “oil of joy instead of mourning” and a “garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.” In other words, the purpose of Jesus coming is to put things right again and to bring us joy.

There are many prophecies looking forward to the Messiah that can be found in the Old Testament. We talked about a few of them today. I have passed out to you today, the lyrics to Handel’s Messiah. The Messiah is truly an Advent masterpiece and I would encourage everyone who has never yet done so to attend a performance of the Messiah this Advent. And pay close attention to what is being sung. The lyrics are taken completely from the Bible, and include many of the Old Testament references to the coming of the Messiah. So I would encourage you sometime this Advent to either attend a live performance, or listen to it on CD or the radio and read the lyrics while you enjoy the wonderful music.

Advent is the time that we look forward to the coming of our Messiah and prepare our hearts and lives for his coming. This, the third Sunday of Advent, is known as Gaudete Sunday. Gaudete is Latin for “rejoice” and is the Sunday in Advent that we focus on joy. We read in Isaiah 61 that Jesus has come to bring us joy. On reading Isaiah 61, I thought of a passage near the end of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, after the hobbits Frodo and Sam have just destroyed the evil ring of power by casting it into Mount Doom. They are caught in a sea of lava that the ring’s destruction has brought about and pass out thinking that they are about to die. But in the next scene, Sam wakes up in a sunlit room and sees the great wizard Gandalf, who he thought had died, standing over him. Gandalf asks him how he feels, and listen to what happens then:

But Sam lay back, and stared with open mouth, and for a moment, between bewilderment and great joy, he could not answer. At last he gasped: ‘Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue? What’s happened to the world?’ ‘A great Shadow has departed,’ said Gandalf, and then he laughed, and the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days without count. It fell upon his ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known. But he himself burst into tears. Then as a sweet rain will pass down a wind of spring and the sun will shine out the clearer, his tears ceased, and his laughter welled up, and laughing he sprang from bed... "How do I feel?" he cried." Well, I don't know how to say it. I feel, I feel" --he waved his arms in the air-- "I feel like spring after winter, and sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!"” (J.R.R. Tolkien (2009-04-17). The Lord of the Rings (pp. 951-952). Harper Collins, Inc.. Kindle Edition.)

This is what Isaiah 61 points to in Jesus. Jesus came to the world to take away the great Shadow of sin from our lives, and to bring us great joy by making everything that is sad come untrue by reuniting us with God our Father. Rejoice!

Let us pray:

Lord, we are commanded to Rejoice in you always. Advent is the time for us to prepare ourselves to receive your Son, our Savior. On this Gaudete Sunday, we ask you to prepare our hearts and remove the sadness that hinders us from feeling the joy and hope which His presence will bestow. Whatever our circumstances, give us the joy of your Son Jesus Christ, as we look forward to the great celebration of His coming to earth as one of us. We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

98th Annual Christmas Bazaar - Saturday, Dec. 3

2011-11-21T10:57:00.001-08:00

Come join us for the 98th Annual Christmas Bazaar!

When: Saturday, December 3, 2011 from 9:00 am - 1:00 pm
Where: St. Luke's Episcopal Church, Galt, California (corner of 3rd and B streets)

Featuring hand-crafted items and baked treats.
Christmas gifts for family and friends.
Enjoy good conversation and light refreshments.

For directions see directions to St. Luke's Episcopal Church.

Sermon November 13, 2011

2011-11-13T00:49:00.000-08:00

Sermon November 13, 2011 Proper 28, Year A

Matthew 25:14-30

James Wirrell

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our heartsbe acceptable in your sight, Oh Lord, our strength and our redeemer.

Today’s Gospel reading is a parable, or story, that Jesustold his disciples concerning stewardship in the end times. It is one of a series on this topic. Now just to orient you, in terms of time, weare living in the end times. No, not assome radio preachers would have you believe, but rather in that Jesus couldreturn or call us home at any time. Thisseries of parables start in Matthew chapter 24 and continue through chapter 25. They all feature a character representing Godgoing away somewhere and who will return somewhat unexpectedly. They also feature characters representing usexercising good or bad stewardship over something. The overall message is to be prepared andpractice continual good stewardship over that which you are responsible so thatyou will be ready when God returns and calls you to account.

Two weeks ago, Barbara and I had one of those weeks wherebad news about our friends just kept coming in unrelentingly. Ron had serious complications with his eyesurgery; a priest friend of Barbara in the diocese collapsed, hit her head onthe floor and died from the resultant brain injury. Another friend told us of her friend who hadjust suddenly died at age 52 of a brain aneurism. Another friend we heard had had a heartattack over the summer, and yet another friend had discovered that her cancerhad spread to her brain. All of thisnews made me think about today’s Gospel reading, which I had been reading overin preparation for today’s sermon. Ithought to myself that none of us knows when our time will come and when wewill be called to account for our stewardship of what God has entrusted to us.

Now you might ask yourself what it means for God to call usto account for our stewardship. Doesn’tthe Bible tell us that we are saved by grace alone and not by works? Didn’t Jesus already die for our sins? So why were the first two servants in today’sparable rewarded for their good work and the third servant condemned for hispoor work? Or were they? Let’s consider what it means for God to callus to account.

There are a few things we need to understand about thisparable. First, the translation we heardtoday speaks of the servants being given five, two and one bags of gold. The original text actually indicates that thefirst servant was given an amount of money that was worth 100 years wages for acommon laborer, the second servant an amount worth 40 years wages, and thethird servant an amount worth 20 years wages. These were not small amounts of money. Second, note that the departing master gave money to the three servantsaccording to their abilities – thus the point of the parable is not to condemnpeople because of their lack of ability.

The first two servants took the resources they were givenand made good use of them – each of them doubling the amount by the time themaster returned. When the masterreturned he heartily congratulated them before telling them that because theywere faithful with a few things, they would be put in charge of manythings. This implies that the master wastraining his servants, and that those who practiced good stewardship would begiven even more responsibility.

The third servant hid away the resources he had been givenand just sat on them. Note that thefirst two servants actively managed the resources they had been given, and,given the amounts involved, this probably took up most of their time. Thus, their time was spent on their master’sbusiness. The third servant, incontrast, by hiding away his resources, would have spent his time on his ownbusiness, and not on his master’s. Whenthe master returned, this third servant attempted to justify his inaction. Most English Bibles translate the servant’sresponse to his master as being “I knew you were a hard man”, but it is importantto know that the Greek word used for “hard” connotes someone who is ruthless,merciless, unpleasant and mean. So thisthird servant is claiming that he was afraid to do anything with the resourcesentrusted to him because he thought his master was a mean jerk.

The master’s response to this suggests that he saw thisservant’s response as being an insincere excuse. The master replies to the servant by callinghim lazy and saying “if what you say is true and I am greedy and ruthless, thenwhy didn’t you at least invest the resources in a bank and, at a minimum, earnsome interest on it?” The master’sretort makes it clear that he doesn’t think that the servant is telling thetruth, but rather was trying to excuse his laziness. And it is only after hearing the untruthfulexcuse that the master became really angry with the servant.

So the problem is not with the third servant’s rate ofreturn on the investment but rather with his attitude to and relationship withthe master. The lazy servant obviouslydid not have respect for his master, because when the master left he simplyburied his bag of gold and ignored it. Then when his master returned, he tried to justify himself with adeceitful excuse.

So what does this parable tell us today? Well, when the master left, he gave each ofthe three servants resources of which they were to be stewards. All three servants were given the opportunityto serve the master. The master evenapportioned the resources according to the abilities of his servants. In the same way, God has given each of useverything that we have, and He expects us to be good stewards of everythingthat He has given us. The two faithfulservants took their master seriously and devoted their lives to investing theirresources in service of their master. This is what God calls us to do also. And if we live our lives devoted to God and what God would have us do,we will be investing our resources wisely. And God will say to us “well done, good and faithful servant.” Not because this service earns us oursalvation, but rather because this service shows that we have accepted God’sinvitation to be in relationship with Him.

The lazy servant, however, hid away the resources he hadbeen given and instead spent his time on his own affairs. This action by the lazy servant shows that hedid not desire an ongoing serious relationship with his master. What’s more, when his master returned, thisservant insulted his master and lied to him with a false excuse. How we treat the resources that God hasentrusted to us says a lot about our attitude towards God. If we don’t use those resources to furtherGod’s kingdom on earth, but instead spend our time on other things, it is asign that God is not our priority.

So to return to our question - what does it mean for God tocall us to account for our stewardship? When God looks to our stewardship and listens to how we explainourselves, He will know whether we want to be in a relationship with Him. Those who want a relationship with God, willgo experience an even deeper and richer relationship. To them, as the Gospel reading says “will begiven more, and they will have an abundance.” But those who think that they can put God in second place and have justa superficial relationship with God will realize that in reality they have norelationship with God at all. Thesepeople will, in the end, even lose their false belief that they can have asuperficial relationship with God – asour reading says “for those that do not have, even what they have will be takenfrom them.”

So let us turn our hearts towards God and a deeperrelationship with Him, practicing stewardship over that which God has given usto reflect where we have set our hearts.

Let us pray:

Oh God, we acknowledgethat all that we have is given to us by You. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to show our commitment to you byexercising stewardship over all that you have given us. Lord, send you Holy Spirit to us that wemight exercise that stewardship in ways that are pleasing to you and infurtherance of Your Kingdom. We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Pastor's Reflections - July-August Newsletter

2011-08-17T11:02:00.000-07:00

Dear Saints of God,

Summertime….and the living is easy…but faith can be challenging or even difficult at the best of times. On the Second Sunday in Pentecost we celebrated two wonderful baptisms when Keira and Mason Ramirez were baptized. Our reading from the Hebrew Scriptures was the story of God testing Abraham’s faith by asking Abraham to take his only son to the region of Moriah in order to offer his son as a sacrifice.

Abraham follows God’s instructions and when he and Isaac get close to the place for the sacrifice, Isaac asks his father; “Where is the burnt offering for the sacrifice?” Abraham answers, “God Himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering.” I have little idea what was going on in Abraham’s mind, but somehow Abraham knew enough about God that he knew God would provide. Sure enough the story has a happy ending for Abraham and Isaac (if not for the lamb.) Abraham experienced God’s provision and named that place “The LORD will provide.” I believe God will provide for us this summer, this year and for the rest of our lives.

God is the kind of God that offered His one and only Son for us. Only God Himself could die in our place and pay the penalty for our sin. Perhaps this Abraham and Isaac story is a foreshadowing of how God will indeed provide for Abraham and for all of us. If God had not become the sin offering for us, we would still be dead in our sins and trespasses.

The apostle Paul puts it like this; “Before you became Christians and/or before you were baptized you were slaves to sin. But through our new life in Christ we have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God.” (Romans 6) The bottom line is that we will either serve God or we will serve ourselves and sin. No matter how far we try to run from God, we cannot be independent beings. We were created to be in a relationship with a loving, holy and self sacrificing God. Before her baptism young Keira put it this way; “I want to be baptized because I love God and God died for us; so who wouldn’t want to be baptized since He did this for us?”

I am thankful for new life in Christ, for Keira and Mason’s baptisms, for the privilege of gathering with God’s people each Sunday, for God’s unlimited faithfulness, and for God’s provision for health and abundant life in Him.

May you too be thankful this summer even when the summer living isn’t all that easy.

With love in Christ,

Pastor Barbara Elizabeth+