December 17, 2006, Advent Three

Collect:
Stir up your power, O Lord, and with great might come among us; and, because we are sorely hindered by our sins, let your bountiful grace and mercy speedily help and deliver us; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen.

Readings:
Isaiah 12:2-6; or Canticle 9; Zephaniah 3:14-20; Philippians 4:4-7; Luke 3:7-18


From Day by Day:
Luke 3:7--18. John answered all of them saying, I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming.

We know that John was speaking of Jesus and yet Jesus too came for baptism. In baptism, we are each marked as Christ's own and with each baptism that we witness we renew our baptismal covenant.
With our baptism we are joined with others in an agreement with Christ. This is between God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit and us. Forever!
As we watch a baptism, it should bring us back to our own or maybe we were too young to remember ours, so maybe we can remember other special baptisms--sisters, brothers, children, grandchildren, friends, or spouses.
In the Episcopal Church, baptism is a community event. You join a large community of the faithful and all are welcomed at the table. All the sacraments are opened to each of us. Come to the table--Christ is waiting there.

Canticle 9
The First Song of Isaiah
Ecce, Deus

Isaiah 12:2-6

Surely, it is God who saves me; *
I will trust in him and not be afraid.
For the Lord is my stronghold and my sure defense, *
and he will be my Savior.
Therefore you shall draw water with rejoicing *
from the springs of salvation.
And on that day you shall say, *
Give thanks to the Lord and call upon his Name;
Make his deeds known among the peoples; *
see that they remember that his Name is exalted.
Sing praises of the Lord, for he has done great things, *
and this is known in all the world.
Cry aloud, inhabitants of Zion, ring out your joy, *
for the great one in the midst of you is the Holy One of Israel.

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: *
as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever. Amen.


Anglican Cycle of Prayer: Kushtia - (Bangladesh) The Rt Revd Paul Sishir Sarkar



Advent calendar: Ways to help others:
3. Practice Alternative Giving. Give more to the needy. Give Fair Trade gifts.

Advent Calendar: Open Wide the Doors To Christ by Elizabeth Bookser Barkley
Lighten up. As we move into a new millennium, we rejoice in this thought: The Messiah is already among us. This presence is confirmed through our good works—as we help the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame leap high, the voiceless speak. When we share from our riches or our poverty, when we lead a just life, we confirm
the Incarnation.




From John E. Rotelle, O.S.A., Tradition Day by Day: Readings from Church Writers. Augustinian Press. Villanova, PA, 1994.

The origins of Jesus by Odilo of Cluny (962 - 1049), abbot, left a lasting mark on the liturgy by introducing the commemoration of the dead on All Souls' Day.

Abraham and David received the promise of our Savior's coming more plainly than any of our other forbearers. And so they deserved to be given the first and most important place in the records of our Lord's ancestry according to the evangelist Matthew, the opening words of whose gospel are: The genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. With these sacred words of the evangelist both the prophetic oracles and the apostolic preaching are in accord. It is evident that when the prophet Isaiah said in the person of God the Father: And so, Israel my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend in whom I took possession of you, his message was that the mediator between God and humankind would be born according to the flesh from the stock of Abraham.

The man in the gospel who was freed from the darkness of ignorance and enlightened by faith addressed God's Son as "Son of David." Not only did he receive spiritual insight, but he also deserved to have his bodily sight restored. Christ the Lord desires to be called by this name, knowing that there is no other name by which the world can be saved. And if we ourselves wish to be saved by him who is the one and only Savior, each of us must also say to him: "Lord, son of David, have mercy on us." Amen.




She in Whom Salvation Was Begun
The Mother of God and the Incarnation

It is said that Rome was not built in a day. True and well accepted this axiom may be, that so great a city did not come to exist in the span of a single day, yet when it comes to the matter of the Incarnation of God in Jesus Christ, we are all too wont to forget its lesson. How often we see the Incarnation commencing beneath the Bethlehem star , in a small cave on the day of the Nativity, where among men the pre-eternal God was born. Yes this mysterious and wonderful event, like the great city of old Rome, 'was not built in a day'. The Incarnation, the great mystery of God's salvific love, was not begun on Christmas afternoon and did not take its commencement in a stable in Bethlehem. The economy of human salvation in the incarnate Christ, the eternal plan and purpose of God and the focus of all human history, began its physical realisation nine long months before, in the town of Galilean Nazareth, in the home of an aging Joseph, in the person of a young woman who in a supreme moment of divine grace became the Mother of God.

It is hard to imagine the scene at the Annunciation, at that event commemorated in what a Syriac calendar once called 'the beginning and source of all other feasts', though Scriptures, the Fathers and the festal hymnography of the Church speak much of it. Who among us can imagine the Archangel's arrival, the sound of his voice as he announces the impossible and proclaims the ineffable? The Evangelist Luke, a man with great love for the Mother of God, famously records the scene: 'Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary'. So simple do his words sound, so straightforward; yet how far beyond understanding are the things he describes. A pure Virgin, by today's standards little more than a child, visited by a messenger of the bodiless hosts, told that she will bear in her womb Him who cannot be contained and give birth to Him who had created even her own self. A great mystery were the angel's words, and a great wonder was the Virgin's response. Mary, knowing full well that Eve had also been visited by an angel and through his counsel had fallen into sin that even in our day still spreads out across the world, made bold with innocence and purity to question the Messenger of God. 'O Angel, help me to understand the meaning of thy words. How shall what thou sayest come to pass? Tell me clearly, how shall I conceive, I who am a virgin maid? And how shall I become the Mother of my Maker?' [1]. The Fathers made much of the Theotokos' dialogue with Gabriel: her questioning, her faithful interrogation and wilful desire to discern the truth of what she heard, stood in stark contrast to Eve's unthinking acceptance of the serpent's words in the Garden. Mary is the first New Testament example of one with the spiritual discernment that Orthodox ascetics have sought ever since. Writes Jacob of Serug in the early sixth century, 'To this one who would bear the Son of God it was told, but she inquired, sought, investigated, learned and then kept silent' [2].

And then kept silent. The Mother of God questioned her newfound call, questioned the Archangel's words, not out of lack of faith or sinful doubt, but out of a reasonable and rational desire to be sure of God's will. When that reassurance came in Gabriel's response, the holy Virgin responded with words that have ever since been almost synonymous with a definition of the term 'faith': 'Behold the handmaiden of the Lord! Let it be unto me according to thy word' (Lk 1.38). Icons of the Mother of God at the Annunciation, among the only icons of her that do not also include a portrayal of Christ, show her with arms folded across her chest, head slightly forward and neck inclined: a pose of ultimate humility and submission which Orthodox faithful throughout the world emulate each week when approaching the chalice to receive God into their own bodies. Here is the posture that prevailed at the beginning of the human realisation of the Incarnation of Christ: humanity, the full humanity of the faithful Virgin, wholly obedient to the will and purpose of God, bowing in submission to His call. In that Galilean room--it cannot have been larger than a monk's cell or typical student's quarters--the greatest event in the history of time took form in the womb of the Mother of God.

It is difficult to comprehend the scope of what took place in that moment. A virgin did not simply conceive: the universe was turned upside down, or perhaps more aptly, was at last turned right-side-up. The natural and the supernatural were united, the result being so mysterious that human language can only begin to express it in paradox. The Uncreated was created, the Uncontainable was contained, the Illimitable was limited, the Unknowable began clearly to be known. At the heart of so great a mystery was the young Mother of God, in whom the mystery was made real. The full scope and reality of the Annunciation goes beyond human description, but one can catch glimmers of its character in the words of those who have been so daring as to attempt to speak of it. One of the best of these is found in a sermon by Pseudo-Chrysostom in the fourth century. Speaking directly to the Mother of God, he cries:

Rejoice, therefore, and dance for joy; rejoice, and tread upon the serpent's head. Rejoice, full of grace. For the curse has come to an end; corruption is taken away; sadness has passed; happiness is flowering; the blessing ever foretold by the prophets of old has come to pass. You are the one to whom the Holy Spirit referred, speaking through the mouth of Isaiah: 'Behold, the Virgin shall conceive in her womb and bear a son' (Is 7.14). You are that virgin. Rejoice, therefore, O full of grace. You are pleasing to the Demiurge; you are pleasing to the Maker; you are pleasing to the Creator; you are pleasing to Him who delights in the beauty of souls. You have found a Spouse who will protect your virginity instead of corrupting it; you have found a Spouse who wants to become your Son because of His great love for men. The Lord is with you! He who is everywhere is in you; He is with you, and He comes from you, the Lord in heaven, the Most High in the abyss, the Creator of all, Creator above the cherubim, Charioteer above the seraphim, Son in the womb of the Father, Only-begotten in your womb, the Lord--He knows how--entirely everywhere and entirely in you. Blessed are you among women! [3]

With the Annunciation to the holy Mother of God, the Incarnation of Christ, the economy of God ever purposed and eternally intentioned, took place in the human, created order. The event for which all humanity had longed, came to be in the womb of a human woman in response to her faithful submission. The mystery of salvation is begun. The life of God as man begins to take form. Humanity, in the person of her who can now truthfully be called its mother, begins anew its ascent into heaven.

One is tempted to wonder how the holy Virgin felt, emotionally, in response to the reality of Gabriel's words. She will have known of the prophecies in Isaiah and elsewhere as to the great suffering that the Messiah would undergo--Righteous Symeon's proclamation, many months later, that a sword would pierce her own so also, could not have come as a complete surprise. She must have known the scandal that her pregnancy would bring, even with her betrothed husband's acceptance. It is especially revealing that a number of icons of the Annunciation show Mary's heart being surrounded by daggers, swords, ominously indicating the tears that lie ahead. Yet Luke does not paint for us the picture of a woman overcome by trepidation, though she must have been afraid. We are given the image of one who, through whatever pain she anticipated, sang the praises of God's grace and compassion: 'My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit rejoiceth in God my Saviour. For He hath regarded the lowly state of His handmaiden; for behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For He who is mighty hath done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation' (Lk 1.46-50).

And so all generations who have received this mercy do indeed call blessed her who was and is the Mother of God. Her life is proclaimed, held up, revered, sought after as an example of the faithful obedience to which every human person is called. Her prayers and protection are sought, her love embraced. And each year, on a day that falls nine months before the Feast of the Nativity, the Church joins her in that moment when the Archangel announces the salvation of man and humanity grasps onto the first rung of the ladder that leads to Paradise. It is in this knowledge and in this spirit that the Church sings with assurance:

Today is revealed the mystery that is from all eternity. The Son of God becomes the Son of man, that, sharing in what is worse, He may make me share in what is better. In times of old Adam was once deceived: he sought to become God, but received not his desire. Now God becomes man, that He may make Adam God. Let creation rejoice, let nature exult: for the Archangel stands in fear before the Virgin and, saying to her 'Hail', he brings the joyful greeting whereby our sorrow is assuaged. O Thou who in Thy merciful compassion wast made man, our God, glory to Thee! [4]

(Text by M.C. Steenberg, 2002)

NOTES:

[1] From Canticle One of the Matins Canon of the Feast (found in the Festal Menaion).

[2] Jacob of Serug, Homily 1 on the Mother of God.

[3] From the Homily on the Annunciation by Pseudo-Chrysostom.

[4] Sticheron at Lauds of the Feast (Festal Menaion).




Reading: Luke 3: 7-18. John said to the crowds coming out to be baptised by
him: You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?
Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to
yourselves: We have Abraham as our father. For I tell you that out of these
stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The axe is already at the root
of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut
down and thrown into the fire.
What should we do then? The crowd asked. John answered: The man with two
tunics should share with him who has none, and the one who has food should
do the same.
Tax collectors also came to be baptized. Teacher, they asked, what should we
do?
Don't collect any more than you are required to, he told them. Then some
soldiers asked him: And what should we do? He replied: Don't extort money
and don't accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.
The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts
if John might possibly be the Christ. John answered them all: I baptise you
with water. But one more powerful than I will come: the thongs of whose
sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptise you with the Holy Spirit
[wind] and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his
threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up
the chaff with unquenchable fire.
And with many other words John exhorted the people and preached the good
news to them.



*Who would we identify with if we had been ‘on Jordan’s banks’: the crowd
[the ordinary person, one of the mob], the tax collectors [sinners], the
soldiers [power and authority]?

Would we have retreated quickly when John addressed us as snakes (pictured
as fleeing from an encroaching bushfire)?
I have to admit that I’m not particularly enamoured of fire and brimstone
preachers and think I may have quietly retreated from the desert and John’s
challenges to my lifestyle.
On reflection though, I resonate with his answer to the question of the
crowd: What should we do then?

His response was about how we should live if we have repented [had a change
of heart and mind and turned towards God]: we are called to care of the
needy, to share what we are able to with others. He called the crowds to
social justice in the simplest way: to clothe and feed those who are without
clothes and food. (In those days, excess of wealth was expressed in terms of
food and clothes.)

Tax collectors in those days had much the same said about them as many say
about lawyers these days.

The tax collectors not only worked for the hated Roman overlords but lined
their own pockets by charging more than was due. They were unwelcome in the
synagogues as well as being damned by the people they exploited.

Jesus, we remember, was criticised for associating with tax collectors. John’s
advice to tax collectors was simple: to collect only the amount due to the
Romans, which would preclude wallets being fattened at the expense of
others.

The military were to stop using their authority and power to blackmail
people or blacken their characters for personal gain.

Misuse of authority and power unfortunately continues in both nation states
and, sadly, churches.

*Luke goes on to assure his readers that John wasn’t the looked-for Messiah
[You may recall Luke recording (Acts Ch.19) Paul finding some ‘followers’
who had only heard of John’s baptism]. The Coming One is more powerful
[which may lead us to consider the way such power was used by John and
Jesus]. John is like a servant [untying sandal thongs] to the Coming One who
describes himself as One who has come to serve. John immerses those who
come in water, the Coming One immerses those who come in wind [spirit] and
fire- blowing away and getting rid of the ‘chaff’ in our lives and exposing
our real selves ready for re-making as people of God.

*Luke tells us that John preached ‘good news’.
It is truly good news that God calls us into a relationship and changes us
as we turn God-ward on our life journey.

Lead us, Lord, on this challenging and stimulating journey:

To new ways of thinking and new life
To asking hard questions, regardless of the answers

To times of peace, quietness and rest

To good company with laughter and friendship and fellowship and to times of
meaningful worship

To healings of scars and wounds of our bodies and our spirits
To joys of discovery and unexpected delights and to people who love and
care in different ways.






SERMON for Advent 3 - December 17th, 2006.

Readings: Zephaniah 3: 14-20; Song of Isaiah, Philippians 4: 4-7; Luke
3: 7-18.

One of my favourite Franciscan stories is about a small town called Gubbio.
Back in the early 13th century, towns and cities in Italy were like small
countries, they were often at war with their neighbours and there was a
great deal of civic pride.

Gubbio was just like this. Its citizens were very proud of their little
town. Actually, the people of Gubbio were not just proud, they were really
very arrogant. But a shadow came to Gubbio. The town's leaders tried to
hush it up, didn't want to upset the people, didn't want their neighbours to
know what was happening. There were a couple of murders, particularly
brutal murders, the bodies found mutilated in the street in the morning.
Fear began to grow in Gubbio; people began to be afraid, particularly of
going out at night. Soon the problem could no longer be hushed up, so the
town mayor issued a command that no one was to go out at night unless given
special permission.

They called for aid of a particularly brave knight but were dismayed the
next morning to find his mutilated body lying in the street. Two of the
local lads, got a little intoxicated one night and filled with foolish
bravery, decided to try and defeat this devil which was stalking their town.
Sadly, the next morning their bodies were found, as others before them had
been.

A town meeting was called and there was much arguing and many ideas and it
seemed that no progress was being made. Some one suggested they called in
the holy man from Assisi, which was not too far away. Francis' reputation
had spread far and wide and many stories had already begun to circulate
about him.

So, the town agreed to call in this scrawny little man, dressed in rags, to
see what he could do. Everyone went to bed that night, wondering what would
be found in the morning. I mean, if a strong and gallant knight ended up
dead, what chance did a skinny little beggar have, even if he was considered
holy?

That night, while the towns people slept, Francis went outside the town
gates and waited to see what would happen. Along came a shadow, slinking,
sliding through the night. He sensed the presence of a human and came
towards Francis. There before Francis stood a wolf, thin, mangy and very
hungry.

The next morning, the towns folk awoke with a sense of a foreboding. They
came out of their houses, but there was no sign of Francis. The townsfolk
began to get frantic. What could have happened? There was a through search
of the town and he was no where to be found.

Then the shout went up - he had been spotted outside the gate of the town .
but he wasn't alone. There, walking beside him, as tame as any pet dog,
walked a great grey shadow of a wolf.

Francis had struck a deal with the wolf. If the town's people left food out
for the wolf, he wouldn't harm them. It took a little while but soon the
wolf was a common sight in and out of people's homes. He lost that lean
hungry look and his coat began to grow thick and healthy. The town's folk
grew to love the wolf, and he the people. While the wolf was transformed,
so were the people of Gubbio. They were no longer arrogant and proud. The
fear and the uncertainty had taught them humility, Francis had taught them
generosity and a more open nature.

In our gospel reading, the people who listened to John the Baptiser, asked;
"What must we do?"

The answer for the people of Gubbio was to put aside their arrogance and
become more generous.

St Paul in his letter to the people of Philippi encourages them to:

4Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.
5Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is
near. 6Do not worry about anything, but in everything by
prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to
God. 7And the peace of God, which surpasses all
understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Rejoice, be gentle, do not worry, be prayerful and give thanks.

The Old Testament prophet, Zephaniah's message is similar:

"Be glad and rejoice with all your heart"

That sounds like what this season of Yuletide is supposed to be about - good
cheer and holiday exuberance and all that. But, let's look again at the
gospel for this week.

As a follow on from last Sunday gospel, we again hear about John the
Baptist, and hear John's message. John would have been a fairly
intimidating figure, recalling for his audience something of the prophets of
old. His message is a call to repentance, a call to shake people out of
their complacency, their arrogance and their pride. He was calling God's
chosen nation to repentance. The Jew's didn't think they needed to hear
this.

The lead up to Christmas, as we prepare ourselves to once more celebrate the
coming of the Christ-child, it is a good time to be reminded that the God
who is coming is not Santa Claus "who knows whether you are naughty or
nice", but Jesus, God with us, the one who calls to us to turn around and
follow him.

John knew that God was near, that the kingdom of God was at hand, and so
felt the urgency of the call to repentance. His call to that selfish,
arrogant people was to repent, turn around, to change their ways. To be
transformed into a caring, generous people, who would "walk the extra mile"
for one another.

The good news of Advent is that God is coming to us, not to destroy us but
to refine us, to help us to become what we were meant to be.

It is God's great gift to us: to own up to what we have been and done, to
repent, acknowledge that we aren't always right and allow ourselves to be
transformed by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

People come up with amazing bumper stickers, don't they?! I heard about one
during the week which states:

"Humankind: be both!" [2]

May you be filled with "the freedom" of knowing that you are not right all
of the time - and "the joy" of knowing that you don't have to be! Christ
has come to set us free. To forgive and to show us God's love. [1]

And perhaps, to identify, befriend and feed our own inner "wolf". Amen.



REFERENCES:

1. Based on Richard Fairchild's sermon The Wolf of Gubbio C 2003.
2. Penny Carson in discussion on midrash.





Revd Sally Buckley tssf
Parish Priest
Anglican Parish of Esperance
Western Australia