Happy Easter
Commentary
On the first Sunday after Thanksgiving the little box began to appear. Every day, in the same place, with only a minor variation. Early on the box engendered no real excitement or enthusiasm, but within a couple of weeks the significance of the box grew well out of proportion to its size. And after three weeks the box produced an anxiousness that seemed universally contagious.
The box was located on the front page, in the lower right-hand corner, of the daily newspaper. It simply read, 30 Shopping Days Until Christmas. Then 29, 25, 20, 14, 10; and by this time no Mercury or Gemini countdown could have been more exciting -- especially to the eight-year-old whose previous interest in the evening paper was limited to the comics page.
I had known, of course, of the importance and meaning of Christmas from my early experiences with church. But it was this simple, yet clever, marketing ploy that indelibly impressed upon my psyche the extra-religious dimension of Christmas -- a dimension with which religion has become engaged in an annual arms race for the soul. In its competition with Santa, the church has been forced to up the ante every year until now, even within religion, Christmas takes on an importance far greater than is justified by the biblical witness.
Isaiah 7:10-16
This passage calls to mind a wordplay on the Apostle Paul's famous conundrum -- "what I want, I do not have and what I have, I do not want." Ahaz wants peace, but is faced with a threatening military alliance. Ahaz has a blank check from God, but doesn't want to cash it.
The king's attitude carries forward a recurring theme of misplaced piety found throughout the scripture. It is seen in Moses' encounter with God at the burning bush and in Jonah's reaction to the revival at Nineveh. The desire not to test God is commendable, but when God makes the offer, this erstwhile piety becomes an act of faithlessness.
Clearly, God's offer through Isaiah is not an end run around faith, but is rather an invitation to faith. At what age does a child know how to "refuse the evil and choose the good"? For a child yet to be born, we could be talking about quite a number of years. Therefore, Isaiah is not calling for a short-term faith to be immediately verified, but is offering years of uncertainty buttressed by nothing more than the promise of God.
Perhaps Ahaz fully understood that the one being tested was not God.
Romans 1:1-7
As mentioned previously (Epistle Lesson, Advent 2), Paul was, at best, a faceless name to the Christian community at Rome. This letter is, in part, his attempt to introduce himself to this community and he begins in magnificent fashion. With a brevity unknown in contemporary sermons, Paul presents his credentials and the essence of his gospel -- and all of this before he writes, "Dear Romans."
First, Paul identifies himself as a servant (better, bondslave) of Jesus Christ. The image of an indentured servant of America's colonial period comes to mind. A written contract was entered into by master and slave and the contract was cut in a unique pattern so that the slave belonged to whoever held the half of the contract that matched his own. For Paul, Jesus Christ alone held the matching half of his commitment.
Next Paul defends himself against the charge made by some, and possibly heard by those in Rome, that his apostleship is somehow sui generus, self-generated. "No," Paul responds, "I did not choose this life for myself. Rather I was 'called' and 'set apart' (v. 1) by God to proclaim the Good News to the Gentiles (v. 5) in order that they, too, might magnify the name of God."
Paul then proceeds to present an encapsulated version of this Good News (Gospel). First, the Good News finds its origin in the heart and purpose of God (v. 1). It is not of human invention nor is it a divine afterthought of recent vintage. Rather the Good News was promised in ancient times through the prophets -- a promised confirmed by being put in writing. Both of these arguments are designed to speak directly to persons steeped in the culture of Rome. For the Romans, two characteristics of any belief worthy of acceptance were its connection to divinity and its antiquity.
The content of this Good News was Jesus Christ who on the human side fulfilled the Jewish expectation of being a descendant of David and who on the divine side was authenticated as the Son of God through the resurrection. Through the resurrected Jesus, Paul received the forgiveness of sins (grace, v. 5) and his divine commission (apostleship). Both forgiveness and commission are available to all who, like Paul, acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord -- Gentiles no less than the Christian community at Rome.
Thus, in a span of a few verses we learn the essentials about God's Good News. It is a resurrection-based Good News involving God's Son, Jesus the Messiah, through whom we have forgiveness of sins and the invitation to participate in the work of God through the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
Matthew 1:18-25
Whenever the interpreter approaches the Gospel of Matthew he/she must keep in mind that Matthew is not just telling a story -- he is engaged in polemic. More so than the other synoptics, Matthew is arguing that the Jesus movement is the legitimate successor of Temple-based Judaism. And in doing so, Jesus is arguing against a nascent, Pharisee-led rabbinic movement. This is a primary reason for Matthew's heavy usage of Hebrew Scripture texts, and it also helps to explain his handling of the birth narrative.
Matthew begins his Gospel with a stylized genealogy in which 52 generations are organized into three groups of 14 each, beginning with Abraham and ending with Jesus. This neat arrangement not only argues for perfection (multiples of seven), but also reinforces the argument that Jesus is the fulfillment (end, completion, goal) of Davidic expectation, since 14 is the numeric equivalent of D-V-D.
The birth narrative proper begins with today's lectionary selection. Matthew leaves no doubt concerning the subject of his Gospel when he states that this story is about Jesus who is the Messiah -- promised of God and anticipated by the people of God. Jesus the Messiah is nothing less than Emmanuel -- God with us.
Matthew and Luke both refer to the miraculous conception of Jesus, but Matthew's account is more overt and direct than Luke's. The obvious question is why -- why did he choose to report this event so unambiguously? By the time Matthew's Gospel was written, rumors questioning Jesus' parentage were being circulated with the intent of discrediting the Jesus movement. Rather than offering a defense, Matthew could have simply ignored the charges. After all, to his Jewish audience the miraculous conception surely sounded incredulous. While it is true that such stories were told among the Hellenists to enhance the stature of significant figures, no such stories were known among the Jews and the Jews were Matthew's intended audience. Nor can Matthew be telling the story to "prove" the prophetic nature of the Isaiah passage. First, just the opposite is happening -- Isaiah is used to verify the birth story, not visa versa, and secondly, as Dr. Achtemeier points out, only the Septuagint version of Isaiah would work for Matthew's purpose anyway -- not the Hebrew version. So why does Matthew include the miraculous conception? The only plausible reason is that it is true. Accepting its truth, however, does not necessarily warrant making the miraculous conception the preeminent doctrine of the Christian faith, but more about this later.
Mathew also describes Mary's betrothed, Joseph. He does this in three ways -- by word, by example and by historical connection. By word, Joseph is called "righteous"; by example, he is described in a compassionate and caring way in his proposed treatment of Mary; and by historical connection with the Patriarchs of the Hebrew Scripture through the use of dreams as a mode of communication.
However, the most important aspect of the birth narrative is the Messiah's purpose. As indicated by his name, Jesus, he will be a savior -- not in the political sense, but in the more fundamental issue of humankind's sin problem.
Application
"Christmas takes on an importance far greater than is justified by the biblical witness." That is a bold, if not controversial, statement to make. Yet, I believe it to be defensible.
Exhibit #1: The Gospels. Of the four Gospels, only two contain a birth narrative and of these two there is no overlap of material. In other words, there is no element of the birth story reported by more than one of the Gospel writers. This fact becomes even more remarkable when compared to the multiple Gospel accounts of other activities of Jesus and especially to the extensive attention all four give to the crucifixion and resurrection. Also, in the two Gospels that contain a birth narrative, the emphasis is less on the circumstances of the birth than on the significance of the birth. In Matthew's case, that significance is that Jesus, as God with us, will save his people from their sin.
Exhibit #2: The Epistles. In none of the epistles is there a mention of any aspect of the birth narrative. One would have thought that if the miraculous conception or any other circumstance of Jesus' birth was of preeminent significance, it would have found its way at least into Paul's theology. What is of ultimate importance to Paul, as seen in today's epistle lesson, is the resurrected Christ through whom we receive the forgiveness of sins.
My purpose is not to appear as some latter day Scrooge or as the Grinch who stole Christmas. But I do want to remind us that in the biblical witness the birth narratives point beyond themselves to the saving purpose of Jesus. To celebrate the birth for the birth's sake and to ignore the larger story is to miss the biblical point. The biblical witness is primarily about Easter, for which Advent is just the opening scene.
So let us sing our carols and perform our live nativities and decorate our sanctuaries with joy and gratitude to God for his wonderful gift. But let us also remember that what we are doing is not just celebrating a birth -- we are anticipating the resurrection. Happy Easter.
Alternative Applications
1) Isaiah: How often in the midst of crises do we ignore the resources of faith and try to solve our problems relying solely on our own resources? Or worse, realizing that the solution is beyond us, we do little more than worry and fret about what we find impossible to address.
For those of us who have been there -- and all of us have -- the actions of Ahaz read like a page from our autobiography. A sermon could be developed contrasting what God was willing to do for Ahaz (read "us") and Ahaz's (read "our") slowness to accept God's offer.
Nor is it necessarily only in crisis situations that God's readiness is met by our reluctance. Other opportunities, with the potential of producing within us deeper experiences of faith, are also met by our spiritual inertia. One motivation toward a greater openness to God is a recognition of how God has acted in our lives in the past. Based upon what God has done, we can trust his willingness to be involved in our continuing faith journeys.
2) Romans: Slavery and servanthood seem lost to our contemporary sensibilities and experience. For that reason, we may cognitively understand what Paul means by the term "slavery," but experientially it is a foreign language to us. What contemporary metaphors help us to understand the kind of commitment that Paul describes in Romans? What does it mean for the postmodern believer to be a "servant" of Jesus Christ?
According to Paul, to be the beneficiary of God's grace implies the outflowing of that grace through apostleship (being sent out). For what purpose has the individual congregant been "graced"? What is the nature of our apostleship, individually and collectively? During this season of giving, how might we gift the grace of God to others?
3) Matthew: Joseph is often overlooked in presentations of the birth narratives, yet Matthew presents him as one with a strong sense of character and a compassionate heart. Joseph no doubt felt betrayed upon first learning of Mary's pregnancy and found her explanation unconvincing. His choices were to publicly accuse her of adultery with the potential penalty of stoning or to settle the matter between the two of them. For Joseph the latter option was the right thing to do.
Just as important as doing what is right is doing what is right in the right way. What are common reactions to public embarrassments and humiliations, which we experience and for which we are not responsible? Can our responses be right, yet done in ways that increase the harm? Does the defense of our pride always take precedence over concern for the other, especially if that other is the source of our damaged pride? For Joseph, doing what was right was different that doing what the law demanded.
What ultimately convinced Joseph of the truth was his listening to God in a dream. The most difficult time to hear God is when the cries of our personal pain drown out all other voices. Yet, it is in those times when a word from God often comes to us. In what ways might God speak to us the truth we need to hear in the midst of our anguish? How do these mini-advents remind us of the Advent in Bethlehem and assure us of the Advent to come?
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
Isaiah 7:10-16
Last Sunday, when we were dealing with Isaiah 35:1-10, we could move almost immediately into the New Testament and into our present time, because Isaiah 35 is an eschatological passage. But the situation is entirely different here in treating Isaiah 7. This prophetic encounter is set firmly within a specific time in the eighth century B.C., and to ignore that historical context would be to misuse the text. Our passage begins in the middle of a conversation between the prophet Isaiah and King Ahaz of Judah, the ruler from 742-727 B.C. How did the conversation come about?
According to verse 1, where the passage has its beginning, Isaiah is given a command by God to confront Ahaz and to give him a message from the Lord. Ahaz is outside of Jerusalem, inspecting the viaduct that supplies Jerusalem's water, and God gives Isaiah highway instructions about where to find him! The capital city is facing a military attack. King Rezin of Syria and King Pekah of Ephraim, that is, of northern Israel, have combined armies to try to force Ahaz to join them in a military defense against the incursion of Assyrian troops. Ever since Tiglath-pileser III of Assyria took the throne in 745 B.C., his armies have been marching westward to gobble up the small states along the path to Egypt. Rezin and Pekah believe that if Judah joins their alliance, they can turn back Assyria's march. But Ahaz has refused and has instead sent emissaries to Assyria to ask for its aid.
In verses 1-9 preceding our text, Isaiah tells Ahaz that he should not fear Rezin and Pekah. After all, they are only men, "two smoldering stumps of firebrands," God calls them, and the Lord will easily defeat them if Ahaz will only trust God's defense. God promised long ago that there would never be lacking a king to sit upon Judah's Davidic throne (2 Samuel 7). Ahaz, a Davidic king, should trust that promise, and rest his fate and that of his country in the hands of his Lord. But if he will not do so, he and his country will not survive (v. 9). Ahaz, however, has no such faith in God.
As our text begins, in verse 10, the Lord tries once more to call Ahaz to trust. Through the prophet, God tells Ahaz to ask for any sign, any evidence that God will defend Judah. It can be a sign in the heavens or even a sign from Sheol, the place of the dead. Ahaz, feigning piety in typical political fashion, replies that he will not test the Lord's veracity by requiring such a sign (cf. Deuteronomy 6:16: "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test ..."). But the Lord God has great patience and is very slow to anger, even though Ahaz wearies him with his duplicity (cf. Isaiah 43:24). Therefore he will nevertheless give Ahaz a sign that his promise is true. An unnamed young woman ('almah) of child-bearing age will conceive and bear a son, and she will name the infant "Immanuel," which means "God is with us," signifying the fact that God is with Judah to protect them.
In the context of Isaiah, that young woman is not said to be either a virgin (bethulah) or a woman in the future. The term "virgin" is used in this passage only in the Greek Septuagint and in Matthew's quotation of it in 1:23. Very likely she was the wife of the prophet or of the king himself. Further, the name that she gives the child could be simply an expression of her own belief, although in its Isaiah context, the name is understood as the promise of God's defense of Judah. Verse 16 therefore goes on to assure Ahaz that before the child has mature discernment between good and evil, the Syrian and Ephraimitic threat will be gone. As the passage continues, however, in verses 17-25, the threat of Assyria will not pass, and Judah will suffer under Assyria's rod, as indeed she did. (A promise of salvation has been inserted only in vv. 21-22).
What, then, are we to make of Matthew's use of this text, and indeed, of the church's doctrine of the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, for the virginity of Mary is clearly set forth in Matthew 1 and in Luke 1? It has been remarked that belief in the virgin birth of our Lord is no strain to credulity if we believe that he is the Son of God incarnate. To believe that God became man, taking upon himself human flesh and condition, is the final test of Christian faith. In that light, the virgin birth makes eminent sense.
What we have in relation to the use of this Isaiah text in the New Testament is a common employment throughout the canon of scripture. God's words in the Old Testament find surprising and new fulfillment in the New. They are never limited in their meaning to their immediate context. Rather, in the story of Jesus Christ they are illumined in new light. For example, Matthew takes Hosea 11:1 and finds its fulfillment in the story of Mary and Joseph and the babe returning from Egypt (Matthew 2:15). Luke finds the final meaning of Israel's (and our!) exodus redemption from slavery in the cross of Christ (Luke 9:31; "departure" in the Greek is "exodus"). The Old Testament gets transformed by the New, by the new and final fulfillment of its words in our Lord, and we find that those things promised of old are not only fulfilled but given fuller meaning by the work of Christ.
We are justified, therefore, in using this text from Isaiah 7 in relation to the birth of our Lord, for it finds its final meaning in that birth. "Immanuel." By that name, God promised to be with King Ahaz and with his people in Judah and to defend them from their foes if they would put their trust in his promise to them. And by the birth of Jesus Christ, who is Immanuel, "God with us," our heavenly Father promises to be with us and to guard and protect our lives in all circumstances, even from the ravages of sin and the finality of death. But as he required also of King Ahaz, he asks also of us -- that we trust his promise, that we place our lives and fortunes and future in his loving hands and rely on his goodness and love for all things. God told Ahaz that if he did not believe, he would not be established. But if we will believe -- if we will trust our God -- we shall stand and live and know salvation to all eternity. Merry Christmas!
PREACHING THE PSALM
Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19
This psalm is used two different years during the Advent season -- here in Year A for the Fourth Sunday of Advent and in Year B for the First Sunday of Advent -- and so we should look for the Advent-type connections. We find at least two.
First, the words of verse 2b, "Stir up your might, and come and save us!" are clearly an appropriate prayer for Advent. The psalm as a whole is a plea to God, the "Shepherd of Israel," to resume the favor he once bestowed upon Israel before the people went astray.
Second, verse 17 is a prayer that God would empower Israel's king -- "the one you have made" -- to be strong on behalf of God. While the verse probably was not intended to be a messianic reference, it is possible to read it that way, as asking God to intervene in Israel's fate by sending the Promised One. (See Dr. Achtemeier's commentary for an explanation of how Old Testament texts can speak beyond their immediate context.)
Here are some preaching possibilities from the verses selected for the Psalm lection:
1) Verses 3, 7 and 19 are the liturgical repetition of the central plea of the prayer. "Restore us, O God, and let your face shine, that we might be saved." A shining face meant an expression of pleasure, and when turned toward others, it indicated favor and goodwill toward them. The expression is used in the priestly blessing in Numbers 6:22-27. Thus the prayer here is for God to restore the people by the shiny showing of his face, to bless them. A sermon could pursue the idea of how blessing can restore someone or some relationship.
2) Verse 4 speaks of the prayers of the people that make God angry. What about them angers him? Selfishness? An unrepentant heart? A haughty spirit? When do our prayers anger God?
3) "Restore us, O God," asks God to change his mind regarding the fate he has allowed to befall the people. Verses 7-16, not included in the lection, state this theme even more strongly. What's missing in the whole psalm is an expression of repentance from the people. They are saying, "Enough, already!" to the things that are distressing them, but appear not to be owning up to their complicity in causing the problems they face. A more positive way to view that, however, is to read the psalm as an expression that in the end, only the action of God can save them. Merely cleaning up their own act would not be enough.
Only God can save ... Hmm. Sounds like an Advent theme to us.
The box was located on the front page, in the lower right-hand corner, of the daily newspaper. It simply read, 30 Shopping Days Until Christmas. Then 29, 25, 20, 14, 10; and by this time no Mercury or Gemini countdown could have been more exciting -- especially to the eight-year-old whose previous interest in the evening paper was limited to the comics page.
I had known, of course, of the importance and meaning of Christmas from my early experiences with church. But it was this simple, yet clever, marketing ploy that indelibly impressed upon my psyche the extra-religious dimension of Christmas -- a dimension with which religion has become engaged in an annual arms race for the soul. In its competition with Santa, the church has been forced to up the ante every year until now, even within religion, Christmas takes on an importance far greater than is justified by the biblical witness.
Isaiah 7:10-16
This passage calls to mind a wordplay on the Apostle Paul's famous conundrum -- "what I want, I do not have and what I have, I do not want." Ahaz wants peace, but is faced with a threatening military alliance. Ahaz has a blank check from God, but doesn't want to cash it.
The king's attitude carries forward a recurring theme of misplaced piety found throughout the scripture. It is seen in Moses' encounter with God at the burning bush and in Jonah's reaction to the revival at Nineveh. The desire not to test God is commendable, but when God makes the offer, this erstwhile piety becomes an act of faithlessness.
Clearly, God's offer through Isaiah is not an end run around faith, but is rather an invitation to faith. At what age does a child know how to "refuse the evil and choose the good"? For a child yet to be born, we could be talking about quite a number of years. Therefore, Isaiah is not calling for a short-term faith to be immediately verified, but is offering years of uncertainty buttressed by nothing more than the promise of God.
Perhaps Ahaz fully understood that the one being tested was not God.
Romans 1:1-7
As mentioned previously (Epistle Lesson, Advent 2), Paul was, at best, a faceless name to the Christian community at Rome. This letter is, in part, his attempt to introduce himself to this community and he begins in magnificent fashion. With a brevity unknown in contemporary sermons, Paul presents his credentials and the essence of his gospel -- and all of this before he writes, "Dear Romans."
First, Paul identifies himself as a servant (better, bondslave) of Jesus Christ. The image of an indentured servant of America's colonial period comes to mind. A written contract was entered into by master and slave and the contract was cut in a unique pattern so that the slave belonged to whoever held the half of the contract that matched his own. For Paul, Jesus Christ alone held the matching half of his commitment.
Next Paul defends himself against the charge made by some, and possibly heard by those in Rome, that his apostleship is somehow sui generus, self-generated. "No," Paul responds, "I did not choose this life for myself. Rather I was 'called' and 'set apart' (v. 1) by God to proclaim the Good News to the Gentiles (v. 5) in order that they, too, might magnify the name of God."
Paul then proceeds to present an encapsulated version of this Good News (Gospel). First, the Good News finds its origin in the heart and purpose of God (v. 1). It is not of human invention nor is it a divine afterthought of recent vintage. Rather the Good News was promised in ancient times through the prophets -- a promised confirmed by being put in writing. Both of these arguments are designed to speak directly to persons steeped in the culture of Rome. For the Romans, two characteristics of any belief worthy of acceptance were its connection to divinity and its antiquity.
The content of this Good News was Jesus Christ who on the human side fulfilled the Jewish expectation of being a descendant of David and who on the divine side was authenticated as the Son of God through the resurrection. Through the resurrected Jesus, Paul received the forgiveness of sins (grace, v. 5) and his divine commission (apostleship). Both forgiveness and commission are available to all who, like Paul, acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord -- Gentiles no less than the Christian community at Rome.
Thus, in a span of a few verses we learn the essentials about God's Good News. It is a resurrection-based Good News involving God's Son, Jesus the Messiah, through whom we have forgiveness of sins and the invitation to participate in the work of God through the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
Matthew 1:18-25
Whenever the interpreter approaches the Gospel of Matthew he/she must keep in mind that Matthew is not just telling a story -- he is engaged in polemic. More so than the other synoptics, Matthew is arguing that the Jesus movement is the legitimate successor of Temple-based Judaism. And in doing so, Jesus is arguing against a nascent, Pharisee-led rabbinic movement. This is a primary reason for Matthew's heavy usage of Hebrew Scripture texts, and it also helps to explain his handling of the birth narrative.
Matthew begins his Gospel with a stylized genealogy in which 52 generations are organized into three groups of 14 each, beginning with Abraham and ending with Jesus. This neat arrangement not only argues for perfection (multiples of seven), but also reinforces the argument that Jesus is the fulfillment (end, completion, goal) of Davidic expectation, since 14 is the numeric equivalent of D-V-D.
The birth narrative proper begins with today's lectionary selection. Matthew leaves no doubt concerning the subject of his Gospel when he states that this story is about Jesus who is the Messiah -- promised of God and anticipated by the people of God. Jesus the Messiah is nothing less than Emmanuel -- God with us.
Matthew and Luke both refer to the miraculous conception of Jesus, but Matthew's account is more overt and direct than Luke's. The obvious question is why -- why did he choose to report this event so unambiguously? By the time Matthew's Gospel was written, rumors questioning Jesus' parentage were being circulated with the intent of discrediting the Jesus movement. Rather than offering a defense, Matthew could have simply ignored the charges. After all, to his Jewish audience the miraculous conception surely sounded incredulous. While it is true that such stories were told among the Hellenists to enhance the stature of significant figures, no such stories were known among the Jews and the Jews were Matthew's intended audience. Nor can Matthew be telling the story to "prove" the prophetic nature of the Isaiah passage. First, just the opposite is happening -- Isaiah is used to verify the birth story, not visa versa, and secondly, as Dr. Achtemeier points out, only the Septuagint version of Isaiah would work for Matthew's purpose anyway -- not the Hebrew version. So why does Matthew include the miraculous conception? The only plausible reason is that it is true. Accepting its truth, however, does not necessarily warrant making the miraculous conception the preeminent doctrine of the Christian faith, but more about this later.
Mathew also describes Mary's betrothed, Joseph. He does this in three ways -- by word, by example and by historical connection. By word, Joseph is called "righteous"; by example, he is described in a compassionate and caring way in his proposed treatment of Mary; and by historical connection with the Patriarchs of the Hebrew Scripture through the use of dreams as a mode of communication.
However, the most important aspect of the birth narrative is the Messiah's purpose. As indicated by his name, Jesus, he will be a savior -- not in the political sense, but in the more fundamental issue of humankind's sin problem.
Application
"Christmas takes on an importance far greater than is justified by the biblical witness." That is a bold, if not controversial, statement to make. Yet, I believe it to be defensible.
Exhibit #1: The Gospels. Of the four Gospels, only two contain a birth narrative and of these two there is no overlap of material. In other words, there is no element of the birth story reported by more than one of the Gospel writers. This fact becomes even more remarkable when compared to the multiple Gospel accounts of other activities of Jesus and especially to the extensive attention all four give to the crucifixion and resurrection. Also, in the two Gospels that contain a birth narrative, the emphasis is less on the circumstances of the birth than on the significance of the birth. In Matthew's case, that significance is that Jesus, as God with us, will save his people from their sin.
Exhibit #2: The Epistles. In none of the epistles is there a mention of any aspect of the birth narrative. One would have thought that if the miraculous conception or any other circumstance of Jesus' birth was of preeminent significance, it would have found its way at least into Paul's theology. What is of ultimate importance to Paul, as seen in today's epistle lesson, is the resurrected Christ through whom we receive the forgiveness of sins.
My purpose is not to appear as some latter day Scrooge or as the Grinch who stole Christmas. But I do want to remind us that in the biblical witness the birth narratives point beyond themselves to the saving purpose of Jesus. To celebrate the birth for the birth's sake and to ignore the larger story is to miss the biblical point. The biblical witness is primarily about Easter, for which Advent is just the opening scene.
So let us sing our carols and perform our live nativities and decorate our sanctuaries with joy and gratitude to God for his wonderful gift. But let us also remember that what we are doing is not just celebrating a birth -- we are anticipating the resurrection. Happy Easter.
Alternative Applications
1) Isaiah: How often in the midst of crises do we ignore the resources of faith and try to solve our problems relying solely on our own resources? Or worse, realizing that the solution is beyond us, we do little more than worry and fret about what we find impossible to address.
For those of us who have been there -- and all of us have -- the actions of Ahaz read like a page from our autobiography. A sermon could be developed contrasting what God was willing to do for Ahaz (read "us") and Ahaz's (read "our") slowness to accept God's offer.
Nor is it necessarily only in crisis situations that God's readiness is met by our reluctance. Other opportunities, with the potential of producing within us deeper experiences of faith, are also met by our spiritual inertia. One motivation toward a greater openness to God is a recognition of how God has acted in our lives in the past. Based upon what God has done, we can trust his willingness to be involved in our continuing faith journeys.
2) Romans: Slavery and servanthood seem lost to our contemporary sensibilities and experience. For that reason, we may cognitively understand what Paul means by the term "slavery," but experientially it is a foreign language to us. What contemporary metaphors help us to understand the kind of commitment that Paul describes in Romans? What does it mean for the postmodern believer to be a "servant" of Jesus Christ?
According to Paul, to be the beneficiary of God's grace implies the outflowing of that grace through apostleship (being sent out). For what purpose has the individual congregant been "graced"? What is the nature of our apostleship, individually and collectively? During this season of giving, how might we gift the grace of God to others?
3) Matthew: Joseph is often overlooked in presentations of the birth narratives, yet Matthew presents him as one with a strong sense of character and a compassionate heart. Joseph no doubt felt betrayed upon first learning of Mary's pregnancy and found her explanation unconvincing. His choices were to publicly accuse her of adultery with the potential penalty of stoning or to settle the matter between the two of them. For Joseph the latter option was the right thing to do.
Just as important as doing what is right is doing what is right in the right way. What are common reactions to public embarrassments and humiliations, which we experience and for which we are not responsible? Can our responses be right, yet done in ways that increase the harm? Does the defense of our pride always take precedence over concern for the other, especially if that other is the source of our damaged pride? For Joseph, doing what was right was different that doing what the law demanded.
What ultimately convinced Joseph of the truth was his listening to God in a dream. The most difficult time to hear God is when the cries of our personal pain drown out all other voices. Yet, it is in those times when a word from God often comes to us. In what ways might God speak to us the truth we need to hear in the midst of our anguish? How do these mini-advents remind us of the Advent in Bethlehem and assure us of the Advent to come?
FIRST LESSON FOCUS
Isaiah 7:10-16
Last Sunday, when we were dealing with Isaiah 35:1-10, we could move almost immediately into the New Testament and into our present time, because Isaiah 35 is an eschatological passage. But the situation is entirely different here in treating Isaiah 7. This prophetic encounter is set firmly within a specific time in the eighth century B.C., and to ignore that historical context would be to misuse the text. Our passage begins in the middle of a conversation between the prophet Isaiah and King Ahaz of Judah, the ruler from 742-727 B.C. How did the conversation come about?
According to verse 1, where the passage has its beginning, Isaiah is given a command by God to confront Ahaz and to give him a message from the Lord. Ahaz is outside of Jerusalem, inspecting the viaduct that supplies Jerusalem's water, and God gives Isaiah highway instructions about where to find him! The capital city is facing a military attack. King Rezin of Syria and King Pekah of Ephraim, that is, of northern Israel, have combined armies to try to force Ahaz to join them in a military defense against the incursion of Assyrian troops. Ever since Tiglath-pileser III of Assyria took the throne in 745 B.C., his armies have been marching westward to gobble up the small states along the path to Egypt. Rezin and Pekah believe that if Judah joins their alliance, they can turn back Assyria's march. But Ahaz has refused and has instead sent emissaries to Assyria to ask for its aid.
In verses 1-9 preceding our text, Isaiah tells Ahaz that he should not fear Rezin and Pekah. After all, they are only men, "two smoldering stumps of firebrands," God calls them, and the Lord will easily defeat them if Ahaz will only trust God's defense. God promised long ago that there would never be lacking a king to sit upon Judah's Davidic throne (2 Samuel 7). Ahaz, a Davidic king, should trust that promise, and rest his fate and that of his country in the hands of his Lord. But if he will not do so, he and his country will not survive (v. 9). Ahaz, however, has no such faith in God.
As our text begins, in verse 10, the Lord tries once more to call Ahaz to trust. Through the prophet, God tells Ahaz to ask for any sign, any evidence that God will defend Judah. It can be a sign in the heavens or even a sign from Sheol, the place of the dead. Ahaz, feigning piety in typical political fashion, replies that he will not test the Lord's veracity by requiring such a sign (cf. Deuteronomy 6:16: "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test ..."). But the Lord God has great patience and is very slow to anger, even though Ahaz wearies him with his duplicity (cf. Isaiah 43:24). Therefore he will nevertheless give Ahaz a sign that his promise is true. An unnamed young woman ('almah) of child-bearing age will conceive and bear a son, and she will name the infant "Immanuel," which means "God is with us," signifying the fact that God is with Judah to protect them.
In the context of Isaiah, that young woman is not said to be either a virgin (bethulah) or a woman in the future. The term "virgin" is used in this passage only in the Greek Septuagint and in Matthew's quotation of it in 1:23. Very likely she was the wife of the prophet or of the king himself. Further, the name that she gives the child could be simply an expression of her own belief, although in its Isaiah context, the name is understood as the promise of God's defense of Judah. Verse 16 therefore goes on to assure Ahaz that before the child has mature discernment between good and evil, the Syrian and Ephraimitic threat will be gone. As the passage continues, however, in verses 17-25, the threat of Assyria will not pass, and Judah will suffer under Assyria's rod, as indeed she did. (A promise of salvation has been inserted only in vv. 21-22).
What, then, are we to make of Matthew's use of this text, and indeed, of the church's doctrine of the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, for the virginity of Mary is clearly set forth in Matthew 1 and in Luke 1? It has been remarked that belief in the virgin birth of our Lord is no strain to credulity if we believe that he is the Son of God incarnate. To believe that God became man, taking upon himself human flesh and condition, is the final test of Christian faith. In that light, the virgin birth makes eminent sense.
What we have in relation to the use of this Isaiah text in the New Testament is a common employment throughout the canon of scripture. God's words in the Old Testament find surprising and new fulfillment in the New. They are never limited in their meaning to their immediate context. Rather, in the story of Jesus Christ they are illumined in new light. For example, Matthew takes Hosea 11:1 and finds its fulfillment in the story of Mary and Joseph and the babe returning from Egypt (Matthew 2:15). Luke finds the final meaning of Israel's (and our!) exodus redemption from slavery in the cross of Christ (Luke 9:31; "departure" in the Greek is "exodus"). The Old Testament gets transformed by the New, by the new and final fulfillment of its words in our Lord, and we find that those things promised of old are not only fulfilled but given fuller meaning by the work of Christ.
We are justified, therefore, in using this text from Isaiah 7 in relation to the birth of our Lord, for it finds its final meaning in that birth. "Immanuel." By that name, God promised to be with King Ahaz and with his people in Judah and to defend them from their foes if they would put their trust in his promise to them. And by the birth of Jesus Christ, who is Immanuel, "God with us," our heavenly Father promises to be with us and to guard and protect our lives in all circumstances, even from the ravages of sin and the finality of death. But as he required also of King Ahaz, he asks also of us -- that we trust his promise, that we place our lives and fortunes and future in his loving hands and rely on his goodness and love for all things. God told Ahaz that if he did not believe, he would not be established. But if we will believe -- if we will trust our God -- we shall stand and live and know salvation to all eternity. Merry Christmas!
PREACHING THE PSALM
Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19
This psalm is used two different years during the Advent season -- here in Year A for the Fourth Sunday of Advent and in Year B for the First Sunday of Advent -- and so we should look for the Advent-type connections. We find at least two.
First, the words of verse 2b, "Stir up your might, and come and save us!" are clearly an appropriate prayer for Advent. The psalm as a whole is a plea to God, the "Shepherd of Israel," to resume the favor he once bestowed upon Israel before the people went astray.
Second, verse 17 is a prayer that God would empower Israel's king -- "the one you have made" -- to be strong on behalf of God. While the verse probably was not intended to be a messianic reference, it is possible to read it that way, as asking God to intervene in Israel's fate by sending the Promised One. (See Dr. Achtemeier's commentary for an explanation of how Old Testament texts can speak beyond their immediate context.)
Here are some preaching possibilities from the verses selected for the Psalm lection:
1) Verses 3, 7 and 19 are the liturgical repetition of the central plea of the prayer. "Restore us, O God, and let your face shine, that we might be saved." A shining face meant an expression of pleasure, and when turned toward others, it indicated favor and goodwill toward them. The expression is used in the priestly blessing in Numbers 6:22-27. Thus the prayer here is for God to restore the people by the shiny showing of his face, to bless them. A sermon could pursue the idea of how blessing can restore someone or some relationship.
2) Verse 4 speaks of the prayers of the people that make God angry. What about them angers him? Selfishness? An unrepentant heart? A haughty spirit? When do our prayers anger God?
3) "Restore us, O God," asks God to change his mind regarding the fate he has allowed to befall the people. Verses 7-16, not included in the lection, state this theme even more strongly. What's missing in the whole psalm is an expression of repentance from the people. They are saying, "Enough, already!" to the things that are distressing them, but appear not to be owning up to their complicity in causing the problems they face. A more positive way to view that, however, is to read the psalm as an expression that in the end, only the action of God can save them. Merely cleaning up their own act would not be enough.
Only God can save ... Hmm. Sounds like an Advent theme to us.
