Roots, Sprouts and repentance!
Commentary
The world and the church approach the "Mass of Christ" with a different pace, and "atmospheres" that are worlds apart. Out in the "highways and byways" tinsel and "sparkly" are everywhere, in the churches the color of the paraments and stoles is a somber violet, or in some places, blue. Through the stores and on the airwaves carols and pop tunes are up-beat, aimed at getting the spirits festive, and the pocketbooks and wallets are open.
In our congregations the theme is getting the old heart swept clean of the chaff that has accumulated there, and of making it ready for the Lord, not some "jolly old elf!" In the world there is a rush to get results in a matter of weeks because when "the day" arrives everything left must be marked down, moved out, or just dumped, in order to make ready for the next plug in of merchandise. In the church the hope is that those who gather there will renew their commitment to the One who is "forever." When "the day" has arrived, and the angel's announcement been made once again, the Christ Child will have found a home within each of us that will not have a "vacancy" sign on it a few weeks later! He will have time to grow within us, enabling us to sprout and blossom as disciples who will bear fruit "a hundred fold."
Isaiah predicts the emergency of the "shoot from the stump of Jesse," who in his coming will move nations to "seek him" filling the earth "full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." The time when it will happen is open-ended, keeping the event longed-for, but promising that it is on its way. Paul reminds those still waiting for that to happen for them that "whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope." So even if the days are ominous ones for you, remember your hope is rooted in God's reliability. Matthew points us to John the Baptist's warning/reminder, "Prepare the way of the Lord," for the One who is coming "is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry." The warning is that this is the time for set-aside-all-else self- preparation for the One on whom your ultimate existence depends. The reminder is that even when you feel ready to explode with the pressures of making it through another day in this world, the Coming One has the will and where with all to change things for the better!
No wonder the moods are different in the "world" and in the church! The "world" is trying to collect that which it cannot take with it when its time runs out. The church is being called to remember the promises God made to his people, and his people are to remember what their responses to their Lord involves. And neither is momentary, here for a turn of the season and then shelved! For the "world" it is only a matter of another business "phase." For the believer the message of the day is that the "business" at hand has to do with eternity ... and that makes it the most serious business with which we will ever have to deal!
OUTLINE I
Sprouts!
Isaiah 11:1-10
A. vv. 1-2. The thing I remember most about the office of the pastor of the parish to which I belonged as a teenager were the bookshelves along his wall. And of all of the volumes stacked there the only one I recall specifically was one titled, When Thy Face I See. I cannot remember the author, and I never got to read its contents, but over the years that intriguing title has prompted me, from time to time, to spin-off imaginary sketches of what the face of God must look like. Even more important than how the Messiah will appear is Isaiah's description of where he will come from, how he will act, and what difference he will make when he comes. He will stand out from the crowd, that's for sure! He will be from the stock that produced the greatest of Israel's kings, David. The "Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord." Though it does not exclude the possibility, it appears that Isaiah expects the Messiah to be a mortal. An extraordinary one certainly, as the characteristics listed indicate, but a mortal, like David, nevertheless.
B. vv. 3-5. "Righteousness" shall be the hallmark of his judgments. Interesting word, righteousness, Hebrew tzedekah. It means to "do what is appropriate to a situation, or in a committed, covenantal relationship." It also means, in one of the essential nuances of its root, "to be kind, sensitive, tender." "Righteousness" involves far more than fulfilling every requirement someone lays on you, even if that Someone is God! It is shot through with empathy, compassion, and a desire to do what is "right," as well as "correct," or "demanded" by the "rules."
"Faithfulness," Hebrew emunah, means to "hang in, to hold to your position, to refuse to let another push you off of your mark." Combined with tzedekah it makes for the kind of Judge in whose hands I would rest easier in placing my destiny.
C. vv. 6-9: The results of the Messiah's presence and labor will turn the way things are to the way they ought to be! Enemies will come together without the purpose of destroying each other. "Wolves and lambs," "leopards and goats," "lions and young cattle," will bed down in safety with each other. Not only will "toddlers," which is the meaning of the Hebrew term used by Isaiah here, stick their hands in the den of the most venomous snake in that part of the word without paying for it with their lives. When that time comes they shall be the ones behind whom these former adversaries line up and traipse. Note it is animals that the child will lead. Though many readers assume that child to be divine, nothing says that the toddler is the Messiah! What Isaiah does make clear with this illustration is that even among mortals a new order of things will emerge.
D. v. 10. The greatest role the Messiah will fulfill will be the in-gathering of all people, who from the time of Babel have been at each other's throats! To him they will come, like Adam did to the Lord before he "bit" on the temptation spawned by the snake to try to push God away and run the world in the Lord's stead.
Humanity has learned from Eden until now, that it has created a quagmire of life from which it cannot extract itself, collectively or individually. We have been too recalcitrant to admit that to ourselves or each other. But God knows! And as a gift to the pain-makers, his heart is set on sending One to do that for us.
OUTLINE II
Roots!
Romans 15:4-9
"What goes around comes around." Have you heard that proverb? In some things it seems to be true. If it is, then we should try to learn from what came around before this moment in time. "Whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction," Paul declares, and can be the source of "hope" when what is coming around now speaks nothing but bad news; countries disintegrating and leaving chaos in their demise for us all; forests falling faster than we can tally them up, taking our capacity to breathe with them; cities becoming burned-out war zones where no one can walk, or children play, in safety; people sleeping on sidewalks, some huddling up to their families, hoping to find a steam-grate, or a cardboard box, or a spot beside a dumpster that will cut the wind, so they will not freeze when the temperature drops tonight.
What will it take to change what has "come around?" The willingness of all of us to "live in such harmony with one another" so that we will see past our own greed, and me-firstism ... our fatal and murderous sins ... and act out the "kinship" God built into all human beings on the day "the Lord God made man."
B. vv. 7-12. Where is the model for doing that to be found? It came in "former days" when One who "though he was in the form of God ... emptied himself, taking the form of a servant ... being born in the likeness of men ... humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:6-8)" came to earth and demonstrated what love looks like lived-out for others. Having Christ's "mind" direct us will turn the moans and cries of anguish, that rise from the earth in a crescendo to the Lord, and is heard by mortals not yet tone-deaf to them, into the "praise to God" and songs of joy for the rebirth of compassion that will flood the planet.
C. v. 13. There is a lot of "joy," or at least "merriment," abroad these weeks before Christmas, when many folks slip back into the nostalgic visions of the holiday as Currier and Ives engravers cut them! But while the punch flows, and cookies get baked and delivered from one household to another, there are the people out of sight in nursing homes, alone in apartments, or surrounded by lots of "bodies" with whom they cannot connect, who wish they were dead. To "abound in hope" takes more than cheer bottled at 90 proof! It takes the touch of the Holy Spirit to let all of us know that we are loved and included, enwrapped in the arms of the One from whose hands we first came. "Believing" that can really fill us with a strange and abiding "peace," even when the worst "comes around."
OUTLINE III
Repentance!
Matthew 3:1-12
A. vv. 1-10. This text reiterates what anybody who looks long and hard at the settings surrounding the coming of Christ must learn. They are filled with some strange, puzzling, driven and marvelous people and events! Instead of heralding the coming with an upbeat, "let's-not-make-people-uncomfortable," "accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative," introduction what we get is a preacher up to his knees in a river, wearing a hair-shirt, eating locusts, and demanding that people get in a mood of repentance. Those willing to stand and listen to him with all this "going for" him, he labels "Snakes," calling them arrogant, and in danger of divine axing, unless they turn their lives around 180 degrees! What would Dale Carnegie have to say to John the Baptist?
What we know is what Jesus said about him, "What did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, "Behold I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee." I tell you, among those born of women, none is greater than John (Luke 7:26-28)." A "prophet," in Greek and Hebrew, "one sent by God to speak the Lord's word." False prophets cooked up their own messages, usually calculated to worm their way into the good graces of their listeners. True prophets delivered what was given to them through divine "hotlines!" It always was what needed to be heard, rather than what would poll the highest numbers for "consumer satisfaction."
B. vv. 11-12. Advent is a time for spiritual preparation, and that always involves the house cleaning of the heart! To duck that issue, and try to keep the "spirit of the season gay," is to misuse the opportunity to "prepare the way" of the One who will become the "Thresher," with the "winnowing fork in his hand," instead of the Savior of those who are not ready to receive him. Remember the words of Paul, "Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation (2 Corinthians 6:2)."
In our congregations the theme is getting the old heart swept clean of the chaff that has accumulated there, and of making it ready for the Lord, not some "jolly old elf!" In the world there is a rush to get results in a matter of weeks because when "the day" arrives everything left must be marked down, moved out, or just dumped, in order to make ready for the next plug in of merchandise. In the church the hope is that those who gather there will renew their commitment to the One who is "forever." When "the day" has arrived, and the angel's announcement been made once again, the Christ Child will have found a home within each of us that will not have a "vacancy" sign on it a few weeks later! He will have time to grow within us, enabling us to sprout and blossom as disciples who will bear fruit "a hundred fold."
Isaiah predicts the emergency of the "shoot from the stump of Jesse," who in his coming will move nations to "seek him" filling the earth "full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea." The time when it will happen is open-ended, keeping the event longed-for, but promising that it is on its way. Paul reminds those still waiting for that to happen for them that "whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope." So even if the days are ominous ones for you, remember your hope is rooted in God's reliability. Matthew points us to John the Baptist's warning/reminder, "Prepare the way of the Lord," for the One who is coming "is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry." The warning is that this is the time for set-aside-all-else self- preparation for the One on whom your ultimate existence depends. The reminder is that even when you feel ready to explode with the pressures of making it through another day in this world, the Coming One has the will and where with all to change things for the better!
No wonder the moods are different in the "world" and in the church! The "world" is trying to collect that which it cannot take with it when its time runs out. The church is being called to remember the promises God made to his people, and his people are to remember what their responses to their Lord involves. And neither is momentary, here for a turn of the season and then shelved! For the "world" it is only a matter of another business "phase." For the believer the message of the day is that the "business" at hand has to do with eternity ... and that makes it the most serious business with which we will ever have to deal!
OUTLINE I
Sprouts!
Isaiah 11:1-10
A. vv. 1-2. The thing I remember most about the office of the pastor of the parish to which I belonged as a teenager were the bookshelves along his wall. And of all of the volumes stacked there the only one I recall specifically was one titled, When Thy Face I See. I cannot remember the author, and I never got to read its contents, but over the years that intriguing title has prompted me, from time to time, to spin-off imaginary sketches of what the face of God must look like. Even more important than how the Messiah will appear is Isaiah's description of where he will come from, how he will act, and what difference he will make when he comes. He will stand out from the crowd, that's for sure! He will be from the stock that produced the greatest of Israel's kings, David. The "Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord." Though it does not exclude the possibility, it appears that Isaiah expects the Messiah to be a mortal. An extraordinary one certainly, as the characteristics listed indicate, but a mortal, like David, nevertheless.
B. vv. 3-5. "Righteousness" shall be the hallmark of his judgments. Interesting word, righteousness, Hebrew tzedekah. It means to "do what is appropriate to a situation, or in a committed, covenantal relationship." It also means, in one of the essential nuances of its root, "to be kind, sensitive, tender." "Righteousness" involves far more than fulfilling every requirement someone lays on you, even if that Someone is God! It is shot through with empathy, compassion, and a desire to do what is "right," as well as "correct," or "demanded" by the "rules."
"Faithfulness," Hebrew emunah, means to "hang in, to hold to your position, to refuse to let another push you off of your mark." Combined with tzedekah it makes for the kind of Judge in whose hands I would rest easier in placing my destiny.
C. vv. 6-9: The results of the Messiah's presence and labor will turn the way things are to the way they ought to be! Enemies will come together without the purpose of destroying each other. "Wolves and lambs," "leopards and goats," "lions and young cattle," will bed down in safety with each other. Not only will "toddlers," which is the meaning of the Hebrew term used by Isaiah here, stick their hands in the den of the most venomous snake in that part of the word without paying for it with their lives. When that time comes they shall be the ones behind whom these former adversaries line up and traipse. Note it is animals that the child will lead. Though many readers assume that child to be divine, nothing says that the toddler is the Messiah! What Isaiah does make clear with this illustration is that even among mortals a new order of things will emerge.
D. v. 10. The greatest role the Messiah will fulfill will be the in-gathering of all people, who from the time of Babel have been at each other's throats! To him they will come, like Adam did to the Lord before he "bit" on the temptation spawned by the snake to try to push God away and run the world in the Lord's stead.
Humanity has learned from Eden until now, that it has created a quagmire of life from which it cannot extract itself, collectively or individually. We have been too recalcitrant to admit that to ourselves or each other. But God knows! And as a gift to the pain-makers, his heart is set on sending One to do that for us.
OUTLINE II
Roots!
Romans 15:4-9
"What goes around comes around." Have you heard that proverb? In some things it seems to be true. If it is, then we should try to learn from what came around before this moment in time. "Whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction," Paul declares, and can be the source of "hope" when what is coming around now speaks nothing but bad news; countries disintegrating and leaving chaos in their demise for us all; forests falling faster than we can tally them up, taking our capacity to breathe with them; cities becoming burned-out war zones where no one can walk, or children play, in safety; people sleeping on sidewalks, some huddling up to their families, hoping to find a steam-grate, or a cardboard box, or a spot beside a dumpster that will cut the wind, so they will not freeze when the temperature drops tonight.
What will it take to change what has "come around?" The willingness of all of us to "live in such harmony with one another" so that we will see past our own greed, and me-firstism ... our fatal and murderous sins ... and act out the "kinship" God built into all human beings on the day "the Lord God made man."
B. vv. 7-12. Where is the model for doing that to be found? It came in "former days" when One who "though he was in the form of God ... emptied himself, taking the form of a servant ... being born in the likeness of men ... humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:6-8)" came to earth and demonstrated what love looks like lived-out for others. Having Christ's "mind" direct us will turn the moans and cries of anguish, that rise from the earth in a crescendo to the Lord, and is heard by mortals not yet tone-deaf to them, into the "praise to God" and songs of joy for the rebirth of compassion that will flood the planet.
C. v. 13. There is a lot of "joy," or at least "merriment," abroad these weeks before Christmas, when many folks slip back into the nostalgic visions of the holiday as Currier and Ives engravers cut them! But while the punch flows, and cookies get baked and delivered from one household to another, there are the people out of sight in nursing homes, alone in apartments, or surrounded by lots of "bodies" with whom they cannot connect, who wish they were dead. To "abound in hope" takes more than cheer bottled at 90 proof! It takes the touch of the Holy Spirit to let all of us know that we are loved and included, enwrapped in the arms of the One from whose hands we first came. "Believing" that can really fill us with a strange and abiding "peace," even when the worst "comes around."
OUTLINE III
Repentance!
Matthew 3:1-12
A. vv. 1-10. This text reiterates what anybody who looks long and hard at the settings surrounding the coming of Christ must learn. They are filled with some strange, puzzling, driven and marvelous people and events! Instead of heralding the coming with an upbeat, "let's-not-make-people-uncomfortable," "accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative," introduction what we get is a preacher up to his knees in a river, wearing a hair-shirt, eating locusts, and demanding that people get in a mood of repentance. Those willing to stand and listen to him with all this "going for" him, he labels "Snakes," calling them arrogant, and in danger of divine axing, unless they turn their lives around 180 degrees! What would Dale Carnegie have to say to John the Baptist?
What we know is what Jesus said about him, "What did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, "Behold I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee." I tell you, among those born of women, none is greater than John (Luke 7:26-28)." A "prophet," in Greek and Hebrew, "one sent by God to speak the Lord's word." False prophets cooked up their own messages, usually calculated to worm their way into the good graces of their listeners. True prophets delivered what was given to them through divine "hotlines!" It always was what needed to be heard, rather than what would poll the highest numbers for "consumer satisfaction."
B. vv. 11-12. Advent is a time for spiritual preparation, and that always involves the house cleaning of the heart! To duck that issue, and try to keep the "spirit of the season gay," is to misuse the opportunity to "prepare the way" of the One who will become the "Thresher," with the "winnowing fork in his hand," instead of the Savior of those who are not ready to receive him. Remember the words of Paul, "Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation (2 Corinthians 6:2)."
