GET DRESSED FOR THE NEW YEAR

A Sermon for the first Sunday after Christmas
December 31, 2006
by Pastor Laura Gentry

Colossians 3:12-17
As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. (New Revised Standard Version)


Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

In our second lesson for today, we hear a portion of a letter that was written to the Christians at Colossae, which was in what is now southwestern Turkey. It had a flourishing wool and textile industry and a significant Jewish population. It seems that most Christians there were Gentile. It was most likely written in Paul’s name, by one of Paul’s disciples. In the ancient world, writing in the name of a respected author was accepted and regarded as an honor.

In this portion of the letter, the author is in the midst of describing the Christian life. He instructs them: “Set your minds on things that are above” In order to be ready for Christ when he comes again, you must strip off the old self. Throw it off—get spiritually naked so that you can put on what is right. You need to cloth yourself with virtuous behaviors instead, so that you can be transformed into God’s image.

Today is New Year’s Eve day! It is the time we think ahead to the coming year. We make resolutions or at least we think that we ought to make resolutions. More than any other time of year, we get serious about how to better ourselves, how to make the coming year count. And so this advice from the book of Colossians is quite helpful in this thought process. How do we better ourselves? We put on the following behaviors, just as you would put on clothes. We've got to get dressed for the new year.

Compassion
Compassion is the first thing we are to clothe ourselves with. Think of the most compassionate people you have known. They have an overflowing sympathy for everyone. They go the distance to connect with others and to help them. What would it take for you to put on an extra cloak of compassion this year?

Kindness
The next thing we are to put on is kindness. To be kind is to be friendly, generous and considerate. Have you seen the bumper stickers that says: “Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty”? It is such a good reminder that kindness should be given lavishly, even randomly, because God is so good to us.

Humility & Meekness
The writer says we are also to put on humility and meekness, a gentleness towards others. We are not to go about puffed up as if everyone owes us something. Rather, we are to be so grateful for what we’ve been given that we seek out the good of all.

Patience
And we are to put on patience. Another bumper sticker I get a kick out of says: “Lord, give me patience, and I want it RIGHT NOW!” That about sums it up. Even with God, we seem to have too little patience. Think about the really patient people you know and dwell for a moment on the pleasantness they bring. How lovely it is to be around someone with great patience. Indeed, we need to make sure we put on patience.

Forgiveness
He goes on to say that we need to bear with one another (the patience helps with this) and forgive one another as Christ has forgiven us. He knows that even in Christian communities, we can get on one another’s nerves and feelings get hurt. So we must be as generous with our forgiveness, as Christ has been in forgiving us.

Love
In wrapping up the clothing metaphor, he writes: “Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” Love is like the suspenders that hold the whole outfit together. Without love, these other wonderful behaviors have little value. Above all, we must be loving. That is the key to healthy community and healthy relationships. And throughout his life on earth, Jesus modeled this kind of self-giving love for us.

Peace
“And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts,” the author writes, “And be thankful.” Now this is a lovely phrase, but how can we live it as we move into 2007? How can the peace of Christ rule our hearts? The word translated as “rule” here literally means be umpire or referee: so may “the peace of Christ” be the reference point for our consciences.

Unfortunately, there is too little peace in our world and that’s because there is too little peace in our hearts. I mean, how many of you never worry? How many of you never wake up in the middle of the night and find your brain wracked with concern about some issue? How many of you can say that you fully posses a peace, as I say at the end of each sermon, that passes all understanding?

If we don’t have that kind of surpassing peace, if it is still missing from our lives—and I would venture to guess that includes all of us here—then we need to go after it. In the way that Christmas shoppers go after the gifts on their list, in the way that athletes go after the win, we must seek peace and pursue it because it is ours for the taking. Christ offers it to us. In fact, in Ephesians 2:14, it says that Christ himself is our peace. He offer us his very presence and that brings us peace.

As I thought about the message of this powerful letter to the Colossians and how it might impact us this morning, on the cusp of a new year, I decided to make little sculptures of hearts for each one of you (pictured in bowl above). These little hearts look perfectly scrumptious but they are ceramic, so do refrain from eating them. Into each heart, I stamped the word “peace”. You’ll notice that the hearts are all different sized. I sculpted each one individually, rather than using a mold, to symbolize how we are each unique. Some are bigger than others, some are lumpier, some are a bit lopsided—just like we are. Yet, whatever shape our hearts are in, Christ comes and impresses his peace upon it. When we allow that peace to be in us, it is as if we are suspended in it. Difficulties will still come, but now they can’t knock us about. With the peace of Christ, we know that it will be okay. Nothing can separate us from the love of God.

At this time, I am going to ask the ushers to come forward and pass these baskets of hearts out to you. As the basket comes by, please choose a heart that suits you. Once you get a heart, I want you to simply hold it in your hand. They are fun to hold because they are small and shiny. You can run your fingers over the letters and feel the word. I’ve designed these hearts to be meditational tools for you. You can hold this heart and it can help to focus your mind on your desire for peace. It is my gift to you for the new year.

Please hold the heart in your hand as I lead us in prayer. Loving God, as we move into this new year that you have given us, help us to strip off all of our old behaviors, our hurtful and selfish behaviors. Help us to get dressed for the new year with your compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, forgiveness and love. And God, as we move into the future, please give us your peace. We need your peace in our hearts so that we can absorb all the shocks this world has to offer. Bless these heart sculptures in our hands, that they may help us to long for your peace, to seek your peace and to receive it with joy and thanksgiving. Now in silence, we offer our prayers for inner peace to you. (silence for meditation) Thank you God. Thank you God for your peace in our hearts. Amen.

And now may the peace which passes all understanding keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

© Laura E. Gentry 2006

WHAT TO DO WITH A BLESSING

A Sermon for the fourth Sunday of Advent
December 24, 2006
Pastor Laura Gentry

Luke 1:47-55
My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever." (New Revised Standard Version)

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

At last, we have come to the fourth Sunday in Advent. Our beautiful wreath is almost entirely aglow and we know this evening, we’ll get to light the Christ candle in the middle. The Advent wreath is a powerful symbol of God’s light illuminating the world’s deep darkness. And how as Christmas gets nearer, the light burns brighter.

This is a powerful symbol precisely because we know darkness. We know it all too well. Even this time of year, which is supposed to be so happy, is a dark, painful and depressing time for many. The the stress of the season shows on most everyone’s face: worn from all the shopping and wrapping and baking.

But that’s not all. Darkness pervades throughout the earth, especially in warn-torn regions like the Holy Land. In the little town of Bethlehem—the very place our Savior’s was born—there is no peace. We also think of US soldiers, like Josh Estebo, in Iraq who are not only in harm’s way, but they cannot come home for Christmas. The death toll of Iraqis is countless and US soldier loss is nearing 3,000. There are so many conflicts around the globe. In fact, there are 15 major armed conflicts at present.

With all of these things on top of whatever burdens we’re already bearing, it doesn’t necessarily make us feel in the Christmas Spirit, does it? We talk of Christmas being a blessing to all of us—that we are blessed with the gift of the Christ child. But how do we rejoice in this gift when we don’t feel particularly blessed in this moment?

And just what does “blessing” really mean? Most people think of blessing as God answering our prayers with what exactly we asked for, when we ask for it. That sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? We pray to God for something, and “poof!” God provides it. It’s almost like God should be wearing a red velvet suit with white fur trim, carrying a cosmic sack full of goodies for nice little Christians. Being showered with the goodies of life would be a great way for us to know we are on God’s “nice” list instead of the “naughty” one.

Yet if we dig into our Gospel text for today, we get a different picture of what a blessing is. Mary, the mother of Jesus, is—we must not forget—an unmarried, pregnant teenager. She certainly didn’t ask God for this. Nowhere in Scripture do we hear her prayer to God to be pregnant, to bear the Messiah. God chose this for her. This predicament was not just embarrassing and inconvenient, it could have gotten her stoned to death. That was the law of her time, and if her fianc?, Joseph, didn’t believe her angel story and turned her in to the religious authorities, she would be as good as dead.

Maybe that’s why Mary dashed out of town to visit her older, wiser cousin Elizabeth, who was also dealing with an unexpected pregnancy by the word of God. Maybe together they could come to terms with what it meant to be “blessed women.”

Elizabeth’s blessing wasn’t exactly what we’d expect a blessing to be, either. Sure, it was her prayers answered. For years, she had prayed for a child. She even promised (like Hannah of the book of Samuel) to give the child back to God for service in the Temple, if only God would grant her this request. Years went by, decades went by; and Elizabeth got used to the fact that she wasn’t going to have children. She got used to the fact that God doesn’t always dish out blessings, no matter how hard we pray for them. Sometimes, God seems horribly silent in the midst of our pain. If Elizabeth had learned to live with God’s silence, she could live through anything. And now, in her old age, when her time for childbearing and child rearing was way past, she had to learn how to live with answered prayers and blessing so long overdue. She, like Mary, had to learn to live with unexpected blessing.

The angel Gabriel had said to Mary, “Do not be afraid; you will have joy and gladness; you have found favor with God. For nothing will be impossible for God.”

Stunned by the angelic visitation, stunned by the impossible message spoken by Gabriel; stunned by the absurdity of their predicaments, no doubt Mary and Elizabeth asked what it means to be “blessed.” How can something be a blessing when it raises more questions than it answers? How do you live with a blessing that creates more problems than it solves? Mary and Elizabeth, no doubt, felt contradictory emotions. Pregnancy alone does that to women. But the strangeness of their pregnancies surely flooded them with expectations and apprehension; happiness and depression; confidence and nagging insecurities; hopes and fears. Elizabeth was old enough and wise enough to know (as Luke writes in Ch. 12) that those “to whom much is given, much is required.” Together, these two women grappled with the irony of being blessed by God: namely, that behind every blessing there is burden.

Both these women were to learn that the sons they were blessed with, were not their own. Both their sons would give up their lives, literally, in service to God. Both mothers would suffer the unimaginable and unspeakable horror of having their sons murdered. Mary, we’re told, witnessed her son’s brutal execution. This is the burden on the other side of blessing.

Indeed, the blessings these women received had burden. They had been given much, and so much was required of them. For them, the meaning of God’s blessing had much more depth than a “Santa Claus” idea of God showering us with goodies. God’s activity in human lives always is surprising; turning up where we’d least expect it; where we’d never think to look for it. God turns the world upside down, making us think again about what’s important, what’s real, what’s valuable.

So here is the interesting thing: if God’s blessings are two-sided (both joy and burden, requiring much from those to whom they are given) then perhaps the opposite is also true: those burdens that come our way in life have the hidden and surprising potential of becoming blessing. If we struggle with our burdens and refuse to let go of them until we receive a blessing—as Jacob did when he wrestled the angel—perhaps our upside-down God will turn our burdens over, in God’s time, and bring good out of them.

As Saint Paul writes, “In all things, God works together for good for those who believe, who are called according to God’s purpose.” That’s why Paul gave this instruction to the Christians in Thessalonia: “Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; give thanks in all circumstances.” It may not be easy, but because we know God is God and God is always at work for our good, despite the darkness of the world, we can rejoice always. We can hold onto hope. That’s what the Christmas message is all about.

This reminds me of a poem by Jan L. Richardson from her book "Night Visions: Searching the Shadows of Advent and Christmas":

With each of our breakings you break,
and with each of our woundings your own wounds grow deeper.
Yet you hold the pieces together
till we learn to make the new connections,
and you guard each throbbing wound
till we have had enough of pain.
You remind us that it is our delight you seek, not our suffering.
And you tell us it is not the wounds that give us life,
but the tending of them in each other.
And you say it is not the breaking that makes us whole
but the mending of the pieces that brings us life anew.

As the season of Advent comes to a close, we prepare our hearts to receive the blessing of the Christ child. God has blessed us richly in this shocking birth of low estate. In it, God turns the world upside down. We must open our eyes and ears to look for God being borne in unexpected places. What is required of us is that we open our hearts to receive the both the burden that comes along with our blessings as well as the blessing that comes along with our burdens, laying them all—as Mary and Elizabeth did—in the hands of our all-powerful God. Amen.

Now, may the peace of God, which passes all understand, keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

© Laura E. Gentry 2006

THROW OUT YOUR CAGES

A Sermon for the first Sunday of Advent
December 3, 2006
Pastor Laura Gentry

Luke 21:25-36
"There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see 'the Son of Man coming in a cloud' with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near." Then he told them a parable: "Look at the fig tree and all the trees; as soon as they sprout leaves you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. "Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly, like a trap. For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth. Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man." (New Revised Standard Version)

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

You can’t fool us. We can read the signs. We know when something is about to happen, like when the sky gets really overcast and we know it is going to rain. Around here, people don’t always signal when they’re going to make a turn with their car. But we can read the signs. We see their head turn right and we know they are about to turn right. There’s no fooling us.

And this time of year, we can tell what’s happening, too. The volume of catalogs we receive quadruples—nearly topping our mailboxes, Main Street is lit with wreathes, and you can’t find a parking spot at the mall. Do you suppose Christmas is coming? Yep, we can read the signs.

Here at church, our Christmas tree shows up, along with our Advent wreath, announcing the beginning of the new church year and the Advent season. Advent means “arrival” and we use this season to prepare ourselves to celebrate the nativity, the first arrival of Christ and to prepare our hearts for his second arrival.

The scripture lesson for today urge us to be alert for this Advent. We see the signs, so we ought to keep awake for Christ’s coming. For when he comes again, our creeds remind us, he will judge the world. We will each be judged. So “being alert” is sort of like preparing for a final exam—the final exam of our whole lives.

How do we prepare? It’s pretty daunting, isn’t it? Because we have to be mindful not only about those wrong things we have done, but also of all the good things we should have done but never got around to. If we take an honest look at our lives, we see that we’re in pretty bad standing for the final exam—that our best preparations have been feeble at best. We are caged by our own unworthiness. Not a very cheery way to start the new church year, is it?

But wait! That’s not the end of the story. At Advent time, we celebrate Christ’s first coming in order to prepare for his second. And how did he come the first time? He came as a vulnerable little baby—just like us. He came gently, quietly. He came to be with us, to walk with us and love us back to life. He came not to condemn the world, but to redeem the world. He came to pass the final exam for us. It is freedom he offers.

Rev. A.J. Gordon was the pastor of the Clarendon Baptist Church in Boston, Massachusetts. One day, he met a young boy in front of the sanctuary carrying an old, rusty cage in which several birds fluttered about. Gordon asked, "Son, where did you get those birds?" The boy replied, "I trapped them out in the field." "What are you going to do with them?" he questioned. "I'm going to play with them, and then I don’t know, maybe I'll just feed them to an old cat we have at home."

When Gordon offered to buy them, the lad exclaimed, "Mister, you don't want them. They're just little old wild birds and can't sing very well." Gordon replied, "I'll give you $2 for the cage and the birds." "Okay, it's a deal, but you're making a bad bargain." The exchange was made and the boy went away whistling, happy with his shiny coins. Gordon walked around to the back of the church, opened the door of the small wire coop, and let the struggling creatures soar into the sky.

The next Sunday he took the empty cage into the pulpit and used it to illustrate his sermon about Christ's Advent, his coming to seek and to save the lost—paying for them with His own precious blood. "That boy told me the birds were not songsters," said Gordon, "but when I released them and they winged their way heavenward, it seemed to me they were singing, 'Redeemed, redeemed, redeemed!'"

This story illustrates the power of what God has done for us in Christ. We celebrate that Christmas is not about judgment, but about redemption. Jesus comes to heal and to forgive us—to set us free. So as we see the signs that his second coming could be at any time, we need not panic. No, in Luke’s gospel, Jesus says to us: “stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Yes, this is an exciting time! Our redemption is drawing near.

What does this mean for us? How ought we to live in light of the fact that Christ’s Advent is near? Jesus instructs us: "Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life.”

Now think for a moment, about the people in your life. Are their hearts weighed down? We live in such a heart-weighed-down world that I’m willing to bet you know a lot of people whose hearts are weighed down with worries of this life both great and small. If you take a close look at your own heart, I’ll bet you’ll notice some weighing-down happening there, too. What’s with that? Why is worry and hurt so widespread when our redemption is so near?

It is because we do not see it. We only see the troubles immediately before us rather than the gift of Christ’s redemption just beyond that. Back to the cage metaphor: it reminds me of the hamster, Eunice, who I used to own. She was single-minded of purpose—to escape. She would sit in the corner and chew on the bars of her cage all day. Eunice was so fixated upon this that when I would come along and open the door, she wouldn’t even notice and would go right on chewing on the bars just inches from the open door. It seems to me that’s exactly what God sees when God peers into our lives. Christ has set us free, but we do not believe it is really for us. We do not believe that we are worthy of such amazing love,. We are afraid of such wonderful freedom. We choose our cages instead. How this must grieve the heart of our God who loves us so—a God who spared nothing to win our freedom!

Today marks the beginning of Advent. And the message of this season is the song of those wild birds: Redeemed! We need to get used to the fact that we’ve been redeemed, my friends. We need to practice living like it is really true. We need to learn to sing the song of freedom every single day of our lives. We are invited to live immersed in grace so that the worries of life cannot weigh us down and the uncertainty of the future cannot scare us. The bottom line is that we must throw out our cages! Christ has conquered them.

So yes, Christ is coming! We see the signs. We know it. But it is nothing to be troubled about. It is incredibly good news. Today, we are invited by the God of love to lift up our heads with hope in joyful anticipation. Our freedom is here. Amen.

© Laura E. Gentry 2006