Michael D. Powell December 7, 2008
Mark 1:1-8 2nd Sunday of Advent/Communion/Consecration Sunday
This morning we’re celebrating the season of Advent, the sacrament of Communion and Consecration Sunday. Each of these three celebrations has an attitude! Advent is a season that points beyond itself. Advent exists for one reason only, and that is to point us in the direction of Christmas and to Bethlehem, the birthplace of the Christ child. Developing an Advent attitude is a personal journey of spiritual growth and our destination is not a chunk of real estate in war-torn Israel. Bethlehem is an attitude, a perspective, a spiritual state that exists ultimately in every human heart. You and I are the innkeepers of Bethlehem and we have to decide what kind of attitude we’re going to adopt. We have to decide - is there time and space for the birth of the Christ child in the manger of our hearts, or are we too busy, too preoccupied and distracted with other obligations and responsibilities?
We read in Mark: “This is the beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Then, instead of shepherds and angels, we hear the story of John the Baptist, the one sent from God as a voice, “crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord.” His message of repentance is about an attitude adjustment, and it’s actually a gift, a gift as simple and hearty as the soup we’re about to share in our Consecration celebration. It’s a simple gift that nourishes our souls and makes all the difference in the world. In order to get to Bethlehem, John tells us, we have to turn. That’s the literal meaning of John’s call to repentance. We often think of repentance in negative terms, but it’s actually full of hope and promise. You know the words: “Tis a gift to be simple ‘tis a gift to be free, ’tis a gift to come down where we ought to be. And when we find ourselves in the place just right, ‘twill be in the valley of love and delight. When true simplicity is gained, to bow and to bend we will not be ashamed. To turn, to turn, will be our delight, till by turning and turning we come down right.” John invites us to turn our hearts and our minds toward Bethlehem to kneel at the manger of the Christ child. Repentance is about changing – changing our attitude, our perspective, our priorities and our direction, turning from the wilderness and facing toward the very heart of Bethlehem, the divine resting place in every human heart.
Stewardship also has an attitude. John preached in the wilderness of Judea, the last place on earth you’d expect to experience the valley of love and delight. Many of us know the wilderness all too well. Our whole nation seems to be having a wilderness experience right now. These are hard times and it’s easy to slip into what’s called a scarcity attitude. A scarcity attitude is when all we see is danger and the threat of the wilderness. This scarcity attitude is self-fulfilling, which is exactly what the holiday retailers fear most. People are cutting back on their gift giving and, at first glance, you might expect that benevolent giving to the church would fall into that same category. But I take confidence in the fact that we have a different history, different priorities, a different perspective and attitude about giving.
It is precisely in the wilderness that John comes to us preaching his message of promise, urging us to prepare the way of the Lord. For the people of Israel, the wilderness was a place where they had met God, and it was in the wilderness that God forged them into a holy people, bound together by the sacred covenant. Many of you know the truth that God continues to come to you in these wilderness times.
Just as each of us has an Advent attitude and a Bethlehem in our own hearts, so we all have our fair share of wilderness to wander through, those times of trial and temptation that forge our identity. Just as God saved the people of Israel and led them out of the wilderness, so God is able to save us, but there’s just one catch - we have to want to be saved! It all comes back to that turning, that change in perspective, priorities and attitude. We can have a wilderness attitude of fear and scarcity, or we can have an Advent attitude of gratitude for God’s blessings and an expectation and desire to draw near to God as we make our pilgrimage to Bethlehem.
William Sloan Coffin once wrote: “At Christmas God sends us a savior.” Then he expands on that by asking: “But, do we want to be saved?” Then he does a bit of confessional musing: “ I’d rather be made happy. I’d rather improve myself; In fact, I’d rather be almost anything than saved. It takes a lot of humility to be saved. To be saved you have to allow someone else to do for you what you can’t do for yourself.”
So, in a very real sense, what we need to be saved from is ourselves, from our self-centered rather than God-centered selves. That’s the symbolism of the baptism that John offered. Going under the water symbolizes a death of the old self-centered, fear-based identity. Emerging from the water symbolizes the birth of our new God-centered Self-identity, self with a capital “S.” It’s a complete change of attitude and perspective. That’s also what is symbolized in Betty’s white face as she mimes the Isaiah passage this morning. The white mask symbolizes a death of the personal ego. Betty is not interpreting the scripture, the Holy Spirit is.
And, finally, we gather this morning to share in the Sacrament of Holy Communion, which is also an attitude. Nobody takes communion alone. You may have come here this morning feeling alone, feeling fearful or empty. But Communion has the power to miraculously transform the loneliness and the scarcity of the wilderness into a celebration of blessing as we share in community with God and the people of God. We are the Church. We are the Body of Christ, and we are thankful. Communion is a Thanksgiving feast as we enter the season of Advent. I’ll close with a poem by Ann Weems, entitled, Kneeling In Bethlehem:
An inn where we
must ultimately answer whether there is room or not.
When we are
Bethlehem-bound, we experience our own advent in His.
When we are
Bethlehem-bound, we can no longer look the other way, conveniently
Not seeing stars –
not hearing angel voices.
We can no longer
excuse ourselves by busily tending our sheep or our kingdoms.
This Advent let’s
go to Bethlehem and see this thing that the Lord has made known to us.
In the midst of
shopping sprees let’s ponder in our hearts the Gift of gifts.
Through the tinsel
let’s look for the gold of the Christmas star.
In the excitement
and confusion, in the merry chaos, let’s listen for the brush of angel’s wings.
This Advent, let’s go to Bethlehem and find our kneeling place.
We are Bethlehem bound. We gather to worship, to be fed, to celebrate and to kneel at the manger of the Christ child. We are thankful for the abundance of God’s blessings. May God bless the ministry and the stewardship of our Church, and may Christ be born again, in the Bethlehem of your heart and mine. Amen.