Be Born In Us

Sermon Luke 3:1-6 December 6, 2015 Advent 2C Communion

Be Born In Us

Yesterday I bought a pine scented candle and a cinnamon scented candle; because those two scents alone tell me Christmas is coming. As I wandered up and down the aisles of the store I realized the moment we are waiting for is almost here.

Are we ready?

Can we see it?

DO we know the sounds or the smells to pay attention to?

I’m trying not to panic as I wait for Amazon to deliver my packages,

as I realize this year-once again-I haven’t even bought the Christmas cards I need to send.

And so I paused there in the middle of CVS on Wednesday and then again on Saturday and asked myself the question,

“Do you even know what you are preparing for?”

I reassured myself of all that was being prepared;

the programs at church,

the gifts for sending off to family,

the enormous work of preparing the manse for guests;

all of these activities are

and have been my way of preparing for Christmas.

My way of understanding the preparations for the coming of the Savior,

is through the activities that surround his coming.

The way of decorating the house for the holidays is one way of preparation.

As mantles are cleaned off to make room for garland, and fall decorations put away to make room for the crèche, corners are swept and cleared to create space for the tree,

our own hearts and minds can drift off to the preparations being made in our hearts. What needs polishing, or mending or straightening out in our relationships, in our goals, in our world?

John the Baptist comes crying from the wilderness with the message of repentance. The message he calls out to the people of the day was to clean house. He called for them to examine themselves. He cried out for a change, an about face, a new look at who they were. His message is no different for us today.

We too are called to clean house, to dust off the cobwebs and take a look at ourselves. Because when we do we discover that self-examination is not a road to condemnation but an avenue to forgiveness. John the Baptist calls out for those who will hear that the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Grace is upon us. In the embrace of grace mercy rises up.

Our dear friend Luke writes his gospel with future readers in mind. He writes to open our senses to hear, see, smell and taste the places he is sharing with us. Writers have a way with words that draw us all into the scene they describe. And even though we stumble over the seven names given, we are made aware that this salvation story happens in an anchored time and place of human history. It is not mythical or fictional but can be traced to actual events and people in the course of the world. This story happens in the context of politics and religion. What better place than in the tension of politics and religion for John to come bursting through with the Word of God.

And so today, what better time and place than in the tension of politics and religion for us to be sharing the message of God bursting forth with the message of “ALL flesh shall see the salvation of God!”

If we are to take seriously the concept that ALL flesh shall see salvation then we are forced to consider all those who have been in the news, we are to consider all those who live behind bars, we are to consider all those who have offended us and those who we have offended. If we are to take seriously this notion of ALL flesh then we have our work cut out for us in order to really be prepared for this notion of peace and this notion of God’s promise. That means ALL people, even those who carry bumper stickers on their cars in support of a politics not our own. That means ALL flesh, ALL people who wear clothes different from our own. Perhaps if we begin to view ALL flesh as God’s people, perhaps we’ll be less afraid as we live in this world of political and religious tension.

Friends, as we make our way to the manger this Advent, we might just be able to let go of salvation as a religious concept and open it up as a new way of life, as a turning and an explosion of our senses to the reality of Christ with us, Emmanuel. This season let us SEE salvation in a way we have never known before. May Jesus be born in us today. For the truth of the message John the Baptist was crying out in history is that the promise of God is that there is no one we can write off and all creation matters to God.

So, as we pray today our hopes and our desires we pray; “O holy child of Bethlehem, descend to us we pray, cast out our sin and enter in, be born in us today. We hear the Christmas angels, the great glad tidings tell, O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel. Amen.