Dec 10 2024
Sunday, December 8th, The Rev. Kate Flexer, Rector
Ok so yes, I’ve started watching some of the holiday specials for this time of year.
I think many of us have, maybe earlier and more often than ever before. The
happy sugary good feeling of ‘Love Actually’ and ‘Frosty the Snowman’ and the
weirder ones like ‘Rudolph’ and ‘Santa Claus is Coming to Town’ – you know, the
weird 1970s stop motion ones – are temporarily satisfying. How many origin story
movies are there for Santa Claus now? I think I’ve lost track. But they all seem to
hit roughly the same note, that we all need a little kindness and love and
reminders to be good. And yes, we do, I heartily agree.
So, it’s jarring when in that atmosphere of sweetness we come to church and
focus on one of the heroes of Advent, John the Baptist. John’s not a sweetiepie at
all. He’s the one who comes before, the one who points the way for Jesus to
come into the world. John is the herald, the one who marches in with the trumpet
before the king appears, the butler who announces the Lord and Lady entering
the hall, the emcee who introduces tonight’s special guest. Only he’s wild-haired
and wild-eyed, dressed in camel’s hair, eating locusts, and crying out in the
wilderness. He’d be incredibly embarrassing to have around at a dinner party, and
probably pretty difficult to have here in church. John the Baptist is yet one more
reminder that Jesus is a different kind of Messiah – and a reminder that this big
huge story takes place on the world’s tiniest stage.
Our gospel reading begins, ‘In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius,
when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and
his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler
of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God
came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.’ You might have heard a familiar
ring to this, because it’s similar to how the Christmas Eve Nativity reading begins:
‘In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should
be registered…while Quirinius was governor of Syria…’ Lots of name-dropping, big
important power players on the world stage; small, no-account people on the
gospel stage. Imagine the trumpeter stepping aside to reveal the scrawny
prophet, scratching himself; the tiny baby lying in some hay.
And these big important power people are uniquely awful people. Tiberius and
Pilate and Caiaphas and Quirinius were leaders of systems of oppression,
authorities of the Roman occupying empire, of the religious oligarchy, of bloody
military force. They were aristocrats and power-mongers, the wealthy few who
lived off the slavery and poverty of many. The whole system they ruled over
depended upon the oppression of people both in their empire and beyond; their
society was rigidly divided into the haves and the have-nots, and they sanctioned
violence both deliberate and random to keep the poor folk in line. As tyrants and
dictators have done and continue to do, down through the ages.
So John the Baptist exits that scene and heads out into the wilderness, naturally,
because you have to get away from the big important people to hear the word of
God. And the Word of God comes to him, and the Word of God is made flesh in
the baby, and the Word of God is shared with small, no-account people in that
unimportant, desperate place. Right in the midst of all that system of violence and
bloodshed and degradation, the Word of God came. Which is just about the best
part of the story of Advent and Christmas, I think.
John the Baptist’s father Zechariah saw this and sang about it to his little baby, in
the Canticle words we sang together today:
In the tender compassion of our God *
the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
To shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, *
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Zechariah’s song must have sunk in for his baby son, because John saw his call to
be about preparing that way of peace, making the paths straight and the rough
ways smooth. It’s a bold vision for a half-crazy person, but it’s a vision that comes
straight out of scripture and tradition, the long path of the prophets and the
followers of God’s love who tried their hardest to be faithful to that love even in
dark times. To be faithful not just because they themselves felt the blessing in
their own lives – but to be faithful because they knew that they needed to hold
that promise for the whole world. If they didn’t, who would?
Because the signs of God’s kingdom can be subtle. Next to the signs of disorder
and chaos, of worldly power and politics, the coming of the Word of God can be
very hard to notice. Violence and warfare loom larger than small acts of kindness.
The dark things in our own lives loom large too – the frightening diagnosis,
uncertain employment, the loneliness and isolation that can come even more at
this time of year. And we can get mired in that darkness. We can lose ourselves in
doomscrolling and unease, in our own wretchedness or the wretchedness of the
world around us. Or maybe what is worse, we can try too hard to distract
ourselves with false light, as if the tinsel will somehow save us. The secular world
doesn’t have any way to save us in times like these – no matter how many
Hallmark movies or retail discounts or sugary butterbombs you grab hold of, the
reality of the darkness looms too great to fend off. Are assassinations the new
normal in this country? Are 45,000 killed and 62,000 starved in Gaza numbers we
can live with? Frosty the snowman is no match for the news cycle.
But we are not secular people – we are people of faith, of enough faith to get up
and come to church on a Sunday, of enough faith that we are trying to try to
believe, even if we feel ourselves to be failing at it. Which means that we have
heard the promise of God’s faithfulness, we know at least at some level what this
season of the year is for, we sense something of the light and are groping our way
toward it. We’re here because we know we need it, something to light our way
and anchor us in times such as these.
And the witness of John the Baptist is that we also are witnesses – the light is not
just for us. We are agents of that light here in this world. It is easy for us to feel
too small and insignificant to make any difference, and like all the forces of
darkness are too great. We’re just bit players on a small, unimportant stage – yes,
New Yorkers, even you. But the light of God’s kingdom isn’t always big and grand
and dazzling at first – sometimes it is just the littlest act of truth-telling or
kindness that sets in motion the sweeping change. We do what we can as children
of the light, however small that might seem. And the light we offer meets up with
the light of others, part of the greater Light that shines in the darkness – and the
darkness does not overcome it.
In the midst of what is big and powerful and set against the forces of good there is
the power of the kingdom of God, small as a mustard seed and ready to take over.
That is the true story of this season. That’s why we spend some time in Advent,
acknowledging the darkness, and looking for the light together. And that’s why
we do the small things, lighting one more candle, praying for the sick, feeding the
hungry, making costumes for children. That’s where the light is, in truth. That’s
where we find it, and that’s how we show it, to our neighbors and beyond. So
may we open our eyes to see it, the dawn from on high, the salvation of God. And
so guide this world into the way of peace.
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