Epiphany 2C - "So the Party Could Go On"

1 Corinthians 12:1–11 and Saint John 2:1–11

A priest friend of mine, who served an extremely wealthy parish on the far northwest side of Chicago used to always begin his first meeting with brides and grooms planning a wedding with the words: “Are you sure you want to go through with this?”

He was too good of a priest to suggest that they not get married or that the ceremony should not be in the church but he was issuing a warning about all the other events surrounding a wedding that they were getting themselves into.  

He was talking about the dresses and the tuxes.  He was talking about the flowers at church and banquet hall and the limousines that were required to prove that your family wasn’t on the dole.  He was talking about the rehearsal dinner, the wedding reception, and now the seemingly obligatory Sunday brunch that is expected to be provided the following day.

That’s what he was talking about when he asked the couple if they really “wanted to go through with this” and instead have a nice little wedding in the church’s beautiful chapel surrounded by family and close friends.

The couples never opted for that option.  Instead, they lived out the words of Spencer Tracy as Stanley Banks in the first “Father of Bride” when he looked straight into the camera and said to the audience: “I'll be honest with you. When I bought this house seventeen years ago, it cost me less than this blessed event in which Annie Banks became Annie Banks-MacKenzie. I'm told that one day I'll look back on all this with great affection and nostalgia. I hope so.”

The rest of the movie is given over to the craziness surrounding almost any but the smallest of weddings causing Tracy to remind the viewers: “Weddings are either confined to the bosom of the family ...or held in Madison Square Garden.”  

The Banks-MacKenzie wedding was clearly going to be of the Madison Square Garden variety causing Tracy to remark when they were going through hundreds of invitations that were all yeses. “Apparently Kay picked a day... ...when nobody within 400 miles has got anything to do.”

We’ve been to those kinds of weddings.  The kinds where, I at least, look around the room and say to myself, “This couple has more friends than people I have met in my lifetime.”  Jesus was at one of those weddings too.

It may not have been as crowded as the painting that appears at the top of this post and where in a painting by Italian Renaissance painter Paulo Veronese a barely identifiable Jesus is surrounded by what seems to be every single person in a village. 

That may not have been what it was like, but it probably was what it felt like.

Saint John goes to great pains to point out that not only Jesus was there, but his mother was, and to add to the crowds, even his disciples. This has always made me wonder who got the invitation. Was it Jesus? Mary? One of his disciples?  When they responded did they indicate not only “plus one” but maybe “plus twelve” or even more.

It doesn’t matter because apparently “nobody within four hundred miles had anything else to do on that day” and this wedding was not one that was going to be held in the bosom of the family but was a “Madison Square Garden variety.” 

Everybody who was anybody was there enjoying a celebration that was in its third day of a scheduled seven when something terrible happens. The wine runs out.

Social scientists tell us: “The fact that the family hosting the wedding has run out of wine threatens a serious loss of honor.”1 Were they too poor? Too cheap? 

It also causes no small measure of anxiety among the servants and especially the wine steward.  They must have gone limp when they discovered that the wine supply was not just low but that they were out.  This kind of miscalculation could have cost them their jobs.  This lack of wine would have cost both the bride and groom’s families their reputation in the community. This breach of hospitality would be talked about, remembered, for years.

But most of all, for those gathered the joy would be left out that wedding like air out of a balloon for wine was and is a symbol of joy.  “One ancient rabbi stated, ‘Without wine there is no joy.’”2

Mary notices and decides for whatever reason that her son, Jesus, can do something about it.  “She sees what’s amiss.  She perceives the high likelihood of scandal and humiliation brewing beneath a seemingly glossy surface.  If John’s account is trustworthy, Mary notices and registers concern before Jesus does.

I can’t help wondering exactly how Mary says it.  Quietly, urgently, after pulling her distracted son away from his friends, away from the music and the dancing, away from the servants working hard to hide their growing panic as countless wedding guests swirl obliviously around them.  I imagine Mary takes Jesus into an inner room, fixes his attention with a stern stare, and whispers the shameful news into his ear: “They have no wine.”3

Much has been made of Jesus’ response probably by scholars who didn’t have mothers.  For every one of us who had remember that at one time or another we have had to respond to an unreasonable request from our mother with “Is that any of our business...”4  Put a long “Mom” on his lips and all of us probably have said the same things to one or both of our parental units when they suggested that perhaps there was a problem somewhere that we could solve.  “Mom, that’s none of our business.”

Mary makes it his business.  In full mom mode she pays no attention to her son, and she goes to the servants and provides us with one of the greatest pieces of advice in all of scripture and perhaps literature: “Do whatever he tells you.”5

That’s great advice for that moment and for all time. Look at Jesus.  Read the words of Jesus. Follow Jesus and then “do whatever he tells you.”

The servants do just that. Looking around and wondering what this wedding guest is up to they do what Jesus tells them to do.  They fill up the water jars only to wonder and wait.  When the wine steward looks back at the jugs and tastes the wine a miraculous discovery is made.

Jesus does not just make a little bit of wine. He does not just do what he needs to do so they can get through the event without the hosts being embarrassed. No, John reports Jesus makes between 120 and 180 gallons of wine. The quantity screams abundance and extravagance. But ... what made this moment even more extravagant was not simply the quantity. Quality mattered too. Apparently the wine Jesus made was more like gallons of Chateau Margaux rather than gallons of Bota box Merlot.6

The sommelier, who has no idea where all this new supply has come from pulls the groom aside and asks in effect, what’s going on here.  “Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now.”7 

Imagine the relief.  On the face of the headwaiter who can keep his job.  On the part of the couple’s parents because they won’t lose face in front of their neighbours.  And most of all, on the part of all the party goers because this Madison Square Garden variety shindig can go on for a few more days.

This story is about a party that continues to this day and we are a part of it.  

Yes, I know we may not always feel like we’re at a party.

Sometimes we may feel as anxious as the hosts of the wedding, the servants and the wine steward over what might happen to us.  We may be literally worried about what tomorrow might bring and the day after that, and the day after that.  We might not only be worried for our nation, but about ourselves, our church, our world.  

We may be worried about how some in our wider families will recover from the loss of their homes, their loved ones, their livelihoods, because of the wildfires. 

There will be no quick solutions to any of these problems, but we will be on our way, on the right track, if we follow Mary’s advice and “do whatever he tells you.”

That’s the church’s job as it has been for the last 141 years in this place.  

As Dr. William H. Willimon, former bishop in the United Methodist Church reflected recently:

If you are a mainline protestant Christian ... it’s hard not to be nostalgic, to look back at our yesterdays as better than our prospects for lively tomorrows.  Yesterday’s wine was better than today’s, a lot better than tomorrows.

Trouble is Jesus Christ, the same one who produced the good wine at the end of the party in Cana in Galilee, keeps providing for us ... and insists on having the last word over our future.8

So, we come to the table and discover that the bread and wine at our little wedding feast has never run out.  We go forward, confident that Jesus may be indeed saving the best wine for last, for now.

We go forward know that the party will go on and at the center of it all, as our host, our gift, and our guest, will be none other than Jesus Christ our Lord.

So,  I say. Let the feast continue.

________________

1. Bruce J. Malina and Richard L. Rohrbaugh, Social Science Commentary on the Gospel of John (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007), 66.

2. Brian Stoffregen, “John 2.1-11 2nd Sunday after the Epiphany - Year C,” John 2.1-11, accessed January 17, 2025, https://www.crossmarks.com/brian/john2x1.htm.

3. Debie Thomas, “They Have No Wine,” Journey with Jesus, January 13, 2019, https://journeywithjesus.net/essays/2053-they-have-no-wine.

4. St. John 2:4. (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE=Eugene H. Peterson, The Message (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2004).

5.St. John 2:5. (NRSV) [NRSV=The New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition]

6. Shannon J. Kershner, “Who Has Time for Joy.” Sermon preached at the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago on January 17, 2016.

7. St. John 3:10.  (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version (Colorado Springs, CO International Bible Society, 1984)]

8. William H. Willimon, “Saving the Best for Last,” Pulpit Resource, Year C, 53, no. 1 (2025): 9-11.

 

Epiphany 1C - "Holy Family Outing"

Saint Luke 2:41-53

“There is a family drama now likely playing in a home near you.” 

Those words, “There is a family drama no likely playing in a home near you” were the opening sentence in this month's cover story of Psychology Today where the author went on to write: “It is the clash between the expectations of parents and the realities of their ... offspring in becoming, or trying to become, or feeling like, fully fledged adults."1

Every parent, every child, knows what it is like to be going through that very awkward stage between childhood and adulthood.  It is often accompanied by loud yelling, some screeching, perhaps accentuated with a little door slamming, and maybe even some storming out.

(At least that’s the way it was in my house as I was growing up and, try as hard as I might, I couldn’t get my mother to stop.)

I’m willing to bet that it was like this for you as you were growing up or raising your children as they were going through what Herman Munster tried to explain to his dear wife Lilly when their son, Eddie announced that he was going to run away from home.  

Herman wisely said: “It's nothing, dear. It's probably just another one of those adolescent cycles. I believe a child psychiatrist would refer to it as the ‘punk phase.’”2

It “is a family drama now likely playing in a home near you” because it is a tale as old as time.  It may well reach all the way back to, and beyond the pages of The Good Book and the story of the Jesus.

Once a hymn writer romantically extolled Jesus’ virtues suggesting that: “he is our childhood pattern; day by us he grew” because “through all His wondrous childhood, He would honor and obey.” So, “Christian children all must be, Mild, obedient, good as He.”3

Like it or not the childhood pattern as the ultimate example of childhood obedience breaks down in the little story of Holy Family dynamics that we have before us today.

I love this story about Jesus and his parents and am astonished by the author’s deep understanding of the human condition. Mary and Joseph were facing the adolescent years with a most unusual child, and yet we have only this one glimpse in scripture of that time in their lives.  The story is common and primal. A young, gifted boy is growing up and beginning to assert his independence against his parents.4

Times like that always make me smile and remember what I was told to do as a little kid if I got lost in the State Street store of Marshall Field’s where he worked.  My Uncle Herb’s first rule on becoming separated was that I was to “stop and stay”.

The theory behind this is simple: If two people are looking for each other it becomes like Brownian motion - two people just wandering around and perhaps even passing each other without either one knowing it.  If one just stops and the other does the searching all the searcher has to do is retrace his or her steps and allowing for a reunion to take place more quickly. 

This is exactly what this story about Jesus and his earthly parents is about. 

But before we dive too deep into this, I must warn you that I have read countless sermons and articles on this reading and most of them have missed how very human the whole business is while they focused on the divine.

The facts are simple.  Mary, Joseph, Jesus and a whole group of relatives, friends and Neighbours from back home are making their annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem in a first century tour group for the Passover.

The city is as crowded as Marshall Field’s used to be at Christmas and somehow, someway, Jesus becomes separated from his parents.  The text says only that he remained in Jerusalem but whether it was by accident or choice remains unclear.  What is clear is that the whole party was a day’s journey out of town before it was discovered that Jesus was missing.

Anyone who is a parent or who has ever been charged with the care of a child knows all about the mixture of fear and anger Mary and Joseph must have felt.  The overwhelming fear that some harm may have befallen their son mixed with the anger of a parent who says: “I hope he’s okay because when I find him, I’m going to kill that kid!”

That last option was not open to Mary and Joseph because of the divine nature of this story.  While they were frantically searching every wagon and asking every relative and friend if they had seen Jesus. Mary was remembering the visit from the solitary angel named Gabriel, the shepherds, and finally the multitudes of angels who hailed her son’s birth.

Joseph was remembering his visit from that same angel, and later, the wise men. All of his doubts must have come rushing back into his head, perfectly expressed in a song by Michael W. Card:

Father show me where I fit into this plan of yours

How can a man be father to the Son of God

Lord for all my life I've been a simple carpenter

How can I raise a king, how can I raise a king?5

I cannot believe that at this moment Mary and Joseph were serene people of prayer with hearts and minds at peace.  No, they were remembering, and they were worried because it was not just their son but the son who had been entrusted to them by God who was missing.

There is only one thing to do but make the long journey back to Jerusalem.  Two exhausting days of travelling and worrying.  Two sleepless nights spent tossing and turning.  Then another day searching in shops, and markets, and anywhere else they could think of asking everyone they had met if they had seen their son.  Frantically they searched for Jesus.

Finally, they try the temple maybe to look and maybe to pray. And when they do, lo and behold, there is their son sitting among the teachers asking questions and amazing eavesdroppers with his understanding.

Mary is not as impressed as the others and instead expresses her relief and frustration in one loaded sentence: “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”6

Do you hear the guilt in that question?  It is almost as if she is saying:  “Why have you done this to us?  Why have you made us suffer so?”

Mary piles the guilt on in one paraphrase “Your father and I have been half out of our minds looking for you.”7  Now she is bringing Joseph into it.  “Its bad enough you have done this to me but look at what you have done to your father. You know he was never sure about this whole business in the first place and now you’ve made him a nervous wreck.”

This is real family dynamics at its best. Not just Holy Family dynamics but real family dynamics because all of us in this room have been involved in the same type of situations and conversations.

Every child who has ever stayed out too late or forgot to call home to tell his or her parents where they were or that they had arrived safely has heard, “We were so worried.”

And every parent has had to endure the kind of answer Jesus gives.  “Why were you searching for me?”8

You can almost hear Joseph, can’t you?  “Why? Why? I’ll tell you why! What did you expect us to do? Were we supposed to go home and wait for you to show up?  You’re twelve years old pal!”

To add fuel to the family dynamic fire that is now raging Jesus says: “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house. But they did not understand what he said to them.”

And neither do we because we load so much theological baggage onto this encounter that we fail to see the reasonableness of his response.

What was he supposed to do, check into an inn? He was a little young for that and besides, his previous experience with inns and innkeepers had not been that pleasant.

No, when he was separated from his parents he headed for the safest place in town, the temple. Here is would be sheltered, secure, and cared for until his parents showed up.

This is the only story we have of Jesus between the time of his infancy to his adulthood. So, it leaves one to wonder why it, above all others, is remembered.

I have no proof of this, but I think that, as he grew, Jesus told this story to any who would hear to remind himself just how much his earthly family loved him. That even though his family may not have always understood what he was up to, or even approved of what he said or did, they still loved him enough to search every nook and cranny of Jerusalem until they found him.

And I think he told it to remind us that there wasn’t anything in this life that he did not experience.  He told it to remind us that now God knows that even the simplest of family outings can turn into disasters of frustrations and frazzled nerves. 

That is what Jesus taught at twelve and teaches still. There will be times when we feel like we have been left behind.  There will be times when we feel like we are living in a home where all sorts of family dramas are breaking out. But it is just there where Jesus has promised to be with us.

Jesus came to remind us that we are part of a family - his family confusing and confused; his wandering and wonderful family; his bemusing and blessed family - all wrapped up in the love of in Jesus, our Lord, who came to be family with us.

Jesus came to make a home with us and be family with us.

That is the best news for all of us who have ever been caught us in the same crazy family dynamics that the Holy Family was on their annual outing to Jerusalem and found that even in the midst and family drama that played out in our home Jesus is present teaching us that, if we let it, our love, and our capacity to forgive is bigger and stronger than all of our arguments put together.

________________

1. Hara Estroff Marano, “The New Grown-Up,” Psychology Today, 2025, 25.

2. Joe Connelly, Bob Mosher, and Norm Liebmann, “‘Herman’s Child Psychology,’” episode, The Munsters (CBS, September 16, 1985).

3. Cecil Francis Alexander, “Once In Royal David’s City.”  

4.     Craig  A. Satterlee, “Commentary on Luke 2:41-52,” Working Preacher , November 11, 2020, https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/first-sunday-of-christmas-3/commentary-on-luke-241-52.

5.    Michael W. Card, "Joseph's Song"

6. St. Luke 2:38b. (NIV) NIV=[NIV=New International Version (Colorado Springs, CO International Bible Society, 1984)]

7. St. Luke 2:46-48. (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE=Eugene H. Peterson, The Message (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2004).

8.    St. Luke 2:49. (NIV)

 

The Epiphany of Our Lord 2025 - "Not For Quitters"

Saint Matthew 2:1-14

I had experienced the phenomenon many times in my life but up until this year I didn’t know it had a name.

At the beginning of each new year new faces would begin to appear at any health to which I belonged.  One could spot them a mile away by their outfits.  Some looked like they were left over from high school or, at best, college phys ed. classes.  A little tattered and torn and much the worse for wear.  Other outfits looked brand new, like they just emerged from a sporting goods store bag. 

The owners always appeared a little lost looking at the weight machines as if they were creations from outer space.  Some gave up trying to figure them out and just used them for benches.

In the comic “The Duplex,” one guy observes “I hate in January when the gym fills up with all the newbies who hog the machines. Look at that bozo sitting on the leg press. He’s been texting for ten minutes.”  Then he turns to his girlfriend and says, “That’s where I like to take my selfies.”1

Seasoned veterans of the health club scene always knew we could wait the new people out and before long they would find other things to do with their mornings.

What we didn’t know that there was an actual date assigned to the day they would disappear until an Apple watch commercial that has been playing on almost every sporting event I watched over New Year’s told us that the second Friday in January, this year January 10, was known as “Quitters Day.”  

The premise of the commercial was obviously if you purchased one of these Apple watches, it would motivate you to the point that you would not be a quitter.

The history of this very pejorative term dates back to “2019, {when} extensive research was conducted by Strava — a social network for athletes —  found that approximately 80% of people who made New Year’s resolutions have tapped out by the second week of January. {By} Making deductions from the available 800 million user-logged activities in that year, Strava even went on to predict that the second Friday of January was the fateful day when the motivations of most quitters begin to decline. 

An accompanying article stated the obvious.  “The key to not quitting something you started is to not just decide to do something but to be totally devoted to doing it.”2

The main characters in today’s Gospel were not checking their watches but checking the stars and when they found that one star that seemed to them to be specially special and totally devoted themselves to finding out what was behind this celestial phenomenon, they decided that they would not quit even though there were countless obstacles in their way.

The first may have been their families.  I’ve always wondered how their spouses and children reacted.

Did their children stare at their fathers with stunned expressions on their faces until they yelled: “Mom!  Dad’s looking at the stars again!”

Did their wives reply? “I’ll show him stars.  Where’s my rolling pin?”

Still the three astrologers were not going to give up.  They closed up their storefront tarot card reading businesses, put away their crystal balls, and began their search until they found what their were looking for.  They were determined not to quit.

Even the weather and conditions of travel did not slow them down.  As W.H. Auden wrote in his poem, “The Adoration of the Magi.”

A cold coming we had of it,

Just the worst time of the year

For a journey, and such a long journey:

The ways deep and the weather sharp,

The very dead of winter.’

And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,

And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly

And the villages dirty and charging high prices:

A hard time we had of it.

A hard time we had of it.

With the voices singing in our ears, saying

That this was all folly.3

Still they didn’t quit.

Even when they found themselves in the wrong place face-to-face with evil incarnate in one person they didn’t quit.  Face to face with Herod, they simply, naively ask:  “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”4

As my former pastor Shannon Kershner observed: 

I cannot even imagine the way his blood pressure must have risen when the magi asked him where was the child who had been born King of the Jews. “King of the Jews?!,” he must have thought. He was King of the Jews. That is what Rome declared, and that was the way it would forever be.

Following the normal way power works in our world, the king responded to his own fear not with a spirit of openness and courage, but by holding on to his power even more tightly and deciding to do whatever was necessary to keep it.5

That’s the way power works observed another pastor friend Shawn Fiedler:

Fear is a powerful, haunting thing. Fear grabs hold of the powerful; a false reality is created, and using their resources of plenty, they protect themselves at any cost.”6

Up against this kind of power they could have quit but they didn’t. Even when Herod lies right to their faces with an unctuous: “Go and search carefully for the young Child, and when you have found Him, bring back word to me, that I may come and worship Him also.”7

They don’t quit or even cower before Herod and his kind. They see through Herod like a cheap suit. They know that Herod and his kind always lie.  They are good at it.  They’ve spent their whole lives saying the most outrageous things and puffing themselves up with their own self-delusions so that lying comes as easy to them as breathing. 

The intrepid seekers have come to far to quit now.  With their newfound information and the correct coordinates they head off until they find what they have been looking for. 

And now the star, which they had seen in the east, went in front of them as they travelled until at last it shone immediately above the place where the little child lay. The sight of the star filled them with indescribable joy.

So, they went into the house and saw the little child with his mother Mary. And they fell on their knees and worshipped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts—gold, incense and myrrh.8

At this point they could have called it quits but, and don’t miss this, after they had completed their mission and done what they set out to do their lives were in the greatest danger.  Disobeying Herod put these outsiders outside the law and who knows what Herod would have done to them.  Still, “they left for their own country by another road.”9

T

he image of the Three Kings, and really, who cares if there were three or not or whether their names were Casper, Balthazar and Melchior or something else entirely.  Who cares if they came from the Orient or more likely  Persia  the very region were so many conflicts rage today? 

This image reminds us that life is more than a moment from a Christmas pageant but is about people who did not quit.  It is about people who looked evil in the eye and turned their backs to go another way.

It is about people who never quit making choices for good and that is where we fit in.  

There are, there will always be, temptations to give in and give up. We will always face temptations to quit and throw up up our hands and say, “What can we do in the face of the Herod’s of our day?” 

But we know, deep down in our heart of hearts we know, that to put our faith in some earthly leaders is folly.  To trust some is pure foolishness.  And to believe their words are dangerous.

We also know there is another way.  We know that there must be another way.  There must be someone else to follow, to put our faith in, to trust. There must be another leader whose way is not built on lies and deceit but whose ways are always justice and peace.  There is another one whom we can’t quit on.  There is another one whom we must be totally devoted to finding and then holding on to.

We cannot give up on his ways.  The Wise Men met Jesus once and it changed their lives.  We’ve met him countless times in story and song and so we do not quit on following his way, holding on to his promises, and finding in him the one true light of our lives.

Like the magi we have found the one, been touched by the one, who came among us to rule not with power or might but the power of love.

Following his ways and never quitting. Never quitting on his promises we’ll be found once again by Jesus Christ, who at the beginning of each new year, at the beginning of each new day, never quits showing us a better way.

Christ’s way! The way that never quits.  The way that never gives up!  

________________

1. Glenn McCoy, “The Duplex,” The Beacon-News, January 3, 2025, sec. Section 1, p. 11

2. Tamkeen Kiani, “Quitters Day,” National Today, August 23, 2023, https://nationaltoday.com/quitters-day/.

3. W. H. Auden, “The Adoration of the Maji” in “Poems about the Three Kings: A Majestic Journey,” PoemVerse, May 27, 2024, https://poemverse.org/poems-about-the-three-kings/.

4. St. Matthew 2:2. (NIV) [NIV= New International Version (Colorado Springs, CO International Bible Society, 1984).

5. Shannon J. Kershner, “Lessons Learned.” Sermon preached at the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago. January 4, 2016.

6. Shawn Fiedler, “By Another Road.” Sermon preached at the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago. January 6, 2019.

7. St. Matthew 2:8. (NKJV) [NKJV= The New King James Version (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Incorporated, 2014).

8. St. Matthew 2:10-12. (PHILLIPS) [PHILLIPS=J. B. Phillips, The New Testament in Modern English (London, ENG: HarperCollins, 2000).

9.    St. Matthew 2:12. (NRSV) [NRSV= The New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)

 

Christmas 2024 - "In the Midst of the Muddle"

 

Saint John 1:1-14

I am always amazed when somebody remembers what I said once in a sermon.  Particularly because I can’t even remember what I said from one week to the next.  I have a hard time remembering what I have said in conversation from one day to the next.

Sometimes I ask my friends what I said, and their usual reply is, “You know, I really wasn’t listening.” I come away with the feeling that they haven’t heard a word I have said in years.

That is why a few weeks ago I was stunned when a good friend remembered over drinks that last Christmas Day I talked about the musical Mame and how one day she was one of New York City’s highest rollers with a gaudy wardrobe and a lifestyle is as outrageous as her behaviour.  

She was the personification of the roaring twenties right until October of 1929. If Auntie Mame was the representative of the glory days, she is also a symbol of the gloom.  One by one we see her garish treasures being removed from her apartment.  No longer able to live on her investments, which are all gone, she has to find a real job.  When she discovers that she is such a failure at this thing called work that she is even unable to sell shoes and her cupboards contains only shredded wheat, she pauses for a moment and announces.

“We need a little Christmas; right this very minute

Candles in the window; carols at the spinet

We need a little Christmas now!”

That conversation got me to wondering what the song for this Christmas might be and then, at a concert I attended, a friend sang “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”

It comes from the musical Meet Me in Saint Louis and it comes again to a family who is distraught over their father’s decision to move from Saint Louis to New York. In the movie, on Christmas Eve, Judy Garland sings the song to cheer up her little sister.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas

Let your heart be light

Someday soon we all will be together

If the fates allow

Until then, we'll have to muddle through somehow

So have yourself a merry little Christmas now.

This year, and perhaps it is me, what stood out from that classic was the promise that “next year all our troubles will be miles away” and the realization that “until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow.”

The simple dictionary defination of “muddle” is to be “in a messy or confused state.”

And sometimes that is exactly where we are and not because we have consumed too many drinks last night that have been “muddled” but in a good way.

In his column last week in “The Dispatch” Jonah Goldberg reminded me of the scene in the movie Parenthood where Steve Martin is a stressed-out dad complaining about the burdens of life to his wife, played by Mary Steenburgen. She says, “What do you want me to do? Give you guarantees? Life is messy.” 

Martin replies, “I hate messy. It’s so … messy.”

Life is messy and the good news of today’s gospel is that we don’t have to muddle through it alone.

I always like to think of John the Evangelist, philosopher and theologian, staring up at the night sky and perhaps trying to make some sense of this Jesus story,

Yes, he had heard all about Mary and Joseph. Yes, he had heard the story of the shepherds and the angels. Yes, he had heard the story about the wisemen from the east.  But more than that he had heard the story of the life, death and resurrection of this man Jesus whom it seemed to him that the plot of the entire universe was caught up with.

You see, he’s studied the scrolls and the Torah and the words of the prophets. He’s studied the  works of Greek philosophy and has read all the poetry he can find trying to explain this Jesus but he just couldn’t find the words to describe him and what he meant.

Then it hits him.  How can he explain what happened? This is it! “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us ... full of grace and truth.”  

I love the way, Dr. Eugene Peterson paraphrased this in The Message. “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. (John 1:14)

Flesh and blood, living next door.  That means that Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us is in the messies we do not like helping us as we try our best to muddle through.  He is the light shining in the darkness helping us to find our way.

But, as Madeline E’Engle wrote in her book, A Ring of Endless Light.” “Maybe you have to know the darkness before you can appreciate the light.”

But we don’t want that. 

As Dr. Scott Black Johnson observed once in a sermon.

I want the light to arrive and to win, and I want it to win big. I want the light to deal with the darkness in a way that is so overwhelming, so completely devastating, that I can switch channels at half-time because there is no way, no possible way, that the darkness is going to come out of the locker room to start the third quarter. 

(I don’t know this for sure but Dr. Johnson is a native of Duluth, Minnesota and a graduate of St. Olaf college so he’s probably a Vikings fan and, unlike Bears fans, doesn’t know the kind of darkness we endure.)

Instead of total victory, we get something painfully modest. The light came into the world, and the darkness did not extinguish it. The darkness was not able (at least, not immediately) to reach over and pinch out the flickering wick of the light.

What John is telling us in his Gospel is that most of all, Jesus is with us when we go through the darkness.  

As Dr. Tom Are said once, “This light does not destroy the darkness, but it is a word strong enough to keep you human in a world of inhumanity.”

That is what we need to know everyday when we are muddling through the mess and need a little Christmas.

We need to know that Jesus is our light in our darkness. In him we find someone who is with us in our deepest depths as well as our highest heights.

And John helps us to discover that he has been there all along, “at work in your life ... bringing creative hope in every dark moment.”

Not just our lives but our world. John wants us to know that Jesus story is not limited to “the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee...” or “those days when a decree went out from Ceasar Agustus” but goes back all the way to the beginning of time and will continue to be with us until the end.  

Jesus story is present in the midst of it all.  In the midst of the mayorship of Brandon Johnson of Chicago and J.D. Pritzger’s governor ship of Illinois.  Jesus is with us when transition from one president to another.  In the midst days of wars and rumors of wars and days of blessed sweet peace, Jesus is with us.

So, if you remember only one thing, I have said this Christmas remember this:  From the very beginning says John in his gospel Jesus has been with us in the midst of the muddle and the mess.  

In the midst of our messy and muddled life the message of Christmas is  Jesus is with us.  

There is no place where we’ve been that he hasn’t been. There is no place that we will go where he will not be. Jesus will be with us, “always and everywhere as near to us as our own breath.”

So have yourself a merry little Christmas now.

Advent 3C - "Have You Heard John Preach?"

Saint Luke 3:7-18

In his classic book Whatever Became of Sin Psychologist Karl Menninger gave us this scene.

On a sunny day in September 1972, a stern-faced, plainly dressed man could be seen standing still on a street comer in the busy Chicago Loop. As pedestrians hurried by on their way to lunch or business, he would solemnly lift his right arm, and pointing to the person nearest him, intone loudly the single word “GUILTY!”  Then, without any change of expression, he would resume his stiff stance for a few moments before repeating the gesture. Then, again, the inexorable raising of his arm, the pointing, and the solemn pronouncing of the one word “GUILTY!”

The effect of this strange faccuse pantomime on the passing strangers was extraordinary, almost eerie. They would stare at him, hesitate, look away, look at each other, and then at him again; then hurriedly continue on their ways. One man, turning to another who was my informant, exclaimed: “But how did he know?”1

Those of us who live in cities can spot street preachers from blocks away.  They are easy to identify with their big megaphones and even bigger bibles.  Their message is almost always the same.  Those who pass by are “guilty as sin” and they need to repent or face the dire consequences.  Most times we can avoid them but there are other occasions where they insert themselves wherever we are.

James Thurber in his essay “The Get Ready Man” remembered that once the “Get Ready Man” interrupted a production of “King Lear” at the local theatre.

The theatre was in absolute darkness and there were rumblings of thunder and flashes of lightening offstage {when} the Get Ready Man added his bawlings to the ranting of the King and the mouthing of the Fool. Right in the middle of the play from the balcony there came the shouts “Get Ready!  Get Ready!  The World is coming to an end!” 

They found him finally, and ejected him, still shouting. Neither father nor I, {Thurber wrote} completely got over the scene... The theatre in our time, {he speculated} has known few such moments.”2

I’ll bet not.  It takes a while to get over any encounter with those who remind us of our shortcomings which is why I tried to deftly avoid John the Baptist last week by talking about his parents,  Zachariah and Elizabeth, in the hopes of giving him a wide enough berth to avoid him entirely.  But apparently, I didn’t swerve far enough because John the Baptist is still here.

It seems that we are not going to able to get to Christmas without hearing John preach.

Long ago in another place in time I quoted a sermon by the late, great, preacher of preachers, Dr. Fred B. Craddock when he let his imagination run wild over the figure of John the Baptist.

He was an oddity. He had long hair, and when I say he had long hair, I don’t mean he just had long hair. It wasn’t like the young businessmen in Atlanta with a little ponytail. He never cut his hair. I mean, he never cut his hair. He had a long beard, not a neat beard like some of you have. I mean, he had never trimmed his beard. He ... was strange. And dressed in an unusual way – camel’s hair and a leather band around the waist. And his food – he never went home with anybody for lunch, and I’m sure no one accepted his invitation. 

 I loved the imagery until after church when a really nice woman who we had spent weeks actively courting for membership came up to me and said, “What do you mean he never cut his hair?  What do you mean he never trimmed his beard? What do you mean he never took a bath?” and stormed out. 

I wanted to run after her myself shouting: “Hey! Hey! Hey!  Don’t blame me! Blame Fred Craddock!” But she was gone, never to be seen at our church again.

While we might try to avoid hearing John and his kind preach I’m with Dr. Peter Marty, who wrote:

What fascinates me about John is that our first-century friends made the decision to go out and hear him in the wilderness. They took the initiative. He didn’t come to them to dwell in their midst and inhabit their lives, as Jesus did. They had to go to him, leaving behind their comforts, conveniences, and suburban cul-de-sacs.3

At the risk of getting in trouble again let me tap into Dr. Craddock’s overactive imagination:

Plows were left in the furrows, bread was left in the oven, shops were left unattended, school was let our early because the crowds were moving into the desert to hear this extraordinary preacher.

I’m sure that many of the people who went were just curious, curious about the way he looked and the way he talked. I’m sure some the young people went out there just out of curiosity, nothing to do, sat out on the hoods of their camels and just watched the crowd and listened to John, bored perhaps. But most of the people who went were very sincere. There was something persuasive about him.4

 Start a sermon like that and the congregation just might come to believe you have real anger issues.  Preacher friends and I can’t remember in all our years of preaching ever starting a sermon by calling our congregations a brood of vipers, a bunch of snakes. We’ve thought about it but thinking and doing are two different matters.

Besides, the people’s reaction to John was amazing.  They don’t announce in returned anger, “Well, I don’t believe it!”  They don’t storm back to their villages and farms. They don’t try to cut off his head. Sadly, that will come later but it will not be one of them but be by a leader who demands ultimate, unquestioning, loyalty from any in their kingdom or court.

Instead, the crowds ask: “Then what are we supposed to do?”6

Just as no preacher I know would start a sermon the way John did, no preacher I know would ever expect that kind of reaction.  Believe me when I tell you, “What do you want us to do?”7 is not a reaction most preachers are used to getting but it is what happens when we hear John preach.

I find it curious that John doesn’t tell the tax collectors to quit working for the Romans and their ... collaborators, nor are the soldiers called to quit serving Caesar and his empire. Both the despised tax collectors and the feared soldiers and called ... to respond to the advent of the Christ, right here and right now in their ordinary everyday lives.8

An encounter with Jesus, the baby in the manger, the full-grown adult who John is pointing us to, makes us different. When we have heard John preach our reaction is “what shall we do?”

And this doesn’t mean just to repeat pious phrases over and over.  This doesn’t mean to try to impress people with our knowledge of scripture or theology.  It doesn’t mean that we only care for our close relatives and friends.  But it does means that we broaden our scope, our horizons, and begin to live like the world really is coming to an end.

When we’ve really heard John preach we may just wind up like Ebenezer Scrooge.  He, and Dickens’ play, A Christmas Carol is playing almost everywhere about now.  

His main complaint about Christmas is that it costs him money.  Money is everything to him, it is his first love.  He has sacrificed everything for it including the love of another person.

is complaint with the poorly paid Bob Crachit is that he wants a day off with or without pay and that will cost Scrooge money in, if nothing else, lost business.

He throws the gentlemen asking for donations to the poor out of his office because he pays taxes, lots of taxes, don’t they know, and his taxes pay for poorhouses.  There is nothing more he wishes to do but be left alone.

After an evening meal and bed, alone as always, he is visited by three ghosts, past, present, and future, that frankly sum up his life in one word, “guilty.”  “How did they know?” might have been his response and it could have been his only response. 

But spoiler alert! Scrooge wakes up a changed man.  Maybe he had heard the three ghosts and they sounded a lot like John preaching.  And, as someone pointed out: “Scrooge’s first merry Christmas cost Scrooge a fortune.”9

Have you heard John preach?  Have you heard him bear witness to the light whose coming we will celebrate in just a few days?  

Have you heard John preach?  It may not cost you a fortune, but it will give you back your life. 

“Share now. Be merciful now. Do justice now. Inhabit your life, no matter how plain, how obscure, how unglamourous, how routine”10 now.

Hear John preach now, and you really will be ready for Christmas.

 

________________

1. Karl A. Menninger, Whatever Became of Sin? (New York, NY: Hawthorne Books, 1197), 1-2.

2. James Thurber, “The Car We Had to Push,” in My Life and Hard Times (Harper Collins, 1999), pp. 13-14.

3. Peter Marty, “The Eerie Call of John the Baptist,” The Christian Century, December 1, 2023, https://www.christiancentury.org/first-words/eerie-call-john-baptist

4. Fred B. Craddock, “Have You Heard John Preach?,” essay, in The Collected Sermons of Fred B. Craddock (Louisville, KY: Westminister|John Knox Press, 2011), 109–14.

5. William H. Willimon, “A Sermon About Sermons,” Pulpit Resource, Year B, 52, no. 4 (2024): 33–35.

6. St. Luke 3:10. (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE:Eugene H. Peterson, The Message (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2004).]

7. St. Luke 3:10. (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible. (Carol Stream, IL:Tyndale House Publishers, 1971.)]

8. Willimon, loc. cit.

9. William Willimon, “How Much Does Christmas Cost?” Pulpit Resource, Year B, 46, no. 4 (2024): 33–35.

10. Debie Thomas, “What Then Should We Do?” Journey with Jesus, December 9, 2018, https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2030-what-then-should-we-do.

 

Advent 2C - "Wait for It"

 

Saint Luke 1:5–23 & 57-80

On Friday, November 1, WLIT-FM which bills itself as “Chicago’s Christmas Music Station,” began playing Christmas music exclusively 24/7. In a press release, Mick Lee, program director and host said:

“93.9 LITE FM listeners have spoken year after year — once Halloween ends, they are ready for Christmas music on 93.9 LITE FM. We’re thrilled to celebrate our 24th year as Chicago’s Christmas station, spreading cheer, unity and warmth all season long!”1

 Now don’t get me wrong and don’t expect the usual harangue one gets from preachers who bemoan the fact that if you start Christmas music on November 1st it does seem that you are rushing headlong into Christmas without giving it a second thought.

There is nothing like a little Christmas music to get you in the spirit but honestly how many times can one listen to Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You” or Burl Ives’ classic rendition of “Frosty the Snow Man” or even a wonderful choral rendition of “Jesse’s Carol” which, the first couple of times can make me tear up, but after that I just dry my eyes and get on with my day.

For, as my friend and Scotsman, Callum MacLeod, said in a sermon once: “It really seems that a sane person can only listen to ‘Feliz Navidad’ so many times before taking a hammer to the appliance.”2

months worth of Christmas music if it didn’t result in exceptionally high ratings.  But I do have my doubts about politicians who promise that if they get elected we’ll be able to say “Merry Christmas” once again to everybody, even our beloved friends of other faiths and traditions, that makes them feel not quite so beloved.

Or, Nicholas Maduro, the Venesuelian dictator, who decided to hide behind a stolen election, political unrest, and lawless gangs causing countless to flee his country for fear of their lives to decree:

“It’s September, and it already smells like Christmas,” Maduro said Monday night during his weekly television show. “That’s why this year, as a way of paying tribute to you all, and in gratitude to you all, I’m going to decree an early Christmas for October 1.”3

 If you can’t give your people peace and prosperity, at least give them “bread and circuses” or in this case, tinsel and garland, and the promise that they will be able to say “Merry Christmas” to anybody they want whenever they want.

The season of Advent that liturgical churches celebrate so well reminds us in the words of the poet Edwina Gateley:

Advent means we are waiting for something; we are to expect something good and up-lifting to make us feel better. And why not? We struggle so, and we only want peace, security and even a little happiness. We dream of it—like a lost treasure in an empty desert. Then, in the very dying of the Autumn Season, along comes Advent with candles, prayers, songs and promises of new possibilities. And, all tingling with excitement and expectancy, we are seduced into hoping once again.”4

 There are two people, glossed over in the Christmas story by all the surrounding hoopla, who were seduced into hoping once again but before this hope became a reality they had to wait.  And their waiting began in a very strange place – at worship.

There is a name hidden deep in our Gospel reading this morning. It is the name of John the Baptist’s father, Zachariah. 

We know a lot about John.  He may be one of the noisiest characters in all of scripture preaching a message of repentance at the top of his lungs out in the wilderness to any and all who will listen.

But his dad, his father, Zachariah is another matter.  He’s an elderly man, the kind of guy with whom I am having a greater and greater affinity.  His wife is getting up there too and she suffers the ignominy of bearing the cruelest title of all, she is called “barren.”

They are an old couple, a faithful couple, who have long since given up on the idea that they will ever be called mom and dad by a child of their own.  That is until one night at worship something happens.  

Zachariah is a priest and it falls to him, entirely by chance, to go into the temple and be the one to burn incense.  It is to be, as my Episcopal friends call it, “a smoking service” which is something that we here at Saint Luke can relate to.

I can see the old priest, perhaps with a smile on his face, putting the coals in the incense pot, loading spoonful upon spoonful of incense in the censer, and swinging that baby around until the temple bore a striking resemblance to St. Luke on a Pentecost Sunday.

Then, from within the smoke, of all things, an angel appears striking terror into the old guy who may have then wondered, “What’s in this incense anyway? One too many, ‘nose hits’ perhaps?”  

“But the angel spoke to him, ‘Do not be afraid, Zacharias; your prayers have been heard. Elisabeth your wife will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. This will be joy and delight to you and many more will be glad because he is born.’”5

 Now one would think the Zachariah would be overjoyed at the news but instead of listening to the angel and rejoicing over the message he snaps back at the angel. “Do you expect me to believe this? I’m an old man and my wife is an old woman.”6

Stop and think about this for a second.  He’s spent years of praying.  He’s spent years of hoping perhaps followed by years of sad resignation that he and his wife would never be parents and an angel shows up, in the temple no less, right in the middle of worship, and tells him that his prayers have been answered and Zachariah is acting like somebody who has either spent too much time in seminary or too much time around other old priests.

He wants to talk about it. Discuss the offer the angel is making. Determine the biological probabilities.

But the angel Gabriel has better, more important things to do.  So instead of listening to the old boy hem and haw and go on and on, the angels just takes away his power to speak.  

A priest who can’t speak! How long have many of you been praying for exactly that?  You may even be praying for that now.

Kathleen Norris, in her book Amazing Grace, writes: 

When the angel strikes Zachariah dumb he is given a pregnancy of his own. I read Zachariah’s punishment as a grace in that he couldn’t say anything to compound his initial arrogance when confronted with mystery. When he does speak again it is to praise God.  It’s just that he needed nine months to think it over.7

When the baby is born his pondering is over and everybody gathered around the mother and the child thinks the little guy should be named after his father. However, Elizabeth and Zechariah make a stunning announcement. They are going to name their son John.

“What?” [the relatives, neighbours, and friends] exclaimed. “There is no one in all your family by that name.”  To affirm his wife’s decision the happy father motions for “a piece of paper and to everyone’s surprise writes, ‘His name is John!’ Instantly Zacharias could speak again, and he began praising God.”8

As Dr. John Buchanan reminded us in a sermon when “old Zechariah finds his voice ... the first words out of his mouth are a kind of joyful poem; the birth of a child turns fathers into poets. Whatever he said, Luke arranges it in a canticle, which the church has loved for twenty centuries, the Benedictus: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people.”

[Then,] “as new fathers are inclined to do, Zechariah can’t resist a little boasting: “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High.”

And then the most beautiful images I know: “By the tender mercy of our God the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”9

Our temptation is to rush headlong into Christmas.  To, by our own power and might, make rough places smooth and paths straight.  Our temptation may be to crank up the carols as soon as we can even though we know that it won’t be long before we tire of hearing them over and over.

Our temptation may even be to use Christmas as a tool to fool people into believing that everything is okay and if they just rush around a little more, or buy a little more, or pretend a little more that everything will be alright. 

But not so cleverly hidden in the Advent celebration are real people like Elizabeth and Zachariah, John’s parents, and Mary and Joseph, who simply had to wait.

And you and I, here and now, wait for that moment when we can celebrate the birth him whose coming marks the day when the dawn from on high will appear once again the and tender mercies of the one for whom we wait will break upon us.

Wait for it!  For it is something worth waiting for.

________________

1. Kelly Bauer, “Nonstop Christmas Music Is Back on 93.9 Lite FM Starting Friday,” Block Club Chicago, October 30, 2024, https://blockclubchicago.org/2024/10/30/nonstop-christmas-music-is-back-on-93-9-lite-fm-starting-friday/.

2. Calum I. MacLeod, “A Christmas Eve Sermon.” Sermon preached at The Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, December 24, 2012.

3. Jorge Rueda, “Christmas in Venezuela Kicks off in October, President Maduro Has Declared,” AP News, September 4, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/venezuela-christmas-october-maduro-elections-tensions-2889fbab6a6a063d1f3bfe9d0afd33ba.

4. Edwina Gately, “Advent.” https://www.journeywithjesus.net/poemsandprayers/3776-advent

5. St. Luke 1:5-17. (PHILLIPS) [PHILLIPS=J. B. Phillips, The New Testament in Modern English (London, ENG: HarperCollins, 2000).]

6. St. Luke 1:18. (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE:Eugene H. Peterson, The Message (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2004).

7. Kathleen Norris, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith (New York, NY: Riverhead Books, a division of Penguin Putnam Inc, 2003).

8. St. John 1:61-63. (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible. (Carol Stream, IL:Tyndale House Publishers, 1971.)]

9. John M. Buchanan, “Keep Calm and Carry On.” Sermon preached at the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago. December 6, 2009