“Following the Prophets to Bethlehem, Part 2: God Is in Our Midst” by the Rev. Dr. Don Wahlig, December 8, 2024, Year C / Advent 2 (Texts from Advent 3) - Zephaniah 3:14-20 / Isaiah 11:1-9, and 12:2-6 / Philippians 4:4-7 / Luke 3:7-18

THEME:  Trust that God is in our midst and follow Jesus to transform ourselves and our world to be more like his Kingdom.
         

This morning, Isaiah has some very good news for us. Isaiah conveys God’s promise of a new king. Like his ancestor David, this new king will be blessed with the full measure of God’s spirit. He will do what the world’s earthly kings rarely do: he will rule in favor of the poor, the widow, and the orphan. In God’s eyes, this is what makes a king righteousness. The result will be a kingdom unlike any in the entire history of humankind. God’s new king will usher in a steady state of earthly harmony, a permanent peace that reverberates throughout creation. It will be like a second Exodus. This new king will redeem God’s people from the chaos and suffering of life lived under the thumb of an evil power. It will be cause for the kind of spontaneous, raucous rejoicing that happens when the darkness of oppression is suddenly and unexpectedly lifted, giving way to light and liberation. For God’s people, it will be the very picture of joy itself.

Today, in this second week of Advent, we anticipate the celebration of this new king who first came into our midst 2,000 years ago in the Christ child. And we still yearn for his return. We trust that on that day, the promise Isaiah declares will finally be fulfilled.  Jesus will sit on his throne as he brings the Kingdom of Heaven to earth in all its fullness. That is what we celebrated two Sundays ago on Christ the King Sunday. 

But now we are in a new season, the season of Advent.  To me, this sudden transition always feels abrupt, a little disorienting. As I thought about that this week, it occurred to me that Advent is a microcosm of the Christian life. You and I live in these awkward days between the fulfillment of God’s promise that we celebrate on Christ the King Sunday, and the initiation of that promise in the manger on Christmas morning. The question is how are we supposed to live in these in-between times, between God’s promise and its fulfillment? And how do we know? Look around us. There is no question that these are some dark days, indeed. Conflict and war, disaster and division, hatred and hunger. The news headlines are filled with such things.

When we hear Isaiah’s Advent promise of salvation and the return of Jesus seated on the throne of his father’s Kingdom, it makes us wonder. How can we be so sure? Where are the signs? Where is the light and the liberation Isaiah promises? Where is the justice and the peace? Where is the hope and the joy? And then the big question. As disciples, what does Jesus expect us to do about that? That is the question I have been pondering this week. The answer comes from his cousin, John the Baptist. Bear fruit worthy of repentance, John tells the crowd.  In other words, it is not enough to confess our trust in God.  We have to actually change the way we live. We have to align our lives with his purposes. Isaiah, Jesus, and John all agree: we must speak and act in ways that are consistent with the demands of God’s law for justice.

That means we have to welcome strangers as Abraham and Sarah did. We have to share food and clothing with the poor. And the ethical demands of the law extend to our public lives as well.  In business, we have to deal fairly and honestly with one another. Those whose work involves the exercise of power have to avoid the temptation to greed and coercion and be satisfied that enough is best. John is describing a righteous society based on mercy and mutuality, justice and generosity, compassion and community.  These are the marks of Jesus’ true disciples. A world filled with people like that sounds like a world worth working for, doesn’t it?  So, what prevents us? In a word, doubt. We see our world the way that it is, and we doubt that it can or will ever be any different. And when we look inside ourselves, we see a little too much of the world there, too. 

This is what the great Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn meant when he said that “the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.”  And when you and I take a good hard look at our own hearts, we know he is right. So, we are tempted to doubt that we can ever really change, let alone change the world around us. But, friends, doubt is not the brick wall to spiritual and social transformation that we think it is. In fact, doubt is essential to our growth as Christians.

George MacDonald knew that as well as anyone ever has. George was a 19^th century Scottish novelist, poet, preacher, and theologian.  He influenced the likes of C.S. Lewis and G.K. Chesterton and many other Christian thinkers. George understood that salvation is not so much a status conferred upon us once and for all, forever unchanging. Instead, salvation is a lifelong journey.  It is the experience of living into the revelation that our loving God is present with us in the living Christ – everywhere and always. As we reorient our lives to the teaching and example of Jesus, we experience a gradual, uneven, but ongoing change.  The journey of salvation and spiritual growth is like a large ship that has been told it has to change course in order to avoid danger. It takes a lot of time, energy, and sheer persistence to make that change in direction. But once it’s made, the ship has momentum that is almost impossible to stop. That was the faith experience of George McDonald.

One of his devoted readers wrote him a letter complaining that he had lost that “old faith,” presumably because McDonald’s views were evolving as his faith grew. McDonald sent a reply that was nothing short of brilliant.  He wrote, “With all sorts of doubt I am familiar, and the result of them is, has been, and will be, a widening of my heart and soul and mind to greater glories of the truth, the truth that is in Jesus . . . and from whom every simple heart may have it.”  His point was that we will never be able to prove the existence of God or the truth of the Gospel the way we can obtain proof from a science experiment.  However, the disciplined, trusting, and ongoing effort to order our lives by Christ’s teaching eventually and inevitably produces a sense of God’s abiding presence and profound peace. From this peace, vague and transient though it may sometimes be, comes the growing conviction that Jesus is the source of all wisdom and all knowledge. In other words, the source of true life.  This has been my experience. I hope that it is yours, too.

Truth is that we can change. We can grow closer to God. And, if we can change, then so can the world.  Especially when we are in the company of others who are of like minds, who are on the same journey we are, walking with God by following Jesus. Margaret Mead, the great Christian anthropologist, said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." She was right. 

Jesus did it. He gathered 12 disciples and, although they could be amazingly dense and unreliable, they ultimately changed the world. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, changed 18^th century England by forming small groups of committed Christians. Together, they helped address the problems of rampant alcoholism and spousal abuse. Their influence led to the Temperance movement and women’s suffrage here in the US. Robert Rauschenbusch, the American Baptist pastor in New York City at the turn of the 19^th century, gathered a group of Christians who took Jesus’ teaching to heart. They were determined to apply his teaching to society. Together, they formed the Social Gospel movement to address problems of urban poverty, child labor, and economic inequality.

What about you and me, friends?  Is there any reason we cannot do something similar here in Mechanicsburg? What are the problems that we face as a community? What are the things that keep life here from being more like the Kingdom that Isaiah promised? Earlier this year, some of us talked about surveying our community to find out what those problems are. It seems to me, that would be a very good next step. I think we might be surprised by what we find. We may also be surprised by what Jesus leads us to do about it.  I think we will be even more surprised by how that changes us. 

This is what it means to live in these Advent times, the days between God’s promise and its fulfillment when Jesus returns. 

May it be so.