Rev. Eliza Linley
Old Testament Lesson: 2 Samuel 7: 1 – 11, 16
Psalm: Magnificat
New Testament Lesson: Romans 16: 25 – 27
Gospel: Luke 1: 26 – 38
Sermon:
Yesterday afternoon at Stanford Hospital, Lou Wolfe died, not of heart failure following open heart surgery on Wednesday, but of other complications. Steve was there, and called me. Lou was surrounded by Ray and their whole family. They prayed together, saying the litany at the time of death. Although no one goes into open heart surgery without having signed their will, this was not expected. She seemed to come through the day-long surgery well on Wednesday. Later that night her heart began to have some leakage, so she went back into surgery and they repaired the leak. But she couldn’t shake the anesthesia. She would become conscious for very short periods, then fall back into unconsciousness. It turned out her liver was not functioning, and simply couldn’t, and didn’t, start up again. Ray and their daughter Cathie have asked that we not call for a couple of days, to give them a little time. Services have not yet been set. I know you will keep this family in your prayers.
The sermon I wrote earlier this week is not what I want to talk about. Rather, how do we make Christmas out of grief? When we gather around the altar there will be a Lou-shaped hole that is profound. How many of us wear one of her prayer bracelets? These bracelets are an outward and visible sign of the Christ-consciousness in which she lived her life. The bracelets, the blankets for the shelter, the e-memo, all the many things she did in this place are of a piece, the manifestations of a loving, giving Christian soul. She will be missed enormously.
And so we approach a holiday, a festival of the church whose by-word is joy. That may be a tough sell around here this year. So I’d like us to think for a bit about Christmas, and Advent, as the intersection of this age and the age to come. Even if you didn’t know Lou Wolfe, everyone’s Christmas is tinged with sadness, because it’s a time we bring to mind those we love who are no longer here to celebrate it with us. The Christmas cookies I bake are my grandmother’s recipe. Many of the decorations are my mother’s. I take out the box of ornaments, and some of them are so old and fragile; well, no wonder! They survived both my father’s childhood and my own. Where are all those people now? I’ll tell you where, they are right here. My mother might as well be standing in the kitchen, telling me to watch those cookies, or they’re going to burn. Christmas is never just this year, but all the years that have been, and all the years that will be. In the spiritual life, time is not linear, and as Christians, we live with one foot in the here and now, and one foot in the Kingdom. As we prepare for the coming of the Christ child, we are also preparing our hearts for the visitation of all those we’ve loved and see no more, as well as those of the here and now, the babies and their parents that are our own icons of new life, the relatives from far away, the friends we don’t see often. It’s a good thing we have the weeks of Advent to prepare, because it all comes at us at once.
It can be a little overwhelming to stand at the intersection of the ages. And what will become of our lives, or the lives of those who come after us, we can’t know. But God’s promise of faithfulness is a sure thing. Look at King David, brilliantly successful at all he undertook. United the tribes of Israel. Made of Jerusalem a capital city. Conquered his enemies. Had himself crowned king. Fully aware that God had made all this possible, he wanted to do something nice for God in return. Build God a temple. But God is not so interested in having a temple built. Rather, God will create of David’s house a great line of kings that will be established forever. God is more interested in people than buildings. And as the prophet Nathan describes this plan, it’s exactly what any king would want. So David is only too pleased to put his own plans aside, to assent to God’s covenant with him, never imagining that the culmination of this dynasty would come a thousand years later in the person of a poor baby, born in a manger, who would turn the world on its ear. In that moment of “yes”, David stood at the intersection of his age and eternity. When we accept God’s will, we stand at the gateway to eternity. By saying “yes” to God, all our unknowing, all we’ve lost, all our fears give way to the Reign of God.
Mary was a teenager whose future looked secure. She was betrothed to a man of her town that her parents approved of; the course of her life was set. Until God broke in with news that must not, at first, have been welcome. Who wants to have their plans and hopes dashed, their lives turned upside down? Her initial response to the angel is one of doubt, the way many of us might respond. She’s not so sure. She has questions. But, in the end, she says, “yes”. And in her time of preparation, her Advent season, something happens to Mary, so that when she goes upcountry to visit her cousin Elizabeth, she has changed. What does she say to Elizabeth?
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
And has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
And the rich he has sent empty away.
This is not the same young woman. In her saying ‘”yes” to God, her self-understanding has changed. She understands that she already stands at the intersection of the present time and eternity. Her ringing prophecy of justice is in the past tense, as though these things have already happened. Yet she and Elizabeth live in a world where the lowly are not lifted up. The hungry are not fed. The mighty are firmly in charge, and the rich have not been sent away empty. As it was then, so it is now, and yet…If she and Elizabeth are to be the bearers of God’s future, well, these things might as well have happened, because anything is possible. Whatever the past has been, saying “yes” to God opens the future to limitless possibility. It does not mean that grief, or injustice, or death, or loss are no longer with us. But it opens the door so we can hold these things in tension with the other reality of that kingdom where there is no sorrow nor crying, but abundant life everlasting.
In a recent book, Between Heaven and Mirth, Jesuit author James Martin quotes an Episcopal priest as saying that joy is what happens at the intersection of great sadness and great happiness. Surely this would describe the joy that Mary and Elizabeth felt at their meeting – the mother of the herald and the mother of God rejoicing in a broken and unjust world. Does it describe our Advent also?
We will prepare for Christmas here as we always have in the knowledge that Lou would have it so. We will have a pageant with our youngest members learning the tradition in fuzzy wings and haloes and bathrobes, and it will be wonderful. We will gather at night and sing the carols, and we will be joyful, if a little teary. But, you know, Jesus would not consent to be born into a heart that doesn’t have the tenderness to hold both the sorrow and the joy together. Saying “yes” to God means accepting death, and life, and whatever life brings. But saying “yes” also gives us the strength we need to be able to stand at the intersection of this age and the age to come, together with those who have gone before us, and those who are yet to come. As Advent rushes to a close this week, may we say with Mary, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word”.
