Isaiah 64:1-9/ November 30, 2008        Isaiah 40:1-11 / December 7, 2008        December 14 2008         December 21 2008

Today is the first Sunday of Advent. Advent of course is one of those seasons that people do not like. But my goal today is to get you to get into the Advent season.

Advent is a combination of getting ready for the celebration of Jesus’ birth. Advent is also at the same time the season to get ready for Jesus to come again.

Many people don’t like advent because most of us don’t like to wait. I’m no different. I find it hard to buy something really delicious at the store and get home without tasting it. When I buy something really fun I want to open it before I get home? I think I’m a typical American. We Americans want instant gratification.

Advent is not about instant gratification, it is countercultural. How does this sound? Does this sound like the world we live in? Advent, the four weeks before Christmas, is a time for preparation, contemplation and denial. Does that sound like how we spend the four weeks before Christmas?

The decorations and advertizing for Christmas used to start with the Macy’s day parade on Thanksgiving Day. In fact, the origins of the celebrating  Thanksgiving Day on the date we do now has its roots in providing a longer time for the Christmas shopping season in order to stimulate the economy during the depression.

These days Christmas decorations go up when the Halloween decorations go down.

Just as an aside, do you realize that many people are decorating more for Halloween than for Christmas?

Back to Christmas, before you start complaining about rushing the Christmas season, when is it that you want to start singing Christmas songs? You know the songs of the season that begins December 24 – January 5. But when do you want to put up the tree, the decorations. It’s funny that the day after the Christmas season begins many people are done with it.

As Christians were know that the world even our country doesn’t think about Christmas the way we do.

Listen to this I hope it will help you get into the Advent season.

David Lose of Luther seminary, said something very helpful. He said, “When we think of Advent as the preparation for Christ coming again. When we think of the final judgment, we have to look at that judgment, through the work on the cross.” Many people get scared thinking about the final judgment. The Look Behind series writers have made a fortune on that fear.

We are to look forward to the judgment, not by our work but by Jesus’ work, Jesus’ work on the cross. If we look to the judgment by our work we are in deep trouble. If we look at the final judgment through the work of the cross it’s a different story.

This really fits in well as we look at our first Lesson from Isaiah. And shows us why we have this reading from Isaiah on our first Sunday of Advent.

This reading is from what they call third Isaiah. Isaiah is believed to be written by at least 3 people maybe 4, Isaiah and his disciples. It covers a long time. It goes from before Israel’s exile, during the exile and after the exile. It is believed, that our reading for today, is when the Israelites are returning to the Promised Land. Cyrus lets them go home but when they get there it is does not look like the Promised Land their parents told them about. It was a mess it all needed to be rebuilt.

So, the people cry out to God. They cry out for God to help. But it is a combination of confession and trying to blame God for their sin. It is also a call for God to remember them as his people, the people he created in spite of their sin and failings.

Let’s take a look at verse 5.

5 You meet those who gladly do right, those who remember you in your ways.

But you were angry, and we sinned; because you hid yourself we transgressed.
See what they are trying to do? Just like little kids. You were angry so we sinned. Because you hid yourself – we transgressed. It’s your fault God. It’s just like back in the Garden of Eden, with Adam and Eve when they ate the forbidden fruit. God asks “what have you done”. Adam says “The woman you gave me gave it to me”.

Now let us look at verse 6 & 7. 6 We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy cloth. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. 7 There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity.

Isn’t this how we fear Christ will find us when he comes again? Aren’t we scared he will find us unclean, our righteous deeds like a filthy cloth; that God’s face will be turned away from us and we will be delivered into the hand of our own iniquity. In other words God will come and find us screwing up and we will get what we really deserve. Isn’t that what we fear. Maybe that is why we want to jump to Christmas and Easter and don’t wan to go through Advent and Lent.

But then in vs 8 & 9 Isaiah so many years ago, reveals our hope. The hope we can hold on to during this advent season.  

8 Yet, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. 9 Do not be exceedingly angry, O Lord, and do not remember iniquity forever. Now consider, we are all your people.

Advent reminds us that we are the work of God’s hands. We are God’s peole.

We are able to do God’s work and God created us to do his work in the world. His work is what he wants to find us doing when he comes again.

Yet because we are the work of God’s hands we are his people. As the work of God’s hands as God’s people, in the light of the work of God’s son Jesus Christ we have a lot to look forward to this Advent season. Advent is a cool season. You should check it out.

May God bless your Advent season, Amen.       Back to  top

Isaiah 40:1-11 / December 7 2008

The grass withers and the flowers fade but the Word of our God will stand forever

• Painting the Kitchen and Living room

  • They were up in their room; Michael and Clark were their names I believe. They were up in their room sent by their parents, their upset parents, their very upset parents. And they deserved to be there.

  • I don’t remember how old Michael and Clark were at the time. They were pretty young but old enough to come up with some ideas and old enough to carry through with those ideas. Yet they were still too young to realize that they were doing anything wrong, that Saturday morning when their parents found them.

  • One of those boys got the idea to do something special for their parents, which is admirable. However, the idea was not. Maybe their parents had been working around the house, painting some rooms because that is what the boys decided to do. The boys decided to paint the kitchen and living room; you know, the walls, the floors, the appliances. They painted the refrigerator, the counter top, the shag carpeting. This a true story. It has been about 30 years since I heard about it but I’m picturing bright colors like orange and green.

  • The parents came down one Saturday morning greeted by two young boys with paint and smiles and all the work they had done.

    • I felt sorry for the mom. I worked with the Dad and I thought he deserved it.

  • Some how in the excitement, in the banishment to their room the boys got the idea that what they had done even with the best of intentions, was not good.

    • Thanks to some quick phone calls, the damage was kept to a minimum.

      • I hope the parents had the forethought to take some picutures.

    • The boys did the time, paid the price – All was forgiven – forgotten was a little more difficult.

    • They were forgiven even though the parents knew that boy will be boys. They were forgiven not because the boys deserved it but because the parents love for their boys was true love.

• Stealing and selling the Kitchen and Living room

  • Two other boys were in their rooms, they too had been sent to their room but not by their parents. A judge sent the boys to their rooms, to their rooms in the juvenile correction facility.

  • I don’t know the names of these boys but these boys were older, teenagers. These boys went to work on their parents’ kitchen and living room as well. But they weren’t working on a plan like painting to please their parents.

  • They were packing everything up from the kitchen and living room, tv, sound system, computer, video games, the refrigerator and the stove. They packed it all up and put it in a van. Two of their “friends” took the items to where they could be sold to raise money for the boys’ business deals.

  • Then they went back to bed.

  • The parents could not believe they did it. Not the stealing, they had stolen from them before but this packing up the two rooms, stealing the two rooms was unbelievable.

  • The boys did the time. Paid the price – Would all be forgiven? – could all be forgotten?

  • They would probably get in trouble again, hopefully not, hopefully they learned their lesson. But who knows? Should they be forgiven?

• The unfaithfulness of Jerusalem

  • With today’s reading from Isaiah we find the prophet bringing God’s word to God’s people in Exile, forced to live in a foreign land.

    • A lot of the Israelites’ history goes like this.

      • God blesses them

        • They rejoice and give him thanks

        • Then they forget about God

        • They turn to other god’s and or abuse people weaker than they are.

        • Then they pay the price for their unfaithfulness

        • They cry out to God

        • God hears their cry, forgives them and saving them

    • Today’s reading is just like that. Because they turned away from God and trusted other gods and other nations instead of God, they were paying the price. They were in the exile from their homeland living in bondage in Babylon.

      • God sends the prophet Isaiah to his children who are sitting in their room, in exile in Babylon.

        • The message Isaiah brings God, Comfort, O comfort my people. God tells them you are my people, you’ve paid the price.

• God says there is forgiveness.

  • It seems as though while Isaiah was communicating with God about this, when he was receiving his mission – probably listening to a tape player that would self-destruct in 10 seconds.

    • While communicating with God, Isaiah says to God and I am paraphrasing. God why are you bothering with them? These people are like grass and flowers here today gone tomorrow. Their faithfulness to you is here today gone tomorrow. Why bother?

    • Remind me not to hire Isaiah as my advocate.

    • The answer Isaiah gets is: people may be like grass and flowers here today gone tomorrow but my Word, my promise will stand forever.

• Our Advent today

  • After last week’s sermon about The season of Advent and Christmas and decorations, a wise woman, who shall remain nameless, said: “You can say whatever you want about theology, forgiveness, grace, eternal life but don’t mess with people’s decorations.” Therefore, I am not going there again – not today.

  • Realizing our sin

    • Since Advent is about reflection, it is a time to think about our relationship with God and God’s children. That can lead us to realize that we are not always the people God wants us to be. We do not act like we are God’s people all the time.

  • Realizing God’s forgiveness

    • This exercise also helps us to realize God’s love and forgiveness for us.

  • Dealing with our failures

    • In realizing our shortfalls and God’s forgiveness, we also see that our faithfulness is not always bright and beautiful.

The grass withers and the flowers fade but the Word of our God will stand forever

• When we think of the painter boys, the boys who painted their parents kitchen and living room and everything else in sight, forgiveness seem easy to forgive or easier. They made a mess probably cost their parents a bit of money but they meant well, and they must have looked really cute. They might get into trouble again. Locking their doors at night might not be a bad idea. But most of us can justify forgiving them.

• The teenage boys who robbed from their parents and the Israelites who turned to other gods don’t seem as easy to forgive.

• When we realize our sinfulness, we do not always look so cute either. Neither can we guarantee that we will not mess up again. Maybe we will not mess up again in the same way but we can be like the grass and the flowers here today, bright and beautiful, withering and fading tomorrow.

• But as we are in this Advent season, we need to remember that we look forward to the birth of the child in the manger. The Child reminds us “the word of our God, the promise of our God, stands forever”

Let us be comforted by the fact that while we might wither and die in thought word and deed, our God, our God, the word of our God, his promise to love us stands forever. Amen.

December 14 2008

John 1:6-8, 19-28 / December 14, 2008

I remember back when Al Franken was a comedian. Maybe he still is but I don’t want to get into politics. In the beginning of 1990s he did this comedy routine. He called it the “Al Franken Decade

Al Franken Decade

People are going to stop thinking about themselves and start thinking about me, Al Franken. That's right. I believe we're entering the Al Franken decade.

Oh, for me, Al Franken, the nineties will be pretty much the same as the eighties. But for you, when you see a news report you'll be thinking "I wonder what Al Franken thinks about this?" "I wonder how this inflation thing is hurting Al Franken?" And you women will be thinking "What can I wear that will please Al Franken?" or "What can I not wear?" A lot of you are probably thinking "Why Al Franken?" Well, because I thought of it, and I'm on TV. Source: Saturday Night Live: The First Twenty Years

You are probably familiar with the television show Raymond. The show is about …. Raymond. Everything on the show pretty much revolves around Raymond. I remember one scene with his brother Robert. Robert thinks that Raymond is full of himself. That Raymond thinks the whole world revolves around him. (Which on the T.V. show it does).

In this one scene, Robert asks Raymond, What do you think we all just hang on hooks until you come in the room? Which was funny because that was pretty much what was happening.

This is not the life of John. The gospel writers of Matthew, Mark and Luke call him John the Baptist. The writer of John doesn’t even give him that distinction. John refers to him as John. I think that is on purpose. John does not want to make a big deal about the John who is the voice of one crying in the wilderness.

Maybe that is because there is something about John that we love, something that attracts us. There is something about John that we want to hold on to, that makes us almost forget about the one, he points to.

There is a story about a wise man and a fool. The wise man says look the moon as he points at it. All the fool sees is the finger and thinks it’s the moon. 

John according to Mark and Luke comes proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins   According to Matthew, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’  This is very good advice in order to prepare the way of the Lord. But that is not the gospel. That is not the good news of Jesus Christ. Repenting is important, and good for us but it is not the gospel. Jesus didn’t have to come to bring that message. That is not a new message. The Moses and the prophets have been calling people to repentance for centuries. Jesus is the goodnews.

John has a very important calling. He is to point and disappear. He says I am not the Messiah. John is to point. If he is to make that path straight, the best thing he can do is point.

John is a witness, a witness to the messiah. He was called to witness to the messiah, point to the messiah.

Can we point to Jesus? Can we look around in this world and see Jesus at work? It’s seems easy to see the work of the other side. Can you see Jesus at work? Can you point to it?

Can you be Jesus at work? At love? Can you live so that it doesn’t point to you but to Jesus?

Is that part of what Rejoicing is? I heard some one say that when you rejoice in Christ you are twice blessed.

Do you think that’s true? We should find out.

Have a joyous week.