Thought for Today
Exodus 19:10 the Lord said to Moses: "Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes 11 and prepare for the third day, because on the third day the Lord will come down upon Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.
Isaiah 40:3 A voice cries out: "In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Mark 1:2 As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, "See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; 3 the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,'"
John 14:2 In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
Every year, as Christmas approaches, I have the same panicked reaction, “I’m not prepared!” I hear the whistle; I see the engine’s headlight; I hear the big steel wheels click-clacking on the rails; I know that Christmas is barreling rapidly upon me. I’m not prepared!
Yesterday, the Second Sunday of Advent, we lit the candle of peace. Yesterday, we read Luke’s quoting Isaiah’s passage, just as did Mark. And, yesterday, if anyone listened to the news, there was no peace in Syria. Nothing was said on the news reports which I watched about Ukraine, but I cannot imagine there was any peace there either. “Jeremiah 6:14 They have treated the wound of my people carelessly, saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.”
Advent should be a time of peace for all of God’s children. During Advent we light candles of hope, peace, joy and love during worship on successive Sundays. Even the name of the holiday itself relates to worship. Christmas is a shortening of Christ Mass. When did we lose the idea of worship associated with God’s great gift to God’s children? What we will celebrate on December 25th is the reality John so eloquently stated in 3:16-17.
Yet somehow, over the ages, the hope, peace, joy and love of God’s gift has become subsumed in a desperate whirlwind, a tsunami of commercialism. “What is the ‘must-have’ toy this year?” “What is the gift I must give to perfectly express the esteem with which I hold (fill in the appropriate name)?” The celebration of the Christ Mass is almost lost in the blur of outdoor decorations, shopping mall Christmas carols blasting away as we madly dash around trying to make this Christmas special.
How do we prepare ourselves for this season? For that special day? How do we eschew the materialistic obsession, the commercial display so that we can honor God’s gift and remember ‘the reason for this season?’
The prophet Isaiah ben Amoz wrote some time around 750 BCE. The synoptic gospels are generally dated around the middle of the 1st century CE. The need for God’s children to prepare predates all of that. The need for God’s children to prepare ourselves predates Moses. From Genesis 1:1 until today, God’s children have always needed to prepare ourselves to be in relationship with our Creator God. Not just once or twice during the year. Not just during what we now know as Advent.
We are told in Genesis, “2:7 then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being . . . 15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.” We became living beings because God breathed into our nostrils the breath of life. We are intended to be God’s gardeners, tilling and keeping God’s garden. That means, of necessity, that we are meant to constantly be in relationship with the Creator of the garden. And that means we must constantly be prepared to meet God, to encounter God as God moves through God’s garden.
We know that God is always prepared. We know that Jesus has gone on ahead to prepare a special place for each of us. Are you prepared? Am I? I may not yet have bought Greta the perfect Christmas present. We do have our tree up and decorated. I am already working on the church’s Christmas Eve service. As I make all of those sorts of preparations, I am making a concerted effort not to be consumed by all of the commercialism and to remember why this is such a special season. I plan to be prepared and to anticipate the birth of God’s Son.
Stay safe, be prepared, trust God,
Pastor Ray