Blessing and Joy

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Luke 1:39-56

Many years ago I had a conversation with a good friend and she coined a phrase I had never heard before and it sounded strange to me.  She said, “I’ve lost my joy.”  She was a Christian of a more charismatic variety than me.  She had been taught that joy is one of the fruits of the spirit that Christians receive through the workings of the Holy Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal. 5:22,23).  These spiritual fruits like fruit on a tree develop and ripen over time in followers of Jesus as a result of a deepening devotional life.  

Being raised your typical Presbyterian I had hardly heard of the Holy Spirit let alone that the Spirit works in us and brings forth these fruits.  I thought being a Christian simply meant being good and sticking to God’s rules all on your own efforts because that’s the deal if you want God on your side.  

My friend was the most committed and devout Christian I knew at the time and always seemed so joyful.  She was the first person I met who went to church and actually worshipped.  She said she lost her joy, that at the end of the day she wasn’t feeling joy anymore, but rather profound disappointment.  People she loved had let her down and hurt her.  These people wouldn’t give her the space to sort things out.  On top of all that she didn’t feel close to God anymore.  She lost her joy.  It even came to the point that this worship-filled person pulled away from church.  For a couple of years, she couldn’t worship.  She lost her joy.

Thankfully, her story is not tragic.  In time her joy returned.  God brought her life together in the way she felt he promised he would.  She married, became an elementary teacher, and had children.  She had hit a period where she just needed to walk alone, a period of time for God to heal some deeper hurts in her than just her present ones.

This friend is one of those people I think of when I hear Mary’s Song.  Let me give a rather expanded translation.  “My soul, the entirety of my being, worships the Lord and my spirit, that within me that makes me feel alive, rejoices greatly in the God of my salvation.  For, He has looked with favour on his overwhelmed servant.  From now on people will call me blessed!  God has done great things for me that only God can do.  His mercy is for all those who trust their whole lives to him.”  Mary sang that song the moment she realized that God truly did have his hand in her troubling circumstances.  The angel had told her that her elderly relative Elizabeth was pregnant and so she was. 

There is great joy in Mary’s Song, in Mary, but it leaves me with a few questions.  I don’t think that what she means by joy and by being blessed is what we think they mean.  Let me start with what it is to be blessed.

These are holiday times and most of us gather together with our families and have a big meal.  Usually someone will say grace and in that prayer begin to count the many blessings the family enjoys.  Everybody is reasonably healthy.  Everybody enjoys a comfortable life.  The family has a good name.  We give thanks that God has blessed us in so many ways.  Gratitude is a good thing to feel towards God, but I don’t think this sort of “count your many blessings” is what Mary meant when she said people would call her blessed.

For Mary, being blessed meant God had included her in his mission to bring healing salvation to his hurting, broken, suffering world.  Oddly, this blessing came by means of an unexpected pregnancy that was troubling, indeed scandalous in so many ways.  In our eyes Mary was disturbingly young, probably somewhere between 13-15.  It was not unusual back then for marriage arrangements to be made between a father and a man between 25 and 50 years of age to marry his daughter.  Such was Joseph.  

Mary and Joseph were only betrothed and not yet married when she was discovered to be with child.  Archaeologists tell us that the wee town she lived in, Nazareth, appears to have been very law-of-Moses-abiding Jewish.  A pregnancy out of wedlock there would have been horribly scandalous.  Nobody but Cousin Elizabeth and Joseph believed Mary that the child in her was the Son of God conceived by the Holy Spirit.  

Then, after Jesus was born Joseph and Mary had to become refugees in Egypt. Jealous King Herod wanted to kill the baby.  That meant Joseph had to leave his job as a respected carpenter.  They would have struggled financially as strangers in a foreign land.  

Add to it all that, the difficult reality that as Jesus progressed through childhood, he apparently wasn’t your "normal" child and people knew it.  So, Mary had to bear the stigma of having a child who appeared mentally unstable.  And after finally leaving home at age 30, Jesus started his “Kingdom of God” ministry on the coattails of crazy cousin John - John the Baptizer...locusts, honey, camel hair…that John.  Then, Jesus appeared to be dealing with his paternity issue by claiming God as his Father and seemed to prove by doing and saying things that only God could do and say.  

Then, Jesus, her son, was arrested and tried for treason.  Mary had to watch her son die a public execution by crucifixion and as she stood there utterly heartbroken people certainly would have mocked her for being the mother of this humiliated false Messiah.  Whatever she felt when she encountered Jesus raised from the dead would have certainly been tempered with what we know today as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Mary said people would call her blessed but when you consider what she went through because of Jesus, you have to ask: How was that a blessing? Mary is called blessed not because she was a good, hardworking person, a good mother and all that and so God rewarded her with health, wealth, and a respected family name.  Mary is called blessed because God was working through her and she remained faithful through all that she suffered for being the mother of Jesus, the Son of God, the Messiah. 

Blessing always comes in the face of suffering.  In this fallen world full of evil, God’s workings, his mission to save and heal it will always meet with adversity.  Yet, the blessing one receives for being a disciple of Jesus and living according to him who is the light of the world is, well, him; the assurance of his presence, the Holy Spirit, being personally with us.  It’s the blessing of enjoying God’s favour, God’s faithfulness to us.  Health, wealth, and a good name are quite often distractions that keep us from being faithful and enjoying the fullness of life that Jesus has for us.   

If blessedness comes in the face of suffering, what does this say about joy?  We live in a culture that sees the pursuit of happiness as a basic human right.  But we also live in a culture in which corporate advertisers tell us we can’t be happy unless we have this or have that and there’s never enough.  True happiness in this broken world is not found in wealth and security.  It’s when your whole being rejoices from saying “I know my Jesus is with me and that he is working through me and that my dis-ease at not having the “good life” that so many around me enjoy is not in vain.  God…yes, God is working through me.  I am blessed!”   There’s a joy in God’s blessing.  It’s when all Hell has broken forth against you trying to break your faith and you somehow find yourself singing, “When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll;

Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well with my soul.

At the end of the day when we are alone with ourselves, what do we come back to?  Is it joy?  Do we lift our hearts in the wonder that we belong to Jesus, that he is with us and we are a part of his reign in this hurting world?  At the end of the day what do we come back to?  Is it joy?  Amen.

 

Economics and Joy

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Luke 3:7-18

At our house we had two cats; an orange tabby named Tiggs, whom we said goodbye to in March a year ago, and a grey and white something or other blob we call Peewee.  They were just months old when we rescued them from the local shelter.  At first, Peewee was quite outgoing and affectionate and Tiggs was a bit shy.  But after a month or so that all changed and we don’t know why. Tiggs became the outgoing, curious cat who liked your company.  Peewee, well quite honestly, he became a disappointment.  He was skittish and rarely let you touch him.  He liked to demand his food with a very annoying bit of relentless meowing that started 30-45 minutes before they got their food.  Peewee would just eat and eat and eat.  He had his dish and Tiggs had his.  Peewee was the faster eater so he finished his food and moved on to Tiggs’.  So, Tiggs was always hungry and Peewee grew quite fat.  Peewee didn’t seem to know how to stop when he’d had enough. He was just a fat, annoying, hairball barfing, litter box filling mistake that we obviously couldn’t euthanize and I know quite well he couldn’t make it as a barn cat.  So, we were stuck with him, which meant…we just had to love him, find out what makes him tick, and try to draw him out.  He has become a completely different can’t now that Tiggs is gone.  If Nellie the dog wasn’t around, I’m sure he would become a fine lapcat. 

Well, that’s cats, what about people.  It’s almost Christmas and of course I’m waxing nostalgic about the Christmas Eve dinners we used to have at Grandma and Grandaddy’s and what joyous occasions those dinners were.  The food, the conversation, the gift giving, being a kid, and then growing up and watching the kids.  Everybody was welcome in their house and loved, even my Aunt’s boyfriends who left a bit to be desired.  Mawmaw always put out an abundant feast.  There was more than enough for everybody.  We ate and everybody was “fat, dumb, and happy.”  There was joy.  

Having mentioned my cats, I can’t imagine what would have happened if there was one or more of us in the family who acted like Peewee.  I’ll pretend it was me. What if I started an hour or so before dinner yelling “When’s dinner going to be ready?  Feed me.  I’m hungry.”  And then kept it up while everyone else was doing their part to get it ready.  And then once dinner was on the table, I claimed all the food for myself, even pushed everybody else away from their plates so as to eat their food too…and we won’t get into the dietary disturbances that come along with eating all that food to which I would so rudely subject everybody else a little later.  Then while I’m gorging myself, I start to go on about “When can we open presents?  I want to open my presents.  Where’s my presents?”  The time comes and I tear into mine and it’s, “Look what I got. Look what I got.” Only to throw it aside and move on to the next.  Cool stuff but apparently, it’s not enough so I start taking everybody else’s presents.

I can’t imagine what would have happened at Christmas Eve at Grandma and Grandaddy’s if someone had been a Peewee.  There would have been absolutely no joy at all.  What do you do with someone like that?  You can’t just euthanize them or banish them to the barn.  You don’t do that to human beings (but we do).  But you know, welcome to Banquet Planet Earth…and you know what else?  We are part of that small percentage of people who are ruining the banquet for most everybody else.  I wish I could say this is the way humanity has been just since the Industrial Age and the advent of Capitalism, but no.  If you look back, it’s the way humanity has been throughout recorded history.  There have always been the human versions of Peewee and Tiggs but, oddly, the Tiggs have idolized the lifestyle of the Peewees and when given the chance have acted likewise.  We want to have it all and turn a blind eye to those who have it all and how they got it and won’t admit the cost that comes from attaining it…the poverty, disease, hunger, pollution, violence.  We simply refuse to make the bold claim that having too much is immoral, but rather it’s our common goal.  There’s no wonder there’s a widespread lack of joy here at Banquet Planet Earth.

Unfortunately, we psychologize Joy.  We tie it to mental health and remove it from the context of economic lifestyle.  We think material comforts contribute to joy and the more material comforts you have the happier you’re supposed to be.  Then, when somebody who has it all winds up being so miserable that they stay doped up all the time, or cheat, we explain their lack of joy away as mental illness, give them antidepressants, and tell them to spend some time reading Joel Osteen or Deepak Chopra.  “Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die” is not the way to Joy.  In fact, there are mental health consequences to living “the lifestyle of the rich and famous” and those consequences are worsened when we realize that that way of life is not the path to joy but rather leads to a profound lack of it.

Well, you might question why I would bring out an angry sermon by John the Baptist on a Sunday when we are supposed to be talking about Joy, but bear with me.  People were flocking to the prophet of God in the wilderness because their lives were so bad that they had no hope in anything other than a mighty act of God to fix it.  They were not happy people. The bulk of them were everyday people who were overtaxed and over-worked, scared not only about the future, but about what loss tomorrow may bring.  Even tax collectors and soldiers (law-enforcement), the upper-middle class were coming to John for answers, for hope and what did he do?  He called them a brood of vipers, a snake pit, who thought they could flee from the cataclysmic change that’s going to affect everybody when God acts, the people of God too.  Apparently, he didn’t go to the same preaching class I went to, but then again, how would my sermons be different if you weren’t paying me?

John actually gave this hope deprived, joy deprived people the way to joy.  The brood of viper comment aside, John gave them a glimpse of the joy-filled life that will be at the heart of the coming Kingdom of God.  It’s quite simple actually, something we learned in kindergarten probably.  If we have more than enough, then we share what we have with those who don’t have.  Don’t use our position of influence and privilege as a means to take more for ourselves which sounds a whole lot like don’t use your wealth to gain more wealth.  Be satisfied with what we get for what we do rather than using extortion to get more.  It’s quite simple…be satisfied with enough.  Be generous with what we’ve earned so that everybody has enough.  Don’t take more than we need.  

It’s interesting that they are in the wilderness and if you remember Israel’s wilderness wandering after God delivered them from slavery in Egypt, then you recall that God fed them on manna.  Every morning God provided them with this bread-like stuff that tasted like coriander.  They were supposed to collect only enough for that day and no more.  Any extra they collected would go rancid.  So it is with life at Banquet Planet Earth.  There is abundantly enough for everybody if everybody takes only enough for themselves to live on.  If we take more, rancidness occurs and it is occurring – Climate change, pandemics, poverty, wars, etc.  All this bad stuff is the consequence of our lifestyle of wanting to have more than enough.

To close, if we want to know more than fleeting glimpses of Joy like at Grandma and Grandaddy’s on Christmas Eve, then we have to accept the fact that true joy is tied to ‘economic justice’ - fairness, generosity and learning to live on enough.  The downside of this is that if everybody lived this way, the economy would crash and those who have everything would lose everything…but, the feast of abundance and resulting Joy will be permanent rather than fleeting.  Joy - that’s God’s promise for what’s coming with his Kingdom and he will bring it about, so it’s best we start living for it now.  Amen.

Shouting from the Backbench

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Luke 3:1-6

Doug was an Elder in a small Presbyterian church.  He at one time became quite motivated about finding an outreach project for his little church.  It just happened that he happened to meet the minister of the Presbyterian church in Puslinch, ON who was passionately involved in a newly founded organization that was a cooperative venture between First Nations Reserves in Northern Ontario and various organizations in Southern Ontario to help relieve poverty on the more isolated northern reserves.  

The organization had a unique approach.  It let the Reserves say what they needed and then it resourced those needs.  The typical protocol in these matters is that the government or some other organization tells the Reserves what the Reserves need and tells them to take it or get nothing.  When actual needs are ignored, the system remains paternalistic and nothing changes.

One of this organization’s success stories involved a Northern Reserve needing clean drinking water.  Government solutions were proving inadequate and slow…and yet the people still needed water like now.  Someone in the Puslinch church looked over at the Nestle water plant and said “They have water” and went and asked if Nestle would help.  Nestle did…by the truckload.  A common-sense solution to a sickeningly unnecessarily all too common problem. 

Inspired by such successes, Doug became more involved in this organization and so did his church.  For some reason known only to him, Doug decided to go to his local Member of Parliament to see if he could maybe possibly see if the government might maybe want to endorse such an ingenious way of helping people.  Doug asked his minister (me) to come along and together they had a very cordial meeting with the MP.  

Now get this, the MP said there was really nothing he could do about the problem.  He said, “I’m just a backbencher in the party and I don’t have a say in anything.”  Moreover, In the conversation the MP noticed that the minister had a Southern accent and offered to do what he could to help him become a Canadian citizen which amounted to nothing more than giving him paper copies of Citizenship documents and forms that are readily available online. 

The minister (me) left that meeting a bit astounded.  Here was a government official drawing a salary over three times his own, a member of the governing party of Canada (PC), elected to represent his constituents yet here he was saying he really could not represent or help anybody because he was a backbencher in his party and in Parliament.  Back benchers sit in the rear of the House and say little to nothing except maybe join in on the very adult heckling and hissing that happens in Parliament.  He was good for photo ops, but not for much else.  

This is troubling for a nation.  If any MP elected to represent the people of a constituency is effectively voiceless in Parliament, this means that in the end Canada is little more than a functional oligarchy, a nation ruled by a few who weren’t necessarily elected by the people but were simply powerful in their party.  How these few gain their power is always an interesting story.  Nevertheless, such is power.

Looking at Luke’s Gospel, it is interesting that he begins his account of John the Baptist’s ministry of preparing the way for the Messiah by naming “the few” in the land who had “the power”.  There were the Roman powers at the top: Tiberius, the Emperor; Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea.  There were the Jewish home-grown powers appointed by Rome: Herod, his brother Phillip, and Lysanias.  And, there were the Rome-appointed Jerusalem Temple authorities: the High Priests Annas and Caiaphas.  This was the rule of one imposed by a few.  But, there’s also the few behind the scenes who have power over that one.  That’s how power works in an Empire.

It was during the rule of this band of cronies that the Word of God came to John the Baptizer out in the backwater region of the wilderness of Jordan. As we remember from Sunday School and Children’s Sermons of yore, John was a bit of an odd cookie.  He was a hermit, very hairy and dishevelled, wore clothes made of camel’s hair, and ate locusts and honey.  He was the son of a rural priest named Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth.  They were too old to have children but God gave them John, a child of promise.  And remember the wilderness?  For forty years after the Exodus God’s people wandered in the wilderness of Sinai and there learned to rely on God and believe his promises.  

In the scheme of how political change happened in the world of first century Israel John was a backwater, backbenching prophet.  He had no “power” at all in the government.  Yet, when prophets start talking about valleys being filled, mountains being brought low, the crooked being made straight, and the rough being smoothened they are talking about the people being empowered, the powerful being brought low, corruption ending, and life becoming better.  But, his own attempts to hold the powers that be accountable to the way God gave his people to live only got him arrested and, in the end, beheaded.  Regardless, the “grassroots” movement the grasshopper-eating backwater prophet started paved the way for Jesus, the Messiah, whose followers did in time destabilize the Roman Empire and change the world.  

John the Baptist didn’t do bad for a backwater backbencher.  If we think that his call to repent to those people of God flocking to him in the wilderness was simply a non-political matter of private religion, we are mistaken.  Moreover, if we think that following Jesus is just a private matter of personal faith, we are mistaken.  Following Jesus is a public matter that will involve confronting the “powers” from the backbench in backwater places. 

The people flocking to John in the wilderness were desperate people who were expecting their God, the God who had delivered them from Pharaoh out of slavery in Egypt, to deliver them from Roman domination.  John’s calling them from the wilderness of Jordan to return to the ways given them by God was a grassroots call to the people of God to stop participating in the elements of their way of life that fed on the Roman way of life and in turn start living as the faithful people of their God.  Faithful living was/is the way to prepare the way for the Lord to come and establish peace. 

We could learn something from what God was doing through John the Baptist.  The way to overthrow an Empire is to stop living according to the ways of that Empire. This is difficult because we ourselves have grown too accustomed if not addicted to the ways of the Empire.  We  have to change our loyalties.  Primarily, we must start doing as Jesus said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself” (Lk 10:27). 

John’s call to repentance was the call to the people of God to start acting like people of God and in so doing find that the Kingdom of God is near.  Love for God lived out looks like love for neighbour…even if and especially if that neighbour comes from Syria or Guatemala.  How different would this world be if we, the followers of Jesus, stopped with the Consumerism, the Materialism, the Militarism, the Patriotism, the Racism, the Individualism, and all those “ism’s” that make empires so strong and simply made a practice of loving our neighbours?  Especially those who are different and vulnerable?  Amen.