"what shall I cry?"

Anna Blaedel
First UMC, Osage
December 7, 2008

2nd Sunday of Advent, HOPE

Isaiah 40:1-11
Mark 1:1-8

Last week I was at Faith Home, visiting with Phyllis Watson. A member of this faith community for over 50 years. Her three children, baptized and confirmed here. Her husband and oldest son, laid to rest here. Now Phyllis is transitioning to Hospice Care, living her final months of life here on earth. In the ways dementia and death work, Phyllis is residing in a liminal space, a thin space some theologians call it, where the past blends with the present, becoming part of the future. Thin because the boundaries become blurred, between life and death, past and present, love and loss, grace and grief, earthly and eternal—cease to be separate, cycle and smudge into each other. Where we have been, where we are, where we are going, entering into each other.

Then, on Friday, I met with Phyllis’ daughter Joan. Nurtured in this church, Joan is now returning regularly to spend time with her mom, sit with her, support her, celebrate her. As Joan and I sifted through the layers of grief and loss, we also laughed. Our conversation centered on hope. What will be, what might be, ushered in through what has been and what is.

Poet Emily Dickenson wrote, “Hope for the future is hidden in the present.” Hope for the future is hidden in the present.
And, like a star shining in the sky, a light illuminating the dark, a Christ child born in a barn, we are invited by God, we are called by our faith, to search for this hope, hidden even here, even now.

Let us pray: May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of all of our hearts, be acceptable in your sight, O God, our strength and our redeemer.

“Comfort, O comfort my people,” says God. So begins this morning’s scriptural text, so begins this passage from Isaiah. If you attended the services for either Beda Dodge or Jo Ann Squier, you know I typically read this scripture at funerals. Our story begins, the story begins, in the midst of great suffering, and in the midst of it, God’s desire for comfort, hope, given.

This text was written by an anonymous prophet, one we have come to call Isaiah, in the 4th century BCE. About 600 years before Jesus’ birth. Judah and Jerusalem are under constant threat by Empire, living in fear of destruction by the powerful and power hungry Babylonians. It is a hard time to hope, for the Israelites. Their homes have been destroyed by war, their community torn apart by terror and violence. The economy has crashed and there is no bail out package to be given. The Israelites are deported, sent to Babylon in exile. In this text, we meet a people not too different from ourselves—scared, feeling forgotten and forsaken by God, searching hard for a glimmer of hope. And we meet a God not too far from us—who is working in the world to bring them home.

The prophet pleads with the people—Don’t give up! Don’t forget God’s faithfulness, not now! Remember God’s promise, made long ago, a promise of the past, known in the present, a promise which will usher us into an unknown future? Recall the hope! Prepare a way in the wilderness for God to do God’s work. In doing so, we participate in God’s work. God with us, Emmanuel.

It is a thin place, this exile, this wilderness wandering, where hunger meets hope, loneliness meets love, bitterness meets blessing.

In his letter to the Romans, so many centuries later, Paul writes: We do not hope for what we already see. What kind of hope is this? We hope for what we cannot see, what is yet to be and become.

“Hope for the future is hidden in the present.”

Look! Can you see it? It is there, it is here, to be found! Listen for the lone voice, crying out in the wilderness, look for a star shining in the night sky, listen for the Christ child, crying out!

Theologian and Biblical scholar Ken Stone writes, “Christians confess both that Christ has already come and yet Christ is still coming. Old things have passed away; all things have become new; yet in many respects we continue to groan with creation, for a redemption that is still arriving.”

Comfort, O comfort my people. Cry Out!

Yesterday, I attended an Advent brunch at Our Saviors Lutheran Church. Many of you were there. Kris Meyer, the guest speaker told many stories. One of them has especially stayed with me.

A church not so different from this one was preparing for its annual Christmas program. The Sunday School teacher directing the program faced the daunting task of assigning roles to the children for the nativity drama. I imagine Brenda, Rozanne, and Angie can especially commiserate! There was one boy, named Jack, who was difficult to cast. Previous years’ programs had proven Jack could rarely remember his lines. When he did, he failed to deliver them with any enthusiasm or umph. His smile was never quite as bright, his voice never as clear, his performance never as, well, cute as the others’.

So Jack was cast as the Innkeeper. All he had to do, thought the teacher, was say, “No!” “No,” was all Jack had to remember. The day of the program came, and Mary and Joseph made their way across the stage. “Is there any room at your Inn?” a four foot Joseph implored? Silence. Joseph prodded, “See, she is pregnant. Due any day now. Is there a room at your Inn?” Silence. “Any room at all?” Still silence. Young Jack the Innkeeper said nothing. From side stage, the teachers and other children tried to help Jack along. “Just say no, Jack! No! No room! No room at the Inn! Jack, just say no!”

After a long time, long enough for people to start shifting in their pews, long enough for Jack’s parents to look embarrassed, long enough for the Sunday School teachers to wonder why on earth they have agreed to do the program one more year, long enough for all to seem lost…Finally, Jack grinned. Jack grinned, and he cried out, “Yes! Yes! I can make room!”

And, hidden in a mixed up, messed up present, a program planned and prepared, hope for the future is born. A lone voice, crying out in the wilderness, creating chaos in the plans, making a way for God.

Cry out, says a voice, and I ask, “What shall I cry?”

Chaos is breaking out—the valleys are lifted up, the mountains and hills made low. The uneven ground level, the hills made a plain. Cry out! A word of welcome, an unexpected, unanticipated space made, for Emmanuel, God With Us. A word of hope, rooted not in people’s strength or goodness or bounty, but in God’s faithful presence making all things new. In God’s promise of liberation—from death, from exile, from meaninglessness, from loneliness, from hopelessness. Hope for the future, hidden in the present.

600 years before the birth of Jesus, the prophet told of one who would come, one who would restore hope, rekindle love, resurrect an ethic of justice and peace. 60 years after Jesus’ birth, Mark tells the good news of Jesus, shares with us the glad tidings we are to tell, speaks of the liberation we are to live into. And now, two thousand years after his death, we are still called to listen for a lone voice, still led into and through and out of wilderness wandering, still commanded to Cry Out! A lone voice, in spite of it all, crying “Yes! Yes! I can make room!” And hope for the future is born. Amen, and amen.