josephholubsermons
January 1, 2012
Luke 2:25-35
It’s that time of year again when many of us make New Year’s
resolutions. Pollsters tell
us about half of the U.S. population make
some kind of resolution.
They also tell us that after six months almost half of us are
still hanging in there with our resolution.
Actually that is
higher than I might have
expected. The most popular resolutions are losing weight and getting
personal finances in order.
I know of a family from year’s back who went through a
kind of resolution ritual
every New Year’s Eve. They
would spend New Year’s Eve together at their cabin in the mountains.
They would make dinner together, followed by board games, and
then, sometime before midnight, the five of them would gather around the
wood stove. Each family
member would get a piece of paper and pencil, and each would write
things on the paper they wanted to
let go of and
leave behind from the waning year: a bad memory, a negative
experience, a failure, a painful conflict, an attitude, a difficulty,
whatever. When everybody
was ready, one by one they would cast their paper into the fire.
They each could share anything on the paper they had written if
they wanted. I was told
everyone shared. When
everyone had presented, they would have a prayer affirming that Divine
Grace could absorb the pain of all of these memories, and they prayed to
be empowered that the past negative memories would not exert undo
control over them in the new year.
After that, they would get another piece of paper, and this time they
would write down their resolution(s) for the New Year.
They would go around and each would share, with the family, their
resolution(s). Each would
keep his/her paper throughout the year as a reminder of the
resolution(s).
Sharing their resolutions
caused them to be held by the entire family so they could encourage one
another to keep their resolutions as the year progressed.
Many people approach New Year’s resolutions with
skepticism and cynicism and
simply do not bother, thinking the exercise as foolish and trivial.
“Why make a resolution I
know I am going to break anyway?” someone said to me recently.
A good question perhaps – why indeed?
My own perspective
on the matter is that the resolutions I have made in the past, that have
been not much more than merely
wishful thinking, I have quickly
abandon and have evaporated
like the morning fog.
But I think there is a
difference between making a
resolution and
wishful thinking.
Wishful thinking is just that – nothing more than an idle desire.
But a resolution implies commitment, passion, discipline,
accountability and support. A
resolution entails an intentional
process of empowerment that
can lead to change and transformation.
It seems to me there is a
deeper issue behind all of the resolution-hype that comes with
the new year. The deeper
issue is this:: It is the acknowledgement that it is
important to live with a
vision; a vision of something more; a vision of what we can be
and what life can be; a vision of something more that we are and know
right now. Without a vision
of something more; something beyond where we are; a life that is more
than who we are at the
moment, we can easily become
like a ship without a rudder tossed to and fro at the mercy of the
waves. Or we can become stagnant and stuck and unyieldingly dogmatic,
cynical and even intolerant. The
book of Proverbs says, “Where
there is no vision, the people perish.”
(Proverbs 29:18) I
trust that to be true. We
can die and wither spiritually, mentally, emotionally and stagnate
without a vision.
One of the most memorable and powerful speeches ever given in the modern
age was delivered by Martin Luther King.
With eloquence and passion MLK presented a vision of an
alternate reality for our
nation based on the biblical vision of the social prophets and Jesus’
vision of the Kingdom of God.
I was but 17 years old, but his words still echo in my soul and
wee formative for me personally:
“I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.
(And then drawing from the prophet Isaiah, he continued…)
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.”
In the Book of Acts on the day that Luke calls the
Day of Pentecost, Peter
declared that it was the fulfillment of what the prophet Joel had
prophesied centuries before: that the Divine Presence would come upon
the people and empower them
to have visions and dream dreams.
The visions and dreams, to which he was referring, were the
dreams of a different kind of life; a different way to live; a
call to be more than who
they were; that they saw and experienced in the person of Jesus.
In today’s gospel we read of old
Simeon. Only Luke
mentions Simeon. Who was
he? We are only told he was
a “righteous and devout man”, but otherwise an ordinary person, not a
part of the temple hierarchy and elite.
Developing a theme he laid down when Jesus’ birth announcement
came to lowly, ordinary shepherds, Luke tells of ordinary Simeon (not
the temple hierarchy) announcing Jesus as the long awaited Messiah, but
it was an announcement with a
twist. Simeon’s
vision of the messiah declared there would be something so
extraordinary, so compelling, so uncommon, and
so singular about this Messiah that he would not be for Jews
only, but he would be gift to the
whole world:
“A light for revelation to the
Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel,” sang Simeon.
And that is exactly what the early disciples and early followers
experienced in Jesus. Jesus
provided his followers with an
alternate vision of who they could be and of what life
could be. The early
followers became captivated
by Jesus and his vision of this new reality he called the Kingdom of
God. He even taught them to
pray, “Thy kingdom come on
earth.” They staked
their lives on Jesus’ vision of reality.
They began to make his vision their reality.
As I immerse myself in the depths of the four gospels, there are
four general things I can
say about Jesus’ vision of an alternative reality that captivated and
called the disciples beyond the limits of their own humanity.
First, it’s a vision that called them beyond fear.
Numerous times Jesus implored his disciples to
“not fear” or ”to not be
afraid.” Jesus knew
about the power of fear.
He knew how fear could distort and twist and disfigure a human
life. He knew how quickly
fear could turn into dehumanizing prejudice and even violence.
Repeatedly, when fear was gripping his disciples by the throats,
he led his disciples through and beyond their fear.
Second, it’s a vision that called them beyond their tribal identities.
The gospels are saturated with examples of being called beyond
narrow and parochial tribal identities.
Simeon sings of a light to the Gentiles; Matthew describes
foreigners coming from the East to worship Jesus; Luke describes diverse
peoples hearing the message spoken in their own language at Pentecost.
Jesus holds up Samaritans and
Gentiles as models of faith. Inspired
by Jesus’ vision, the apostle Paul declares that in Christ there is
“neither Jew nor Greek, male nor
female, slave nor free.” (Galatians 3:28)
Jesus’ vision called them beyond narrow and ancient tribal
identities to create a new reality, a new kind of community, a different
world. Jim Wallis of
Sojourners writes with
passion and conviction that one of the
greatest failures among
Christians is that Christians too often assert tribal identities
ahead of Jesus and either
forget about Jesus or work-in a watered down innocuous version of Jesus
that does not challenge basic
tribal identities that foster hostilities whether they be national,
ethnic, racial, cultural, social, religious or whatever.
Third, the gospels clearly
show that Jesus’ vision called his followers beyond the strict limits of
their religion.
Religion, by its very nature, becomes dogmatic, inward focused
and draws strict, legalistic boundaries.
Time after time, Jesus trumped religious law with grace, love and
compassion. He and his
disciples were harshly criticized for breaking super sacred
Sabbath laws, touching lepers and the unclean, including those outside
the boundaries of religion, and blurring the lines between sinners and
the righteous. He even affirmed
the basic humanity of their enemies and called upon his followers to
show love even for them.
Finally, Jesus’ vision called them beyond a sense of their own mortality
by dying for the his vision with courage and grace and placing his life
at the point of death in Divine hands.
Afterward, they continued to experience him
as a living presence
which empowered them to continue to live by his vision and shape their
lives by his vision-and even die for the vision if need be.
And that brings us to this first day of 2012 to you and me and this
community of faith. I look
around and I do see evidence
that Jesus’ vision lives and continues to exert its influence upon us.
I see it reflected in our mission statement and welcome statement
that is printed on the back of the every Sunday bulletin and hangs on
the walls of the narthex. I
see it in the outreach and music and arts displays in the narthex and
the realities they represent.
I look out at you, and I know Jesus’ vision lives on in the
personal commitments than many of you make to advance the Kingdom of God
through your life in our community and world.
We (LOTM) received a thank you note from
Domus Paces respite this
week, one of our 2011 second offering recipients.
They expressed their gratitude for our support that empowered
them to host 60 families of cancer patients this past year.
In their note they expressed that their
vision for 2012 is to reach
out to 100 families. A similar
story can be told about each and every one
of our second offering recipients and others.
The vision that Jesus embodied and proclaimed was far more than wishful
thinking or a half-hearted resolution.
In spite of centuries of unceasing and formidable resistance from
powers and principalities that would stifle it, Jesus vision has
captivated human hearts and
imaginations and ignited lives with a passion for peace-making, social
justice, compassion and grace. I
pray with all my strength that it will continue to captivate us and we
will make it the primary vision that continues to guide and shape us.
Amen.