Looking Forward to December 4, 2022 -- 2nd Sunday of Advent

 This is the first Sunday of December so we will be celebrating the sacrament of Communion.

The Scripture Readings for this week are:

• Isaiah 11:1-10
• Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19

The Sermon title is The One Who Brings Change and Peace

Early Thoughts:  It seems too good to be true. It could not possibly happen....could it?

At first glance Isaiah's portrayal of the Peaceable Kingdom seems to be a bit of a pipe dream. Actually it seems a little farfetched at a second, third and one hundredth glance too! What kind of a leader can make these things happen? Who is this shoot from the stump of Jesse?

For Christians, of course, the shoot from the stump of Jesse (father of David) is seen to be Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, born in David's town of David's line. There is a strong tradition that the original hearers of Isaiah's words might have thought King Hezekiah was the one who would bring these things about. Scripture tells us that Hezekiah was a Godly king and leader who did many good things, but he did not bring about the Peaceable Kingdom. Has Jesus? Will Jesus?

What level of change is needed for ancient enemies, predator and prey, to lie quietly together. If you think back to Genesis and Adam and Eve, you may remember that the serpent and the human were told they would be enemies "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”" (Genesis 3:15). But in the Peaceable Kingdom foretold by Isaiah "The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den." (Isaiah 11:8) What wizardry is this?

We are not there yet. Some days I wonder if we are even getting closer...

Ancient hatreds, and new hatreds for that matter, still seem very powerful. In Isaiah 10:1-2 we are told that the Northern Kingdom (Israel) has fallen to the Assyrians because of their failure to care for the least in their society: the needy, the poor, the widows and orphans. How do we measure up on that account? Is the Peaceable Kingdom really just a dream?

Maybe. But we are called to be dreamers. Maybe it seems beyond possibility, but so does resurrection. 

The Psalm reading this week is a prayer for the king. But I suspect it was a prayer for a king who never really existed. It sounds to me like a prayer that the king will live up to an ideal, an ideal that few (if any) monarchs in history could claim as their legacy. There is, however, a lot of overlap between this ideal king and the leader described in Isaiah 11 [no doubt this is why the passages were linked by the lectionary creators]. We need ideal leadership if we are going to get to the Peaceable Kingdom. And one of the markers of the ideal leader (in both Psalm 72 and Isaiah 11) is a passion for and commitment to justice for the people at the margins of society. The path to peace is paved with justice and equity, righteousness and faithfulness.

The promise of Christmas, the promise of Jesus, the Word-Made-Flesh is a transformed world. The promise of Emmanuel, God-With-Us, is that peace and justice are more than a dream -- they are a real possibility that will one day be a reality.

It may seem improbably as we look at the world around us. It my seem that we are incapable of that much change. But the promise is there. Jesus is coming. Jesus will bring transformed hearts, repentant people who go a different way, and the Peaceable Kingdom is waiting. As the old prayer says: Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.
--Gord

An ADvent/Christmas Letter

People, look east. The time is near of the crowning of the year...
Set every peak and valley humming with the word, the Lord is coming.
People, look east and sing today: Love, the Lord, is on the way.
(lines from verses 1 & 5 of People Look East by Eleanor Farjeon, #9 in Voices United)

Friends in Christ, Grace and Peace to you all!
Somehow I look at the calendar and find that Advent is upon us already! The crowning of the year is imminent!
As a community of faith we once again start to prepare for the birth of a child in a stable, a birth proclaimed by angels visiting shepherds, a child who will change the world. As we move into this season of preparation and hope and promise I thought I would take time to share some news about the season and about the life of our community of faith.

Here at St. Paul’s it is customary that we have a special Outreach campaign during Advent. This year we have made cash donations from the Outreach Fund to support the work of our partner agencies. We were able to give $4 000.00 to The Salvation Army, $500.00 to the Elders Caring Shelter, and $500.00 to the St. Lawrence Centre. Donations to the Outreach Fund to build it back up so we can continue to offer food vouchers as needed are welcomed.

The other part of our Advent Outreach Campaign this year is to support the Explorers as they create Blessing Bags. They are looking for things like socks and gloves, toiletries, feminine hygiene products, and portable snack food. These items can be dropped off at the church by December 4^th as the Explorers will fill the bags at their meeting on December 6^th. If you would rather, you can make a donation to St. Paul’s Outreach Fund earmarked for the Blessing Bags and we will pass the money on to the Explorers to cover their costs.

Over the last few years we have had a practice of a Memory Tree, where we hang names of those we remember at Christmas. Without having a Blue Christmas service this has been our way to mark the “blueness” of the Christmas season. This year we will include the hanging of our memories on the 1^st Sunday of Advent (November 27^th) and invite folk to add names throughout the season. If you are currently attending worship online and wish to have a name added to the tree just let the office know and we will make it happen.

As a reminder, all of our worship services are live-streamed on our YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/@st.paulsunitedgrandeprairie. This year that will include the CGIT Vesper service at 7:30 on December 4^th. Please join us in person or online as the CGIT girls invite us into the Christmas Season.

Our Christmas Eve service this year will be at 8:00. Again please join us online or in person as we celebrate in story and song the miracle of a baby in a manger. As we are, hopefully, beyond the most active part of the COVID-19 pandemic we are not limited in attendance numbers this year and pre-booking a seat is not required. I would love to see the sanctuary filled with folk on Christmas Eve.

I would be remiss if I did not mention the financial realities of our life together. We continue to struggle to meet our budget, with a year-to-date deficit of around $33 000.00 as of the end of October. So I ask each of us to consider how we might be able to support the ongoing ministry of St. Paul’s this year. We make a difference in the life of Grande Prairie because of your support. Donations can be dropped off at the church during office hours, or they can be brought on a Sunday morning, or a cheque in the mail always works. For electronic giving you can give through CanadaHelps (https://www.canadahelps.org/en/dn/36020) or through an e-transfer using secretary@stpaulsuc.ca as the receiving e-mail (no security question is required). E-transfer might be preferable as there is no service charge paid by St. Paul’s for that. An ongoing option is to get started on, or adjust your current, PAR. Contact Carla if you want information about PAR.

Yet with the woes of sin and strife the world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel strain have rolled two thousand years of wrong;
And warring humankind, hears not the love-song which they bring;
Oh, hush the noise, and cease your strife to hear the angels sing.
(verse 3 of It Came Upon a Midnight Clear by Edmund Hamilton Sears, #44 in Voices United)

Every year in the Advent/Christmas season we look for signs that God is breaking into the world. Every year we name that the world as it is is not the world as it could (or should) be. So we wait with Hope for the coming of the Prince of Peace who will transform the world. We wait for songs of Joy to spring out of our mouths and the gifts of Love to spread from every corner and hamlet. There is a lot of bad news out there, but once again the angel will bring Good News that shall be for all people. For unto US a child is born, unto US a child is given, God is with us, we are not alone. God will transform the world through the life of a baby born to a peasant family in a backwater part of the Roman Empire. And the world will never be the same again.

May you find time this Christmas season to hush the noise and listen for angel song. May you find God in ways and places you least expect. May you feel the Hope, Peace, Joy and Love of Christ’s presence in your busy-ness. Have a blessed Christmas.

Or, as Tiny Tim might say, “God Bless us, every one!”

Looking Forward to November 27, 2022 -- 1st Sunday of Advent

The Scripture Readings for this week are:

• Romans 13:11-14
• Matthew 24:36-44

The Sermon title is This Is Hope? This is Change!

Early Thoughts: We start off our journey to Christmas with the Sunday of Hope. And so of course we have a Gospel reading about the End Times paired with some Pauline injunctions about how we should live. What hope do we find in these passages?

The hope is in the change. The hope is in the fact that God is transforming the world, transforming us, when we least expect it.  Of course that may also mean that the hope is in the pain, because sometimes transformative change is both painful and terrifying.

I always find it a challenge to know what to do with the apocalyptic passages in the Gospels. On the one hand they really tend to give off a "be afraid, be very afraid" vibe. On the other, I know that they are pointing to the hoped-for era when the Reign of God has broken into the world with full power and glory, when the world has been transformed and we return to the garden. There is fear but there is also promise. There is transformation and renewal and there is destruction. As we begin the season of Advent, the time when we prepare for God to break into the world as a baby in a manger, we remind ourselves that there is a continuing promise that God will break into the world in ways and times that we least expect.

That, in the end is our hope. Our hope is based on the God who continually breaks into the world and brings transformation.  Sometimes the transformation is big. Most often, it seems to me, it happens in small, easily missed increments. Being awakened may be a shocking, blaring alarm. Or it may be a gentle "wake to music". Either way being awakened (being woke?) leads us to live differently in a world that is also different. Hope lies in being awake, even if being awake calls us to make changes.

What changes give you hope this year? What changes do you hope to see this year?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to November 20, 2022 -- Majesty of Christ Sunday

The Scripture readings this week are:

• 2 King 24:8, 11-17
•  Psalm 47 
• Matthew 27:11-14, 27-37

The Sermon title is Destruction, Death, Majesty?

Early Thoughts: Reign of Christ, Christ the King, Majesty of Christ. What images do those terms evoke?

Now, how does the destruction and looting of a city, thousands being dragged off in exile, or a beaten peasant hanging on a cross fit in with those images?

I am going to guess there might be a bit of a discrepancy.

To follow Christ means we have to embrace a series of paradoxes. I think that the last Sunday of the liturgical year really highlights that. We refer to this Sunday using titles like I listed up above. They are titles that tend to evoke power. Words like Reign, or King, or Majesty draw our minds to grand ballrooms, Buckingham Palace, pomp and pageantry, horse drawn carriages, people bowing in respect and fealty.

And yet Christ is a King on a cross. Christ's majesty is shown through death and and empty tomb. No pomp. No gilded carriage. No grand palace. Over the centuries that have followed you will find the people bowing in respect and fealty but certainly not in this story of trial and execution.

Christ has a different form of majesty, Christ is a different type of king with a very different type of reign.  The Majesty of God's Kingdom is seen in death and resurrection. The Majesty of Christ is seen in a specific approach to life and love, not in pomp and pageantry.

Sometimes we need to see how destruction and tragedy might (not always but might) lead to something new.  In the moment it will not feel like it. In the moment it feels like defeat and disaster. But sometimes God can lead us to new hope and possibility, maybe even majesty?

--Gord

Looking Ahead to November 13, 2022 -- 23rd Sunday After Pentecost

This week's Scripture Reading is John 2:2-11

The Sermon title is Mom Knows Best.

Source

Early Thoughts: Sometimes we need someone to give us a bit of a shove. Even Jesus did.

Normally when we talk about this story we talk about the incredible abundance of wine. I did the math once and it is hundreds of regular (750mL) bottles of wine. Everyone was sure the wine was running out and then BAM enough wine (and good quality wine at that) shows up to keep the party going for days [and the hangovers for a few days beyond that I suppose]. There is a lot of sermonic potential there. In a world where we are too often led to see life in terms of what we are lacking, what we don't have enough of it is always a good idea to remind ourselves of the abundance the lies right under our noses --  even if we have yet to recognize that it is there.

However there is one detail about the story that has always fascinated me. Jesus acts because he is pushed. Left to his own devices Jesus does not seem inclined to do anything. Even when it is suggested he should do something he is pretty clear he sees no reason why he should. "Not my problem" he says. Only when his mother (let's go with the other Gospels and call her Mary even though John leaves her unnamed) pushes harder does Jesus actually do anything. This leads to the miracle and the great abundance and the reason we remember the story.

But let us not forget Mary. Mary who sees a problem and looks for a solution. Mary who knows that Jesus can fix the problem and will not let him brush it off. Part of me wonders if under her breath she was muttering something like "stop partying with your friends, get off your butt and fix this problem". Jesus is unquestionably the focus of the story, the miracle of water into wine is the focus of the story. But none of it happens without Mary. Maybe mom does know best after all.

How many of us have only started to act because we have been pushed? Many call stories I have heard over my life have referred to someone who first asked "have you ever considered?". Those initial questions, those words of encouragement are often what push people into a variety of tasks and roles in life. sometimes we first hear them and we are sure we are not ready so we try to push it off, "not the right time" we say. So time passes and quite commonly the questions, the "you might want to consider"s, the "I think you would be good at"s keep coming. Eventually we might start to listen, we might even start to act on it.

How many times have those pushers/encouragers been mother-like figures in our lives?

Maybe that is one of the roles of eldership, to push people, to make suggestions, to point out possibilities we see in others. Maybe that is part of how we keep individuals and the community growing.

It can be daunting to make the suggestion. It can certainly be daunting to follow the prod given by another. There can always be a reason to keep quiet and/or remain inactive. But I think God challenges us both to be the prodder and the proddee. Maybe in that person who asks "have you ever considered..." God is speaking.

Will we choose to listen? If not now, when?
--Gord

People of Hope...

 As people of faith we are all called to be people of hope. Indeed in 1 Corinthians 13 Paul lists hope as one of the three highest virtues “But until then, these three remain – faith, hope and love – and love is the greatest” (1Cor 13:13, First Nations Version). And that is great to say, but what does it mean to be people of hope?

Hope is what keeps us moving forward. Hope is what keeps us working for change. Hope is what allows us to dream. Hope can change the way we see the world. Hope is very powerful, hope is a motivator. Just yesterday I was starting to work on Advent worship by looking for poetry (my plan is to use some piece of poetry each week in Advent). The poem I think I will use on the first Sunday, when we light the candle of Hope, was written by an 11-year old in Texas and is titled I Can Change the World with Hope. But still I wonder, what does it mean to be people of hope? What does it mean to be a hope-filled community?

Having hope is sometimes seen as an unrealistic, pollyanna-ish response to life. I can see that reaction. Sometimes people use hope and trust as words to cover their flights of fancy. Sometimes hope is used as a way to escape from hard realities. Dreams are vitally important, but those dreams have to deal with reality. Hope is a vital part of growth but it has to be grounded. Simply wishing away the hard stuff is not, in my opinion, hope. True hope is ready to get down into the trenches and get dirty.

About 11 years ago I read a book that remains one of my go-to sources for short reflections. It is called It’s Not Too Late: A Field Guide to Hope. In its’ opening pages I read:

...The “field is the seemingly inexorable deterioration of the earth’s environment and the economic well-being of humankind. Like a handbook about desert plants or inner-city tourism, this book might seem to promote a seemingly futile task: looking for a rare thing amid a hostile environment. In fact the opposite is true. Just as plants bloom in the desert and inner cities teem with barely visible wonderments, so hope flourishes in these difficult years.
(It’s Not Too Late by Bob Sitze, Alban Institute ©2010 p. xx-xxi)

Christian hope is based on flowers that bloom in the desert, and an empty tomb, and the Word-Made-Flesh lying in a feed trough. Christian hope centres on the claim that God has not abandoned the world but shares the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, stands against the troubles of the world and, by opposing, ends them – eventually. Christian hope lies in the words of Dame Julian of Norwich “all shall be well, all shall be well, all manner of thing be well”. Christian hope reminds us that the Reign of God is real and growing in our midst.

The world is a tough place. We are still sorting out how things have been totally changed by the pandemic. We still have news reports full of violence and bloodshed. Those words I quoted earlier were written over a decade ago but economic chaos and environmental deterioration are still leading stories (and arguably getting worse). Many communities of faith find themselves wondering what their future as a community will look like with shrinking numbers, aging members, and uncertain finances. What might hope look like for us today?

I think we need to look for hope in the surprising places, places we might not expect (of course if we expected it they wouldn’t be surprising would they?). Hope will not be found, I think, by looking back to what once was. Hope will be found, as it often is in our Scripture story, where God is doing something new and renewing the community. We can not, in my opinion, create hope. That is what God is doing around us. We can become infected with hope as we open ourselves to see, hear, and feel God active in the world around us.

What does it mean to be people, to be a community of hope? It means we acknowledge the messiness of the world around us, the ugliness, the broken-ness and then we look for more. It means we listen for angels singing about a baby on a manger, we dare to visit a tomb in a garden only to find it empty, we allow a mighty wind to drive us from our places of safety out into the world where we share in word and action the love of God. To be hope-filled people and communities means we sing about the world that could be, the world that God is creating and re-creating, even as we work hard to make the world as it is a safer, more loving, more equitable place to live.

Listen, for here is Good News! God is at work around, within, and among us. The germ of hope and promise is floating in the air, ready to infect all of us. As individuals, as a community we could choose to despair at all the broken parts that seem to make up the world. Or we could try to wish them all away. Or we could decide that this world does not really matter and wait for some heavenly reward. Or we could choose to be people of hope, people that look for the flower in the sidewalk crack, the love in a sea of anger or fear, the life where death seems to have won. God calls us to be people of hope. Shall we give it a try?