Looking Ahead to December 21, 2025 -- Advent 4

 

The Scripture readings this week are:

• 1 John 4:7-12, 16-19
• John 1:1-14

The Sermon title is The Christmas Dream: Embodied Love

Early Thoughts: What was that first word? The one that was with God from the beginning...what was it it? What is it?

Theologically speaking, when John talks about the Word, the Word which becomes flesh and dwells or abides among us, we see the 2nd person of the Trinity, Jesus, the one we call Christ. John is telling us that Jesus (the 2nd person of the Trinity to use an understanding that would be codified in the 4th-5th century) has been co-existent with God (the 1st person of the Trinity) since the beginning. Indeed nothing was created without this Word.

But what if we have to say it was an actual word, a part of speech?

I posit that the creating word which has been with and been part of  God since the beginning is in fact Love. After all the passage from 1 John (likely written by a different person than the Gospel of John but someone who shares a similar theology) names that "Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him." If God is love then it makes sense to me the that Word is also love, love becomes flesh and dwells (or abides) among us. This is the Christmas story, this is the mystery of the Incarnation.

What does it do to see Jesus as Love with flesh on? What does it to our understanding of the world if we say that nothing was created without Love?

I think it makes a world of difference. If we claim to follow the one who is Love Enfleshed, the very embodiment of Love it has to change how we interact with each other. If we claim that all that is created was created through Love then it has to impact how we interact with all of creation.

Part of my Christmas Dream is that, as Christina Rossetti once wrote, Love shall be our token/Love shall be yours and love be mine/Love to God and to all men [sic]/Love for plea and gift and sign. It is my dream that when we meet Love with skin on laying in a manger we will be changed. As we follow the one who commands us to Love each other as we have first been loved (John 13:34) we change the world.

Love is free and wild in the world. Our job is not to try and tame or restrict it. Our calling is to dance with it, joining with wild abandon. Love has been in the world from the beginning, humanity had trouble understanding it so Love took on human form and dwelt/abided among us. Love then defeated the power of death and continues to dwell/abide among us. May we feel free to join in the dance.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to December 14, 2025 -- Advent 3

 

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Isaiah 35:1-10
• Psalm 146 (We will use the responsive reading from Voices United)
• Luke 1:39-45

The Sermon title is The Christmas Dream: Blossoming Joy

Early Thoughts: Where do you find joy this year? When has joy been absent or difficult?

For that matter what does Joy mean to you?

Just for fun I went to dictionary.com and found this

OR if I clicked on the "American" tab I found:

So there are options. I think many people tend toward the American focus on great happiness or delight. Certainly that seems to be how the word is often used. I tend to lean toward the British usage, particularly when we talk about Joy in a faith sense. The Joy of Christmas comes from that deep feeling of contentment. Joy as great happiness can then, I truly believe, flow and grow out of that sense of contentment. 

In fact I think Christmas Joy is first related to trust and then later to happiness. We trust that, as the New Creed reminds us, we are not alone and the Christmas story reminds us that God not only is with us but chooses to become like us. Out of that trust can come contentment even when happiness would be totally out of place.

What would it take for Joy (either deep contentment or great happiness)  to erupt in your life today?

Isaiah speaks of the wilderness and the dry land bursting into flower and then of the liberation that is to come. The Psalm reminds us that happiness (or maybe even joy) lies in trusting in God (with another reminder of liberation that is to come). Elizabeth's unborn child leaps for joy at the mere presence of Mary and her unborn child (after which Mary sings of the liberation that is to come). Joy breaks into our story over and over, Joy that comes with the active presence of God in the world.

When Joy comes into our lives colour returns. Like the desert after a rain can burst into fresh new growth God pouring into our lives makes us bloom. Sometimes life can be hard and joy, particularly that definition of great happiness, seems like nothing more than a pipe dream. But God is active in the world. God calls us to trust and seek contentment in God's presence. That needs to be the source of our Christmas Joy. 

Joy can come to the wilderness places in our world. The wilderness can break into bloom. It takes faith and trust. It doesn't come, as the Grinch once learned, from the store.  

Let us all look for signs of Joy blossoming in the world around us this Christmas.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to December 7, 2025 -- Advent 2

This is the first Sunday of the month and so we will be celebrating Communion this week.

The Scripture Readings this week are

• Micah 4:1-5
• Isaiah 11:1-10

The Sermon title is The Christmas Dream: Transformative Peace

Early Thoughts: We proclaim that Jesus is the Prince of Peace. The ancient prophets point to a future where people living together in peace will be not just dream and hope and promise but a lived reality. Part of our dream of God breaking into the world is that God will bring a reign of peace.

How might God get us to that point? How might God create the Peaceable Kingdom described in Isaiah 11? How might God convince people that "they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war any more;" as Micah envisions?

By transforming the world, by transforming the people. Total transformation of ideals and priorities and assumptions are needed to get us to that place.

This is part of the promise. Total transformation. This is part of what we wait for at Christmas, the one who will change the world.

When we meet Jesus as an adult he proclaims that the Kingdom of God is either here already or near at hand. Jesus is all about this new transformed world. For Christians it is easy to read these two passages from the ancient prophets and seeing Jesus in them. The original writers and hearers may well have had a different understanding of how the dream/vision would come to pass but for Christians we see Jesus. 

But there is one question that nibbles at my conscience. Are we ready or willing to be transformed? Are we ready or willing to name that the coming of Jesus, the one we see as the Messiah, means that the world is irrevocably changed? This is not a Jesus who calls us to a personal, individualized faith. This is not a Jesus who calls us to simply put up with the injustice and evil in the world because our true reward will be in heaven. This is a Jesus who says that God's Kingdom is here and now, a Jesus who challenges us to embrace a new way of being in this present world not in some future time after a great cataclysm.

We dream of a peaceful world. We dream of true peace, one that grows out of justice and righteousness not one that it the result of the strong holing down the weak. We dream of a world where swords are turned into plowshares (I wonder what we turn assault rifles into in that image?), where it is true the "they shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain", where people live the commandment to love neighbour and friend, family and enemy. 

I believe God is at work transforming the world. Sometimes I believe that in spite of a lot of evidence to the contrary. Still I hold on to the dream and the promise. Transformation and peace is possible, is indeed coming.

Remember the angel song as Jesus is born: Peace on the Earth, Goodwill to all.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to November 30, 2025 -- Advent 1

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Isaiah 9:2-7
• Romans 13:8-14
• Luke 1:67-79

The Sermon title is The Christmas Dream: Awakened Hope

Early Thoughts: Once more we enter into Advent, once more we speak of hope. What does it mean to speak of hope being awakened in a world which too often leads us to despair?

Often during Advent I like to find a piece of poetry to go with each week. {Usually I then find pieces that are too long for reading in the service anyway}. As I was looking for something to go with this week I found this one which begins:

War darkens the world

more than the length of days

violence, gun shots, fear and hatred

echo through our streets promising only more of the same

It’s easy to lose hope

when every day the weight of worry

grows heavier and heavier still

What does it take to awaken hope in the world today?

Isaiah talks about people walking in darkness seeing a great light. He talks of a time of renewal and release. Often we read these words on Christmas Eve, I have used them as the basis for a call to worship on that day. The promise Isaiah shares is about the coming of one ho brings hope, peace, justice, and liberation. We begin Advent this year re-hearing the promise of the child who shall be born. That child brings hope.

This week we also hear the song Zechariah sings as his son John is named. Zechariah sings of renewal and transformation. He sings of hope for his people. Like Isaiah, he also uses the image of light shining in the darkness, light that drives away shadows. Maybe part of hope being awakened is that the shadow of despair is being driven away?

Rachael Keefe concludes her poem (I really encourage you to follow the link above and read the whole thing) with these words:

Darkness interrupted by chaotic lights,
disjointed décor from one house to another
boldly proclaims the Light
the Light that shines through all things
in every color, every shape, every rhythm
no matter how chaotic – not
just for December nights,
not just for Christmas this year
or next
 These holiday lights – no matter how old,
or how garish – are pleasant, perhaps joyful,
reminders that Hope shines on and on
even when the days are short
and humans hold their weapons
closer than their neighbors

AS we move into Advent this year there is a lot of horrible things happening around the globe. People are being dehumanized. People are starving. Might seems to make right. Violence breaks out in a myriad of forms and locations. Sometimes it seems like one great big nightmare and despair seems like the only option. But I encourage us to look beyond our nightmares to those things we scarcely dare to dream. There we might find hope just waiting to be awakened in our hearts and souls. Look beyond the big stories and try to see the glimmer of Christmas lights, the flicker of a candle flame, shining in the dark places.

Then may we let the hope change us.

The Romans passage calls us to love our neighbours. It also calls up to wake up, to become woke one might say. When hope wakens in our hearts and guides our lives we can be different people. In Advent we light candles every week, we brighten the world one tiny flame at a time. We proclaim that the dawn is near. May the hope that awakens in Advent, the hope for a baby who will call us to live as different people, wake us up. May that hope lead us to be people of hope in a world that too often leads us to despair.
--Gord

Advent Pastoral Letter

We wait for God, creation longs to see a new day dawn.

And though the night is dark and deep, we dare to sing our song...
We watch for God, the earth cries out, “Will violence ever cease?”
he one who saw the signs is seen in ways that make for peace.
(from “We Wait for God” by William Kervin, #57 in Then Let Us Sing)

Friends in Christ,
Grace, peace, hope and love be with you as we move into another Advent Season.

Every year I am struck by the circular nature of the church year. We move from the last Sunday of the year where we name that the Reign of God is a reality growing in our midst directly into the Advent time of preparation and waiting for God to break into the world as a newborn baby.

There is a passage in Isaiah that is sometimes used on the first Sunday of Advent (we often hear from Isaiah in our Advent waiting and preparing). It begins “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence” (Isaiah 64:1). Some years I feel that prayer more acutely than others. This is one of those years. From Alberta to Chicago to Ukraine to Gaza and so many other places there is much that needs to be set right with the world. It would be nice if God were to break into the world and cause some speedy transformation in how the world works.

We are promised that in the birth of Jesus God is doing just that. When we wait and prepare in Advent it is not just to remember a birth long ago and far away it is also to remember that Christ continues to be born, that God continues to come to us bringing hope and peace, joy and love. Advent means that God is coming, coming to transform us, to change the world, Glory to God in the Highest! And on Earth Peace.

For now we watch and we wait. We light candles and we sing songs and we pray. But primarily we watch and wait. We open our hearts and souls so that we might recognize what God is up to around us. We name the troubles we see near and far and we join creation in longing for a new day, we cry out with the rest of the earth, we dare to sing our songs.

There are traditions that go with this annual time of watching and waiting and preparing. For many many years one of our traditions has been to gather with the CGIT for their Vespers Service. Though CGIT has come to its end the Vespers Service continues as a group of Alumnae have gotten together to welcome us to worship with them at 7:30 on November 30^th. The theme for the service this year is Faces of Joy. All are welcome.

Another tradition of the Christmas season is that we stretch out and think of the community around us. This year the Social Justice and Affirming Ministry Team (SJAM) is encouraging us to make extra donations to our Local Outreach Fund. This fund allows us to support our neighbours in times of need. It allows that when one of our partner agencies phones the office and says “we have a client who needs some help” we can respond with a voucher for groceries. Every day I drive past the Salvation Army building and see a line of people waiting for the Food Bank to open. There are so many of our neighbours who are struggling, let us do what we can to be the hands and face of Christ in Grande Prairie. SJAM is also reminding us all that the Salvation Army Christmas Kettle campaign is in need of volunteers to staff the kettles.

Dream a dream, a hopeful dream, as children do on Christmas Eve,

imaginings, surprising things to hold and to believe
Dream a gift, the Christmas gift that changes every thing we see:
the shimmering of angel wing, the Child, the Mystery.
(from “Dream a Dream” by Sheila Erena Murray, #158 in More Voices)

In a world where the news is so often nightmarish it is good to dream. I think that dreaming is a big part of how we, as Christians watch and wait for God. Dreaming can be, I believe, a big part of how God shares their vision for what the world could be. With that in mind the theme for my Advent sermons this year is The Christmas Dream. What dreams has God planted in Scripture as we prepare for Christ to be born? What dreams spring up in your heart and soul as you think of Christmas? Sometimes it feels like Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love are just dreams for the world. What might it look like if those dreams came true? I invite you to dream along with me this season. Our Christmas Eve celebration will be at 8:00 and we will probably talk some more about dreams that night.

I close this year’s letter with a piece of news. United Church ministry personnel are encouraged to take time for rest and renewal. After a few years of encouragement from the St. Paul’s Ministry and Personnel Team I have decided, with their agreement, that is it time to take a Sabbatical Leave. I last did this in 2016 to mark 15 years since I was ordained, so in 2026 I will do the same to mark a quarter century in ministry. Between three months of leave and the normal month of vacation I will be off from May 8-September 8. Look for more details in the New Year.

I look forward to you joining us during the Advent and Christmas season. If it is a challenge to join us in person, all our worship events are also streamed on our YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@st.paulsunitedgrandeprairie).

Have a Blessed Advent and Christmas Season!

For the Advent Newsletter

Dream a dream, a hopeful dream...

Dream a time, this Christmas time...
Dream a peace, our planet’s peace...
Dream a gift, the Christmas Gift
that changes everything we see...
(Words from Dream a Dream by Shirley Erena Murray, #158 in More Voices)

We are entering the time of preparation and waiting we call Advent. Four weeks of lighting candles and preparing our hearts for the birth of a baby who will change the world. As we get ourselves ready for Emmanuel, God-With-Us to be born what dreams fill your heart, soul and mind this year? What does Christmas need to bring for the magic of The Word becoming flesh to re-energize your world as we move into 2026?

Dreams are important, they help us envision a world renewed and re-vitalized. Dreams remind us that there is another possible reality. In our faith stories dreams are often a way that God communicates with God’s people (it happens 4 times just in the first 2 chapters of Matthew!). What dreams has God placed on your soul this year?

This year as we gather on the four Sundays of Advent I invite us to be open to the power of dreams. The theme I have chosen for the season is The Christmas Dream:____. Each Sunday we will finish the phrase with one of our Advent themes: Awakened Hope, Transformative Peace, Blosoming Joy, and Embodied Love. Sometime between now and then I will figure out how we might finish the phrase for Christmas Eve itself. When you think of Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love what dreams stir in your heart?

The weeks leading into Christmas can get very busy and hectic, but let’s take time to pause and listen. Let us dream together. Let us share our dreams with each other. May we be open to how God is speaking to our hearts and minds as we prepare for God to change the world by becoming one of us, to walk around among us. In 4 weeks a baby will be born. We will sing carols and remember shepherds and angels. Hope, peace, joy and love will break into our lives again. Life can be a dream. Dream along with me.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to December 22, 2024 -- 4th Sunday of Advent -- Love Candle

 

The Scripture Readings this final Sunday of Advent are:

• Psalm 146 
•  Luke 1:39-55

The Sermon title is Jesus Is Coming, Sing Justice, Dance Love

Early Thoughts: Mary was not, it appears, meek nor mild. Mary had a vision of how was God was at work to transform the world -- ands wasn't shy about sharing it.

I think I like the story of Mary and Elizabeth's meeting as much as the Christmas story itself. Elizabeth, pregnant when it was well past the time that such thing should happen (to quote a play I was in 30 years ago "when a women who shops the Co-Op on Seniors day is about to have a child the world is not out of surprises yet") meets her cousin Mary, pregnant too soon. As Luke tells the story, the child Elizabeth carries will be known as John the Baptizer, he will predict the coming of the Messiah. The child Mary carries will be seen as God living among us, the Word-Made-Flesh, Emmanuel. Two special children and two bold mothers.

When they greet each other Elizabeth feels her child leap for joy (which can't have been too comfortable for mom in her last trimester), some might even say John was dancing in his mother's womb. At that instant one of the women (generally seen to be Mary but some sources say Elizabeth) is moved to song.

But her song is not a lullaby. Her song is not about the worries and wonders of impending parenthood. Her song is a cry for change, a manifesto for a just new world, a proclamation that God ahs something grand in mind. Mary sings of justice, of a world turned upside down by the God who created and loves the world.

I believe that working to create a world where justice reigns is what it means to put "love your neighbour" into action. The Christmas story is not just a sweet story about angels and shepherds and a baby in a manger. The Christmas story is a story of the world being changed. It is a story of God breaking into the world to live among us and start the avalanche of justice called for by the ancient prophets "But let justice roll down like water and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." (Amos 5:24) Mary sings a song of justice to help us dance the dance of love.

Both the children who are in this story today (albeit in utero) will carry forward the song of justice and the dance of love. John will preach a baptism of repentance and encourage folk to change how they live (se Luke chapter 3 for how he does that), Jesus will call attention to the way the world could be and invite us all to live into a new way of being. It is an old song, an ancient dance -- it's rhythms can be felt from the days of Moses right through to the new heaven and new earth in Revelation and on through wise ones, prophets, and teachers to this very day.

We are invite to sing and dance too. Are we ready to lift up our voices, faltering as they may be at times, and try out the steps, even when he may have two left feet? Can we join Mary, Elizabeth, John and Jesus in hope and joy, working for peace love and justice -- a world reborn and renewed?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to December 15, 2024 -- 3rd Sunday of Advent, Year C -- Joy

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Zephaniah 3:14-20
• Isaiah 12:2-6
• Philippians 4:4-7

The Sermon title is Jesus is Coming, Relax Into Joy

Early Thoughts: What does Joy mean to you this year? Where does joy fit into the chaotic world in which we live?

I think that when defined in a faith sense joy is not about being happy. I think it is about trust.  Earlier this fall I saved this quote with the thought it might come in handy this week:

We are called to be joyful not by ignoring the chaos of the world but despite the chaos of the world.

Our Joy rests in the knowledge that we are not alone. Joy comes with the promise that God is at work transforming us and transforming the world. Joy comes with the reassurance that the powers of death and destruction will not have the final victory. Joy, as one of our Easter hymns tells us, comes with the dawn, with the morning sun, with the empty tomb.

All three of our passages this week talk about rejoicing, about being joy-filled. And in each of the presence and work of God is a key part of the call to rejoice.

As we go through Advent, as we move closer to the day when we will listen for angel song and eavesdrop and the angel says to the shepherd "I bring you Good News which shall be for all people" we await God breaking into the world yet again. When God breaks into the world, when God acts decisively in our lives we are called into joy.

Can we trust in God's presence and action enough to allow us to relax into Joy in the midst of a broken world?
--Gord

Looking Ahead to December 8, 2024 -- 2nd Sunday of Advent, Peace Candle

The Scripture readings this week are:

• Malachi 3:1-4 
• Luke 3:1-18

The Sermon title is Jesus Is Coming, Be Refined for Peace

Early Thoughts: We all Jesus the Prince of Peace. We share the promise of a transformed world where peace will be the norm. How will we get there?

I think this weeks passages hold a clue, or at least part of the answer. But first a song. Whenever I read this passage from Malachi I am reminded of a song that I learned many years ago in my late teens.

Now back to the idea of peace. Certainly peace comes from structural, systemic change. We can not have a reign of peace unless the rules of how we live together (as individuals, communities and nations) are changed. But it also means that we ourselves have to be changed. We need to be refined.

This week we hear from John the Baptist, who Luke tells us is a cousin of Jesus. John is an interesting character in our story. From what Matthew, Mark, and Luke tell us it seems he was wildly popular. People flocked out into the wilderness to hear him and be baptized by him in the Jordan (Jesus himself will be baptized by John a bit later in the story). But John's message is not warm and fuzzy. He is not in this business to make friends. John is in the business of calling people to repentance -- his is described as a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins (which makes for some interesting questions when Jesus gets dunked) -- and he is not shy about telling them how they have fallen short of the target.

Source

John's vision of what the promised Messiah will do is not different. He envisions a Messiah who will be big on judgment, on separating out the wheat from the chaff, of getting rid of the dead weight. Such a nice message to hear as we prepare for Christmas. "Joy to the World! You are all terrible people"

Then again, maybe some self-reflection is in order as we prepare for God to break into the world yet again. If we are honest with ourselves we know that we could probably do better, live better, love better. Using imagery like brood of vipers, chaff fit to be burned, or a tree that needs to be cut down might be a bit over the top but it does not hurt to be reminded that personal change is needed.

Historically Advent, like Lent, has been described as a penitential season. To repent means more than admitting where we have made wrong turns, it means to change directions. In Lent we are called to change directions in preparation for the story of cross and tomb, when God will break into the world and change the world through the Resurrection. In Advent we are called to change direction so that we are ready for God to break into the world through a baby in a manger. And our lives will never be the same again.

I actually like the imagery used by Malachi, of refining and purifying. It reminds me that each of us has the final product (gold or silver) inside us already. Refining ore removes the overburden and dross so that the pure  (or purer) product gets released. Each one of us is a diamond in the rough, a chunk of ore being refined to draw out our true essence.

As the years have passed some folk have felt uncomfortable seeing Advent as a penitential  season. Repentance language is not always comforting or joyful. There has been a desire to spend Advent in a mode of joy and celebration, to focus on Good News, to keep it all light and cheery. I get that. I understand the need to counter the dark news that fills our world. But I also don't think it is being honest.

If we are to be peacemakers in a troubled world we need to be prepared for the job. If we are going to be labourers for the Reign of God we need to be prepared for the task. Jesus is coming. God is going to break into the world yet again. It is time to let the dross get melted away, to toss the chaff into the air to blow away, to be refined and cleansed and purified. Thanks to God who continues to refine us to be who we are meant to be.
--Gord

Looking Ahead to December 1, 2024 -- 1st Sunday of Advent, Hope

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Jeremiah 33:14-16
• Luke 21:25-36

The Sermon title is Jesus Is Coming, Seek Hope in Chaos

Early Thoughts: The world is a chaotic place -- and getting more so. In the midst of that chaos is a lot of fear and despair. In the midst of that chaos are wars and rumours of wars, or economic instability, or social unrest. All of that brings worry, or foreboding, about the future.  Will things get worse? Will everything fall apart?

In the middle of all this comes Advent. In the middle of all this unrest and chaos comes the promise of God breaking into the world -- either as a baby in a manger or as the returning Christ, come to change the world.

That is where our hope lies. Our hope is in the God who promises to be with us and promises to b an active force in the world. The days are surely coming....

To a large degree we see what we want to see. Or we see what we expect to see. Or we see what we are looking for. Which does not mean that what we see is not actually there. It does mean that we may not be seeing the whole picture. In the Gospel reading this week Jesus tells his friends to be alert and watchful so they would be ready and prepared. He acknowledges the hard things but still look for the signs of something else happening. Look out and recognize the signs that the kingdom of God is near.

Traditionally the first week of Advent we light the candle of Hope. Hope, I think is a vital commodity for human well-being. Hope is what keeps us moving forward. Hope is what keeps us from self-destructing.

The world is a chaotic place. There are lots of stories about what is going wrong. If we choose we may only see the problems and the chaos. Or we can choose to look for the hope. This Advent (and on into the next year) let us commit to seek signs of hope. Speaking through the centuries Jeremiah still tells us that the time is surely coming when the world will be changed. What new leaves are sprouting? Will we miss the hope and not be ready for the transformation?
--Gord

Looking Forward to December 24, 2023 (morning) -- 4th Sunday of Advent, year B

This week we light the last candle of  our wreath, the candle of Love.

The Scripture Reading this week is John 1:1-18

The Sermon title is Word-Made-Flesh, Love Enfleshed

Early Thoughts: In the beginning there was the Word....

I am often struck by good openings. I often wish I could create good openings. Some of the ones that stick in my mind are "Call me Ishmael" (which sticks even though I have never read the book), or "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit" (what is this thing called a hobbit? why does it live in a hole?) or "Space. The final frontier...", or those opening notes  of Beethoven's 5th. These are opening that stick with you, that draw you in.  I count the opening of John's Gospel as one of those good openings.

It may not look like it but this is John's Christmas story. I know there is no bright shining star, there are no angelic messengers, no shepherds, no Magi, not even a baby but still it is a Christmas story.  It is John's statement about who Jesus is and where Jesus came from. For John Jesus is the Word that was with (and part of) God from the beginning. Jesus is that Word which was essential for creation: "All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being" and indeed for life itself put into flesh: "And the Word became flesh and lived among us".

Still there is a part of me that always wonders, what was that word? If a word is a piece of language what was it? In one of her songs Linnea Good suggests that the word was laughter, a word the song suggest echoes through the faith story. I can see some logic in that suggestion. And maybe laughter is indeed a part of that original word. But I have another candidate, one I prefer.

Any guesses what it might be? It has 4 letters....

In chapter 4 of the Epistle of 1 John (probably not written by the same person who wrote the Gospel but almost certainly written by someone from the same theological/church community) we read: "Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.".  For God is Love. Johannine theology constantly reminds us of the importance of love as we follow The Way of Jesus. WE love because God loves us, "for God so loved the world". People will know we are followers of Jesus because of our love. Not our words or our good deeds, not by the prayers we share or the hymns we sing, not by the way we dress -- by our LOVE.

Is it too much to suggest that the primeval, creative word that was with God and was God in the beginning is in fact LOVE?

The priestly hymn to creation found in Genesis 1 tells us that God speaks creation into existence. Despite the old lie many of us were told as children [Sticks and stones can break my bones but...] words have real power. They can create or they can destroy, build up or tear down.

In the beginning was the Word...
How might it change our view if we read that opening paragraph saying something like this:

In the beginning was Love and Love was with God and Love was God...All things came into being through Love and without Love not one thing came into being What has come into being in Love was life and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it.

John is clear that Jesus, who Matthew calls Emmanuel -- God-With-Us, is the Word-Made-Flesh. John the Gospel writer and John the Epistle writer are both clear that love is a key part of God's identity, that love is a key part of the Jesus story, that God loves the world. Jesus comes to show that love.

It is a Christmas story. It is about love coming to wear skin and walk among us. It is about love abiding (John's Gospel likes the word 'abide'). In Jesus the primeval creative Word becomes visible. And I think that Word is LOVE.
--Gord

Looking Forward to December 17, 2023 -- Advent 3B

This Sunday we will light the candle of Joy.

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• 1 Thessalonians 5:16-19
• Luke 1:26-55

The Sermon title is Expectant Joy

Early Thoughts: Where do you find joy in this Christmas season? Where do you find joy all year long so you can follow Paul's instruction to rejoice always? Can you give thanks in all circumstances?

Could Mary give thanks after the visit from Gabriel? Was she rejoicing? Or did it maybe take a moment or two for her to get to the joy?

I have always wondered if Luke missed a bit in his description of that discussion. Did Mary really meekly accept the news or did she argue a bit?  I sort of want to ask her, as Roger Whittaker asked, "How did it feel?" Certainly later in the story we find that Mary is a bit of a prophet, one who sees the truth of what is coming (which, as many people point out each year, makes the song Mary Did You Know sound a bit out of touch with a reading of Luke 1). I think that is where her joy comes from, the vision of what God is doing through her and her son.

The joy of Christmas is not about parties and carols and gifts. It is not about gathering with family and friends. The joy of Christmas is found in the message of angels -- and I would point out that often when angels show up they have to tell the listener to not be afraid. The joy of Christmas comes in the expectant waiting for a baby who will turn the world upside down. The joy of Christmas comes in the promise that God is active in the world -- even if that might be a bit terrifying.

And really, maybe that is the joy we should carry with us always as we follow Paul's injunction to rejoice always, to pray without ceasing, and even to give thanks in all things.  

Theologically speaking I don't think Joy is not about being happy. Joy comes from a deep place of trust and hope and confidence. I do think joy is expressed in many different ways. I do think there are times when the fear and anxiety overpower the feeling of joy. But I think that joy is always lurking in the background, even when it feels like an unwelcome guest.

We are expecting a great thing to happen. We are expecting a baby (as wonderful and terrifying as that may be). We are trusting that God is active and will be active in the world to change it, to cast the mighty from their thrones and send the rich away empty. 

Sounds like a reason for joy to me.
--Gord

Looking Forward to December 10, 2023 -- 2nd Sunday of Advent, Year B

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Isaiah 40:1-11
• Isaiah 61:1-11

The Sermon title is Rebirth!

Early Thoughts: How do we celebrate the coming of the Prince of Peace when his birthplace is a spot of violence and injustice? Where do we see the possibility of Peace in a world that is so heavily broken? Is the God of Peace and Justice active in the world? Is God sleeping, distracted, inattentive? What is the promise?

Most of those questions are not unique to 2023. Most of them, or variations on them, could have been asked in many Advent seasons over the centuries. But still we ask them, still we look for peace, still we trust (or try to trust) in the promise.

Chapter 40 marks a turning point in the book of Isaiah. Scholars will tell us that chapters 1-39 are the work of one man, with chapter 40 we move into the life and work of another person -- either also named Isaiah or a disciple of the original. The earlier chapters are more about warning the people that bad times are coming. With chapter 40 we move toward the promise of return from exile and rebirth of the nation. [This is of course a generalization --- the early chapters of Isaiah also have promises and visions of a new world, they also include the promise that God is active to renew the world.] This new section of the book begins with explicit words of comfort for a broken people.

To people in exile God offers words of reassurance. God tells them that the penalty has been paid and that the road home is being prepared. What words of comfort and reassurance do we need to hear today? What highway is being laid through the wilderness of the world leading to the promised land, the promised time of peace? If the herald were to mount up to the city walls or the high mountain (Maybe the top of the Kleskun hills??) to announce Good News what would we hear today in 2023?

We would hear the old promise of the God who comes into the world. We would hear of the God who is reshaping and reforming God's people. We would hear about the God who continues to gather God's people into their arms. We would be reminded of the God who is in control -- despite the evidence to the contrary God is somehow in control.

Later in the book we come across chapter 61, possibly the work of a third person in the school of Isaiah. Here we are reminded of the vision of what the Reign of God, the Reign of the Prince of Peace, will be like. We are reminded that the reign of peace only comes with social justice. Indeed, that which we sometimes call peace is not true peace because so often it comes at the expense of full inclusive justice for all. For true peace to reign we need true justice to be a reality.

We need the world to be reborn.

Advent is a time of getting ready for a world to be reborn. Advent is a time of reminding ourselves of the God who offers both correction and comfort. Advent is a time when we plan for the birth of a baby who will transform the world. Advent is a time to remind ourselves of the promise -- and peace is a part of that promise.

It can be hard to look at the world, to read the news, to listen to the radio and believe that peace is anything other than a pipe dream. But rebirth and renewal is possible. God is still at work. Peace and Justice are the long term plan. It will happen.

Thanks be to God.
--Gord

Looking Forward to December 3, 2020 -- 1st Sunday of Advent, Year B

In addition to being the 1st Sunday of Advent, which makes it the 1st Sunday of a new church year, this is the beginning of a new month, which means we will be celebrating the sacrament of Communion.

The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Isaiah 64:1-12
• Mark 13:24-30

The Sermon title is New World In the Morning

Early Thoughts: A new year is beginning! New possibilities lie ahead! God is at work, doing a new thing,transforming the world!

The most familiar Advent themes are probably Hope, Peace, Joy and Love.  But underlying and amidst those are also themes of birth and newness. At the smae time we celebrate those things in the midst of a world that so often seems to work against Hope, Peace, Joy and Love. How do we proclaim the promise in a broken world?

Well Christians have been proclaiming the promise in a broken world for almost 2000 years by now -- so we should know how to do that.

The reading for the 1st Sunday of Advent always feel a little bit out of step with the world around us. AS the world is ramping up for Christmas we show up in church 4 weeks before Christmas and hear words that don't sound very joyful or hopeful. Do we really want God to "tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence—as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil—to make your name known to your adversaries, so that the nations might tremble at your presence!"? Where are the jingling bells and the bright lights and the sweet happy songs?

Advent is about preparing for a baby. Advent is also about preparing for the world to be changed. This is the Sunday when we will light the candle of Hope. Our hope is in fact that God will tear open the heavens. Our hope is that God will reshape and remold us (and indeed the whole world) as a potter would work the clay. Our hope is in the promise that the Reign of God, the Reign of Christ will break into our reality and a new world will be born. We share the hope shared by John of Patmos, the writer of Revelation, who saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the old one had passed away (Revelation 21:1).

The world is not what we would hope it could be. Between inflation and interest hike, a looming (or already breaking) climate crisis, homelessness, opiod crisis, gang crime, racism, war zones around the world and so many other things hope might seem like a fool's bet. I think we are sometimes called to be fools.

Hope is rugged and ready for the fight. Hope is what leads up to look at the world as it is and keep looking for what it could be. Roger Whittaker once sang about a new world in the morning. He then reminded us that the morning is today. Dawn is breaking, a new world is being born, God is tearing open the heavens and breaking into the world. Advent is here!

And in that reality I do indeed find hope -- most days at least.
--Gord

Looking Forward to December 18, 2022 -- 4th Sunday of Advent

 The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Matthew 1:18-25
• Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23

The Sermon title is Dreams of Love

Early Thoughts: Disney's Cinderella would have us believe that "a dream is a wish your heart makes, when your fast asleep". The Everly Brothers suggested that all we had to do was dream and our beloved would be in our arms. The Mamas and the Papas told us that California Dreamin' was the way to escape a dreary winter's day. It seems often, but not always, when we sing about dreams we treat them either as wishful thinking or a way to escape reality.

Maybe dreams are like that sometimes. I know I have had my share of escapist or wishful or 'what if' day dreams over the years.

But sometimes dreams are something deeper. When we quote Dr. King's famous speech where he pronounced "I have a dream" nobody accuses us of being escapist. We recognize the words of a man who knew reality and saw a different possibility. Sometimes dreams push us to live differently.

Still, it often seems that to say someone is a dreamer is a slightly nicer way of saying they have unrealistic hopes or expectations.

Then there are dreams in Scripture. Dreams are a common way for God to communicate with God's people in our faith story. Consistently those dreams are times when God offers direction and/or comfort so that those people can go on following God's Way. And so I believe they are dreams based in God's love for the world and for those individuals. In love God encourages them to follow a hopeful path (even if there are times the path seems fraught with danger and disaster).

As Matthew tells the story, Joseph is a dreamer [which reminds me of another Joseph who rose to prominence  not just for having dreams but also for interpreting other people's dreams]. In a dream he is told not to give in to the rules and divorce Mary, despite her being pregnant, but to marry her and name the child (to have Joseph name the child would show that Joseph is accepting the child as his own). In a dream he is warned to get out of town before Herod's goons get there. In a dream he is told to go back to his homeland, and then a subsequent dream suggests he go to a different town instead.

Would the story of Jesus even get going without all these dreams? What role do dreams have in furthering the story of Love?

In these verses Matthew shows God acting through dreams to make the story possible, to make the renewal and restoration of the world possible. [There is another dream in these chapters of Matthew -- the Magi are warned not to tell Herod where the child is to be found.] In dreams, God is acting to protect the promise of Christmas.

How does God move in our dreams? How does God prod us to act, to participate in the story of renewal and restoration and redemption that we find in Jesus of Nazareth? How does God plant the dream of a renewed world in our hearts?

Are we ready to dream big dreams, and live out the dream despite the dangers there may be along the way? Can we share the dream and possibility and promise of love active in the world?

Can we risk being called dreamers?
--Gord

Looking Forward to December 11, 2022 -- Advent 3A

 The Scripture Readings this week are:

• Psalm 146:5-10
• Isaiah 35:1-10
• Luke 1:46-55

The Sermon title is Rejoice! The World is Changing!

Early Thoughts: Joy to the World! The Lord is come! Mind you that seems also to carry the promise of a lot of turning the world upside down.

In the Gospel of John we are told that unless a seed falls into the ground and dies it will only remain a seed, but if it goes through death it becomes much more. When a seed is planted it is transformed. When a seed is planted what looked like barren ground can burst into life. Flowers can bloom. Joy  abounds!

Our cause for rejoicing as people of faith is inextricably linked to God's ongoing work of transforming the world, transforming us. And yeah, sometimes the process of being transformed is really kind of difficult and painful and less than joyful.

Mary sings words that echo the Psalm reading, words about a world being turned upside down. Isaiah promises renewal and return and new life (flowers in the desert wilderness). Isaiah also talks about strengthening weak hands and hearts, about encouraging those who are fearful as this time of renewal breaks into the world.

This week we will light the candle of Joy. Paul once exhorted us to "Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say rejoice". Our faith story is not about a world that is staying the same. It is the story of a world that is being changed, of values that run counter to what is generally considered common sense, of an invitation to let ourselves be transformed in mind, heart, and soul. And still we are called to rejoice.

Change is hard. Change is often nerve-wracking or terrifying. Often we try to avoid change, or at least to control it. But God invites us to embrace change that we can not control. God steadies our nerves and strengthens our trembling knees so that we can be transformed. And for that we will rejoice.
--Gord

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