John 1:43-51
David A. Davis
January 14

Our text from John’s gospel this morning comes from the very first chapter. Here in John, right after John the Baptist comes on the scene, he points to Jesus coming toward him so that his own disciples could see “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Two of John’s disciples then followed Jesus. They asked Jesus where he was staying and Jesus said, “Come and see.” One of those disciples named Andrew went and found his brother Simon and told him that they found the Messiah. As soon as Jesus saw Simon, he announced that Simon would now be referred to as Cephas, which when translated is Peter. All this naming and calling and looking and seeing continues in the last part of John, chapter 1, which is our reading.

[John 1:43-51 is read]

Jesus found Philip. Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found him about whom Moses… and the prophets wrote.” Nathanial wondered how anything could come out of a podunk, nothing town like Nazareth. Philip said, “Come and see.” When Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him he praised him as one of strong character and faith. Nathanael wondered how Jesus knew anything about him at all. Jesus told him, “I saw you.”

Nathanael — in a way that was something more than the Samaritan woman, who said after meeting Jesus at the well, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” — Nathanael — in a way more like Mary, who when in the empty tomb turned and said to the Risen Jesus, “Rabbouni” — Nathanael — in a Thomas kind of way after Thomas saw the scarred hands and side, and said, “My Lord and my God!” — Nathanael said, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!”

Jesus responded to Nathanael’s acclamation and told him, “You will see greater things than these.” And with the reference to the angels of God ascending and descending Jesus must have been hearkening back to Jacob, and Jacob’s dream, Jacob’s ladder, the angels ascending and descending. For in that dream, God affirmed to Jacob God’s promise, God’s covenant, God’s intent for greater things. God to Jacob. Jesus to Nathanael. Jesus to Andrew. Jesus to Peter. Jesus to the disciples. Jesus to the church. Jesus to us. “Come and see.”

Of course, the “come and see” in John’s gospel is all about the life, the teaching, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus. John is often understood to be the gospel of signs, the seven signs of Christ’s ministry: miracles, healings, feedings, raising Lazarus from the dead. And the very last verse of John’s Gospel? “There are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” Come and see all that he has done.

In the other three gospels, when the devil comes to tempt Jesus in the wilderness, Jesus is taken to see stones that could be turned into bread. Jesus is lifted to the highest point of the temple in the holy city and told to throw himself down. Jesus is taken to a very high mountain to see all the kingdoms of the world.

In John’s gospel, Nathanael, Andrew, Peter, the disciples, the church, the reader, the followers of Jesus are taken to see all that Christ has done. Miracles, healings, feedings. Come and see lives saved, lives transformed, a kingdom unfolding in the hearts and minds and lives of people. Come and see, not mountains and temple tops, but humanity transformed, forgiveness on the loose, wholeness unleashed, abundant life on the rise, servanthood unbound, righteousness afoot, justice rolling down. Greater things. Kingdom-like things. Come and see what God’s people dream about, and work toward, and speak to, and pray for. Come and see God’s people live!

The remarkable part of the “come and see-ness” of John’s gospel is how people-based it is. Jesus and Nathanael. Jesus and the 5,000. Jesus and the paralyzed man by the pool. Jesus and the Samaritan woman. Jesus and the man born blind. Come and see… people. Lives. The “come and see-ness” of John’s gospel, it may not always come with a name, but there is a face. Not just faith-based, it’s face-based.

And the “come and see-ness” of the gospel has an extreme present tense to it. Jesus said to Nathanael early on, “You will see greater things than these.” And he did. He did then see greater things. In real time. The “come and see-ness” of the timeless gospel of Jesus Christ. John the Baptist pointed to him. He pointed to everyone else whose lives were forever touched, forever transformed, forever made whole. The timeless gospel. Greater things in real time.

The “come and see-ness’ of the gospel. It raises the question of the “come and see-ness” of your life and mine, the “come and see-ness” of all who know themselves to be the body of Christ. In real time, who else does Jesus have to point to?

On the morning of the special senate election in Alabama, the editor of Christianity Today penned an essay entitled “The Biggest Loser in the Alabama Election.” The editor of theologically conservative magazine argued right from the beginning that the biggest loser bar none was Christian faith. He wrote, “When it comes to either matters of life and death or personal commitments of the human heart, no one will believe a word we say, perhaps for a generation. Christianity’s integrity is severely tarnished.” The present issue being addressed was how the far evangelical right lined up and endorsed a candidate of questionable background and moral standing pretty much in the name of Christian faith.

The editor went on to criticize quite thoroughly people of faith on all sides whose witness in the political arena falls short of the gospel they proclaim. He writes at end of the editorial:

The way forward is unclear, for to love one’s neighbor in a democratic society means that Christians must participate in the public square to seek the common good. We cannot forsake our political duty, and that duty will lead believers in different directions. It’s just that when we do engage in politics, we so often end up doing and saying things that make us sound and act like we don’t care about the very values we champion. Perhaps the first step is for Christians Left and Right, when they stand up to champion a cause, to stop saying, ‘Thus says the Lord’ and ‘Lord, I thank you that you have not made me like these other Christians,’ but frame their politics with, ‘Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

It seems to me his was a call for the “Come and see-ness” of the gospel of Jesus Christ. People like us, in the sinfulness of our humanity, are more interested in something more akin to comeuppance when it comes to faith and public life. Jesus isn’t interested in comeuppance. He’s calling for “come and see-ness.” Jesus calls us to a “come and see-ness” in the witness of our faith in life public and life private. Jesus calls us to a real-time Christian life worthy of his gospel, of his witness, of his pointing. Where else does he have to point?

On the night before he was murdered, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King delivered his infamous “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech in Memphis. The end of the sermon was unforgettable.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land! And so I’m happy, tonight I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!

Dr. King and his dreams. Dr. King and angels ascending and descending. Dr. King and greater things. Just a bit early in the sermon King tells the story of the letter he received from a young white girl after he had been stabbed in New York City. Reports circulated afterward that if Dr. King had sneezed he would have died from the wound so close to his heart. The 9th-grade girl wrote to him, “I am simply writing to you to tell you I am so happy that you didn’t sneeze.” Dr. King then went on in the speech with a litany of sorts, a riff on how he too was happy he didn’t sneeze.

He was happy he didn’t sneeze because of all that he had seen between 1960 and 1968. He preaches:

If I had sneezed, I wouldn’t have seen when students all over the South started sitting-in at lunch counters… If I had sneezed, I wouldn’t have been around here in 1961, when we decided to take a ride for freedom and ended segregation in inter-state travel… If I had sneezed — if I had sneezed I wouldn’t have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation, and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill… If I had sneezed, I wouldn’t have been down in Selma, Alabama, to see the great Movement there… If I had sneezed, I wouldn’t have been in Memphis to see a community rally around those brothers and sisters who are suffering… I’m so happy that I didn’t sneeze.

Maybe the mountaintop for Dr. King, maybe the glory of the coming of the Lord, wasn’t just a spiritual vision, or an out-of-body mystical moment of prayer, or a godly moment of seeing visions and dreaming dreams. Maybe the mountaintop was in the glimpses, in the seeing Christ at work in hearts and minds and lives and people. Hoping against hope in a harsh and brutal world and yet still experiencing the “come and see-ness” of the gospel in the lives of God’s people. Being blessed to see the greater things, to see all that Jesus has done, is doing, in real time. “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!”

If that editor at Christianity Today is even partly correct, that no one will believe a word we say perhaps for a generation, then Nassau Presbyterian Church, we better be paying more attention to how we live, and how we act, and what the world perceives when they come and see. The face-based part of life in the body of Christ here and now. How you and I together look to seed transformation and allow forgiveness to set us free and crave wholeness for all and commit to abundant life in the power of the Holy Spirit and a selfless servanthood first and righteousness that comes with feet on the ground and hands getting dirty and crying out for and looking for and pointing to the everlasting stream of justice. Come and see how God’s people live!

How they stick up for the most vulnerable, how they never give up working for those the world deems “the least of these,” how they yearn to speak truth in the face of power, how they pray for the sick and care for the dying and sit with the grieving, how they commit even more to teaching children and young people that there is, in fact, a more excellent way. That way of love.

Come and see how God’s people live! How they recommit to use their voice for others who have been too long silenced. How they have to figure out over and over again that, actually, your Christian faith ought a play a role in the jokes you tell and how you refer to other people, and Christian faith does make a difference in every relationship, the most intimate to the most public, relationships at work, relationships on the street, relationships where you have all the power, relationships where you have none. That “love your neighbor” and “turn the other cheek” and “the last shall be first” are not listed as optional in the gospel.

The “come and see-ness” of the gospel of Jesus Christ in real time. Where else does Jesus have to point?

© 2018 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.

Readings from Matthew 1-2 and Luke 2
Joyce MacKichan Walker and others
December 31, 2017

© 2017 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.

Isaiah 61:1-11
David A. Davis
December 17, 2017
Advent III

When preparing to preach on a particular biblical passage, preachers like me often go and find other sermons that have been given on the text. When you have been doing this for a while, that would include looking at your own past sermons. Finding other sermons is lot easier now than it used be. Back in the day the search would be limited to the books of sermons on the shelf in the study. Now, of course, a pastor can spend a morning online and find tons of sermons. In this case, sermons on Isaiah 61.

Some look for sermons by notable preachers who have inspired before or important preachers in history. Others have their “go to” church websites to listen to friends and colleagues, folks who are slugging it out week in and week out. Sermons in “real time” as it were. Preachers have to figure out a way to have their own craving for good preaching met. Not much inspiration comes if the only voice you hear is your own.

The thing about Isaiah 61 is that Jesus preached on this passage. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Jesus preached on that. Good news to the poor. Release to the captives. Recover of sight to the blind. The oppressed go free. Jesus preached on Isaiah 61. Luke writes about it in his gospel. Luke, the fourth chapter.

After Jesus was tempted by the devil for forty days in the wilderness, Luke tells of Jesus, now filled with the power of the Spirit, returning to Galilee as reports about him spread through all the surrounding country. Jesus began to teach in the synagogues of Galilee and he was, according to Luke, being praised by everyone. Then he came to Nazareth, where we had been brought up. He came to teach in the synagogue in his home town. That’s when, that’s where he preached on this passage from Isaiah.

Jesus stood up. The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled it and found the place where it was written, where this was written: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Jesus rolled up the scroll. He gave it back to the attendant and sat down again. All the eyes of the people in the synagogue were fixed on him. People waiting, wondering, watching. And Jesus began to say, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” And that was all he said.

He didn’t preach that sermon in the Garden of Gethsemane at the Last Supper. He didn’t preach it then and say, “Tomorrow this scripture shall be fulfilled.” He didn’t preach the sermon at his trial before Pilate, or when the soldiers were taunting and abusing him, or when he was hanging there between the two thieves. He told them, “Today you will be with me in Paradise,” not “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” The Risen Jesus didn’t preach this sermon at the tomb when Mary held onto his feet, or along the Emmaus Road when he taught the two men all that was in the scripture, or when he cooked breakfast for the disciples on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, or when he gave the Great Commission. The Risen Christ didn’t preach Isaiah 61 then and say, “Now, finally, at last, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

No. Jesus preached Isaiah right at the beginning of his ministry in Luke. He preached it before he healed Simon’s mother-in-law, before he touched the man with leprosy and healed him, before that paralyzed man was lowered through the roof and he healed him, before he called the tax collector and the rest of the twelve, before all the teaching, before all the miracles. Jesus and Isaiah 61. It was before the Sermon on the Plain, before the parables, before the lost sheep and the lost coin and the Prodigal Son and Zacchaeus and the widow with two copper coins. Before all of that, Jesus read from the scroll of Isaiah, sat down, and said, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” But the sermon didn’t end there.

The sermon was his life. Good news to the poor. Release to the captives. Recovery of sight to the blind. The oppressed go free. Comfort to those who mourn. Building and repairing from ruins. Loving justice. Exulting in God. Clothed with the garments of salvation. Covered with robes of righteousness. Righteousness and praise before all the nations. Jesus preached Isaiah 61 with this life. God’s glory revealed in him. Before God’s glory revealed in his death, before God’s glory revealed in his resurrection, before God’s glory revealed in the Lamb upon the throne, God’s glory is revealed in his life, in his touch, in his teaching, in his healing, in his preaching. God’s glory revealed in his flesh.

There is a certain timelessness to the last few chapters of Isaiah. The prophet is preaching to the people of God who had, in every possible way, failed to live up to the expectations and hopes of better and more faith-filled days. Rebuilding and restoring and refreshing religious life and ritual practice and community cohesion was all a failure. Division and rejection of the other and passing judgment and splintering and separation carried the day. The faith being touted and professed was not the faith being lived and practiced.

The prophet’s encouragement, the prophet’s word, the prophet’s hope, the prophet’s “good news” comes to the oppressed, the brokenhearted, the captives, the prisoners. The prophet’s “good news” is promise that life shall again flourish even from the ruins, that repair shall come to the cities, that righteousness shall rise among the nations. The prophet’s “good news” is that amid all that life-crushing devastation, even then, even now, God is faithful. God of the everlasting covenant is faithful. Amid the timeless failure of God’s people to live up to the expectation of better and more faith-filled days, and the chronic inevitability of our sinfulness, and the episodic chaos of life, God is faithful…still.

Cynthia Jarvis, pastor at the Chestnut Hill Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia and once a pastor here at Nassau, puts it this way. Cindy writes, “the God who can build up ancient ruins is also the God who can redeem the ruin a prodigal son believes he has made of his life, the God who shall raise up the former devastations is also the God who means to pick up a daughter’s broken parts, the God who shall repair the ruined cities and the devastations of many generations is also the God who can repair even the ruined nation that has forgotten its way in the world.”

The prophet’s “good news” is that God’s transforming and redeeming faithfulness is revealed in the flesh of our lives. God’s glory revealed in Him, in his flesh, and thus, the hope, the promise, the yearning that God’s glory would be revealed in ours. Jesus didn’t wait until the end of his life, the end of the gospel, to preach Isaiah 61. That’s because God’s glory isn’t just about the promised life to come, it’s about life here and now. It’s about good news and comfort and repair and justice and righteousness and praise… now. In your life and in mine and in the world.

I told you all a few weeks ago to come to our Wee Christmas celebration that first Wednesday of December. You missed quite the production and proclamation. As I told the story of the birth of Jesus the second time, all the children had parts and were in costume: angels, shepherds, animals, Magi. It just so happened with the numbers that we had four or five Marys and one Joseph. Each of the Mary’s were carrying a baby doll Jesus. You will understand the decorum that allowed for the Mary’s to be “carrying the child” in the form of a doll in arms while on the way with Joseph to Bethlehem. After Joseph found them a spot for the night back in the barn, and after all the animals came to gathered round to welcome Mary and Joseph to their stable (animals being kids with horse, cow, sheep, and pig masks), the time came for Mary to deliver her child and lay him in the manger.

Now I did invite the Marys to all put their baby doll Jesuses in the manger. I did not, however, imply Jesus should be tossed into the manger with the same vigor of tossing a t-shirt at the end of the day in the dirty clothes basket. Jesus (all four or five of them) was hurled into the manger with a significant amount of force that frankly left Joseph looking rather bewildered. The result was that Jesus dolls were strewn in that manger every which way; piled in, hanging out, with no concern at all for what might be cute and cuddily. That manger was teeming with flesh. There was flesh everywhere. Humanity just spilling out of the manger.

Upon further review, that pageant image from Wee Christmas, is an apt theological metaphor for the manger, for the Incarnation, for God with us. God in Christ come all the way down. Humanity just spilling out of the manger. Because God’s glory is revealed not just in Christ’s holiness, in his divinity. God’s glory is also revealed in his flesh: in his healing touch, in his tears, in his embrace of the sinner, his welcome of the stranger, his care for the sick, his daring, boundary-crossing love, his challenge to the rich, his threat to the powerful, his frustration with the pious, his concern for the poor, his undivided attention to the broken. Good news and comfort and repair and justice and righteousness and praise with his life. The prophet’s “good news” is God’s glory revealed in Him. The prophet’s promise is that if God’s glory is revealed in Him, then God’s glory can be revealed in us, as we live for Him, as we serve Him, as we learn from Him.

There is a certain timelessness to the last few chapters of Isaiah and the promise and call for good news and comfort and repair and justice and righteousness and praise. A timeless resonance when it comes to our lives, to our community, to the nation, to the world. A timelessness relevant to the brokenness of our humanity. Here’s the prophet’s call, the prophet’s challenge, the prophet’s inspiring, convicting call upon our hearts and our lives: Isaiah 61 in one hand and the world in the other. You and I, we’ve got to start preaching. Preaching with our lives. Preaching, living, working for, telling, shouting, praying about, serving, doing, the “good news.”

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

“Today.”

© 2017 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.

Isaiah 40:1-11
David A. Davis
December 10, 2017
Advent II

There is not as much “comfort” in the Bible as one might think. Comfort, as in the word “comfort.” Comfort, as in “Comfort, O comfort my people.” You would sort of think that the word would pretty much be strewn all over the pages of scripture. The word “comfort” in Hebrew and Greek ought to roll off the pages, the scrolls, in abundance. But not really.

You and I, we could all list some familiar citations, the most familiar examples. “For thou are with me, thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me” (Ps. 23). Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, the Beatitudes. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall me comforted” (Mt. 5). A few of the other psalms go for some “comfort.” “You, O Lord, have helped and comforted me” (Ps 86). “You will increase my honor and comfort me once again” (Ps 71). Psalm 119 is long enough that there are several occurrences of the word there.

Some may remember that the three friends of Job famously met together and set out to “console and comfort” (Job 2). Job when his life started to fall apart. The prophet Jeremiah beautifully tells of God’s promise of turning mourning into joy, gladness into sorrow, “I will comfort them” (Jer. 31), says the Lord.

But other than that one Beatitude, there is very little other “comfort” in the four gospels. The Apostle Paul tosses in some “comfort” in his thanksgiving offered in the Second Letter to the Thessalonians. But a careful reading and keeping of the semantic metrics would indicate there is a surprising lack of “comfort” in the Bible.

A professor of the Hebrew Bible once described the first 39 chapters of Isaiah as one long prophet finger wag at the people of Israel. In fact the term used was that of “prophetic assault,” that the prophet lays into the people for their continuous, ever mounting, and quite appalling sin, especially as it related to their lack of care for the poor, the hungry, the orphans, and the widows. To read the first 39 chapters of Isaiah is to, as the professor put it, “take a bath in religious condemnation” intended to reflect how furious God was with God’s people.

Thirty-nine chapters far from “comfort.” That helps me to understand how when the old Wednesday morning men’s Bible study decided to join the congregation in reading the Bible through the year, when we got to Isaiah, folks started dropping like flies. Isaiah 1-39 together with the fact that I was diagnosed with “mono” about the same time pretty much brought an end to that Bible study!

All of the above on “comfort” is to say that “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God!” is a really, really big deal. “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem.” To a people now in exile, now held captive in Babylon, now trying to sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land, to a people whose sins are exponential, who have known little else but destruction and judgment and chaos and ruin, enough, now. Enough!Speak tenderly, “comfort, comfort, comfort, comfort.”

Thirty-nine chapters of judgment and the voice changes, the page turns, a new song is heard. Not because of a people’s miraculous transformation, not because of some seismic behavioral shift, not because of a religious great awakening. It all changes because of the unilateral, prevenient, intrusive, shocking grace of God. The term has been served. The penalty has been paid. Enough is enough. “Comfort, O comfort my people says your God.” The radical, game changing, life changing, salvation history-changing comfort of God.

Pat Lyons was our former director of communications here at the church. He died very suddenly several weeks ago. His memorial service was held at Trinity Church where he was a member. Pat was an Episcopalian. He had this self-deprecating Episcopalian humor. “We’re not always sure what we believe, but darn it we dress well,” he would say. And he would tell me that Episcopalians don’t believe salvation by good works, they believe in salvation by good taste.

Don’t get too carried away, you frozen chosen, you “decently and in order” rowdies, you Protestant Work Ethic devotees, you Presbyterians who major in being the Type A personalities of the Protestant world. Type A Protestants who really do think we better still earn it, or work to deserve it, or do something, anything to help it… to earn, to work, to deserve, to help along our salvation.

I mean we Presbyterians give it a good go when it comes to singing and proclaiming that we are “saved by grace through faith alone” but that deeply rooted spiritual myth of pulling up bootstraps never really goes away. And we’re kidding ourselves in when we pretend there isn’t always that underlying threat to our experience of — that heretical detraction from, our ingrained tendency to deny — the radical unexpected comfort of God.

When you underestimate the bold intrusion of “comfort” in the opening verse of Isaiah 40, then it’s way to easy to read the rest of the promise as a conditional clause, an “if-then statement.” “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low, the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain… Then… the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.” Prepare the way. Make straight a path. Prepare and make, in every valley and every mountain, all the uneven places and rough places. Prepare. Make. Excavate a way and then “the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” It is the “if you build it, he will come” reading of the prophet’s song. If you prepare the Way, then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.

There is old saw of a story in my family and I could never tell if it was true or not. It was often said that in my parents’ younger years when they would entertain, have a dinner party or a New Year’s Eve party or a bowl game party, my mother’s preparation took a unique form. She would go through the house and replace all the light bulbs with lower wattage, dimmer ones. Rather than clean beforehand, she would wait and clean afterward. The party was going to happen whether the house was clean or not. Dim the lights, clean once. A bit of party wisdom, probably party folklore as well. Party preparation in a different light.

Preparing the Way is not in order for the glory to be revealed. Preparing the Way is in response to that that radical, game changing, life changing, salvation history-changing comfort of God. John the Baptist with his “Brood of Vipers” sermon in Luke made it quite clear that the glory of the Lord is coming whether you are prepared or not, the Way of the Lord shall be made whether you make it or not, this glory train is coming whether you’re working the track or not, whether you deserve it, earn it, work it, help it, or not. Isaiah blurts it out like never before. The glory is revealed in God’s comfort. “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.”

And the Way? The pathway, it’s going into every valley, and every mountain and hill, and all the uneven ground, and the rough places too. The Way of the Lord shall be everywhere. The kingdom shall know no end. It shall be on earth, on all the earth, as it is in heaven. The glory of the Lord will touch the roughest places and the most uneven ground and the highest mountain and deepest and darkest of valleys, even in the valley of the shadow of death, God’s glory, God’s comfort. Yes, it shall meet you there too.

The glory of the Lord revealed in every valley. The vast expanse of the Way, every valley, every mountain, and every rough place, is not a reflection of the thoroughness of our preparation. It is an affirmation of the “completeness” of salvation. It sounds like a no-brainer, almost a silly thing to have to say, but it is no small theological and spiritual affirmation: “Salvation is bigger than us” and no one understood that better than the Hebrew prophets and John the Baptist.

Yesterday at the memorial service for Margaret Migliore, as we witnessed to our resurrection hope in Christ the Lord, I shared with the gathered congregation that Margaret never asked for prayer for herself. She never complained either. But in the midst of a pastoral visit from me or other members of the staff, when asked what she would like us to pray for, it was always prayers for others and prayers for our nation and prayers for the world.

In fact over the summer as Margaret was struggling for health and facing setback after setback, she was always more worried about what was going in the world, and in our country, and in our community, and in the lives of those she loved, those in need, including the poor, the hungry, the orphans, and the widows. Margaret’s prayer was for the rough places. Her prayer was for the salvation of the world. Her prayer was for God’s comfort for the world. That the glory of the Lord shall be revealed. Her confidence was in God’s love for her and God’s love for the world.

The radical, game changing, life changing, salvation history-changing comfort of God. And the completeness of salvation. That’s not a bad Advent pairing. Not a bad Advent affirmation. The comfort of God in every valley, and every mountain, all the uneven ground, and rough places too. Comfort. Comfort. Comfort.

Here’s the Advent prayer: that the glory of the Lord would be revealed in every valley. And the Advent promise? That the glory of the Lord shall be revealed in every valley.

“Comfort, O comfort, my people, says your God.”

© 2017 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.

Isaiah 64:1-9
David A. Davis
December 3, 2017
Advent I

You can imagine it. You may have experienced it. That moment when the two kids, just older than toddlers, not quite first graders, maybe siblings, maybe friends, they are off in the bedroom playing, keeping themselves occupied. The parent, just a few steps away, has that sudden realization that things have been too quiet for too long and goes to stick a head in the door. It was the morning that the kids found out crayons can write on walls as well as paper. But the walls are a lot bigger and more fun. And the parent, with all the appropriate amount of love and playfulness in the voice, proclaims, “Oh my goodness, what a mess!”.

You can imagine it. You may have experienced it. The college student is home for the holidays. Home, meaning sleeping at home… a lot. Sleeping a lot. Finals just complete. Another semester in the books. The parent, so glad to have the young adult home, sticks a head in the door mid-day to make sure the child is still there, still sleeping. And the room, well, the room is a mess. And the parent bites the tongue, opts for the joy of having them home, closes the door, and proclaims in a whisper, with a sigh, “Whew, what a mess!”

You can imagine it. You may have experienced it. Another crazy week at work. Too many twelve-, fourteen-hour days. The long commute. The stress of the numbers. The emails that won’t stop, ever. Then that night of the holiday concert at school. The parent didn’t get away from the office as planned. The train was late. Finally arriving halfway through, the now quite discombobulated, weary one who left home at 5:45 that morning plops into the seat on the edge of the row there with the rest of the family. The look from them, from friends and strangers and from the middle-schooler up on stage, now sitting back down, says it all. The solo just finished. And sitting there, still trying to catch a breath, the craziness of an out-of-control life screams inside. And the parent holds back the tears and with regret proclaims to himself, “Wow, what a mess!”

You can imagine it. You may have experienced it. The freshly minted retiree sits down at the kitchen table with a big old cup of coffee and two newspapers. The scene is one the retiree looked forward to for years. Papers in hard copy, morning sunshine, quiet room, nowhere to go. Obituary section first. Then local news. Followed by national, international, sports, entertainment, and, lastly, opinion. The silence is broken both by the sound of sipping from a cup and the voice of the retiree, who knows full well there was no one to hear, but with a voice full of frustration: “What a mess.” The morning reader doesn’t just say it after reading the two papers; the proclamation comes after every single section, everything but the crossword.

You can imagine it. You may have read about it. A prophet rises among the people of God. The temple, the center of worship and religious life and identity, it stands in ruins. The attempt to rebuild is in shambles as well. Just like the temple, the community is nothing but ruins. Conflict and bitterness rampant. Suffering fills the land. The longing is for a life back in exile, back in captivity. God seems distant. Sinfulness abounds. And the prophet rises among the people of God and proclaims, “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence… From ages past no one has heard, no ear perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you… We have all become like one unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy cloth. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.” A prophet rises among the people of God and with urgency and passion, proclaims, “What a mess!”

What a mess! “Yet, O Lord, you are our Father, we are the clay, and you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.” The potter and the clay. You will remember another prophet and another day. The same image. The potter and the clay. Jeremiah and his trip to the potter’s house. The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah and told him to go down to the potter’s house. Jeremiah tells of watching the potter work there at the wheel. The vessel of clay was spoiled so the potter just kept working, reworking, reshaping a new vessel until it seemed good to the potter. And the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: “Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done?… Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand…”

The potter and the clay. Three hymnbooks ago in the Presbyterian Church, it was number 302. The old red hymnbook. “Have thine on way, Lord! Have thine one way! Thou art the Potter, I am the clay. Mold me and make me, after thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still.” Both the early 20th century hymn and the prophet Jeremiah, affirming that we are like clay in the hands of God. For the individual disciples and for the community of faith, the promise tells of the shaping and reworking of the very hand of God in our lives. “Have thing own way, Lord! Like clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand,” says the Lord.

That’s Jeremiah. But we’re reading Isaiah this first Sunday of Advent. And Isaiah steps into the image of the potter and clay from a different perspective. The downbeat of Isaiah’s use of the metaphor is not the promise, it’s the mess. What a mess! Of course the prophet’s exhortation is directed to the people of Israel. But a careful read of the text shows the proclamation is intended for the very ears God has as well. What a mess, O people! What a mess, O God! And yet, and still, and even now, the prophet keeps preaching, “Even now you are our Father; we are the clay and you are our potter. We are all the work of your hand.” The people of God aren’t the ones Isaiah is reminding here. It is God. Look at this mess, the mess of our lives, the mess of our world, the mess of my heart and my faith. Yet, O Lord, you are our Father. Yet, you are our God.

We are just the clay. You are the potter. We’re just all the work of your hand. Don’t give up on us now. Don’t hide from us now. Don’t be angry now. You are the God of our salvation. Our help comes from you and you alone. In you is our hope. In you we find forgiveness. In you there is new life. You better have Thy own way, because mine, because ours, it’s not working all that well, O Lord. To quote the Advent prayer: come, Lord, Jesus, quickly come. You’d better come quickly, Jesus. As Robert Duvall in the movie The Apostle put it, “I’ve always called you Jesus. You’ve always called me Sonny. Tell me what to do Jesus.” We’re only the clay. You’re the potter!

“Every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death, until he comes.” Here at the table, every time. We say it. You hear it. And we all wonder why only his death is mentioned. “You proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” Some celebrants toss a little resurrection in there, or refer to it as his saving death to help us all feel better about it. But the quote, the quote is from Paul in I Corinthians 11:26. “You proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” The Lord’s Supper. The Last Supper. The night of his betrayal. The night of his arrest. The night before he was hung up to die. Our Savior, the Child of Bethlehem, the Son of God, the Great Shepherd of the Sheep, the Teacher, the Healer, the one who ate with sinners, and challenged the rich, and touched the unclean, and wanted to be servant of all, the one born in a manger in the still of night, it was the night before he was nailed to a cross to die abandoned by absolutely everyone. Yeah, what a mess.

Yes, you remember his death until he comes. Because in his death, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in his death you really find out that the Potter, the Potter became the clay. Christ took on our flesh. Christ took on this mess. Christ took all this on because of God’s love. Because we are all the work of God’s hand. And God saved us through Christ. And Jesus, Jesus was clay. He became clay. Christ and us. God with us. You are the potter. Our salvation, the Glory of the Lord, revealed in clay.

Advent is so much more than a time of year. Advent is when you come to the point in your life, in your heart, in your faith, in the world when you crave to be assured yet again that your salvation, that our salvation rests in God and God alone. Advent is when you feel like things are a mess yet you know that despite the all the mess, in the midst of all the mess, right smack in the middle of all this mess, Christ shall come.

Come, Lord Jesus! Quickly come! No, really, Jesus. Really quickly come!

© 2017 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.

I Thessalonians 4:13-5:11
David A. Davis
November 12, 2017

Wake up and encourage one another! Here in Paul’s letter, after the salutations, and the greetings, and the expressions of thanks, and after tending to the pastoral relationship, and offering exhortations, and pretty much constantly giving thanks to God for how much they love each other, and after the description of what it means to be holy, now Paul seems to get to what is on the congregation’s heart. The question that is tugging at their faith. The worry that is not being helped by all that love for another. Well into the letter, well into the body of the letter, Paul brings up the nagging questions that won’t seem to go away. Paul finally comes to what it is in the day-to-day in all that is going on around them. He gets to what is weighing them down. They are worried about those who have died. It’s their grief. What’s getting to them is all the death and destruction. And Paul writes to them and pleads with them to wake up and encourage one another with the promise of life forever in the presence of God.

Some of the language, the images, the expressions leap off the page. They grab the readers’ ears and sort demand their own attention: a cry of command, the archangels call, the sound of the trumpet, a thief in the night, a pregnant woman, children of light, the breastplate of faith and love, a helmet of faith and faith. And this word picture of Jesus swooping out of heaven and scooping up the living, “we will be caught up in the clouds together with them to meet the Lord in the air.” What is so easily missed, taken for granted, overshadowed by flashy language that catches is the part that Paul repeats. Did you hear it? What he writes to the Thessalonians who are crumbling under the burden and reality of death, what he writes to them, and then writes again. What he repeats: wake up and encourage one another with the promise of life forever in the presence of God.

There must be those times in most congregations when the relentlessness of death starts to tear away at the heart and soul of life together. I certainly know that our congregation has experienced such seasons of despair. Amid the suffering and persecution of the early church, however, Paul’s pastoral response goes beyond offering comfort in response to one death or another. What he offers is a faith-filled perspective when not much in the world around you makes sense. What he acknowledges is that humanity’s illusions of peace and security can be shattered in a heartbeat. What he lifts up is that even the best intended assumptions and conclusions when it comes to faith and God, even the most ardent attempts to put all things divine and holy together, to have them all worked out in both your heart and mind, yeah, that can all be torn down, as Paul might say, in the twinkling of an eye.

A hurricane absolutely devastates the island where you live and weeks, months later there’s still no power. Really, God? Someone intentionally drives a rented truck down a sidewalk to kill and hurt as many people as he can. Really, God? You watch as folks in the public square use scripture and the language of faith to espouse beliefs so far from your experience of God and defend opinions so hateful and justify behavior that is horrific. Really, God? You watch as a family you love and care for faces the sudden onset of inexplicable loss, pain, and grief. Really, God? A man walks into a church with an assault rifle, and… really, God? When your community of faith is looking to the darkness where answers never come and chilling reminders of our mortality never cease, then, even then, Paul writes, wake up and encourage one another.

The theologian Karl Barth suggested that believers are not just those who woke up, they are those who keep waking up. The difference between the children of light and the children of darkness is not simply a difference between those who are awake and those who are asleep. Rather, for Barth, the followers of Christ are those who, in fact, are consistently in need of being jolted awake. They are those who keep waking up, those who over and over again find themselves awakening to the call to discipleship and a fresh taste of the grace of Christ and a renewed commitment to a life that yearns for reconciliation and righteousness and kingdom life. Watch. Keep awake. Pay attention. Keep waking up. Not to the world crumbling all around you but to the Christ who calls you and bids you to come, follow me. The one who promises to be with you forever. The one who promises that you will be him… forever.

Just a few nights ago Cathy and I were with some friends at a violin concert at McCarter Theater. The violinist finished performing the pieces published in the program and announced he was going to play a few more selections. I think it was three. The soloist announced each one before he played it. Now, I listen to a lot of classical music and I enjoy violin solos. But I am not very good at remembering titles or particular composers’ works or really even being able to tell a really, really fine violin player from a really, really, really fine one. Clearly, most in the theater that night were much better at all of the above. Because when he announced each piece before he played it, this audible gasp-like sigh rose from the crowd, like everyone had just taken their first bite of grandma’s best pie ever! And I had no idea what was coming. But in listening, in taking it in, in letting the music wash over me, I bet it was as beautiful to me as the person in front of me who knew, understood, savored, interpreted, explained, defined every note.

The power and assurance and encouragement of God’s promise is not limited to those who can understand it. It is not any better for those who think they can explain it. It is not more real for those who have never questioned it or those who want to dissect it and diagram it and detail it, down to every last note. The beauty comes when you let it wash over you. “We will be with the Lord forever…” Forever. “Remember, I am with you always…” Forever. “Where I am, you will be also…” Forever. “If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord, so then, whether we live, or whether we die, we are the Lord’s…” Forever. “Today, you will be with me in paradise.” Together with the Lord. In God’s presence, forever. Forever.

I made the serious error in judgment a while back when I decided that I could install the new under-the-cabinet microwave in our kitchen all by myself. Now, in my defense, it didn’t go all that badly. It only took two days, two friends, and my wife. It works fine and looks great, thank you very much. But also in my defense, the written material made it all sound so easy. So easy, in fact, that they even provided a paper template to show where the holes should be drilled for the screws to hold the blasted thing up under the cabinet. Now, when I say paper template, I mean the actual life-sized facsimile of the top of the microwave. The instructions were to tape that paper up under the counter to show exact size, edges, and, of course, the placement of the holes. All one had to do to get it right was to drill the hole right into the paper where it said, “hole, drill here.” And I still got it wrong.

When the Apostle Paul finally writes about the concern of the Thessalonian believers, when he addresses their worry about all those who have died, he doesn’t give them a template, a cut-out, a diagram. Writing to the church now grown weary because of death and suffering, Paul tries to write them a picture of “forever.” Professor Eric Baretto puts it so when he concludes, “The point is not how. The point is the promise.” Between you and me, if you will excuse the possible heresy here, when comes to exactly what happens when we die, I don’t think Paul knew any more than we do. He does now! And he was a few years off on his expectation that Jesus would return pretty much in his lifetime. It’s not a template. It’s a promise. “The point is not how. The point is the promise.” Wake up and encourage one another with the promise of life forever in the presence of God.

A few weeks ago I came over to Mark Edwards here in the chancel during the hymn we were singing and told him I had an out-of-body experience while I was preaching. I was counting the number of people who were falling asleep during that particular sermon. I stopped when I got to six. Yes, I see it! No, I will never say anything. Maybe a vocal “elbow nudge” by raising the volume every now and them. Keep awake!

Paul’s exhortation. It’s not a mad vision for the church, for a congregation. Nudging each other to stay awake and encouraging each other along the Way. Pointing one another back to the life of discipleship and speaking hopeful words of God’s promise. Calling one another back to the pathway of faith and patting each other on the back with whispers and shouts about “forever,” our life forever in God. Helping each other to keep waking up to the gift of God’s grace and helping each other never lose sight of the visions of God’s future. Not letting each other forget Christ’s call to servanthood, and loving neighbor, and putting God first. And lifting each other up with the assurance of the light that never dims, and the love that never fades, and the life that ever ends. Keep awake and encourage one another. It’s what it means to be the church.

And these days, when it comes to life and death and faith and heart and mind and the world and figuring it all out, and wrapping it all together, holding it all together, you just can’t do that alone. God doesn’t expect you to do that alone.

So, to the body of Christ that is Nassau Presbyterian Church, keep awake and encourage one another with promise of life forever in the presence of God. In the presence of God. Forever.

© 2017 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.

I Thessalonians 3
David A. Davis
November 5, 2017

It seems to me that most of us Presbyterians aren’t sure what to do with “saints.” Not as in “For all the saints who from their labors rest, / who thee by faith before the world confessed, / thy name, O Jesus be forever blest, / alleluia, alleluia.” No, we love that one. Presbyterians love to sing that hymn.

But it’s the term “saints,” it’s the understanding of “saints” that makes us uncomfortable. Today is All Saints’ Sunday. The Sunday closest to November 1st, All Saints’ Day. Remembering All Saints’ Day today, remembering it today, because Presbyterians would never come out mid-week to celebrate saints.

To be fair, it’s sort of in our Reformation DNA. Some of what John Calvin wrote in the 16th century about the veneration of saints is so harsh it would be difficult for me to quote here in worship. Here’s a calmer snippet from Calvin and his Institutes of the Christian Religion: “A few centuries ago the saints who had departed this life were elevated into copartnership with God to be honored, and also to be invoked, and praised in his stead. Indeed we support [try to convince ourselves] that by such an abomination God’s majesty is not even obscured while it is [in fact] in great part suppressed and extinguished.”

Presbyterians are supposed to be uncomfortable with saints. Though there will always be those among us who would admit to a quick prayer to St. Anthony when we’ve lost something really important and are in a complete panic. But saints? We know that none of us were ever, are ever, or will ever be that good. Presbyterians tend to prefer “the great cloud of witnesses” to the “communion of saints.” It is as if every time we Presbyterians use the term “saints”, we need a hand gesture to indicate small “s.” All saints’ Day.

But, yet, on the other hand, if we’re honest, if the truth be told, all of us, even us Presbyterians, have known some saints in our lives. Yes, some among us have studied the saints, read lots of work by the saints. But we’ve known a few along the way too. All of us can name those heroes, those big names of faith in our lifetime, just outside our lifetime. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Mother Theresa, Dr. King, Rose Parks, Bishop Tutu. That’s a hall of fame approach to saints.

But we’ve known a few along the way. Even Presbyterians have known a few a saints along the way. People who have, by the content of their lives, shown us the way of Christ. Shown us the way, less by their piety and more by their example. Less by their certainty of faith and more by their enduring relationship to God. Less, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer might put it, by talking to you about Jesus over the years and more because over the years they never gave up talking to Jesus about you. Less by showing you an unwavering, steadfast belief in every season of life and more by showing you the courage of holding on by nothing other than the thread of grace in the darkest of days.

Saints. Not the pillar of the church on Sunday but the example of Christ on Monday. Not the one who writes of a transforming, supernatural vision of Christ but the one who somehow by God’s mercy is able over and over again to see the face of Christ in the face of the other and the stranger and the outcast and the untouchable and the unloved and the last and the least. Saint: someone who in the gritty ordinariness of their life has shown you the holy path of Christ himself.

Many, many years ago I was meeting with a family I did not know in the office at a local funeral home just prior to officiating at the service for the husband, father, and grandfather who had died. I didn’t know them. I didn’t know him. Such meetings were intended for introductions but also to pluck a bit of last minute material for the service, things the family would like said, qualities and experiences and attributes for which the family would like to offer thanks to God related to their loved one.

In this case the man had lived well into his 80s. When I asked his wife what about him she would like me to lift up in the prayer, in the thanks, she couldn’t think of anything. She did want me to know that while he wasn’t religious at all and he wasn’t a church-goer, and he was certainly no saint, he was a man of faith. That’s a refrain we clergy types hear a lot in funeral planning. And she shared that he always said the prayer at every family Thanksgiving dinner and that his favorite Bible verse was “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”

Their son, who sat with us, didn’t say a word. The meeting wrapped up, they left. I waited the few minutes prior to entering the next room with the casket and the lectern where everyone was gathered. The son came back to me and said, “You can say whatever my mother wants you to say about my father but I need you to know he was a real son of a gun.” And he walked away. The life of faith is more than a table blessing and a favorite Bible verse.

Saint: Someone who has, by the content of their life, shown you the way of Christ. Here in the middle of First Thessalonians, the Apostle Paul continues to expound on the importance of the relationships he has with the believers in Thessalonica. He writes of sending Timothy to see them and offers such gratitude for the reports that came back that told of the “good news of [their] faith and love.” Amid all the thanksgiving and joy, Paul continues to express his concern that they would stay strong in their faith amid suffering and persecution, that God would allow their love for another to increase and abound. Not just their love for one another but their love for all. “And,” as Paul writes, “may the Lord so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.”

That God would so strengthen their hearts in holiness. The remedy for a struggling faith, the opposite of a weakening faith, Paul’s prayer for them in light of what might be lacking in their faith, is that they would increase and abound in love and have their hearts strengthened in holiness. When struggles and suffering comes, when the world shakes, when your faith is dicey, Paul urges, recommit in your faith, double down in your faith, focus in your faith on love and holiness. Hearts strengthened in holiness.

When John Cavin would administrate church discipline in Geneva in the 16th century, historical records indicate that he would often admonish an individual and them tell them to go to more sermons, to go hear more sermons and to listen better the next time. In one case of follow-up, the person was asked to tell how many sermons had been heard, what had been learned, and then was asked to recite several creeds and catechisms. One might conclude that Calvin was exhorting people to work on the holiness.

But in First Thessalonians, Paul doesn’t go there at all when it comes to strengthening hearts in holiness. In the first part of chapter four, the verses that follow Paul’s prayer for hearts strengthened in holiness, in what is to come next, Paul exhorts the believers to live in a manner that is pleasing to God. Phrases leap from the text about controlling lustful passions, and not wronging or exploiting a sister or brother, and loving more and more, and aspiring to live quietly, and minding your own business, and working with your hands, and behaving properly to outsiders, and being dependent on no one.

Paul does not challenge them to listen more, study more, read more. He writes not just of a Sunday morning holiness but a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday holiness, a Thursday, Friday, Saturday witness. Not just a holiness of the prayer offices at the start of the day and the end of the day, but a holiness that carries throughout the day and carries through the night. Not just a witness of faith in devotion in prayer, but a witness of faith in every relationship, a witness in every context, a witness in every role of life, a witness to everyone.

When their life was shaken, and their faith lacking, Paul doesn’t exhort the church at Thessalonica to get their piety on, to do better at this religion thing, he urges them to be saints: to be people who have, by the content of their lives, shown the world the way of Christ Jesus. He prays for their hearts to be strengthened in holiness.

Years ago at the Woods Memorial Presbyterian Church down near Annapolis, when they did a major renovation they built a columbarium in the rear of the sanctuary. Beautifully done, the niches for ashes were behind large doors that matched the design, the architecture of the now redone sanctuary. When our colleague was showing us, he said that on All Saints’ Sunday, they open those large doors as a way of remembering the saints. My first thought was that it was a bit creepy. But you know, every time we gather at this table, we are joined in the mystery and promise of God’s mercy by such a great a cloud of witnesses…(uh, uh, uh?!)…joined by the communion of saints.

Today, in our bulletin, we have the list of those in our congregation who have died in the last year. We will read that roll of names from the table in just a moment. We Presbyterians might have some trouble with saints, but I have to tell you, some people on that list, some were flat out saints in my life.

Saints, who by the content of their life showed me the way of Christ. We’ve known a few along the way, haven’t we? Come to the Table, and remember all that Christ has done… and remember them too.

© 2017 Nassau Presbyterian Church
Contact the church to obtain reprint permission.