There is the silent hush of valley fog enshrouding our house today. The mute world waits, hoping for a sign. A sign of what? A sign of life, life everlasting, before and to come. A sign that we are more than flesh, more than animals on the hunt to survive.
I have long found it interesting that the Jewish world before Christ knew who humankind was and is, knew their identity and mission expressed in rituals and rules. They knew they were made in the image of God, their Creator. Just so, they treasured life, children, families. When they erred, their God called them back to Him and set them on the path to life.
The Greco-Roman world also knew that humankind was not mere flesh, but owned a spirit, a soul.
And so Jesus, the Son of God incarnate, was born into the Roman world, a Jew in the messianic lineage of David. The time was ripe for the two cultures to merge, for the Roman world gave the life-changing message of Christ the forum to broadcast the good news, the gospel. It is in the Roman Mediterranean basin that the first Christian churches would be planted, secretly in homes, then building upon the graves of the martyrs, celebrating eucharists over holy bones.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea He synthesized these worlds, baptizing Rome with Jerusalem, and opening Heaven to all mankind.
Today’s gospel tells of John the Baptist who prepares the way for Christ’s birth, life, death, and life. The great followings that John attracted would shift to Jesus of Nazareth, as our preacher pointed out today. The Baptist prepared the way. And what did he say that prepared the world for the Savior? What could he possibly say that would be enough? Repent, he said, make his way straight. And with baptism, each follower said yes, I will change and I will make the crooked straight in my life.
And so the way was prepared in the hearts of many.
William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905), Song of Angels (1881)
Just so Advent prepares each one of us to receive the Lord of Lords, to kneel with the shepherds and bring gifts with the kings, to fly with the angels into the starry night of Christmas, Christ’s Mass.
Christmas, full of giving and singing and sharing for a brief time, gives us a taste of glory, the glory of the angels, the glory of life itself, the glory in a newborn baby.
Christmas says you needn’t be great or rich or powerful. In fact, it is better if you are lowly, poor, and powerless. Christmas says look at the baby and sing to him. Thank him. Love him. Invite him into your heart.
As Christina Rosetti wrote in her lovely Christmas sonnet, “What can I give him? I give him my heart.”
May we all experience the glory of the love of God this week, this sacred and holy time, when Christ Jesus came among us, bringing us life here and now, and forever in Eternity.
Come Lord Jesus, come.
Today is Gaudete Sunday, or Rose Sunday, and Heaven Sunday too. The Third Sunday in Advent is rich with meaning as we prepare for Christmas and the Incarnation of God, come to us to live with us and in us. Such miracle and mystery often astounds me.
“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice. Let your forbearance be known to all, for the Lord is near at hand; have no anxiety about anything, but in all things, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be known to God.” (Wikipedia)
orld of faith, hope, love, and joy. It sounds too good to be true, but it’s true.
We light our three candles today, including the rose candle, and we recall our ultimate destination, Heaven. As we do, we experience a moment of Heaven on Earth. The candles flame, testifying to the Lord of Lords to come, to be born on Earth and reborn in our hearts.
The opening prayer that collected our small flock together on this brilliantly clear morning in a chapel in Berkeley was the “Collect for the Second Sunday in Advent”:
Advent’s daily prayer begins with “Almighty God, give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armour of light…”. To memorize this prayer is to digest it, to send our words to God, expressing our need for re-forming, re-creating. And even as we pray the words, we become clothed in a protective garment, an armour of light, lighting the darkness.
Today is also the theme of Judgment. We shall be judged. The world shall be judged. But Christ takes our part if we desire Him; we are forgiven if we repent. And so we return to words – words to instruct our conscience, learning right and wrong, law and love. Holy Scripture becomes the textbook that teaches us where we have gone wrong, returning us to who we are and are meant to be. We need merely pray our words to Our Lord to be changed, to be redeemed, to be saved.
The nights have been clear and cold here in the Bay Area. We can see the stars and I reach to touch them, they seem so close. Advent is the time of stars in the heavens. Advent is when we follow the star to Christmas. We reach and we follow the star.
These are big things, subjects we would rather avoid. Especially judgment. We define deviancy down and further down, so that we can deny judging anyone and thus not be judged ourselves. And yet we know deep within there is a moral law all mankind senses, reckoning that a standard has been set, a standard we don’t meet. And with law there is judgment.
We light our first Advent candle in our Advent wreathe. It is only one small flame in the dark, but it will light the others, each week, until we see the light of Bethlehem, the light of the world, the light of Christ.
It is good we practiced gratitude for our blessings this past week. Gratitude humbles us. Gratitude says, we owe something to someone else. Indeed. We owe much to those giants that have preserved the West, and fought for our freedoms through war and peace. We owe much to our local church, filled with good souls who try to love us. We owe much to our own families who try to put up with us. We owe much to Our Lord who gave us life itself and continues to breathe life into each day we live.
We begin at the beginning, the first day of the Church Year. In this new year we open the gates of Jerusalem – and our hearts – to the Messiah as our Gospel reading describes. Today the story begins, and each one of us will play a vital part in the greatest drama of all, life overcoming death, eternally, minute by minute.
Today we celebrate the Holy Trinity, the three persons in one God, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, beginning the long green Trinity season of growth.
My father, a chaplain on board the Phoenix in the South Pacific in World War II, was a man of truth. Fresh out of Dallas seminary, he joined his ship in June of 1944 at the age of 28. He prayed and he preached and he pastored his young charges, as kamikazes dove into the sea around them. He returned to America even more dedicated than when he enlisted. 
For we are broken, with hearts both good and evil. But the Father reaches out to us with the Son, and the Son fills us with the Spirit. A trio of loves lives with each believer, a holy nesting birthing a holy voice that sings the song of the Holy Trinity to the world.
So on this Memorial Weekend we pause to praise the God of all memorials, the Lord of all lives, the Father of all freedoms. We remember with our sacred memory those who have gone before us, those who gave themselves for you and me. We tell our children these sacred stories, so that they will tell their children, so that the people of this great nation will never forget our brave soldiers.
The Feast of Pentecost, the celebration of he descent of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples gathered in Jerusalem, is one of the most dramatic scenes in the New Testament, and while I have always been astounded at the Gospel and Epistle for this Sunday, today I considered one phrase our preacher said.
And, as she was commanded, she named him Jesus, this Holy Spirit child, this quickening of Our Lord in Mary. She said yes, be it unto me according to thy will. (Luke 1)
The Spirit gave them the words, reversing the story of the Tower of Babel, uniting, not dividing, loving, not hating. With words.
Today is the last Sunday in Eastertide, the celebration of Christ’s resurrection from the dead, and with his conquering death, we too are resurrected, now and when our bodies die, releasing our souls to fly heavenward.
And should we be confused as to the meaning of these events, we look to the Early Church and the letters of Paul and others who trained these baby Christians to become adults in Christ. 
Nevertheless, in the time that is ours, the life we own, we witness to the God of love who created you and me. We witness to life, from the baby in the womb to the last days of our elderly to those suffering early deaths. We witness to the family, the life blood society that trains our children to be truth-tellers too when they come of age. We witness to the delight in being a woman or a man, knowing that we are made in the image of God, Imago Dei.
In this month of Mary’s May, we thank Our Mother Mary for saying yes long ago in a village called Nazareth. Her fiat made all the difference to the world, our world. Our fiat makes all the difference too.
It’s a beautiful spring day here in the Bay Area, a time to appreciate the beauty of the natural world as it is reborn each year, giving us a good greening before the dry season turns the grasses brown.
It is said that when writers send their manuscripts out into the wide wide world it is like sending a child away to school. At some point, we just say, okay, fly. But don’t forget who created you! Still we think of all the changes and additions we still need to make – create another plot line, another character, another setup and payoff, another scene, another dialog. That’s when I tell myself, breathe, breathe, breathe the name of Jesus.
We had a lovely annual Church Synod last week, another extended family gathering of the faithful which is one part reunion, one part inspiration, one part meeting and greeting, one part fellowship, and many parts encouragement. We live in a challenging time for the Church – any church – a hostile time in which we must not throw pearls before swine, must choose charitably, desire dutifully, and trust Our Lord completely. We are the music of the mountain (plot spoiler), each note, each hymn, each concerto. We all play our part.
Thinking about my draft again, and all the stories I didn’t tell, all the loves I wanted to include, all the mysteries and miracles of life that are stacked in folders all around me that didn’t make the cut (there’s still time I tell them). At the end of the day, what I have not packed into these chapters is huge and daunting and waiting to be included. Alas, I tell them, sometimes less is more…?
Christine Sunderland
Christine Sunderland 