Text used – Isaiah 40:21-31

• So I have this book in my office (not a kids book this time … sorry, all). It’s a book that I bought after hearing an interview on NPR a few years ago, and it’s actually a book that I ended up using while I was writing my dissertation.
  • Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle[1] – written by twin sisters – Emily and Amelia Nagoski
    • Emily = PhD in health behavior with a minor in human sexuality, been a sex educator for 20 yrs. and is currently the inaugural director of wellness education at Smith College in Massachusetts
    • Amelia = DMA (doctor of musical arts) in conducting and assistant prof and coordinator of music at Western New England University in Massachusetts
    • Now, you may hear those two CVs and think, “Why are these two women writing a book about stress and burnout?” Let me read a portion of the NPR interview to you (from the program “All Things Considered” which aired May 5, 2019[2]): (Amelia speaking) I was in doctoral school getting my doctorate of musical arts in conducting. I was also working two part-time jobs. And I’m the mother of three people who were teenagers at the time. And I was commuting 65 miles each way. And the stresses of my life were overwhelming. And I was totally in denial about how hard I was working and how much challenge I was actually having. I had no idea how much my body was suffering. So it took me totally by surprise when in the middle of one night, I woke up in such pain that I had my husband drive me to the emergency room. And I was in the hospital for four days. And they didn’t come up with a diagnosis. They just said well, it’s stress. You just need to relax. And that is not an evidence-based strategy for coping with stress, it turns out. So I spent about the next year – I called Emily, of course, who brings me a big stack of books because this is the way she shows her affection is peer-reviewed science. … Yeah. So it was very supportive and convenient to have a twin sister who has a Ph.D. in public health. So in the next year, I started working on doing the actual things that the science says will combat burnout. It was too late. And a year later, I ended up back in the hospital. And they removed my appendix, which had been inflamed. (Emily interjects and affirms) Inflammation is a result of extreme stress.
    • So these two sisters embarked on this project together – one specifically aimed at helping women overcome this stress cycle that is so prevalent in our society. [read book synopsis from dust jacket]
  • And talk about timing … this book was published in 2019 just a few months before the COVID-19 pandemic swept the globe and ratcheted up everyone’s stress levels beyond anything most of us have ever experienced before. → burnout has become a very real, very prevalent part of many people’s lives
    • Signs of burnout: exhaustion, isolation, anxiety, frequent illness, irritability, feelings of hopelessness, lack of motivation, cynicism, concentration issues, headaches, lack of control, gastrointestinal disorders, loss of enjoyment, a negative outlook, insomnia, depression, depersonalization, feeling listless, anger, inconsistent appetite, reduced efficiency, catastrophic thoughts
• I think this issue of burnout is particularly relevant to our continued Epiphany exploration of creativity – this idea that we are created in God’s image to be creators, that we are called to active participation in God’s newness – God’s creation and re-creation – as an essential tenet of our faith.
  • Yes, it’s an inspiring call → I mean, there is something powerful and empowering and uplifting about working your way through the creation process and coming out the other side with something wonderful that you made!
  • BUT, when you’re already feeling tired and weary … when you’re already feeling creatively wrung-out … when you’re already feel sapped of all strength, that call to participate in creation can be daunting at best. And today, as we move past the middle point of our Created Anew series, we are given the effectual, poignant, and vital reminder that we need in times like these: that God is God, and we are not … and that is enough.
• Isaiah passage
  • Begins with that reminder that God is God → first 6 verses are all about God’s power and might, God’s sovereignty and ultimate creative ability
    • Text: Don’t you know? Haven’t you heard? Wasn’t it announced to you from the beginning? Haven’t you understood since the earth was founded? God inhabits the earth’s horizon— its inhabitants are like locusts— stretches out the skies like a curtain and spreads it out like a tent for dwelling. God makes dignitaries useless and the earth’s judges into nothing. Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely is their shoot rooted in the earth when God breathes on them, and they dry up; the windstorm carries them off like straw. So to whom will you compare me, and who is my equal? says the holy one. Look up at the sky and consider: Who created these? The one who brings out their attendants one by one, summoning each of them by name. Because of God’s great strength and mighty power, not one is missing.[3]
    • Let’s give this a little context.
      • Cultural context: Is is delivering these words to the people in exile – people who have been forced from their homes by an occupying legion and forced to live away from their homeland, sometimes their friends and family, and all the customs and traditions and holy places that made up their whole lives to that point → If ever there were a people who needed God’s word in the midst of challenging circumstances – who needed to be reminded of God’s steadfastness, God’s transcendence, and God’s goodness – it was the people of Israel as they went about their lives captive in the land of Babylon.
        • Hear that reassurance in today’s text: God makes dignitaries useless and the earth’s judges into nothing. Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely is their shoot rooted in the earth when God breathes on them, and they dry up; the windstorm carries them off like straw.[4] → It was these dignitaries and judges that had made the decisions that forever altered the lives of those held in captivity in Babylon, and through Isaiah, God is reassuring the people that even in the face of what presents as power on earth, God is more.
          • Certainly a word that we need to hear today, too → It feels like every time I open my news app, I hear about another of the earth’s dignitaries or judges being accused of corruption and abuses. The stories of one group reigning violence and oppression down on another group are rampant. Borders between nations – the constructs of those same dignitaries and judges – have become places of fear and revulsion and exclusion, and those who cross borders have been turned into people to ridicule and despise and subjugate, again by those same dignitaries and judges.
            • Rasche alludes to this in her commentary for today’s passage: In the midst of the power struggles between nations and the struggles we may find closer to home, many individuals and institutions can take credit for creating, whether that be a political system, a set of values, or influences on how people can live their lives. Yes, this can be viewed as a form of creation, but not as how God intended for us. Creative endeavors are meant to be life giving and life sustaining … Some of the “creative” endeavors we see in the world claim such titles, but when the veil is lifted, the life-giving and life-sustaining characteristics are questionable at best.[5]
      • Truly, friends, we are living in a time when we all need to be reminded that God is a God of “great strength and might,” as our passage this morning puts it, who leaves no one and no thing behind. – reassurance echoed within this section of book of Is → These verses complete a chapter that we started during Advent: Comfort, comfort my people! says your God. … A voice is crying out: “Clear the Lord’s way in the desert! Make a level highway in the wilderness for our God!”[6] Following this reassurance that God is coming to the people is a section subtitled “The incomparable God” (at least, that’s how it’s subtitled in the Common English Bible translation) in which Isaiah extolls the many mind-boggling wonders of God’s creative acts.
        • First half of today’s text = part of that section
  • Leads us into 2^nd half of today’s text = part of section subtitled “Power for the weary” → certainly a word of comfort and confidence to a people struggling under Babylonian captivity
    • Words of the people during this time (from Ps 137): Alongside Babylon’s streams, there we sat down, crying because we remembered Zion. We hung our lyres up in the trees there because that’s where our captors asked us to sing; our tormentors requested songs of joy: “Sing us a song about Zion!” they said. But how could we possibly sing the Lord’s song on foreign soil?[7] → Isaiah’s words this morning are the balm to that open wound – the reminder that God is with all those who’s faith and energy falter in the face of dire circumstances.
      • Is’s reply both acknowledges Israel’s struggle with their circumstances – all of the frustration, anger, fear, anxiety, and grief that must have come with being part of that contingent of the people forcibly removed from Jerusalem to Babylon – and it gives the reminder that God’s presence and God’s power never fail: Why do you say, Jacob,and declare, Israel, “My way is hidden from the Lord, my God ignores my predicament”?Don’t you know? Haven’t you heard?The Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. He doesn’t grow tired or weary.His understanding is beyond human reach,giving power to the tired and reviving the exhausted.Youths will become tired and weary, young men will certainly stumble;but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength;they will fly up on wings like eagles; they will run and not be tired; they will walk and not be weary.[8] 
• I want us to notice here that there is no judgment or shame – from Isaiah himself or from God – directed that those who have become tired and weary and exhausted. Those states of being are recognized as being part of what comes from living in a less-than-perfect world as someone who is trying to follow a God who is so much more than our human understanding can even begin to comprehend. What Isaiah does do is remind us that even when we are at our most depleted, God continues to work in and through us, not just for the benefit of creation, but for our benefit as well: “Those who hope in the Lordwill renew their strength; they will fly up on wings like eagles; they will run and not be tired; they will walk and not be weary.”
  • Rasche: While we are created as creators, Isaiah continues to remind us of our origin story, that while we are created in God’s image, we are not God’s equals in a broken humanity. Even if our attempts to imitate creation are not perfect, it doesn’t mean that we … give up. … Today’s passage reminds us of the identity of the ultimate Creator, and that the creative process in God’s created world and within us is never ending.[9] → Simply put, friends, God is not done with us. There is more to do … more to create … more to be in this world for God’s love and the building up of God’s kingdom on earth. We are indeed called to participate in that creation … but if you find yourself tired, sapped of your energy (creative and otherwise) … if you find yourself burned out, God will not leave you there. You are not a spent marker that God is prepared to discard with another, identical “you” waiting to finish the picture. You have a particular calling in this world – something you and only you can do and be for God – and if you feel too tired, too weary, too burned out for that today, that’s okay. Because God will renew your spirit and your strength. Yes, we are called to create alongside God … but God is also always creating us anew as well. So take heart, and hope in the Lord. Amen.

[1] Emily and Amelia Nagoski. Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle. (New York: Ballantine Books), 2019.

[2] Aarti Shahani. “Beating Burnout: Sisters Write Book to Help Women Overcome Stress Cycle,” heard on All Things Considered produced by National Public Radio. Aired May 5, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/05/05/720490364/to-help-women-kick-burnout-sisters-write-book-to-understanding-stress-cycle.

[3] Is 40:21-26.

[4] Is 40:21-23.

[5] Tuhina Verma Rasche. “Epiphany Series: Created Anew” in A Preacher’s Guide to Lectionary Sermon Series: Thematic Plans for Years A, B, and C, vol. 2. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2019), 95.

[6] Is 40:1, 3.

[7] Ps 137:1-4.

[8] Is 40:27-31.

[9] Rasche, 95.

Text used – 1 Corinthians 8:1-13

• I have another children’s book I want to share with you this morning.
  • Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Jon Klassen[1] → crucial element to this story clarified through the illustrations: connection

• • • Many times when Annabelle knits something for people, the individual creations are connected to each other by a length of yarn (e.g. – when she knits sweaters for her whole class)
    • Connection that makes space for uniqueness
      • Sweaters are all different colors: similar but individual
      • Same colors for Mr. Crabtree’s hat → creation that fits who he is but also includes him in the community
    • Color and familiar pattern of Annabelle’s knitting bring both a brightness and a kinship to her little village
      • Brightness and kinship that began to be recognized by others: “People came to visit from around the world, to see all the sweaters and to shake Annabelle’s hand.”
    • And what disrupts that connection? Vanity … hubris … and greed. → the archduke who first tries to buy, not a single sweater, but Annabelle’s entire box of yarn → archduke hires robbers to steal the box when Annabelle refuses to sell → gets this magical box home only to discover it was empty → box finds its way back to Annabelle … who begins to knit again
      • More color
      • More brightness
      • More connection
      • More togetherness
  • Within the cycle of the liturgical calendar, we find ourselves ensconced in the season of Epiphany.
    • Broad definition of an epiphany: an appearance or manifestation of a divine being
    • Christian context: the manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles as represented by the Magi → Basically, the Epiphany celebrates the first time Gentile recognized and worshiped Christ.
    • But here’s the thing about the Epiphany within the Christian context: it’s not just a one-off sort of occurrence. Yes, within the realm of the church, we celebrate Epiphany on (or close to) January 6, but the phenomenon of Christ being revealed to others is not something that happened just that one time thousands of years ago. It’s something that continues to happen yesterday, today, tomorrow.
      • Rasche: What I love about the Epiphany of our lives of following Christ is the opportunity to see God in our neighbor. That’s just how creative God can be: that in wonder and amazement, we can turn to our neighbor and see the image of God in one another. This is God revealing to us that God is relational. God loves us and cares for us and wants to be with us.[2] → The ways that we get to see God in one another are just like Annabelle’s sweaters. They’re the connections that bring color and wholeness to our lives. They make us the body of Christ together.
• Paul’s point in this morning’s passage from 1 Cor
  • Story of Corinthian church = not so different from the story of Annabelle and her miraculous box of yarn
    • Location: large peninsula known as the Peloponnese → located off the southern tip of mainland Greece
      • Even more important: Corinth = still located on the narrow strip of land that connects the peninsula to the mainland → made Corinth a hub: wealth, commerce, culture, religion
    • Church established by Paul himself on one of his mission journeys (probably somewhere around 50 C.E.)
    • Diverse body that reflected the make-up of Corinth as a city – scholar: The congregation at Corinth reflects the socioeconomic and religious makeup of the city. In keeping with the “steep social pyramid” that was typical of that culture, very few believers were rich, and most were poor.[3]
      • Goes on to point out that names mentioned throughout the Corinthians letters include a variety of names: Roman, Greek, and Hebrew → continues: In 1 Corinthians, there is absolutely no evidence of any strife or even tension in the relation of Jewish believers and gentile believers.[4]
  • Clear from today’s reading that it’s not the cultural differences that have caused the rift in the Corinthian church that Paul is addressing … It’s vanity … hubris … and greed.
    • Scholar explains the situation: The occasion for Paul’s comment is that the Corinthian church has a strong faction of well-educated, well-to-do, relatively sophisticated members who believe that Christians should be free to eat meat offered to idols. … Also present in the Corinthian church were more ordinary working people whose incomes and habits allowed for very little meat in their diets. For these people … eating meat offered to idols threatened faith by drawing them back to the idolatrous culture from which they had only recently been converted to the Christian faith.[5]
      • Not so different from the archduke in Extra Yarn → He didn’t care about the needs or wholeness of Annabelle’s community. He wanted what he wanted when he wanted it. There was an entitlement to his want. He deserved to have the miraculous box of yarn, not because of anything he had done, but simply because he was who he was: rich, privileged, “better than.” The struggles of others … the impact that his demands would have on their lives … didn’t matter.
  • Basically the richer, more upper-class people within the Corinthian congregation wanted to be able to eat the meat. They wanted it. They were accustomed to it. They could afford it. And in our text today, Paul is making it clear that their failing as Christians is not in the wanting of the meat itself … but in the way that, in pursuing that desire, they are neglecting the lives and spirits of their fellow Christians.
    • Text: We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge makes people arrogant, but love builds people up. If anyone thinks they know something, they don’t yet know as much as they should know. But it someone loves God, then they are known by God.[6] → This is a powerful statement, friends. Paul is basically chastising those who think they know everything, reminding them that, while knowledge is never fully complete – while there is always more to learn, more to know, more to understand – love is complete. Love is whole. Love is all-encompassing.
      • Scholar: Love is not just a sentiment, not just a feeling, not merely a sort of disposition. Love works; it acts; it does things; and the chief thing it does is to edify, build up, cause growth in each of the persons who engages in it and who is engaged by it.[7]
• Paul spends the rest of this morning’s text explaining how love works in a situation like this – emphasizing how little importance meat has in comparison with the spiritual well-being of the rest of the body → And it’s in this part that we hear God speaking most prominently to us today.
  • True, it’s not meat sacrificed to idols that brings out the judgmental separations between us … but that certainly doesn’t mean those judgmental separations don’t exist. There are all sorts of ways we neglect … or refuse … to see the image of God in those around us. There are all sorts of ways we decide that the struggles of others are trivial … or nonsensical … or even deserved. But in the face of that failing, we have Paul’s example – text: You sin against Christ if you sin against your brothers and sisters and hurt their weak consciences this way. This is why, if food causes the downfall of my brother or sister, I won’t eat meat ever again, or else I may cause my brother or sister to fall.[8] → Paul is willing to go so far as to remove meat from his diet entirely just to build up his siblings in Christ.
    • Rasche brings this idea into our lives/conversations today: Not only do we exist for Christ; we are also created to exist for one another, to accompany one another, and to be accountable to one another. We gather in community so that if a sibling in the faith struggles, the community can accompany them. It’s both daunting and terrifying, because being in community comes with incredible responsibility for one another. Sometimes it takes a member of the community to be an epiphany for us, to show us where we are headed. God sent us a reminder of God’s creativity in the flesh of Jesus.[9] → It sort of all comes full circle here. God had such a profound and powerful love for humanity that God chose to come down in the person of Jesus Christ and dwell among us – to put on our flesh and blood and humanness all for the sake of love, to become not just God but God-With-Us. God knew we needed that Love Embodied to restore us to God – to bridge the gap of separation and sin that are an undeniable part of our world. Knowing we were imperfect … knowing we would continue to make mistakes … knowing how it would all end … God came to Love. God came as Love in Jesus Christ. And after his life and death and resurrection and ascension, Jesus’ teaching of love and grace continued through the early church and through Paul – Paul, who saw that disconnectedness, that brokenness, that lack of love and tried to help people see God in each other again. Because it was and is and always will be the love of God that brings us back to God … back to one another … and back to wholeness.
      • Scholar: Love works. Love transforms circumstances and people. The loved one is never again the same; the one who loves is never again the same. … Love, once under way, takes on a life of its own; like the grace on which it is built, it surprises. Love restores, love enlarges, and love makes whole.[10] → In that love, through that love, we get to be God’s revelation – God’s epiphany, God’s blessed presence – to and for and with one another. Thanks be to God! Amen.

[1] Mac Barnett. Extra Yarn (New York: Balzer + Bray), 2012.

[2] Tuhina Verma Rasche. “Epiphany Series: Created Anew” in A Preacher’s Guide to Lectionary Sermon Series: Thematic Plans for Years A, B, and C, vol. 2. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2019), 93.

[3] J. Paul Sampley. “The First Letter to the Corinthians: Introduction, Commentary, and Reflections” in The New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary series, vol. 10. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2002), 777.

[4] Ibid.

[5] V. Bruce Rigdon. “Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany – 1 Corinthians 8:1-13, Pastoral Perspective” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary – Year B, vol. 1. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 302, 304.

[6] 1 Cor 8:1b-3.

[7] Sampley, 898.

[8] 1 Cor 8:12-13.

[9] Rasche, 94.

[10] Sampley, 898.

Text used – Genesis 1:1-5

• There’s a beautiful children’s book that I have loved my whole life – one that my mom read to me and that I now read to my kids.
  • Miss Rumphius written and illustrated by Barbara Cooney[1]

• • Story of a little girl named Alice who has grand plans for her life
    • Travel to beautiful, adventurous, far-away places
    • Live by the sea
    • When she shares these grand plans with her grandfather, he tasks her with one more plan: “That is all very well, little Alice, but there is a third thing you must do. You must do something to make the world more beautiful.”
    • Alice grows up and becomes a librarian → decides one day it is time for her to embark on her travels → visits many, many beautiful, adventurous, far-away places
      • Climbs mountains and makes friends on tropical islands
      • Visits jungles and desserts
      • Encounters lions and kangaroos
      • Injures her back getting down off a camel in India → decides it’s time to go home
    • Alice realizes her 2^nd goal: buys a small house by the sea → plants some of her favorite flowers – blue and purple and rose-colored lupines – in the rocky gardens around her house
    • One day, after being ill in bed for a long time, Alice goes for a walk near her seaside home. Along the way, she encounters more lupines just like the ones she planted in her garden, and she realizes that the seeds from her garden have been transplanted down the lane by the wind and the birds. And all of a sudden, Alice knows how to accomplish that elusive 3^rd task her grandfather had set for her: “do something to make the world more beautiful.”
      • Rushes home
      • Orders 5 bushels of the very best lupine seeds
      • Walks all around her village and the surrounding area with pockets full of lupine seeds sowing them as she walks: “She scattered seeds along the highways and down the country lanes. She flung handfuls of them around the schoolhouse and back of the church. She tossed them into hollows and along stone walls.”
        • Garners Alice the nickname: The Lupine Lady
    • And sure enough, the next spring, there are lupines everywhere, creating seas of blue and purple and rose-colored flowers wherever you look … creating beauty – delicate and growing and alive – wherever you look.
• Throughout this season of Epiphany – this liturgical season that started with the Feast of Epiphany yesterday and continues through to the beginning of Lent with Ash Wednesday – we’re going to be focusing on creation and creating → idea: Created Anew
  • Another series based on work of ELCA minister Tuhina Verma Rasche (just like our Advent series)
  • All about celebrating God’s creativity – an our own – in the season of new beginnings: This series begins at the start of a new year, a time to start over and create the world anew through resolutions, hopes, and dreams. This is an opportunity for a community to explore what it means to be a follower of Jesus in a new calendar year and see Christian identity in a new way. Through Scriptures that span all sections of the Bible, let’s discover new and creative ways to explore what it means to be a baptized Christian in the world today. … Epiphany is an opportunity to tap into the creative energy of your community.[2] → It’s this emphasis on creativity that made me think of Miss Rumphius. Sure, the Lupine Lady doesn’t create the flowers … but by sowing the seeds, she creates the opportunity for them to grow. She creates the chance for beauty to flourish all around her.
• Perfect illustration to keep in your mind as we begin talking about God’s creation → Because God’s initial act of creation and all the creation that followed is the source from which all our own creative energy and imagination flows. → begin, of course, at the beginning: When God began to create the heavens and the earth – the earth was without shape or form, it was dark over the deep sea, and God’s wind swept over the waters – God said, “Let there be light.” And so light appeared. God saw how good the light was. God separated the light from the darkness. God named the light Day and the darkness Night. There was evening and there was morning: the first day.[3]
  • First thing I want us to notice about this passage is its cadence – the innate rhythm it possess → You can’t help but move with the words – with the rise and fall of them, with the breathing-in and breathing-out of them. [RE-READ, emphasizing cadence/movement]
    • Cadence/rhythm repeated throughout the rest of the Gen 1 creation story: God creates → God observes/speaks to the supreme goodness of that creation → “there was evening and there was morning: the X^th day”
      • Cadence/rhythm to creation as well
        • Cadence/rhythm to God’s creation
          • Rhythm of living beings: heartbeats, lungs expanding and contracting, cadence to the way we move through the world whether we walk or crawl or slither
          • Rhythm of the seasons: new life in spring to the full flush of summer, fading life in the fall to the long sleep of winter, then back to new life in spring again, migrations of species from one season of life to the next
          • Rhythm of the world in which we live: phases of the moon, journey of earth around the sun, daily rise and fall of the tides, movement of wind/water currents, constant shifting of earth’s plates
        • Cadence/rhythm to our own creative processes, too
          • Idea phase → brainstorming, concept mapping, playing with words or colors or concepts or chords (depending on your creative medium of choice)
          • Initial burst of creation → color to canvas, chords in progression, words piling up into paragraphs or stanzas on the page, materials coming together (sculptor, engineer, carpenter, etc.)
          • Refining creation → adding and tweaking, changing and emphasizing → If that initial burst of creation is large, expansive brush strokes, this refining phase is small, focused brush strokes. If that initial burst is basic chord progressions, this refining phase is adding the riffs and particular melody.
      • Cadence/rhythm is set from the very outset with God and creation → our own rhythm continues to flow from God’s very first rhythm, God’s then-and-now-and-forever rhythm
  • Second thing to notice = something-from-sheer-nothing of creation – text: When God began to create the heavens and the earth – the earth was without shape or form[4]
    • Heb. is particularly vivid and revealing: “without shape or form” = combination of two nouns (which lends emphasis to both, sort of like saying “strong strong” instead of “really strong”)
      • First word = wasteland, emptiness, nothingness, confusion, unreality, solitude, formlessness
      • Second word = void, emptiness, waste
      • Truly, the text could not be more clear: there was nothing but God … and then, God created. And created. And created. And created.
        • Did God create because God was lonely?
        • Did God create because God was bored?
        • Did God create because it was the plan all along (whatever “all along” might mean before anything even existed)?
        • Did God create because the beckoning of an utterly blank canvas called even God into action?
          • First day: light and dark … but God had more creation stirring within.
          • Second day: sky and waters … but God had more creation stirring within.
          • Third day: dry land and all manner of plants growing on it … but God had still more creation stirring within.
          • Fourth day: sun and moon and stars … but God had more creation stirring within.
          • Fifth day: all birds and all fish … but still, God had more creation stirring within.
          • Sixth day: all the creatures on dry land … but even still, God had more creation stirring within.
          • Seventh day: God created humanity in God’s own image, in the divine image, God created them, male and female God created them[5] … and finally, God’s creativity was spent … at least, for the time being.
  • Another thing that’s crucial in our understanding of creation: Nothing about our Scripture reading this morning or in the rest of Genesis 1 or even in the parallel creation story that we find in Genesis 2 (that story of Adam and Eve) … none of it says that God stopped creating. It simply says, “God rested from all the work of creation.”[6] → implication: creation is ongoing
    • Rasche: Remember that it was out of the void, out of chaos, that God created the earth and the seas and the birds and the snakes and us. God was so creative in wanting to know our experiences, how we live, what we feel, and what we do, that God came to us in the person of Christ. When I think of what Christ did for you and for me and for creation, reconciling us to God, forgiving us our sins, dying and rising, that amazement and wonder is amplified. Not only did God create; God wanted and continues to want to be a part of creation, beside and in and through you and me.[7] → One of the most amazing things about creation is that God created each and every one of us in God’s own image with the ability to love, hope, dream, and create as God loves, hopes, dreams, and creates.
      • Words of Osho, 20^th Indian philosopher and mystic: To be creative means to be in love with life. You can be creative only if you love life enough that you want to enhance its beauty, you want to bring a little more music to it, a little more poetry to it, a little more dance to it. → God was so in love with the world, and particularly with the humanity – broken, imperfect, and frustrating though we can be! – that God continues to choose again and again to enhance that beauty.
        • Creating beauty around us
          • Every sunrise/sunset
          • Every fall when the leaves blaze orange and red and gold
          • Every spring when we are surrounded by a thousand shades of green
          • Every flower the blooms
          • Every mountain that reaches toward the sky
          • Every wave the laps or crashes against a shore
        • Creating beauty within us
          • Beauty of love
          • Beauty of hope
          • Beauty of forgiveness
          • Beauty of connection and relationships
          • Beauty of creativity
• And so, friends, there is something you must do – something that you are called to do, something that you are created to do by the One who created you in all love, all joy, and all grace: You must do something to make the world more beautiful. Amen.

[1] Barbara Cooney. Miss Rumphius. (New York City: Penguin Random House), 1982.

[2] Tuhina Verma Rasche. “Epiphany Series: Created Anew” in A Preacher’s Guide to Lectionary Sermon Series: Thematic Plans for Years A, B, and C, vol. 2. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2019), 88, 89.

[3] Gen 1:1-5.

[4] Gen 1:1-2a.

[5] Gen 1:27.

[6] Gen 2:3.

[7] Rasche, 90.

Texts used – Luke 2:1-20; John 1:1-14

• I’m going to kick things off with something that might be a little controversial tonight, all. Everyone have their Christmas Eve seatbelts on? Are you ready? I want you to do me a favor and look through the text of the Luke passage, and let me know when you find the word “stable.” [PAUSE] Anybody? That’s because it’s not there. There is nothing in Scripture that says Jesus was born in a stable.
  • Multiple mentions of Jesus in a manger → traditional elaboration has led us to believe this means stable → Because nowadays and for at least a few generations now, the type of animals that eat out of mangers/feed troughs are kept in their own space: barns, stables, and so on. But this isn’t always how it’s been.
    • Tradition of bringing animals into the shared home at night
      • Protects them from the elements, especially in places where it gets colder at night (also provides much-needed extra body heat in those places!)
      • Protects them from other animals that may way to snatch them and eat them
      • Protects them from thieves who may try to come by in the night and steal them
    • Fabulous scene from the movie A Knight’s Tale in which the protagonist, William, who is trying to rise up out of the peasant class into which he was born is arguing with the noble woman he’s fallen in love with → She’s trying to convince him that they can run away together so he can avoid a deadly duel he’s set on fighting, and he’s trying to describe to her what a peasant life will look like. He says to her, “And where will we live? In my hovel? With the pigs inside in winter so they won’t freeze?” And she responds, “Yes, William, with the pigs. With the pigs.”

• • • Something done by homesteaders in American history
    • Lots of places around the world where this is still the case today
  • Non-stable idea = work of theologian Ian Paul, professor at Fuller Seminary in California → cites Kenneth Bailey, renowned scholar in field of 1^st-cent. Palestinian culture: Most families would live in a single-room house, with a lower compartment for animals to be brought in at night, and either a room at the back for visitors, or space on the roof. The family living area would usually have hollows in the ground, filled with hay, in the living area, where the animals would feed.[1] → This is certainly a far cry from the traditional home layout that we’re used to, so along with a traditional misunderstanding leading us to the stable, we’re also laboring under a cultural misunderstanding.
  • One more misunderstanding layered onto this that makes a huge difference = grammatical → And this one is understandable because it has to do with translation from the original Greek.
    • Gr. for “inn” as we think of it nowadays = word that referred to a shelter for strangers that included a common cooking/eating space and a large communal sleeping space → Think modern-day hostels: large communal room with separate beds, shared bathroom, communal kitchen.
    • But the thing is, the Greek in Luke’s story is not that word. → another word that specifically refers to a spare upper room in a private house that was set aside for guests (no payment expected)
      • Same word used for the Upper Room in which Jesus and his disciples share their last supper together[2]
  • Ian Paul gives us a glimpse into what this means for our understanding of the Christmas story that we know and love: What, then, does it mean for the [inn] to have ‘no space’? It means that many, like Joseph and Mary, have travelled to Bethlehem, and the family guest room is already full, probably with other relatives who arrived earlier. So Joseph and Mary must stay with the family itself, in the main room of the house, and there Mary gives birth. The most natural place to lay the baby is in the hay-filled depressions at the lower end of the house where the animals are fed.[3]
• Okay … pause and take that in for a second. Now, I know that for a lot of years, all sorts of people – pastors included … myself included! – have used that image of Jesus … of the Son of God, God-With-Us, Emmanuel … being born in a stable as a metaphor for God coming down into the lowliest of lowly and inhabiting humanity in the most humble, modest, commonplace way. And that’s a powerful metaphor. But tonight I want us to look at and think about this miraculous birth in another way – a way that sheds a whole new light and dawns a whole new meaning onto the passage from John’s gospel that we also read this evening.
  • Jn passage begins with description of all the ethereal exceptional-ness of Jesus: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The Word was with God in the beginning. Everything came into being through the Word, and without the Word nothing came into being. What came into being through the Word was life, and the life was the light for all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness doesn’t extinguish the light.[4] → John wants to be sure we understand from the very outset how truly Other this Jesus – this Word-Made-Flesh – really is.
    • Jesus has always been AND has always been with God
    • Everything came into being through Jesus
    • Jesus was light and life – a light so powerful, so eternal, so other that even the most impenetrable darkness is no match for this Jesus-Light → It wasn’t. It isn’t. And it never will be. “The light shines” … as in a constant and perpetual action, an ongoing action … “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness doesn’t” … as in a fixed and terminable action, a limited action … “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness doesn’t extinguish the light.” The light goes on and on, so much so that the darkness no longer has the final word.
  • It’s this Everlasting Light – this Wonder Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, as the prophet Isaiah called him … it’s this Light of the World that was being born that night. It is God Incarnate – the Almighty Creator of the entire universe – who is choosing to take on the frail, vulnerable, precious form of a human baby. God chose a heart that beat just like yours. God chose flesh that ticked and itched, tingled and ran with goosebumps just like yours. God chose lungs that breathe in and out just like yours. God chose eyes that cried and lips that smiled and a stomach that rumbled just like yours.
  • Where was this miraculous God Incarnate born? → If we follow the reasoning and scholarship of Ian Paul, that precious and world-altering little baby Savior was born … in a home. A peasant home. An ordinary home. In the most used, the most communal, the most shared room in that house – the main room in which most of the family’s whole life took place.
    • Yes, they guarded/sheltered their animals there
    • Shared everyday family life there
    • Probably birthed other babies there
    • Jesus Christ … God’s only begotten Son … the Savior of the world … the one who came to put hands and feet and a heart and breathe on the Love of God … was born literally in the midst of the everyday lives of people.
    • Ending of Jn passage: The Word became flesh and made his home among us. We have seen his glory, glory like that of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.[5]
• Throughout Advent this year, we’ve been talking about the theme “Where We Belong” and how God meets us wherever we are on our journeys and brings a holy, blessed presence to that place. Tonight is the absolute, ultimate culmination of that idea – of finding belonging in God because God chose to belong with us. Fully. Without exception. In our homes. In our lives.
  • Tuhina Verma Rasche, ELCA minister who put together the main ideas for this sermon series: The reality of life – well, reality, at least as we know it – is filled with muck. Highs. Lows. Joys. Sorrows. Messy, and sometimes more uncensored than we can bear. In the midst of an uncensored reality, God took on our nature, took on our form, and came into a very real and broken and beautiful world. The Word made flesh came to truly make our stories and God’s story come together, become close and relational and passionate and full of feelings. … Let us remember the Word made flesh that came to live among us, to be with us, and to live out our experiences. This is a gospel of embodiment, not mere words, but the Word.[6] → That home and those circumstances that Jesus was born into weren’t perfect. Mary and Joseph ended up in that communal, family space because they showed up later than everyone else and the honored space specifically for guests was already full. But into that difficulty and overcrowded space – into all the awkwardness and the annoyance of that situation – God made space anyway. God made space for the Light to shine in the darkness. God made space for shepherds and the adoration and alleluias they would bring. God made space for Love and Hope to be born, making God’s own home among us. “Glory to God in heaven, and on earth peace among those whom God favors!” Thanks be to God. Amen.

[1] https://www.psephizo.com/biblical-studies/jesus-wasnt-born-in-a-stable-and-that-makes-all-the-difference/.

[2] Lk 22:11.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Jn 1:1-5.

[5] Jn 1:14.

[6] Tuhina Verma Rasche. “Advent/Christmas series: Where We Belong – Christmas Eve: Home in the Word” in A Preacher’s Guide to Lectionary Sermon Series: Thematic Plans for Years A, B, and C, vol. 2. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2019), 86.

Text used – 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16

• One of my favorite shows to watch with my family when I was home from college was Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.
  • Show that used to be on ABC → family would be nominated by friends, family members, co-workers, community members for an elaborate home makeover
    • Families were always people who were living in a house that was not good for them
      • In disrepair
      • Dealing with issues like mold
      • Inaccessible/physically troublesome for someone with a disability → e.g. – doorways too small for a wheelchair
    • Families were also always people who did good things
      • People who made their communities better
      • People who made the world better
      • People who, despite being “down on their luck,” still found ways to give
  • Host Ty Pennigton and his team would show up at the family’s home, talk to them about what they needed and what they liked, send the family on an amazing vacation, and either fix/add on to their home or build them an entirely new one … in just one short week
    • Focus family’s extended family members would come help
    • Friends and co-workers would come help
    • Sometimes an entire community would come out
    • And at the end of the week, there’s be this huge, amazing reveal where the family got to walk through their new home for the first time and see all of the amazing stuff that the team did. And, especially toward the end of the series, the family usually learned that whatever remained of their mortgage had been paid off as well. It was the kind of show you couldn’t watch without crying.
      • So much gratitude
      • Powerful to see people so blessed
      • And one of the things that really got me was always how humble the receiving family was. They never felt like they were anyone special or deserving of this incredible gift. They never expected any kind of recompense for the kindness that they put out into the world. They were always just amazed that someone else had thought of them in that way. It was that flip-flop – them being on the receiving end of kindness and generosity instead of the giving end – that really got me.
• And that’s not so different from where we find King David in our Scripture passage this morning.
  • Background
    • Still closer to the beginning of King David’s story
      • Whole debacle with Saul is over and done with → Saul is dead[1], and David is the settled king over the whole of Israel[2] (before northern and southern kingdoms split)
        • Find David riding a bit of a high
          • Just after being made king, David and his forces marched against the city of Jerusalem, held by the Jebusites at the time, and conquered it, establishing it as David’s city and building his palace within.[3]
          • In addition → Philistines have heard that David is now king, so they come to march against him (payback for the whole incident with Goliath when David was a youth) à But despite the fact that the Philistines attacked David and his army, the Philistines were defeated.[4]
          • And after these victories, David decides to bring the ark back into the city[5] – God’s chest, the chest that, according to the book of Hebrews, contained “a gold jar containing manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the stone tablets of the covenant”[6]
            • Chest had been kept safe in the home of Abinadab and Eleazar after being stolen, then returned by the Philistines before Saul was made king[7]
            • Brought in with much fanfare, sacrifices, and dancing
  • And it’s on the heels of that celebration that we join David’s story with our passage this morning. Clearly, David is in a good place! – beginning of today’s text: When the king was settled in his palace, and the Lord had given him rest from all his surrounding enemies
    • Heb. “settled” = connotations of being established and enduring → There is a finality and a permanence to the way David feels as our text begins this morning.
      • Reiterated with Heb. “rest”: calm, remain → It’s another word that carries implications of being settled in comfort and safety.
    • And in that settled state, King David looks around and realizes that, while he’s safe and comfortable in his lavish palace, “God’s chest is housed in a tent!”[8] And this thought appalls him. Now, our text never actually says that David decides to build a temple for God – a grand and glorious home like the one David himself now enjoys. But the implication is there.
      • Nathan’s words: “Go ahead and do whatever you are thinking, because the Lord is with you.”[9]
      • Directly following that = God’s words to Nathan in a dream that night: Go to my servant David and tell him: This is what the Lord says: You are not the one to build the temple for me to live in.[10] → So it’s pretty apparent that that’s what David was in the early stages of planning.
• And it’s what God says next that brings this passage into the realm of Advent and this theme that we’ve been talking about this year of where we belong and finding that place of ultimate belonging with God. – God’s continued words to King David (through prophet Nathan): In fact, I haven’t lived in a temple from the day I brought Israel out of Egypt until now. Instead, I have been traveling around in a tent and in a dwelling. Throughout my traveling around with the Israelites, did I ever ask any of Israel’s tribe leaders I appointed to shepherd my people: Why haven’t you built me a cedar temple? So then, say this to my servant David: This is what the Lord of heavenly forces says: I took you from the pasture, from following the flock, to be leader over my people Israel. I’ve been with you wherever you’ve gone, and I’ve eliminated all your enemies before you. Now I will make your name great – like the name of the greatest people on earth. … Your dynasty and your kingdom will be secured forever before me. Your throne will be established forever.[11] → Now, I know that’s a lot, but it’s all important, so let’s break it down a bit.
  • First part: God’s point about traveling with the people
    • God is making it clear that what God desires above all else is to be with the people
      • God doesn’t desire the extravagance of gold and cedar, of plush fabrics and bejeweled ornaments
      • God is saying to David, “I have spent all my time traveling with the people, living in tents as they did, and I never once complained because that is where I wanted to be: with the people.” God even emphasizes this by reassuring David, “I’ve been with you wherever you’ve gone” and reminding David that many of those places have been humble, simple places: “from the pasture, from following the flock.”
        • Certainly seems to turn David’s and Nathan’s expectations upside-down – scholar: According to the text, both king and prophet have misjudged the mind of the Lord. … David and Nathan misconceive the character and purpose of the One they worship. … The king and the prophet discover they are in the presence of the One who confounds human expectations and surprises even the faithful – or especially the faithful, who presume to know how God is acting because it is the way God must [12] → goes on to describe God as “the God who is not captive to human expectations and who – not only once upon a time, but time and time again – scatters “the proud in the thoughts of their hearts,” brings “down the powerful from their thrones,” lifts “up the lowly,” fills “the hungry with good things,” and sends “the rich away empty” (to quote Mary’s Magnificat from Luke 1)[13]
    • And it’s exactly this longing – God’s desire to be with the people in the midst of their everyday and their every circumstance – that we honor and celebrate and await in this season of Advent.
      • Wait for the birth of Jesus the Christ, Emmanuel, God-With-Us → a time when God once again yielded lavishness and majesty for the humblest of dwellings: humanity itself
      • Waiting for Christ to return to this humble, broken, crazy world and bring us back into that way of peace everlasting
      • Scholar: Think about the vulnerability of a tent. The tents of David’s day would have been made of animal skins and woven materials or rugs. They would have been patched probably and torn by the winds. Even the tent of the Lord would have been threatened by the forces of nature and would have had to be rebuilt periodically. … The tent’s fragility is the price paid for its mobility. As we take the last steps toward our celebration of the incarnation, it seems appropriate to linger for a moment over the idea of a God who is constantly ready to pull up stakes and move where we go, sleep where we sleep, and be buffeted by the same winds that blow sand in our eyes and tear the roofs off the shelters we erect: Emmanuel![14]
  • But God doesn’t stop there with David. God is not content with turning David’s expectations upside-down. God also flips them back to front. → in response to David’s desire to build God a lasting and bountiful home, God promises to make David’s name great: “Your dynasty and your kingdom will be secured forever before me. Your throne will be established forever.”[15]
    • Tuhina Verma Rasche (architect of this particular Advent series theme): Of course, God is the God of reversals and surprises. God tells David, “I will establish you a home, for you and your people, and I will establish a dynasty.” This home, this dynasty? This is a significant proclamation to come from God. Especially for a people who have lived with displacement, who have a history of wandering, including a good forty years in the desert, having this home is paramount.[16] → This declaration is one we feel like we can gloss over nowadays because dynasties really don’t mean anything to us. But God is promising the people residence and roots. God is promising the people not only a place but an identity in which they can dwell. Yes, God sent the people wandering in the wilderness for 40 yrs. as punishment for their lack of faith, but not only is God saying, “I was with you in all your wandering,” but God is also saying, “That wandering time is over. I am bringing your wandering to an end. You are home.” Truly, it is the best kind of surprise. Thanks be to God. Amen.

[1] 1 Sam 31-2 Sam 1.

[2] 2 Sam 5:1-5.

[3] 2 Sam 5:6-15.

[4] 2 Sam 5:17-25.

[5] 2 Sam 6.

[6] Heb 9:4.

[7] 1 Sam 4-6.

[8] 2 Sam 7:2.

[9] 2 Sam 7:3.

[10] 2 Sam 7:5.

[11] 2 Sam 7:6-9, 16.

[12] Eugene C. Bay. “Fourth Sunday in Advent – 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16 – Pastoral Perspective” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary – year B, vol. 1. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 76.

[13] Bay, 76.

[14] Linda Lee Clader. “Fourth Sunday in Advent – 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16 – Homiletical Perspective” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary – year B, vol. 1. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 79.

[15] 2 Sam 7:16.

[16] Tuhina Verma Rasche. “Advent/Christmas Series: Where We Belong – Advent 4: Pitching the Tent” in A Preacher’s Guide to Lectionary Sermon Series: Thematic Plans for Years A, B, and C, vol. 2. Complied by Jessica Miller Kelley. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2019), 85.