I preached this sermon at St. Lydia's on Sunday, November 18, as part of our exploration of the Gospel of Luke. The text is Luke 1:1-25; read it here.
You only got to offer incense at the temple
once in your life.
That was it.
Just once.
Just once did a priest have the opportunity
to pass through the entire assembly,
climb the stairs of the temple,
and enter the that most sacred place,
the Holy of Holies,
and pour out incense onto the fire.
Zechariah and all those gathered there praying
understood the curls of smoke rising up to the heavens
to represent the prayers of all of the people
rising up to God,
and Zechariah prayed,
as he did this thing,
that God would find those prayers pleasing.
When he opened his eyes,
there was something with him in the Holy of Holies.
A strange other-worldly presence
emerging through the haze and shimmer of the smoke-filled room.
Do not be afraid,
the angel told him.
Your prayer has been heard.
Like Abraham and Sarah,
their ancestors in the faith,
Zechariah and Elizabeth had waited,
for many years,
for a child.
Perhaps they had been waiting so long
that they thought their prayer would go unanswered.
Perhaps they had been waiting so long
that they thought God was deaf to their cries.
Perhaps they had been waiting so long,
they gave up hope that this particular blessing
would fall on them.
And now,
in a moment,
something had turned.
*
Zechariah and Elizabeth
were not the only ones were were waiting for something.
At that time,
the entire nation of Israel
was positioned on the brink of its own future.
Waiting for a Messiah.
Waiting for someone:
a king, a powerful ruler,
who would tip the scales and turn the world toward justice.
They were waiting for that King
that the prophesies foretold
who would topple Herod from his throne
and reign with fairness and equity.
All of Israel was waiting.
For the salvation of the world.
Just like all of you are waiting.
For something.
For some missing piece that has yet to be fulfilled.
That thing that you live in expectation of.
That thing that you hope will enter in one day,
restoring that which has been lost...
redeeming that which has been defiled...
re-making that which has decayed.
Just like Zechariah,
you live in hope.
And just like him, you are waiting.
*
If the stories of our holy book,
teach us anything,
it’s to expect God to do her thing
in the most unlikely places possible.
God chooses Zechariah and Elizabeth,
who are getting on in years,
and gave up hope of having children long ago,
to parent John the Baptist.
And in a cunning, second reversal,
it is not John, the son of the the righteous and good priest,
born to parents much to old who is the Messiah,
but some kid from Nazareth,
born to parents much too young.
Parents who, it seems, were hastily married after his birth.
Israel’s been waiting for a messiah,
a King,
and when they think they’ve found him,
this John, a prophet,
it turns out it’s actually that guy's cousin --
somebody no one’s ever heard of called Jesus.
So what can we glean from this story?
What can we decipher about what God is up to?
We might be tempted to presume
that God answers our prayers when we least suspect it.
But I think that interpretation sells God short,
turning God into a kind of fairy godmother in the sky
who grants wishes just when we’ve given up hope.
God didn’t choose Zechariah and Elizabeth to bear a son
because it was their most fervent hope and prayer,
the thing they had been waiting for all these years.
God chose them to play a role in a great cosmic drama:
the world was about to turn.
And they were going to help turn it.
It’s not wishes God answers,
it’s not happy endings that God grants,
but the slow, unfolding fulfillment of the hope that is within us.
That thing that we live in expectation of.
Then why Zechariah and Elizabeth?
Again, what might we glean from this story
about what God is up to?
Perhaps it is that God acts in the last place we might expect.
Even in ways we might find unreasonable or inconvenient.
Or excessive or wasteful or absurd.
God chooses a barren field in the bleak midwinter,
hard as iron and crusted with frost,
and causes it to bloom.
God chooses Elizabeth,
who is barren,
and causes her to conceive.
God chooses Mary,
who is young and poor,
and causes her to give birth to a savior.
Again and again in this gospel,
as we work our way through its story,
we will see God, through Jesus,
choose those who stand on the outside:
those who have little
and those who are despised,
to do unexpected things.
God chooses them,
on the outside,
to restore that which has been lost...
re-make that which has decayed.
to redeem that which has been defiled...
Just like Zechariah,
you live in hope.
And just like him, you are waiting.
It is the most unexpected places where God will do her work in you.
The fields of your heart
which are dead and bare;
the fields of your heart
which are hard as iron and crusted with snow,
these are the fields
in which God plants
and harvests.
Those are the fields that God chooses
to do God’s work.
These are the fields from which the world begins to turn.
*
We share the sermon at St. Lydia’s. And so I invite you to reflect in silence and then, if you feel moved, to share a story that’s been sparked for you by the text.
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