Two-Coat Theory
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For December 12, 2021:
Two-Coat Theory
by Dean Feldmeyer
Luke 3:7-18, Philippians 4:4-7
The American Heart Association
The Free Store Food Bank
Wounded Warriors
Doctors Without Borders
Matthew 25 Ministries
Planned Parenthood
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
Sandy Hook Promise
WVXU – Public Radio
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital
The United Methodist Mission Foundation
University of Cincinnati Alum Assoc.
Sycamore High School Alum Assoc.
Methodist Theological School of Ohio
Those are the charitable solicitations I have received in the mail in the past five days, with more rolling in. And they’re all good causes.
I receive those solicitations becaue at some point in the past I gave money to each of these organizations but I can’t give to all of them every year. To paraphrase English poet John Lydgate, I can afford to give to some of the charities all of the time and all of the charities some of the time, but I can’t afford to give to all of the charities all of the time.
So, what should I do?
John the Baptizer offers some helpful advice in this week’s lectionary gospel reading for Gaudete Sunday, the Third Sunday of Advent.
In the Culture
This is Gaudete Sunday, the Sunday of Joy named for the French word that means “rejoice.” We have lit the rose-colored candle, which calls us to celebrate iminent arrival, just 12 days hence, of the Messiah, the bringer of life and light, the son of YHWH, and the one who redefines what it means to be a child of God.
The rose candle also reminds us that one of the primary ways we celebrate the coming of the Christ is through repentance and turning away from our self-absorbed, self-centered, narcissistic attitudes that focus all of our attention and resources to the service of our own wants and needs.
Even if that message has escaped those who call themselves followers of Jesus Christ, as they hustle and bustle through the season, it has not slipped past the multitude of non-profit and charitable organizations that populate our country. Most of us are receiving weekly or even daily direct-mail solicitations from these organizations. I have named just a few that I have received.
Also, our television viewing is regularly interrupted with long pleas from charities and hospitals accompanied with soulful music and pictures of children who have been ravaged by the effects of chemotherapy. Animal shelters and rescue organizations offer ads that are just as accomplished at pulling on our heartstrings. We are assailed by pictures of puppies chained to dog houses in the snow, older dogs clearly suffering and shivering in the cold; homely mixed breed dogs and cats with pleading eyes beg for us to adopt or at least send a check to feed and care for them.
The web site, valueandinvest.com gives this accurate and insightful description of charity commercials, especially at this time of year:
“Charity commercials follow a proven theme: an animal or person in a desperate situation — most often a child — stares at you with wide, pleading eyes. A voice, perhaps of a celebrity, talks about how difficult a situation a group of people, animals, or even the environment is in. Sad music plays. Your feelings of sadness at what this group is facing build. Then, the voice tells you that for a small dollar contribution, you can stop hunger/help literacy/provide medical solutions. Suddenly, there is hope. You know the solution to this problem: pay some money.”
Corporations, not the least of which, Subaru, remind us that they have given large donations to worthwhile charities, and have more in common with the Ebenezer Scrooge that we meet at the end of the Christmas Carol than the one at the beginning. And further, if you buy a car from them, they will give some of your money that you spent on the car to one of their favorite charities.
I’m not saying that these charity groups are bad — most of them do very good and valuable work. In fact, one of the reasons I keep getting all these direct mail solicitations is that, at some time in the past, I’ve given money to all of them.
The real problem is not quite so easy to see and it is this: The real problem is that no matter how much we give, there will still be another solicitation in the mail, another commercial on TV, another photographic ad in a magazine at this time next year. The money we give isn’t solving the problem. It’s mitigating it, maybe, but the problem goes on and on. It never seems to end.
So, what should we do?
In the Scriptures
“What should we do?” It is the very question that the people ask John the Baptizer.
Luke tells us that John comes from “the wilderness.” An important designation. First, the people of Israel, his principal audience, has some profound connection to that arid plain. It is part of their history. It is through the wilderness that God guided their ancestors with a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. It was through that wild terrain that Moses led them until they could actually see the promised land.
This wilderness is not the romanticized wildernesses of North America, covered with pine forests and snow-capped mountains. This is not the Grand Tetons or the Canadian Rockies. There’s no Pike’s Peak, Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, or Zion National Park. This is a hot, dry, dangerous place. Home of scorpions, jackals, lions, outlaws, and robbers.
And it is there, tradition holds, that one goes to be close to YHWH of hosts.
John emerges from the wilderness to preach but his message is a hard one. He offers a baptism for the forgiveness of sin but when people come to receive it, he probes into their motives with a white hot, rhetorical knife.
They are, in his words, a “brood of vipers,” snakes slithering away as fast as they can from the burning fire of God’s judgment. And as they run, they shout over their shoulder the feeble defense that because they are “children of Abraham,” they should be given special consideration.
John is having none of it, however. Your pitiful excuses, he tells them, are insincere and even if they weren’t, they come too late. The judgement is already taking place.
Now they’re worried. They came to be baptized for the forgiveness of their sins. Is the baptizer telling them to go home? Is it really too late?
“What then should we do?” they ask.
John replies that there are, in fact, some things they might be able to do to mitigate the toxic effect of their otherwise sinful lives.
First, he says, if you have two coats and your neighbor has none, give one of your coats to that neighbor. There, see? Easy-peezy. Oh, and if you have more food than you need, give some of your excess to those who are hungry.
Unlike in Matthew, where John’s audience is made up primarily of Pharisees and Sadducees, in Luke, the audience is an eclectic one. Observant Jewish common folk, hated tax collectors, and soldiers representing the gentile occupying army of Rome are all in attendance.
Having heard from the common Jewish folks, we now hear from the tax collectors: What about us? What should we do?
Well, John says, it should be obvious. Don’t extort money from the tax payers you are assigned to collect taxes from. Collect only what you are assigned to collect and be content with your commission.
And now, much to everyone’s surprise, even Roman soldiers want in on the act. What about us? They ask.
And, again, John demonstrates that his message is an inclusive one. God’s grace is available to gentiles, too. Stop brutalizing and bullying the people you have been sent to serve and protect, says he. Yes, the law says that you can compel someone to carry your rucksack for one mile. But when you have done so, let that person return to their home and find someone else to carry it the next mile. Don’t take money from the citizens through threat or force. Do your job well and proudly and be content with your wages.
Generosity is one pathway to the Kingdom. And it sounds like the generosity expected of us is of the small kind. Giving away one of your two coats, after all, is hardly a burden. It’s giving from your excess.
In the Pulpit
There’s nothing wrong with giving money to charity. It is, in fact, a good thing to do and I commend it without reservation. Please, be generous with your giving as we move deeper and deeper into the seasons of Advent and Christmas.
Give as much as you can afford to give and know that sometimes a small gift is just as helpful as a large one. Companies who hand out multi-thousand or even multi-million-dollar gifts and grants often ask not how much money the charity has raised in the past year, but how many donations they have received from donors. Your $5 gift counts as one gift the same as Daddy Warbucks’s $1,000 gift.
In reality, however, our gift, be it $5 or $1,000, is solving only the immediate problem. That’s good, but we can’t be satisfied that solving today’s hunger is enough for the people of God. We must also be attentive to the needs of tomorrow and next week and next year.
John the Baptizer reminds us that, in our quest to enter God’s kingdom, what we believe is not nearly as important as what we do and how we behave. The impact of our beliefs is not, in God’s judgement, as big as the impact of our lives and deeds. The question is not whether we are descended from Abraham but whether we behave like Abraham.
John calls on us to be generous in our giving and certainly, to give half of what you have to those who have nothing, is generous. But if we look closely, we realize that John is insisting on more than one generous gift. In reality, he’s calling upon us to change how we live.
Watch!
I have two coats and I see a person who has none so I give one of my coats to that person. Now, what are you and I probably going to do? We’re going to go to Target or wherever they have coats on sale right after Christmas and we’re going to replace that coat we just gave away.
Only then, what do we have? Two coats, right. And, the world being what it is, this means that we can’t just stop with that one coat we gave away back before Christmas. John’s admonition to charitable living has no ending. It goes on and on.
This is John’s “Two Coat Theory.” It is the notion that we are called not just to address the issues of want and need in our world but to solve those issues. Luke is calling us to never have more than one coat while others are cold and exposed. He is calling us to never hoard more food that we need while others go hungry. He is telling us to accept the money we have earned honestly but no more — to treat people fairly and with dignity no matter how powerful we are.
This, says the gospel writer, is how we prepare for the advent of the Christ child. This is how we show that we are worthy of and thankful for his grace and acceptance. This is how we walk the walk that is the path to the Kingdom of God by accepting the fact that God does not want the dollar we put in the red kettle or the $10 we put in the offering plate or the $20 or $100 check we write to the homeless shelter. Those are very kind and helpful.
But they are not what God wants of us. God does not want 50% our money, God wants 100% of ourselves. When we have resolved to live that kind of life and done so resolutely, then we shall have taken on the admonition that Paul spoke to the Philippians, to “Let your gentleness be known to everyone…” And we will receive the promise that “…the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
SECOND THOUGHTS
Finding Reasons to Rejoice!
by Tom Willadsen
Zephaniah 3:14-20, Philippians 4:4-7, Luke 3:7-18, Isaiah 12:2-6
In the Church
It’s the third Sunday of Advent, Gaudete Sunday, also known as “the pink candle Sunday.” Gaudete is Latin for rejoice. Gaudete is the first word in today’s Philippians reading, in Latin: Gaudete in Domino semper! Rejoice in God always!
(Here’s a funny thing about “rejoice.” In English it’s a command, something like “Be glad again!” We do not use “joice” as a verb, but we have “rejoice.” Implicitly one has to have known joy before rejoicing.)
While Advent is a season of anticipation and penitence, sort of a junior varsity version of Lent, on the third Sunday a little joy is permitted. Gaudete Sunday is Advent’s hump day. “We’re a little more than halfway to Christmas; let’s celebrate making it this far!” In theory we get a foretaste of the joy we have scheduled for December 25 to keep ourselves from exploding into full blown rejoicing too early. My mother employed a similar tactic permitting my brother and me to open one gift on Christmas Eve.
Give some thought to how the congregation can experience joy on this Sunday. Perhaps you could select a true Christmas carol, instead of singing an Advent hymn. Your members have been hearing “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” in the supermarket for six weeks now, stop being so rigidly liturgically correct and lighten up, Preacher!
In the Scriptures
You will not find a more joyful and joy-filling book than Philippians. Paul’s affection for the Christians in Philippi leaps off the page. Today’s verses command rejoicing. They also command gratitude and not worrying. Forget your troubles, c’mon get — you get the idea.
The reading from Zephaniah is the happy ending, the upbeat promise of the Lord’s deliverance. The great day of the Lord is foretold in chapter one. Today’s reading is the fulfillment of that promise; it’s an enthronement liturgy filled with rejoicing, delight, and the removal of reproach, in short the standard deliverance package in Hebrew scripture. Earlier in the reading Israel is condemned for being indifferent to the Lord’s presence, as though, drunk on syrupy dregs (v. 12) they are completely indifferent to the Lord’s presence or absence in their lives. The rejoicing with which the book culminates is animating for the lethargic people of God.
It would be wise to add verse 1 to today’s reading from Isaiah; it gives context that is otherwise lacking. Like the readings from Philippians and Zephaniah, the one from Isaiah is a hymn of praise. You’re interpreting lyrics this morning, Preacher, try to imagine the happy music that would have accompanied the words.
A contrast worth exploring when looking at Zephaniah and Isaiah is that the last three verses of the Zephaniah reading are from God’s point of view. While it is obvious that the people rejoice in the Lord’s salvation, a certain amount of delight is expressed by God in Zephaniah. How do you imagine God rejoicing or expressing delight?
“You brood of vipers” is hardly in keeping with joy expressed in today’s other readings. The lesson from Luke follows last week’s, so worshippers will get a sense of continuity. Last week John revealed that he was “preparing the way.” This week he is confronting those taking part in his movement to do so sincerely, such that they behave differently, not just going through the motions of faith. His advice is practical. John does not call for anarchy; his followers are instructed to behave ethically, especially soldiers and tax collectors who have a reputation for abusing their authority.
In the News/In the Sermon
Yes, we’re still in the throes of Covid-19. Yes, inflation is higher than it has been in more than 30 years. Yes, distrust of voices of authority and reason is stronger than ever. But it’s Gaudete Sunday—why not go all Anne Murray on your congregation and tell them some good news? See this link to her 1983 country hit “A Little Good News.”
You could visit GoodNewsNetwork.org and find inspiring stories of underwater devices generating electricity by harvesting tidal energy, or a collection of solar cells arrayed on the site of a former landfill, turning a brownfield into a greenfield.
Look at the local mission efforts your church supports. Find out how many families your local food pantry feeds each month. Lift up the work of a member of your church who does things behind the scenes, not because they need to be done, but because doing them brings her joy. (Get her knowledge and approval before outing her goodness, a lot of people would be embarrassed. You might want to explain that she does not need the church’s gratitude, but the church needs to express its gratitude to her.)
We’re getting better at treating Covid-19. Researchers have found two new oral antiviral treatments for Covid-19.
Success in treating Covid-19 comes after the stunning, rapid success of creating vaccines to prevent it.
“In truth, the virus has already been largely defanged for most Americans, and it would be surprising if Omicron changed that. The death rate for vaccinated adults under 50 is virtually zero, according to data from Minnesota and King County, Wash. (which publish detailed statistics); the hospitalization rate is similar to that of a typical flu. For children, vaccinated and not, the risks are even smaller.”
Christmas is only 13 days from now! Get into the holiday spirit by finding reasons to rejoice. Amen!
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Mary Austin:
John 3:7-18
Preparation
John is preparing the people for the coming of the Messiah, getting their hearts ready and their actions to match their spiritual transformation. In his book Leadership Jazz, Max De Pree talks about the construction of New College, Oxford, in the fourteenth century. The quadrangle provided all the services the students needed, with the chapel and the great hall as the crowning achievements. About five hundred years later, the buildings had begun to deteriorate — the giant oak beams that supported the structure had started to rot. Architect Sir Gilbert Scott was enlisted to help, and with a group from the college visited Great Hall Woods in Berkshire. There he found trees that had been planted a hundred years before, specifically planted to be replacement beams when the time came and the need arose. They’d been growing large and strong for a century, waiting for the opportunity to be used to make an ancient building sturdy and beautiful again. May we be equally ready when the Messiah comes!
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Rejoice In Spite of It All
Even in a stressful time, Paul encourages the churches in Philippi to, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” He reminds them that, “The Lord is near.”
Covid has sharpened our ability to find joy even in loss and stress. As Angela Gorrell writes, echoing Paul, “I want to be clear: Joy is not the same as happiness. Happiness tends to be the pleasurable feeling we get from having the sense that life is going well. Joy, on the other hand, has a mysterious capacity to be felt alongside sorrow and even — sometimes, most especially — in the midst of suffering. This is because joy is what we feel deep in our bones when we realize and feel connected to others — and to what is genuinely good, beautiful, and meaningful — which is possible even in pain. Whereas happiness is generally the effect of evaluating our circumstances and being satisfied with our lives, joy does not depend on good circumstances.”
She finds that joy is often waiting for us. “A couple of days after my cousin’s husband died, a small group of family members and I were shopping for funeral items when the group decided to go to the place where Dustin had died by suicide. It was getting dark, and the sun had almost set. As we were taking in the landscape, we suddenly noticed a star above the trees. Standing next to one another in a line, we looked across the sky, and one of us asked whether any other stars could be seen. There were none. We realized that there was just this one exceedingly bright shining star in the sky. Gazing at the star, we felt as if Dustin had met us there, that he’d allowed that single star to be seen in the sky so that we would know he was all right. It was not the kind of relief we wanted for him. But for a few minutes, we allowed the tragedy of what had occurred in this very space just two days before to hang in the background, and we instead focused on the star. We were filled with a kind of transformative, quiet joy. And we all gave ourselves over to this moment.”
Rejoice, the Lord is near.
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Rejoice Right Now
“Rejoice in the Lord, always,” Paul writes to the churches in Philippi. To rejoice, we have to stop and take note of the gifts around us. Blogger Sarah Tuttle Singer recalls a time when her son forced her to stop and rejoice in his presence. “My son was nestled in my lap last night, slumbering at last, while I trolled the Internet for entertainment. Somewhere in a moment between status updates on Facebook and searching for shirts on oldnavy.com, I felt a gentle nudge on my arm. I looked down, and he was awake, his eyes as round and bright as twin moons shining in the pearly glow of the laptop screen. His mouth bent and stretched into a smile, and he poked me again. “Hey Mama, cyberspace can wait.” “But there’s a really good sale that ends tomorrow, and if I want to save 15% on all clearance items, I have to order NOW.”
She says that delight must be attended to, and seized. “Sometimes, I have to force myself to remember that this — all of this — is not forever. No matter what. Whether I skim over these moments in haste, or saturate myself in every poignant second, nothing will stay the same. Somewhere, in between stressing and (not) sleeping, in between being and breathing, in between power struggles and cooking dinner, tiny changes add up. They lose their belly-rolls, and their legs grow strong and sturdy, and suddenly, they’re out of diapers, starting school, taking ballet class and playing soccer, whirling and twirling into grownups. And suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, they’ll be growing their own families, struggling to hold onto sanity and sleep, while we go on trips to the Wine Country as our wrinkles dig down deep. And eventually — suddenly — we will all become old, marked with the eternal etchings of a life forever and ever spent thinking about tomorrow.”
Bent on delight, she says, “I shut the laptop.”
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Finding Joy in the Apple Orchard
On a lark, Chip Richards decided he wanted to pick apples as a way to re-awaken his writing career. It also turned out to be a lesson in delight. “The notion was quite romantic initially… I’d spend my days wandering the orchard rows connecting with my Muse, and my evenings writing to my heart’s content. The first few days were pretty exciting — driving tractors, climbing trees, embracing the daily challenge of filling three big apple crates with 2,000 apples each before sunset. But by day four… I’m pretty sure I hated it.” He started to wonder is he was wasting his time. “Here I was, slaving away for a fraction of my normal fee, getting pounded by the days and by the foreman, who had a way of applying subtle pressure to the pace of my picking that made me feel, well, inept.”
Then a new co-worker arrived, and he began to experience the missing delight in his work. “By the end of week three, I was starting to seriously consider pulling the escape hatch… That’s when George arrived. George was a tall, thin Chinese man. I don’t know how old he was but I would guess mid-fifties. He had run a successful importing business for many years but recently let it go to be with and look after his parents for a while. Somehow he found the orchard and had decided to drive 90-minutes each way across city traffic to be there picking each day. I was having a hard time dragging myself out of bed to make the ten-minute drive, so I wondered how long George would last. He was a quiet man and we didn’t talk much for the first few days, but one thing I noticed straight away — which admittedly gave me some comfort at the time — was that he was a much slower picker than me. I was about half as fast as the foreman, and George… well George was about half as fast as me.”
“Knowing that I would now have to pick even faster in order to make up for George if we were going to make our daily quota (a concept that George didn’t seem to understand) I found myself getting stressed and almost a bit resentful of my new partner. But a few days into our partnership, during our first lunch together, all of this changed…I joined George on the edge of an apple crate where he was eating a big chunk of homemade bread. We were well behind schedule, so I was eating fast and starting to do the math in my head of how many chest pouches would be needed to fill the next crate when I heard George bite into a crispy Pink Lady and take a deep sighing breath.”
“This is the best job ever,” he said, with the sincerity of a child. “Fresh air, fresh apples, green grass, blue sky… Best job ever.”
Richards looked at him, and “I realized that while we were both there doing the exact same work together, George was having a totally different experience to me. I was stressing out, picking as fast as I could, going home exhausted and frustrated, feeling like I should be doing something else… and he was driving three hours a day, picking half the amount of apples and experiencing moments of enlightened rapture. I was definitely missing something.”
George was there for delight. He gently handled each individual apple, “looking at it for a moment or two before he placed it in his pouch and reaching for the next.” George had learned to embody the words Paul writes to the Philippians, “Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything,” and he had come to teach that.
* * * * * *
From team member Chris Keating:
Zephaniah 3:14-20
The sounds that stay with you
When the brain processes a sound, it forms what is known as an “echoic” memory that is stored within the primary audio cortex (PAC), found in both hemispheres of the brain. After a few seconds, the echoic memory then moves into your short term memory, where your brain processes it and adds meaning to the sound. It’s an automatic process that happens all day long, even when we’re not aware.
For Zephaniah, the sound of joy breaking through layers of gloom and despair becomes a memory that stimulates hope. The sound of joy rising above the mourning cries of lament causes the prophet to know the goodness and grace of God.
Echoic memories can also be rooted in tragedy. When Congressman Jamie Raskin, for example, revisits the painful days of the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, it is the sounds he remembers most. The attack, which came the day after the funeral for Raskin’s eldest son, started with the pounding noises followed by the sounds of an enraged rabble.
Raskin described his memories to reporter Caitlin Gibson. He recounts hearing “the hammering of an enraged mob trying to violently force its way onto the floor of the House of Representatives, bashing some unseen, heavy thing against the central doors leading to the chamber, again and again. ‘I will never forget it,’ says the Democratic congressman, who has represented Maryland’s 8th District since 2017.”
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Celebrating the ordinary days
Despite all of our efforts to make the holidays magical, sometimes our expectations exceed reality. As Lindsay Crouse writes in The New York Times, “The planned punctuations to life — holidays, job promotions, family milestones — often disappoint.” She goes on to say that:
New Year’s Eve is useless; Thanksgiving ends up being memorable not for the meal but for the next-day deliberations over how many ways you can eat a leftover turkey. The polished moments that ended up on Instagram weren’t what I remembered at the end of the year, either. I rarely had any photos at all of the best days. I was too busy living them.
Her advice: designate a regular, ordinary, run-of-the-mill day as “the best day.” She backs up her idea with evidence from Robert Waldinger, a psychiatrist and director of the Harvard Happiness Study. Waldinger notes that by designating an ordinary day as “special” rewires our brains in such a way to see those everyday moments in a more favorable light. Lacking any scientific research, Paul said much the same thing so many centuries ago: “rejoice in the Lord always, again I say rejoice.”
* * *
Luke 3:7-18
Joy, sorrow, fear
Joy interspersed with sorrow and fear might seem like a rather incongruous, even discordant mixture this Third Sunday of Advent. Traditionally “Guadete Sunday,” (from the Latin, “rejoice”) provides some light-hearted relief from Advent’s preparations for the Lord’s coming. Indeed, this week the lectionary’s pairing of John the Baptist’s plaintive cries in the wilderness with Paul’s effervescent acclamations of praise.
But take a second look, and imagine how the Baptist’s call to repentance might lead to a life of joy known by the fruits of justice, grace, and charity.
“Joy, sorrow, and fear” were the emotions Kevin Strickland expressed last week following his release from more than 40 years of incarceration. Strickland, convicted in 1979 of a triple murder, had steadfastly maintained his innocence. Two days before Thanksgiving, a Missouri judge agreed with him and exonerated Strickland.
“I’m not necessarily angry,” Strickland said, an astonishing statement given that Missouri leaders had delayed action on releasing Strickland even when the evidence clearly demonstrated his innocence. Even more astonishing is that though Strickland has spent more than two-thirds of his life confined for a crime he didn’t commit, he will receive no assistance from the state in starting his new life.
Even the wheelchair that rolled him to the prison gates belonged to the Department of Corrections.
Missouri law prohibits the state from compensating Strickland. By contrast, neighboring Kansas offers wrongly convicted individuals $65,000 for each year they were in prison. For Strickland, that would amount to $2.7 million.
Those are only some of the sorrows inflicted by the injustices Strickland endured. While nothing can remove the agony he faced or mitigate the fears he may still encounter, Strickland is the beneficiary of a $1.7 million fundraiser sponsored by the Midwest Innocence Project. “I’ve heard about it,” Strickland told reporters. “It’s nice, I appreciate it. But it’s a shame I have to resort to that.”
When asked what had surprised him the most since being released, Strickland said he was surprised that “everybody might not be as hateful as the stuff I’ve been seeing in the media over the years.”
He continued, “Not everybody is in that lane. The couple places I’ve been, people reach in their pockets and give me five dollars, ten dollars, whatever they have. That tells me there’s a lot of love and good people out there.”
* * * * * *
WORSHIP
by George Reed
Call to Worship
One: Let us take delight in the instructions of God.
All: We will not follow the path of sinners or scoffers.
One: On God’s ways we will meditate day and night.
All: Then we will be like trees planted by streams of water.
One: We will yield the fruit of our learning from God.
All: In righteousness God will watch over us always.
OR
One: God calls us to come and learn God’s wisdom.
All: We long to hear God’s word and to become wise.
One: God’s wisdom is not just for our heads but for our hearts, as well.
All: We open our hearts and our minds to God’s counsel.
One: God’s wisdom changes our hearts, minds, and our actions.
All: We will allow the wisdom of God to guide our acts.
Hymns and Songs
Holy God, We Praise Thy Name
UMH: 79
H82: 366
PH: 460
NNBH: 13
NCH: 276
LBW: 535
ELW: 414
W&P: 138
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty
UMH: 139
H82: 390
AAHH: 177
NNBH: 2
NCH: 22
CH: 25
ELW: 858/859
AMEC: 3
STLT: 278
Renew: 257
Lift High the Cross
UMH: 159
H82: 473
PH: 371
AAHH: 242
NCH: 198
CH: 108
LBW: 377
ELW: 660
W&P: 287
Renew: 297
Ye Servants of God
UMH: 181
H82: 535
PH: 477
NCH: 305
CH: 110
LBW: 252
W&P: 112
What Wondrous Love Is This?
UMH: 292
H82: 439
PH: 85
NCH: 223
CH: 200
LBW: 385
ELW: 666
W&P: 257
STLT 18
Love Divine, All Loves Excelling
UMH: 384
H82: 657
PH: 376
AAHH: 440
NNBH: 65
NCH: 43
CH: 517
LBW: 315
ELW: 631
W&P: 358
AMEC: 455
Renew: 196
Cuando El Pobre (When the Poor Ones)
UMH: 434
PH: 407
CH: 662
ELW: 725
W&P: 624
Holy Spirit, Truth Divine
UMH: 465
PH: 321
NCH: 63
CH: 241
LBW: 257
ELW: 398
Lord, Whose Love Through Humble Service
UMH: 581
H82: 610
PH: 427
CH: 461
LBW: 423
ELW: 712
W&P: 575
Rnew: 286
What Does the Lord Require?
UMH: 441
H82: 605
PH: 405
CH: 659
W&P: 686
Refiner’s Fire
CCB: 79
Shine, Jesus, Shine
CCB: 81
Renew: 247
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELW: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day/Collect
O God who is all wise:
Grant your children wisdom
that we may serve you through our service to others;
through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, because you are wise. You hold all knowledge and all wisdom. Help us to be wise so that we may learn to be like you in our service to others. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
One: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins and especially our trying to get ahead of others instead of serving them.
All: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You created us as one people to be your blessed children and yet we see each other as competitors and adversaries. Instead of helping each other to become more like you, we push and shove others to try to get ahead. Where you created us for love and unity, we make ourselves hateful and divided. Forgive us and renew us in your Spirit that we may truly be your image. Amen.
One: God created us in love to be loving and continues to recreate us in that image. Receive God’s grace and Spirit and live into your creation.
Prayers of the People
We praise you, O God, because you are our loving and wise parent. You made us to be like you and have gifted us with your own self.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You created us as one people to be your blessed children and yet we see each other as competitors and adversaries. Instead of helping each other to become more like you, we push and shove others to try to get ahead. Where you created us for love and unity, we make ourselves hateful and divided. Forgive us and renew us in your Spirit that we may truly be your image.
We thank you for all the ways you have shared your wisdom with us. You have given us judges, prophets, psalmist, and seers to guide us. You have given us instructions in how to live in this world. You have given us your own Son to live among us and teach us by words and example what it means to be created in your likeness.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for one another in our need. We pray for those who have not heard of your loving kindness and grace. We pray for those who struggle to find their way without the guidance of your wisdom. We pray for those who are caught up in the competitive ways of the world and forget that we are all your children.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together saying:
Our Father....Amen.
(Or if the Our Father is not used at this point in the service.)
All this we ask in the name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
* * * * * *
CHILDREN'S SERMON
“Sharing Is Caring” Is More Than Just A Saying
by Quantisha Mason-Doll
Luke 3:7-18
Props for service: Something that can be shared. Think of a roll of stickers or a wood block puzzle.
Has anyone here ever heard the phrase “sharing is caring?” If you have not heard this phrase it means that when you share you are caring for God's creation.
Today we heard a story from the ministry of John the Baptist that teaches this very thing. John tells the people around him that if they had two coats and their neighbor had none then they should give one of their coats to their neighbor. By doing this they show God’s love.
(Give one child the props and ask them to share with the other children.)
When we have more than enough it is better to share with others that do not have enough. Just because you are children does not mean you cannot share God’s love with those around you. Remember our friend John tells us that all of God’s children can bear fruit.
(If you use a puzzle ask the children to come together and combine their puzzle pieces. If you used something like stickers then ask the children to place their sticker on another child...)
Prayer
Loving God, we thank you for the gift of sharing.
Help us to be like John the Baptist and know when to share.
Guide us as we seek to love you with our whole hearts.
We pray this in your son’s name.
Amen.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, December 12, 2021 issue.
Copyright 2021 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
- Two-Coat Theory by Dean Feldmeyer — One way we celebrate and rejoice in the coming of the Lord is through charitable giving. But how much should we give, and to whom?
- Second Thoughts: Finding Reasons to Rejoice! by Tom Willadsen.
- Sermon illustrations by Mary Austin, Chris Keating, Katy Stenta.
- Worship resources by George Reed.
- Children's sermon: “Sharing Is Caring” Is More Than Just A Saying by Quantisha Mason-Doll.
Two-Coat Theoryby Dean Feldmeyer
Luke 3:7-18, Philippians 4:4-7
The American Heart Association
The Free Store Food Bank
Wounded Warriors
Doctors Without Borders
Matthew 25 Ministries
Planned Parenthood
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
Sandy Hook Promise
WVXU – Public Radio
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital
The United Methodist Mission Foundation
University of Cincinnati Alum Assoc.
Sycamore High School Alum Assoc.
Methodist Theological School of Ohio
Those are the charitable solicitations I have received in the mail in the past five days, with more rolling in. And they’re all good causes.
I receive those solicitations becaue at some point in the past I gave money to each of these organizations but I can’t give to all of them every year. To paraphrase English poet John Lydgate, I can afford to give to some of the charities all of the time and all of the charities some of the time, but I can’t afford to give to all of the charities all of the time.
So, what should I do?
John the Baptizer offers some helpful advice in this week’s lectionary gospel reading for Gaudete Sunday, the Third Sunday of Advent.
In the Culture
This is Gaudete Sunday, the Sunday of Joy named for the French word that means “rejoice.” We have lit the rose-colored candle, which calls us to celebrate iminent arrival, just 12 days hence, of the Messiah, the bringer of life and light, the son of YHWH, and the one who redefines what it means to be a child of God.
The rose candle also reminds us that one of the primary ways we celebrate the coming of the Christ is through repentance and turning away from our self-absorbed, self-centered, narcissistic attitudes that focus all of our attention and resources to the service of our own wants and needs.
Even if that message has escaped those who call themselves followers of Jesus Christ, as they hustle and bustle through the season, it has not slipped past the multitude of non-profit and charitable organizations that populate our country. Most of us are receiving weekly or even daily direct-mail solicitations from these organizations. I have named just a few that I have received.
Also, our television viewing is regularly interrupted with long pleas from charities and hospitals accompanied with soulful music and pictures of children who have been ravaged by the effects of chemotherapy. Animal shelters and rescue organizations offer ads that are just as accomplished at pulling on our heartstrings. We are assailed by pictures of puppies chained to dog houses in the snow, older dogs clearly suffering and shivering in the cold; homely mixed breed dogs and cats with pleading eyes beg for us to adopt or at least send a check to feed and care for them.
The web site, valueandinvest.com gives this accurate and insightful description of charity commercials, especially at this time of year:
“Charity commercials follow a proven theme: an animal or person in a desperate situation — most often a child — stares at you with wide, pleading eyes. A voice, perhaps of a celebrity, talks about how difficult a situation a group of people, animals, or even the environment is in. Sad music plays. Your feelings of sadness at what this group is facing build. Then, the voice tells you that for a small dollar contribution, you can stop hunger/help literacy/provide medical solutions. Suddenly, there is hope. You know the solution to this problem: pay some money.”
Corporations, not the least of which, Subaru, remind us that they have given large donations to worthwhile charities, and have more in common with the Ebenezer Scrooge that we meet at the end of the Christmas Carol than the one at the beginning. And further, if you buy a car from them, they will give some of your money that you spent on the car to one of their favorite charities.
I’m not saying that these charity groups are bad — most of them do very good and valuable work. In fact, one of the reasons I keep getting all these direct mail solicitations is that, at some time in the past, I’ve given money to all of them.
The real problem is not quite so easy to see and it is this: The real problem is that no matter how much we give, there will still be another solicitation in the mail, another commercial on TV, another photographic ad in a magazine at this time next year. The money we give isn’t solving the problem. It’s mitigating it, maybe, but the problem goes on and on. It never seems to end.
So, what should we do?
In the Scriptures
“What should we do?” It is the very question that the people ask John the Baptizer.
Luke tells us that John comes from “the wilderness.” An important designation. First, the people of Israel, his principal audience, has some profound connection to that arid plain. It is part of their history. It is through the wilderness that God guided their ancestors with a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. It was through that wild terrain that Moses led them until they could actually see the promised land.
This wilderness is not the romanticized wildernesses of North America, covered with pine forests and snow-capped mountains. This is not the Grand Tetons or the Canadian Rockies. There’s no Pike’s Peak, Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, or Zion National Park. This is a hot, dry, dangerous place. Home of scorpions, jackals, lions, outlaws, and robbers.
And it is there, tradition holds, that one goes to be close to YHWH of hosts.
John emerges from the wilderness to preach but his message is a hard one. He offers a baptism for the forgiveness of sin but when people come to receive it, he probes into their motives with a white hot, rhetorical knife.
They are, in his words, a “brood of vipers,” snakes slithering away as fast as they can from the burning fire of God’s judgment. And as they run, they shout over their shoulder the feeble defense that because they are “children of Abraham,” they should be given special consideration.
John is having none of it, however. Your pitiful excuses, he tells them, are insincere and even if they weren’t, they come too late. The judgement is already taking place.
Now they’re worried. They came to be baptized for the forgiveness of their sins. Is the baptizer telling them to go home? Is it really too late?
“What then should we do?” they ask.
John replies that there are, in fact, some things they might be able to do to mitigate the toxic effect of their otherwise sinful lives.
First, he says, if you have two coats and your neighbor has none, give one of your coats to that neighbor. There, see? Easy-peezy. Oh, and if you have more food than you need, give some of your excess to those who are hungry.
Unlike in Matthew, where John’s audience is made up primarily of Pharisees and Sadducees, in Luke, the audience is an eclectic one. Observant Jewish common folk, hated tax collectors, and soldiers representing the gentile occupying army of Rome are all in attendance.
Having heard from the common Jewish folks, we now hear from the tax collectors: What about us? What should we do?
Well, John says, it should be obvious. Don’t extort money from the tax payers you are assigned to collect taxes from. Collect only what you are assigned to collect and be content with your commission.
And now, much to everyone’s surprise, even Roman soldiers want in on the act. What about us? They ask.
And, again, John demonstrates that his message is an inclusive one. God’s grace is available to gentiles, too. Stop brutalizing and bullying the people you have been sent to serve and protect, says he. Yes, the law says that you can compel someone to carry your rucksack for one mile. But when you have done so, let that person return to their home and find someone else to carry it the next mile. Don’t take money from the citizens through threat or force. Do your job well and proudly and be content with your wages.
Generosity is one pathway to the Kingdom. And it sounds like the generosity expected of us is of the small kind. Giving away one of your two coats, after all, is hardly a burden. It’s giving from your excess.
In the Pulpit
There’s nothing wrong with giving money to charity. It is, in fact, a good thing to do and I commend it without reservation. Please, be generous with your giving as we move deeper and deeper into the seasons of Advent and Christmas.
Give as much as you can afford to give and know that sometimes a small gift is just as helpful as a large one. Companies who hand out multi-thousand or even multi-million-dollar gifts and grants often ask not how much money the charity has raised in the past year, but how many donations they have received from donors. Your $5 gift counts as one gift the same as Daddy Warbucks’s $1,000 gift.
In reality, however, our gift, be it $5 or $1,000, is solving only the immediate problem. That’s good, but we can’t be satisfied that solving today’s hunger is enough for the people of God. We must also be attentive to the needs of tomorrow and next week and next year.
John the Baptizer reminds us that, in our quest to enter God’s kingdom, what we believe is not nearly as important as what we do and how we behave. The impact of our beliefs is not, in God’s judgement, as big as the impact of our lives and deeds. The question is not whether we are descended from Abraham but whether we behave like Abraham.
John calls on us to be generous in our giving and certainly, to give half of what you have to those who have nothing, is generous. But if we look closely, we realize that John is insisting on more than one generous gift. In reality, he’s calling upon us to change how we live.
Watch!
I have two coats and I see a person who has none so I give one of my coats to that person. Now, what are you and I probably going to do? We’re going to go to Target or wherever they have coats on sale right after Christmas and we’re going to replace that coat we just gave away.
Only then, what do we have? Two coats, right. And, the world being what it is, this means that we can’t just stop with that one coat we gave away back before Christmas. John’s admonition to charitable living has no ending. It goes on and on.
This is John’s “Two Coat Theory.” It is the notion that we are called not just to address the issues of want and need in our world but to solve those issues. Luke is calling us to never have more than one coat while others are cold and exposed. He is calling us to never hoard more food that we need while others go hungry. He is telling us to accept the money we have earned honestly but no more — to treat people fairly and with dignity no matter how powerful we are.
This, says the gospel writer, is how we prepare for the advent of the Christ child. This is how we show that we are worthy of and thankful for his grace and acceptance. This is how we walk the walk that is the path to the Kingdom of God by accepting the fact that God does not want the dollar we put in the red kettle or the $10 we put in the offering plate or the $20 or $100 check we write to the homeless shelter. Those are very kind and helpful.
But they are not what God wants of us. God does not want 50% our money, God wants 100% of ourselves. When we have resolved to live that kind of life and done so resolutely, then we shall have taken on the admonition that Paul spoke to the Philippians, to “Let your gentleness be known to everyone…” And we will receive the promise that “…the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
SECOND THOUGHTSFinding Reasons to Rejoice!
by Tom Willadsen
Zephaniah 3:14-20, Philippians 4:4-7, Luke 3:7-18, Isaiah 12:2-6
In the Church
It’s the third Sunday of Advent, Gaudete Sunday, also known as “the pink candle Sunday.” Gaudete is Latin for rejoice. Gaudete is the first word in today’s Philippians reading, in Latin: Gaudete in Domino semper! Rejoice in God always!
(Here’s a funny thing about “rejoice.” In English it’s a command, something like “Be glad again!” We do not use “joice” as a verb, but we have “rejoice.” Implicitly one has to have known joy before rejoicing.)
While Advent is a season of anticipation and penitence, sort of a junior varsity version of Lent, on the third Sunday a little joy is permitted. Gaudete Sunday is Advent’s hump day. “We’re a little more than halfway to Christmas; let’s celebrate making it this far!” In theory we get a foretaste of the joy we have scheduled for December 25 to keep ourselves from exploding into full blown rejoicing too early. My mother employed a similar tactic permitting my brother and me to open one gift on Christmas Eve.
Give some thought to how the congregation can experience joy on this Sunday. Perhaps you could select a true Christmas carol, instead of singing an Advent hymn. Your members have been hearing “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” in the supermarket for six weeks now, stop being so rigidly liturgically correct and lighten up, Preacher!
In the Scriptures
You will not find a more joyful and joy-filling book than Philippians. Paul’s affection for the Christians in Philippi leaps off the page. Today’s verses command rejoicing. They also command gratitude and not worrying. Forget your troubles, c’mon get — you get the idea.
The reading from Zephaniah is the happy ending, the upbeat promise of the Lord’s deliverance. The great day of the Lord is foretold in chapter one. Today’s reading is the fulfillment of that promise; it’s an enthronement liturgy filled with rejoicing, delight, and the removal of reproach, in short the standard deliverance package in Hebrew scripture. Earlier in the reading Israel is condemned for being indifferent to the Lord’s presence, as though, drunk on syrupy dregs (v. 12) they are completely indifferent to the Lord’s presence or absence in their lives. The rejoicing with which the book culminates is animating for the lethargic people of God.
It would be wise to add verse 1 to today’s reading from Isaiah; it gives context that is otherwise lacking. Like the readings from Philippians and Zephaniah, the one from Isaiah is a hymn of praise. You’re interpreting lyrics this morning, Preacher, try to imagine the happy music that would have accompanied the words.
A contrast worth exploring when looking at Zephaniah and Isaiah is that the last three verses of the Zephaniah reading are from God’s point of view. While it is obvious that the people rejoice in the Lord’s salvation, a certain amount of delight is expressed by God in Zephaniah. How do you imagine God rejoicing or expressing delight?
“You brood of vipers” is hardly in keeping with joy expressed in today’s other readings. The lesson from Luke follows last week’s, so worshippers will get a sense of continuity. Last week John revealed that he was “preparing the way.” This week he is confronting those taking part in his movement to do so sincerely, such that they behave differently, not just going through the motions of faith. His advice is practical. John does not call for anarchy; his followers are instructed to behave ethically, especially soldiers and tax collectors who have a reputation for abusing their authority.
In the News/In the Sermon
Yes, we’re still in the throes of Covid-19. Yes, inflation is higher than it has been in more than 30 years. Yes, distrust of voices of authority and reason is stronger than ever. But it’s Gaudete Sunday—why not go all Anne Murray on your congregation and tell them some good news? See this link to her 1983 country hit “A Little Good News.”
You could visit GoodNewsNetwork.org and find inspiring stories of underwater devices generating electricity by harvesting tidal energy, or a collection of solar cells arrayed on the site of a former landfill, turning a brownfield into a greenfield.
Look at the local mission efforts your church supports. Find out how many families your local food pantry feeds each month. Lift up the work of a member of your church who does things behind the scenes, not because they need to be done, but because doing them brings her joy. (Get her knowledge and approval before outing her goodness, a lot of people would be embarrassed. You might want to explain that she does not need the church’s gratitude, but the church needs to express its gratitude to her.)
We’re getting better at treating Covid-19. Researchers have found two new oral antiviral treatments for Covid-19.
Success in treating Covid-19 comes after the stunning, rapid success of creating vaccines to prevent it.
“In truth, the virus has already been largely defanged for most Americans, and it would be surprising if Omicron changed that. The death rate for vaccinated adults under 50 is virtually zero, according to data from Minnesota and King County, Wash. (which publish detailed statistics); the hospitalization rate is similar to that of a typical flu. For children, vaccinated and not, the risks are even smaller.”
Christmas is only 13 days from now! Get into the holiday spirit by finding reasons to rejoice. Amen!
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Mary Austin:John 3:7-18
Preparation
John is preparing the people for the coming of the Messiah, getting their hearts ready and their actions to match their spiritual transformation. In his book Leadership Jazz, Max De Pree talks about the construction of New College, Oxford, in the fourteenth century. The quadrangle provided all the services the students needed, with the chapel and the great hall as the crowning achievements. About five hundred years later, the buildings had begun to deteriorate — the giant oak beams that supported the structure had started to rot. Architect Sir Gilbert Scott was enlisted to help, and with a group from the college visited Great Hall Woods in Berkshire. There he found trees that had been planted a hundred years before, specifically planted to be replacement beams when the time came and the need arose. They’d been growing large and strong for a century, waiting for the opportunity to be used to make an ancient building sturdy and beautiful again. May we be equally ready when the Messiah comes!
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Rejoice In Spite of It All
Even in a stressful time, Paul encourages the churches in Philippi to, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” He reminds them that, “The Lord is near.”
Covid has sharpened our ability to find joy even in loss and stress. As Angela Gorrell writes, echoing Paul, “I want to be clear: Joy is not the same as happiness. Happiness tends to be the pleasurable feeling we get from having the sense that life is going well. Joy, on the other hand, has a mysterious capacity to be felt alongside sorrow and even — sometimes, most especially — in the midst of suffering. This is because joy is what we feel deep in our bones when we realize and feel connected to others — and to what is genuinely good, beautiful, and meaningful — which is possible even in pain. Whereas happiness is generally the effect of evaluating our circumstances and being satisfied with our lives, joy does not depend on good circumstances.”
She finds that joy is often waiting for us. “A couple of days after my cousin’s husband died, a small group of family members and I were shopping for funeral items when the group decided to go to the place where Dustin had died by suicide. It was getting dark, and the sun had almost set. As we were taking in the landscape, we suddenly noticed a star above the trees. Standing next to one another in a line, we looked across the sky, and one of us asked whether any other stars could be seen. There were none. We realized that there was just this one exceedingly bright shining star in the sky. Gazing at the star, we felt as if Dustin had met us there, that he’d allowed that single star to be seen in the sky so that we would know he was all right. It was not the kind of relief we wanted for him. But for a few minutes, we allowed the tragedy of what had occurred in this very space just two days before to hang in the background, and we instead focused on the star. We were filled with a kind of transformative, quiet joy. And we all gave ourselves over to this moment.”
Rejoice, the Lord is near.
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Rejoice Right Now
“Rejoice in the Lord, always,” Paul writes to the churches in Philippi. To rejoice, we have to stop and take note of the gifts around us. Blogger Sarah Tuttle Singer recalls a time when her son forced her to stop and rejoice in his presence. “My son was nestled in my lap last night, slumbering at last, while I trolled the Internet for entertainment. Somewhere in a moment between status updates on Facebook and searching for shirts on oldnavy.com, I felt a gentle nudge on my arm. I looked down, and he was awake, his eyes as round and bright as twin moons shining in the pearly glow of the laptop screen. His mouth bent and stretched into a smile, and he poked me again. “Hey Mama, cyberspace can wait.” “But there’s a really good sale that ends tomorrow, and if I want to save 15% on all clearance items, I have to order NOW.”
She says that delight must be attended to, and seized. “Sometimes, I have to force myself to remember that this — all of this — is not forever. No matter what. Whether I skim over these moments in haste, or saturate myself in every poignant second, nothing will stay the same. Somewhere, in between stressing and (not) sleeping, in between being and breathing, in between power struggles and cooking dinner, tiny changes add up. They lose their belly-rolls, and their legs grow strong and sturdy, and suddenly, they’re out of diapers, starting school, taking ballet class and playing soccer, whirling and twirling into grownups. And suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, they’ll be growing their own families, struggling to hold onto sanity and sleep, while we go on trips to the Wine Country as our wrinkles dig down deep. And eventually — suddenly — we will all become old, marked with the eternal etchings of a life forever and ever spent thinking about tomorrow.”
Bent on delight, she says, “I shut the laptop.”
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Finding Joy in the Apple Orchard
On a lark, Chip Richards decided he wanted to pick apples as a way to re-awaken his writing career. It also turned out to be a lesson in delight. “The notion was quite romantic initially… I’d spend my days wandering the orchard rows connecting with my Muse, and my evenings writing to my heart’s content. The first few days were pretty exciting — driving tractors, climbing trees, embracing the daily challenge of filling three big apple crates with 2,000 apples each before sunset. But by day four… I’m pretty sure I hated it.” He started to wonder is he was wasting his time. “Here I was, slaving away for a fraction of my normal fee, getting pounded by the days and by the foreman, who had a way of applying subtle pressure to the pace of my picking that made me feel, well, inept.”
Then a new co-worker arrived, and he began to experience the missing delight in his work. “By the end of week three, I was starting to seriously consider pulling the escape hatch… That’s when George arrived. George was a tall, thin Chinese man. I don’t know how old he was but I would guess mid-fifties. He had run a successful importing business for many years but recently let it go to be with and look after his parents for a while. Somehow he found the orchard and had decided to drive 90-minutes each way across city traffic to be there picking each day. I was having a hard time dragging myself out of bed to make the ten-minute drive, so I wondered how long George would last. He was a quiet man and we didn’t talk much for the first few days, but one thing I noticed straight away — which admittedly gave me some comfort at the time — was that he was a much slower picker than me. I was about half as fast as the foreman, and George… well George was about half as fast as me.”
“Knowing that I would now have to pick even faster in order to make up for George if we were going to make our daily quota (a concept that George didn’t seem to understand) I found myself getting stressed and almost a bit resentful of my new partner. But a few days into our partnership, during our first lunch together, all of this changed…I joined George on the edge of an apple crate where he was eating a big chunk of homemade bread. We were well behind schedule, so I was eating fast and starting to do the math in my head of how many chest pouches would be needed to fill the next crate when I heard George bite into a crispy Pink Lady and take a deep sighing breath.”
“This is the best job ever,” he said, with the sincerity of a child. “Fresh air, fresh apples, green grass, blue sky… Best job ever.”
Richards looked at him, and “I realized that while we were both there doing the exact same work together, George was having a totally different experience to me. I was stressing out, picking as fast as I could, going home exhausted and frustrated, feeling like I should be doing something else… and he was driving three hours a day, picking half the amount of apples and experiencing moments of enlightened rapture. I was definitely missing something.”
George was there for delight. He gently handled each individual apple, “looking at it for a moment or two before he placed it in his pouch and reaching for the next.” George had learned to embody the words Paul writes to the Philippians, “Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything,” and he had come to teach that.
* * * * * *
From team member Chris Keating:Zephaniah 3:14-20
The sounds that stay with you
When the brain processes a sound, it forms what is known as an “echoic” memory that is stored within the primary audio cortex (PAC), found in both hemispheres of the brain. After a few seconds, the echoic memory then moves into your short term memory, where your brain processes it and adds meaning to the sound. It’s an automatic process that happens all day long, even when we’re not aware.
For Zephaniah, the sound of joy breaking through layers of gloom and despair becomes a memory that stimulates hope. The sound of joy rising above the mourning cries of lament causes the prophet to know the goodness and grace of God.
Echoic memories can also be rooted in tragedy. When Congressman Jamie Raskin, for example, revisits the painful days of the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, it is the sounds he remembers most. The attack, which came the day after the funeral for Raskin’s eldest son, started with the pounding noises followed by the sounds of an enraged rabble.
Raskin described his memories to reporter Caitlin Gibson. He recounts hearing “the hammering of an enraged mob trying to violently force its way onto the floor of the House of Representatives, bashing some unseen, heavy thing against the central doors leading to the chamber, again and again. ‘I will never forget it,’ says the Democratic congressman, who has represented Maryland’s 8th District since 2017.”
* * *
Philippians 4:4-7
Celebrating the ordinary days
Despite all of our efforts to make the holidays magical, sometimes our expectations exceed reality. As Lindsay Crouse writes in The New York Times, “The planned punctuations to life — holidays, job promotions, family milestones — often disappoint.” She goes on to say that:
New Year’s Eve is useless; Thanksgiving ends up being memorable not for the meal but for the next-day deliberations over how many ways you can eat a leftover turkey. The polished moments that ended up on Instagram weren’t what I remembered at the end of the year, either. I rarely had any photos at all of the best days. I was too busy living them.
Her advice: designate a regular, ordinary, run-of-the-mill day as “the best day.” She backs up her idea with evidence from Robert Waldinger, a psychiatrist and director of the Harvard Happiness Study. Waldinger notes that by designating an ordinary day as “special” rewires our brains in such a way to see those everyday moments in a more favorable light. Lacking any scientific research, Paul said much the same thing so many centuries ago: “rejoice in the Lord always, again I say rejoice.”
* * *
Luke 3:7-18
Joy, sorrow, fear
Joy interspersed with sorrow and fear might seem like a rather incongruous, even discordant mixture this Third Sunday of Advent. Traditionally “Guadete Sunday,” (from the Latin, “rejoice”) provides some light-hearted relief from Advent’s preparations for the Lord’s coming. Indeed, this week the lectionary’s pairing of John the Baptist’s plaintive cries in the wilderness with Paul’s effervescent acclamations of praise.
But take a second look, and imagine how the Baptist’s call to repentance might lead to a life of joy known by the fruits of justice, grace, and charity.
“Joy, sorrow, and fear” were the emotions Kevin Strickland expressed last week following his release from more than 40 years of incarceration. Strickland, convicted in 1979 of a triple murder, had steadfastly maintained his innocence. Two days before Thanksgiving, a Missouri judge agreed with him and exonerated Strickland.
“I’m not necessarily angry,” Strickland said, an astonishing statement given that Missouri leaders had delayed action on releasing Strickland even when the evidence clearly demonstrated his innocence. Even more astonishing is that though Strickland has spent more than two-thirds of his life confined for a crime he didn’t commit, he will receive no assistance from the state in starting his new life.
Even the wheelchair that rolled him to the prison gates belonged to the Department of Corrections.
Missouri law prohibits the state from compensating Strickland. By contrast, neighboring Kansas offers wrongly convicted individuals $65,000 for each year they were in prison. For Strickland, that would amount to $2.7 million.
Those are only some of the sorrows inflicted by the injustices Strickland endured. While nothing can remove the agony he faced or mitigate the fears he may still encounter, Strickland is the beneficiary of a $1.7 million fundraiser sponsored by the Midwest Innocence Project. “I’ve heard about it,” Strickland told reporters. “It’s nice, I appreciate it. But it’s a shame I have to resort to that.”
When asked what had surprised him the most since being released, Strickland said he was surprised that “everybody might not be as hateful as the stuff I’ve been seeing in the media over the years.”
He continued, “Not everybody is in that lane. The couple places I’ve been, people reach in their pockets and give me five dollars, ten dollars, whatever they have. That tells me there’s a lot of love and good people out there.”
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WORSHIPby George Reed
Call to Worship
One: Let us take delight in the instructions of God.
All: We will not follow the path of sinners or scoffers.
One: On God’s ways we will meditate day and night.
All: Then we will be like trees planted by streams of water.
One: We will yield the fruit of our learning from God.
All: In righteousness God will watch over us always.
OR
One: God calls us to come and learn God’s wisdom.
All: We long to hear God’s word and to become wise.
One: God’s wisdom is not just for our heads but for our hearts, as well.
All: We open our hearts and our minds to God’s counsel.
One: God’s wisdom changes our hearts, minds, and our actions.
All: We will allow the wisdom of God to guide our acts.
Hymns and Songs
Holy God, We Praise Thy Name
UMH: 79
H82: 366
PH: 460
NNBH: 13
NCH: 276
LBW: 535
ELW: 414
W&P: 138
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty
UMH: 139
H82: 390
AAHH: 177
NNBH: 2
NCH: 22
CH: 25
ELW: 858/859
AMEC: 3
STLT: 278
Renew: 257
Lift High the Cross
UMH: 159
H82: 473
PH: 371
AAHH: 242
NCH: 198
CH: 108
LBW: 377
ELW: 660
W&P: 287
Renew: 297
Ye Servants of God
UMH: 181
H82: 535
PH: 477
NCH: 305
CH: 110
LBW: 252
W&P: 112
What Wondrous Love Is This?
UMH: 292
H82: 439
PH: 85
NCH: 223
CH: 200
LBW: 385
ELW: 666
W&P: 257
STLT 18
Love Divine, All Loves Excelling
UMH: 384
H82: 657
PH: 376
AAHH: 440
NNBH: 65
NCH: 43
CH: 517
LBW: 315
ELW: 631
W&P: 358
AMEC: 455
Renew: 196
Cuando El Pobre (When the Poor Ones)
UMH: 434
PH: 407
CH: 662
ELW: 725
W&P: 624
Holy Spirit, Truth Divine
UMH: 465
PH: 321
NCH: 63
CH: 241
LBW: 257
ELW: 398
Lord, Whose Love Through Humble Service
UMH: 581
H82: 610
PH: 427
CH: 461
LBW: 423
ELW: 712
W&P: 575
Rnew: 286
What Does the Lord Require?
UMH: 441
H82: 605
PH: 405
CH: 659
W&P: 686
Refiner’s Fire
CCB: 79
Shine, Jesus, Shine
CCB: 81
Renew: 247
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELW: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day/Collect
O God who is all wise:
Grant your children wisdom
that we may serve you through our service to others;
through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, because you are wise. You hold all knowledge and all wisdom. Help us to be wise so that we may learn to be like you in our service to others. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
One: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins and especially our trying to get ahead of others instead of serving them.
All: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You created us as one people to be your blessed children and yet we see each other as competitors and adversaries. Instead of helping each other to become more like you, we push and shove others to try to get ahead. Where you created us for love and unity, we make ourselves hateful and divided. Forgive us and renew us in your Spirit that we may truly be your image. Amen.
One: God created us in love to be loving and continues to recreate us in that image. Receive God’s grace and Spirit and live into your creation.
Prayers of the People
We praise you, O God, because you are our loving and wise parent. You made us to be like you and have gifted us with your own self.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You created us as one people to be your blessed children and yet we see each other as competitors and adversaries. Instead of helping each other to become more like you, we push and shove others to try to get ahead. Where you created us for love and unity, we make ourselves hateful and divided. Forgive us and renew us in your Spirit that we may truly be your image.
We thank you for all the ways you have shared your wisdom with us. You have given us judges, prophets, psalmist, and seers to guide us. You have given us instructions in how to live in this world. You have given us your own Son to live among us and teach us by words and example what it means to be created in your likeness.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for one another in our need. We pray for those who have not heard of your loving kindness and grace. We pray for those who struggle to find their way without the guidance of your wisdom. We pray for those who are caught up in the competitive ways of the world and forget that we are all your children.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together saying:
Our Father....Amen.
(Or if the Our Father is not used at this point in the service.)
All this we ask in the name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
* * * * * *
CHILDREN'S SERMON“Sharing Is Caring” Is More Than Just A Saying
by Quantisha Mason-Doll
Luke 3:7-18
Props for service: Something that can be shared. Think of a roll of stickers or a wood block puzzle.
Has anyone here ever heard the phrase “sharing is caring?” If you have not heard this phrase it means that when you share you are caring for God's creation.
Today we heard a story from the ministry of John the Baptist that teaches this very thing. John tells the people around him that if they had two coats and their neighbor had none then they should give one of their coats to their neighbor. By doing this they show God’s love.
(Give one child the props and ask them to share with the other children.)
When we have more than enough it is better to share with others that do not have enough. Just because you are children does not mean you cannot share God’s love with those around you. Remember our friend John tells us that all of God’s children can bear fruit.
(If you use a puzzle ask the children to come together and combine their puzzle pieces. If you used something like stickers then ask the children to place their sticker on another child...)
Prayer
Loving God, we thank you for the gift of sharing.
Help us to be like John the Baptist and know when to share.
Guide us as we seek to love you with our whole hearts.
We pray this in your son’s name.
Amen.
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The Immediate Word, December 12, 2021 issue.
Copyright 2021 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
