Advent 2 sermon...

This is the day that the Lord has made – let us rejoice and be glad in it!
In the name of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Happy Second Sunday in Advent!!!

Now I see some of you looking at me with … lets call it… mild amusement:

Because truly, this doesn’t sound much like a proclamation. It doesn’t really have the same emotional quality that we feel reverberate in our hearts with the ringing of the Easter bells and the lighting of the candles on Holy Saturday. And the proclamation that “Jesus Christ is risen today!”

It also doesn’t feel like being surrounded by the hushed singing voices that remember the words to silent night so clearly it is almost as if they have been etched into our very beings. “For unto us a Child has been born, Jesus Christ our Lord.”

Those feel like proclamations to me!

Advent is different. It isn’t an event, it’s a journey – and like all journeys, they are as unique as each one of us.

So I wonder what Advent feels like for you this year?

I would bet it will be different from what you felt last year, subtly perhaps, or perhaps not so subtle… Because you are not the same as you were last year – none of us are the same as we were last year. Between then and now has been an entire year of life, of experiences – of joys, sorrows, new births, deaths, losses, excitements – a year filled with living!

I wonder now what is it like to be back here in this place?
Or here for the first time exploring… anticipating - What does the birth of this Christ child mean for me?




Our common tradition tells us that advent is the time we prepare for the great celebration of Christmas. We prepare to hear again the birth story with all the unlikely and sometimes dubious characters - the shepherds and wisemen, families, and innkeepers, and the great star leading to the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes.

All this is coming. But its not here yet. We have to wait for it.

I wonder if waiting is as hard for you as it is for me!

Because I am an impatient person. I have a tendency to speak too quickly. I don’t like line ups. In fact, if I’m truly honest… I never used to like surprises at all. Waiting for Christmas was horrible! I wouldn’t consider myself a very theologically advanced kid, I knew Christmas had something to do with Jesus, and wasn’t all about presents, but on the other hand… as a kid… for me… it was all about presents. So it may not surprise you to know, that as a kid, I’d go looking for them.
This would usually start around the end of November. I would come home on the bus from school, before either of my parents were home from work, and I’d begin to casually look around.
Peeking into closets, under beds, sofa’s – even the high shelves that I needed a chair to see on top of.
Then there were the more obscure places, like the little room in the basement that had the freezer in it or the crawl space under the house where all the electrical wires and plumbing were – I was not to be deterred by the fact that it had a sand floor!

Nothing was safe from my prying eyes!

My mom never caught on – she never knew this is what I did. But slowly I came to a realization. I was losing the joy of Christmas. I knew what I would find as I unwrapped the gifts that were given in so much love. I had stolen away my own joy through my impatience. I had focussed on the end instead of the anticipation. I had given up the experience, because I just wanted to know.





It’s so tempting to rush into the Christmas story – to take the cue from society around us
We live in an instant, on demand sort of a world – a place that has had Christmas decorations in the stores since September!
A secular society that make this one day such a huge event.

As much as instinct tells us to rush it, to get there - we’re not there yet.
The manger is empty, yet God is still with us, just as the cross is empty, but Christ is among us still. These are the wonderful tensions that as Christians our traditions and common story hold together. And we continue this tension, anticipating the future, yet living in the present.

Christmas is coming – but it isn’t today. Today, is the Lords day - Let’s rejoice in our story, this Second Sunday of Advent.

Because today we hear the proclamation that someone BIG is coming – someone who is going to turn the world on it’s head.

John tells us that it is someone much more important than he is. Someone so important he doesn’t feel worthy to carry his sandals. And sandals were the humblest part of a persons clothing - good custom would dictate that anyone entering a home would have their sandals taken off and have their feet washed by the lowliest servant.
So here, John is calling himself lower than the lowliest servant in God’s household.

We hear the Gospel writer recalling the words of the prophet Isaiah, and proclaiming that John the Baptist, in his strange clothing, and his bizarre diet IS:
“the voice of one crying out in the wilderness –
prepare the way of the Lord.
Make his path straight.”

But to whom is he making this proclamation?
What is this wilderness he is speaking of?

Preparation is not a passive activity – just ask anyone preparing a Christmas dinner for 12. It is part anticipation and part action.
It is about understanding what is to come and taking an active role in the future, through living today.
This voice in the wilderness of our lives is crying out that we repent from our actions and turn away from the things in our lives that drive us from the love of God and from the love of each other.
John is blunt. Start living now, don’t rely on our ancestral roots, but prepare our path – don’t leave it to chance, live it into existence, leave behind the things that pull us off the path of who we are in God.
(Pause)

So I’d say that today is vitally important.
It is as important as Christmas.
It is as important as Easter.
It is as important as yesterday and tomorrow, it is none of these and all of these.
So today we celebrate today.

Because sometimes in the waiting, in the anticipation, we put off living.

Sneaking a peek at my presents ruined the surprise. But it didn’t change the story. Those were still my presents – it just changed my experience. Jumping ahead to the wonders of Christmas, doesn’t change the story. Christ was born, he lived, and laughed and taught and died and was raised to new life. It changes our experience and bends our paths - we can miss out on the journey to manger, to the cross and beyond.
Advent isn’t simply an event to be celebrated, it is a stony path full of twists and turns that the voice who cries out in the wilderness calls us to make straight, calls us to understand and calls us to rejoice in.

This Advent, its my hope that we can each make time in our busy lives to try to straighten our path.

To wonder our way out of our own personal wildernesses and hear that voice calling us to new birth, calling us to new life - TODAY.
After all… this is the day that the Lord has made – let us rejoice and be glad in it!

Amen.

a "U2'charist"???

Hmm.... this is... well - I don't know what this is...

Ash Wednesday

Lent – purple – Spring!
Doesn’t look much like spring out there today!
I've always had a hard time connecting spring and ashes
Spring represents life – ashes represent death
Forests where the burning is done purposely in order to renew the soil and let the vegetation grow back and renew the forest floor.
Out of the ash, new life can emerge
Out of the snow and death of winter, new life can emerge

Ashes are a reminder that we are just that, carbon and water, yet if you were to simply mix the two, you could never have it create beautiful works of art or compose heartbreakingly wonderful music. We can do that because in addition to carbon and water, we are spirit. Animated Stardust.

In the funeral liturgy, we say Ashes to ashes, Dust to dust. When we die, and our human body breaks down, we are not lost. What makes us who we are as children of God, little sparks of the divine, lives on. We take those memories with us, the good the bad the hurts, the loves, the terrible things we've done, the beautiful things we've done, those whose lives we have touched and those who have touched our lives. We don't just live on in the memories of those left behind, we live on in spirit with God.

Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust… Spirit to Spirit

Sometimes on this journey we choose what is wrong. We make mistakes and we fall short of becoming who our Creator and Redeemer is calling us to be. Today is a time where we honestly face and admit our frailties, using the ancient sign of ashes.

We acknowledge and ask God for forgiveness in our failure to be who it is we are called to be.

our lack of love

our tempers

our hatred

our ego

our pride

our jelously

our half-hearted Christian committment

our attempts to make ourselves feel better through others suffering

and the list goes on...

But it's not about guilt - it's about God's grace.

Today doesn't end with ashes, our lives don't end with ashes. We are pure spirit, and by the Grace of God we are able to rejoice in life after life.

Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust.... Spirit to Spirit

Thanks be to God!

Pilgrimage

This will be the view in my not so distant future... Yes folks, you read it right. I'm going back to Iona. I leave July 22nd and return on August 6th. This is my anticipated reward for a grueling summer of CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) at Toronto Western Hospital, and after the conclusion of my full time parish internship. All this is in preparation for next year. I still don't quite know what I've gotten myself (and Jonathan!) into... co-head of Divinity... I'm looking forward to the challenge - but I'm also looking forward to this much needed break! I'm going to be staying with my friend who is a resident on the island in a little house called Dunsmeorach (I know I've spelled that wrong...!). She came last year to stay with me here in Toronto, and may come back next year when she's finished her 3 year stint on the island.

We are going to end the trip with a tour of Glasgow - see the sights generally have some fun!

I am so unbelievably excited. I'm going back. I'm going home. The little island that (as a friend wrote) calls me by whistle and by prayer.

In Iona of my heart,

Iona of my love,

instead of monks' voices

shall be lowing of cattle;

but ere the world

come to an end,

Iona shall be as it was.

Visio Divina

I came across this term - Visio Divina and my heart lept! I have friends who find God in music - yes, I love music, but I can't make music - I lack the training and the time to practice - but I have friends who use thier music as prayer, and their time playing as worship. I have friends who go out into the woods to walk and pray and simply 'be' in creation. I love doing that too, but have little opportunity here in Toronto to go for a nice long walk where you don't see cars and stores!

I have always felt that my art is a form of prayer; painting, calligraphy, cross-stitch. When I go to a gallery I see others works and the light and life that comes through in them. One of my favourite places to go and visit is the McMichael Gallery

It is such a place of peace and prayerful contimplation for me. To see the inspired beauty that comes from deep within someone and displayed for all to see, is like a concert for the eyes.

I think I'm going to go and buy me some paints, and use that easel that my best friend gave me for Christmas. Maybe that will bring my hardening prayer life back from the desert... water that dry soil and stop the truly deep and irreversable cracks from forming...

The alternative to CNN

This one is called CNNNN
Look out Rick Mercer - there is a new kid in town poking fun at the Americans. I know they only pick out the stupid answers - and you can find people who are quite clueless.... but come on! Take a look at the Maps and see what they have labled Australia - and they don't realize that's wrong... scary... truly scary!

The bible in 50 words

I was sent this a while ago and have no idea of the origins, but I quite liked it~

God made, Adam bit,
Noah arked, Abraham split,
Joseph ruled, Jacob fooled,
bush talked,Moses balked,
Pharaoh plagued,people walked,
sea divided, tablets guided,
promise landed,
Saul freaked, David peeked,
prophets warned, Jesus born,
God walked, love talked,
anger crucified, hope died,
Love rose,Spirit flamed,
Word spread,
God remained.

furious

I do a lot of driving on the 400 series highways. I grew up living in a border town so we would often go shopping over there for the day, just because. My best friend is now an American, I know several wonderful folk who are American. This is not just an anti-american rant, but an anti hate one.

Define "the enemy" I dare you. I've heard it said more times than I can count - "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."

It is my personal opinion that any truck who posts this sign on their rig should be refused entry into this country for spouting hate. I'd also like to know what is being transported inside that truck so I could make sure I didn't buy any of it.

Disgusting.
Truly disgusting.

Vandalism strikes!

One broken light fixture

One overturned planer

One missing reindeer

one missing reindeer???

Wait a minute - it's not missing...

They put it on the roof!!!

I'm so glad this is all the vandalism we see... a couple of guys drinking beer in our parking lot (leaving the cans as evidence!) and moving the reindeer to a much more majestic location!

an often dirty word...

I was reading Fr. Jake tonight (instead of writing my essays), and he posed some interesting questions inspired by their new presiding bishop.

1. How would you tell the great truths of our faith without using overtly theological language?

2. How would you tell a new neighbor that God loves him or her without measure, and invite him or her to learn more?

Ahh… evangelism… sticky topic. I think part of it is the absolute fear of coming across like one of those nutters on late night TV offering you water that will solve all of your money problems… if you’d only send them… you guessed it… money!

These are however thought provoking questions, to which there is obviously no one correct answer. Personally, I feel that the moment your actions are separated from your words, you have given up on trying to answer these questions. Old adages exist for a reason… actions really do speak louder than words and in our society of instant gratification and slick marketing ploys, people have become cynical, yet strangely intuitive. We know when our heart strings are being pulled. We know when our fears are being exploited. And though we don’t like it, we put up with it. To counter this, our emotions become either hypersensitive or shut down altogether. Yet even in that void of emotion, there is still a desire to feel connected – even if that feeling cannot be named.

How we choose to live and act and be on a daily basis actually does raise curiosity and elicit questions from those around us– people naturally want to know why it is that we are content or joyful. Why we help people, volunteer, and spend time working for justice and peace. I think this is what needs to be recognized before you can even begin to tell the truths of your faith and look at the questions raised above.

When we do eventually stumble along and try to answer the questions, we must remember that everyone has some sort of religious language; something that gives one person great comfort, can be an absolute show stopper (or ear plugger) for another. God reaches each of us where we are – not who we think we should be, or who we think someone else should be – but exactly where we are in this time and in this place.

And yet through all of this, I know that I am inspired by those who can embrace their faults and foibles and show that we are all human - just doing whatever we can to uncover that spark of the divine within each of us and to find our path as we live into the love of God.

BOTAFUMEIRO

How would you like to be the monk at the end whose job it is to catch this?
And I thought we used a lot of incense!

back again...

This really is quite fun! I’m writing to you from my brand spanking new laptop… It is very pretty… nice big 17 inch screen… only problem is that it’s a heavy thing! Ah well… I’ll just have to suffer through J Boxing day sales are fun!

I’m back in the big smoke again after a well loved (and hopefully well deserved!) rest. It was good to see family and friends and now it is back to work.
Let the second term adventures begin!

'Tis the Season

Tonight felt like Christmas. I know January 1st is a little late to say that since it's New Years Day. I'm not getting things mixed up, Houston, there is no problem... I just haven't been in the Christmas mood at all this year. Years past of working in retail force me to avoid the malls at all costs over the holidays (so I wasn't subjected to the forced canned Christmas happiness where everything looks like it threw up green and red bobbles) - even seven years after the fact! This is my first non-Xerox Christmas in ages. I didn't have to work the crazy hours, I didn't feel like I was pulled away from all the people that I wanted to spend time with. But at the same time, it just didn't feel like Christmas - but tonight it did. My cousins came over with their kids and one other cousin with her boyfriend, my Nana was here, my parents my sister. I got a chance to remember what it's like to be surrounded by family. I've needed that. I've felt so single minded recently, it's been school, school, school and since my old flame and I broke up, I think I've been lonelier than even I'd like to admit.

But tonight, after much cajoling and persistent pestering, Laura brought out her flute, Aurora sat down at the piano, and they played Christmas carols. They played without sheet music, ad-hoc and vamped up the middle bits - essentially they jammed (which sounds kinda bizarre for a flute and piano!) I haven't heard Laura play in so long. She is so talented, I love just listening to her play - I hope she can keep falling in love with music all her life. What an amazing thing it is to have put in so much work and to now be able to reap the benefits by just sitting down and playing something. Tonight those two brought me Christmas - and even though I told them that - I don't really know if they really understand.

Technically - 'Tis still the Season - It's still Christmas in my books! I went to two different churches yesterday - one celebrated Christmas 1 the other celebrated Epiphany. I know it can be either, but to me Epiphany has always been on Jan 6th. So this is the Christmas season - the 12 days of Christmas - a time to celebrate the Christ child born among us and to celebrate God born into our lives. To know that in life, death, joy, sorrow, pain, fear, love and peace follow us every day of the year - events in our lives that happen at Christmas are no different from any other day of the year. But this is a time that we can pause, and remember the events of history 2000 years ago. Not a fictional story, but a historical event - the incarnation of God, here among us. A time to pause that we take to live into the love of God that shows us how to live out our love for each other.

I'm glad Christmas finally hit me.

The House by the Side of the Road

Mum read this poem the other morning to us - a little rhymie, but it was the sentiment that got me... enjoy...

There are hermit souls that live withdrawn
In the place of their self-content;
There are souls like stars, that dwell apart,
In a fellowless firmament;
There are pioneer souls that blaze the paths
Where highways never ran-
But let me live by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

Let me live in a house by the side of the road
Where the race of men go by-
The men who are good and the men who are bad,
As good and as bad as I.
I would not sit in the scorner's seat
Nor hurl the cynic's ban-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I see from my house by the side of the road
By the side of the highway of life,
The men who press with the ardor of hope,
The men who are faint with the strife,
But I turn not away from their smiles and tears,
Both parts of an infinite plan-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I know there are brook-gladdened meadows ahead,
And mountains of wearisome height;
That the road passes on through the long afternoon
And stretches away to the night.
And still I rejoice when the travelers rejoice
And weep with the strangers that moan,
Nor live in my house by the side of the road

Like a man who dwells alone.

.

Let me live in my house by the side of the road,
Where the race of men go by-
They are good, they are bad, they are weak, they are strong,
Wise, foolish - so am I.
Then why should I sit in the scorner's seat,
Or hurl the cynic's ban?
Let me live in my house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

by Sam Walter Foss