The king has landed

 I want you to think about David for a moment. Him, his hometown of Bethlehem, his rule and his family.  We know him as a man after God's own heart, yes, of course.  But we do so because we have the benefit of hindsight. 

By the time the Bible has been placed into our hands, we already know some of the best known stories about him.  Including, but not limited to, the story of David and Goliath.  You know the story so well by now, that it's kind of a trope by now.  David, the shepherd boy, manages through sling and stone to overcome the giant Goliath, and bring him to ruin and death.  But by the time we encounter that story for the first time, we already know how it ends.  There's an expression out there of a 'David and Goliath struggle.'  There are weapons of war called the Goliath, named for their destructive potential. So given that these things are in our language, are part of our lexicon, it should be no surprise that we know how the story ends.

But try to think about David, Bethlehem, the whole story as though you were hearing it for the first time.  We have the benefit of knowing that Saul is going to be a bad king already, but imagine that you were seeing it for the first time.  You would for sure give Saul the credit and admiration over David.  As everyone did.

Osama Bin Laden, back when he was alive, famously said "When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, they will by nature like the strong horse."  And we'd be liars to assume that we would work out that David was the one to watch.  Saul was strong, mighty, handsome, and all of that.  He was bold, athletic, and a capable warrior.  In short, Saul was the strong horse that we, and Israel, instinctively would like.  But what he wasn't was faithful.  Saul did that thing that we must not do, and he believed in his own hype, and turned his back on God.  Actually, that's not quite true.  He viewed God as an accessory to what he wanted.  God was useful to him only insofar as he could get what he wanted out of the divine, believing what a great many kings at the time, as well as commoners do today - Even God in Heaven works for me.

He was wrong, of course, and was replaced in due time by David, son of Jesse.  David, out tending the sheep in the surrounding regions of Bethlehem, which is such a nowhere place that I'm sure that most people in the centres of empire didn't even know it existed.  And David was specifically chosen by God, and anointed by Samuel at his command, because he was the least of his brothers.  Not what the people of Israel would have sought after, but he ended up being the king that they needed.

How about this for a second.  How many of us can look at our current crop of rulers, and say that we're satisfied with everything they've done so far? How many of us can look at how that's going, and say that we're 100% delighted with how things are going?  Most of our time these days is spent being relatively upset at what our leaders are doing, given that they're mismanaging pandemics, are corrupt, are mean-spirited and wicked, are inept and dottering, whatever stick you choose, you can beat a politician with it.  But here's the deal, which is that these politicians who are hopeless, meandering and callow, we picked them. Given the choice in a slate of candidates, we chose the ones we've got running the show. In many ways, it says more about the electorate than it does about the elected.  It says more about us as people who elected them than it does about them.  Wouldn't it be nice if that choice was a)up to someone else, and b)they made consistently good choices?

In many ways, it's a lot like us as Canadians, looking down to our neighbors to the south.  Sure, we can't vote in American elections, but the president, and the congress of the United States sure affect how things run here in Canada.  A president who likes Canada and Canadians makes things a lot easier for us, but a president who doesn't like Canada too much, well it makes things a lot harder.  And that's tough for people who don't have any control over the situation.  And for us, we want Americans to make a good choice for us, given that we can't participate in the elections, and also we want that good choice to stay in place for as long as possible.  But they have term limits, which means that even if a president is top notch, he'll only be in there for a maximum of 8 years.

What we really want is for the president that we like, whom we didn't elect but who affects things greatly for us, to be in power for forever, and to rule and govern in a way that benefits us, the people who did nothing to put him into power.  That, in a roundabout way, is close to what we're talking about with Christ the King.  We didn't vote for him, and in many ways, if we could have, we likely would have voted for someone else.  We would have voted for something more in keeping with a strong bold zealot, a conqueror, someone who would institute a kingdom here on earth to govern justly, etc.  Christ isn't that, he isn't that at all.  He isn't what we would choose, but is exactly what we need.  And he doesn't have a term limit.  He's not limited to 8 years, he can govern eternally. 

So who could he rule over eternally?  That's where we need to think about what we mean when we say 'eternal.'  It's not just a long time, it's forever.  For longer than the earth will exist, you know.  And if that's the case, that we're not talking about a while, even a very long time, like McKenzie King.  We're talking forever.  And if he's going to be king forever, he's going to have to rule over people forever.  And folks, that's us.

Part of the good news is the eternity of his reign.  Not for a while, not even for a long while, but forever.  If that's the promise that gets made in the Old Testament, ratified in the New Testament, and guaranteed to us now, we have a great deal of comfort.  The king has wildly humble beginnings, but he has the promise of an eternal throne, and makes a promise to people that he will rule them forever.  Not as a tyrant, not as a Saul, but as the true and rightful king.

Joy

 This last Sunday, the third in Advent was the joy Sunday.  Are you all feeling joyful? 

There's a good chance that you're not. Far from joy, it's actually relatively uncommon for people to be even contented right now.  There's a good chance that you're tired, worn out, or in some other way relatively disturbed.  There's a good chance that you're not doing as well as you'd like.  There's a good chance that you, like the rest of us, are living under restrictions that you weren't planning on living under.  Your family may as well be miles away, your friends are locked away from you, and you're going to have to work very hard indeed to get anything done.  It's all hard, all difficult, and all unpleasant.  This world that we're living in right now is a world that we are stumbling through, and most of us can just barely get by.  

So where's the joy?  

Well if joy was to be synonymous with happiness, then you'd probably be out of luck.  That is, there's a very good chance indeed that your happiness is miles away. And although I do it surprisingly rarely, I'd like to run that through the lens of a reasonably popular Christmas tune.  

Have yourself a merry little Christmas,

Make the season bright.

From now on our troubles will be out of sight.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas,

Make the yuletide gay,

From now on our troubles will be miles away.....

Really? Because it doesn't seem like it.  It doesn't seem like it at all. In fact, it seems for all the world like our troubles are right here, and right now.  And they're surrounding us and swarming all over us. If you've had a particularly troublesome year, it becomes more and more difficult to engage in the 'xmas season,' you know. That is, the season in which we engage in what I have been calling 'enforced merriment.' And merriment is a tricky customer, because at this time of year, we are all asked to behave as though the song lyrics above were universally true.  This turns the Christmas season, so focused as it is on merriment, into a burden on people.  They are tired, burned out, and sad.  The only thing that could make it worse would be an invalidation of their feelings of grief or weariness, and a focus on the idea that they should be having fun.

But fun and joy, happiness and joy, aren't the same things.  They may overlap, which they do, but they're not identical.  Rather, they have large, pronounced differences that speak to the nature of the holiday for you.  If the season is all about family and friends and togetherness and a big meal and that warm feeling when you have hands to clasp, you're only going to be miserable this Christmas. You'll be miserable because you've spent a long time confusing joy with happiness, then have no joy to fall back on when the happiness gets removed.  But the happiness that you were promised was, itself, the illusion.  I'll explain what I mean.

A long time ago, someone very clever made some deductions about the Christmas season. They looked at the season and saw that people were buying and selling, and that it was an immensely profitable season.  And said individuals said 'you know, things seem to be going well, but not everyone is buying and selling at this time of year.  What can we do to increase the commerce?' So they hit upon a brilliant plan - to throw open the season not just to the Christians who were celebrating anyway, but to everyone, by encouraging buying and selling, partying and revelry, to absolutely all people.  That worked fine for its purposes, but you have to play a very careful game on this one.  You can't just tell people 'you need to buy things from us because it's the end of December.'  Even with our jaded outlooks, we would resist such naked consumerism.  So, you have to couch it behind some other reasoning, some sort of emotion, which would induce your consumers to, well, consume.  So, instead of making it about the birth of Christ, which is exclusive, you make it about family and togetherness - which is not.  Even in Grinch terms, Christmas is about family and clasping hands and singing.  With the fig leaf of family and togetherness in place, you are free to ramp up the consumption on emotional grounds.

This year, though the family and togetherness just aren't there.  And if they're not there, but the consumption remains, what on earth is going to be bringing you the happiness you were seeking? As I said earlier, if you take out even the fig leaf, you're not going to like what's underneath.  

And that brings us neatly to joy.  Joy as something different than happiness.  You should know that for most of human history, they celebrated the birth of the savior in far more meager circumstances than we do today.  That is, they shuffled around with a low life expectancy, in miserable conditions, polluted and afflicted, but they still managed to rejoice.  They had very few if any gifts, and nothing was easy or pleasant. So how did they celebrate with joy?

 Joy and happiness are blessedly different things.  And Paul tells you as much when he discusses the situations of his own life.  Paul tells us in 1 Thessalonians when he was free to rejoice, but also tells us to rejoice in Philippians, while he is in chains.  How can he do both? Because he knows what the source of joy is - the victory of Christ Jesus over sin, death, the devil and all the forces of scarcity and misery in this world.  Paul knows that the world is a dark and brutal place sometimes, where things can go in your favor, but they also may very well not.  And if you're only capable of experiencing joy while things are going well, then you're going to find that most of the time, there's not going to be much joy to be had.  But if you can learn the secret of being intact in plenty or in want, with a full stomach or empty, then you will be able to find joy.  Because the things of this world cannot bring joy.  They can bring happiness, even if it is only for a short time, but they cannot bring joy.  Even the people of this world, on their own, cannot bring joy.  They can bring happiness for a while, but not joy.

True joy is to be found in Christ, who brings not happiness, but joy.  He does say that in this life you will have trouble, and we believe him in that, but he promises joy.  He promises that because he lives, we will live too.  Because the grave could not hold him, it can't hold us either.  And he promises us that the ones we love who die in the faith will be with us for eternity.  That's joy, and it doesn't depend on this particular Christmas being just so.  It depends on Christ and what he has already done.

With the focus in the right place, you can have an intensely joyful Christmas, full of faith and confidence in what Christ has done already.  And that can't be taken away.  It's the same yesterday, today, and forever.  It points to a definite time and place in history where Christ stepped into our world, passed through it like a flame, died the death we deserved and rose again so that we, and those whom we love, would not have to be apart forever.  This Christmas will be painful, with not being able to see one another.  But Christ's work is to ensure that this pain is temporary.  

Joy is eternal.

All flesh is grass

 Hi reader.  Take a second here.

Are you tired?  

There's a good chance that you are.  Maybe if you're reading this in the distant future, you'll be fine, but gosh, today is a tiring day.  And they're all tiring these days.  These days in which we're hanging out and waiting, shuffling our feet.  These days where we're cut off from one another, these days where we're segmented and sliced away, these days are hard.  It's not too much to admit it.  I'm giving you permission to take a second, breathe, and to take in your exhaustion.

Now, unfortunately, unless I'm much mistaken, I don't think that your exhaustion is going to get fixed by a good night's sleep.  Were that the case, I would simply recommend that you go, take a nap, or go to bed early, and get a good night's sleep tonight, and all week.  But it's not that easy.

For we are dealing with weariness, with a general exhaustion, a tiredness that is caused not by a lack of sleep, you know, but caused by a general ennui, exhaustion, weariness which are hard to come out of.  These aren't easy times, and it's okay to admit that.  It's okay to say that you're tired, worn out, and fit to be tied. That's fine.  And what you need to know is that you're not alone in this. The scriptures are full of references about this similar sort of circumstance.  I have to tell you, you practicing Christian you, that the desire to read through the Bible from beginning to end runs aground not where you'd expect. People expect to fail on the book of Numbers, but honestly once you push through the names of the armies and so on, it's quite an exciting book!  It's got Baalam and his talking ass, it's got the serpent on a pole, and it's got a bunch of grapes so big it takes two men to carry it.  No, where people tend to run aground is when they decide to read through the psalms beginning to end.  No thanks.  

Reading through those is like reading through the hymnal and expecting it to read like a novel.  Which it doesn't, because the psalms aren't a narrative.  They don't tell a story or a history, they don't recount events, rather they're poetry.  And what poetry!  But they do get a bit repetitive, which shouldn't be too bad, given that our lives are repetitive, to be honest.  And all human experience is thus, repetitive, and our experience through this time is echoed through the Psalms, which were written by real people who were going through similar things to ourselves.  Here are some examples:

"If I do not remember you, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth" (Psalm 137:6)

"I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint.  My heart is like wax, it has melted in the midst of my bowels.  My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaves to the roof of my mouth. You have brought me to the jaws of death." (Psalm 22:14-15)

"My burdens are too heavy for me. My wounds stink are are corrupt because of my foolishness.  I am troubled, I am bowed down greatly.  I go mourning all the day long.  For my loins are filled with a loathsome disease, and there is no soundness in my flesh.  I am feeble and sore broken.  I have roared by reason of the disquetness of my heart." (Psalm 38:5-8)

That's just a sampling. There are plenty more, have fun looking them up.  But the point I am trying to make is that being tired, worn out by the weight of the world, that's not a new thing.  We can echo the words of the prophet Isaiah who says 'all flesh is like grass,' and think about the grass that we can see these days.  Brown, dried up, not green and healthy and vibrant, but dried up and gone.  All flesh is like that.  And I'll tell you, your flesh is probably feeling like it these days.

For everything takes extra effort these days.  Even simple things are hard: going to the store is an ordeal of hoops to be leapt through.  Seeing friends and family almost requires a waiver, and I'm only just barely joking.  Going to church is a totally different experience, and Christmas itself is set to be the biggest grind of all time in a few short weeks.  You thought you were tired before, you're going to be really tired then.

We're not used to it, but we'd better get used to it.  Not that you should get used to this Christmas being a horrible grind, which it will be, but you should get used to the idea, the concept that wars, rumors of wars, famines, pestilences, that's the natural order of things.  And whatever peace and comfort we have, that's the aberration.  That's the uniqueness.  That's what we shouldn't expect to last for too terribly long.  I don't say this to you to get you down. I too hope for an end to the COVID experience, and I long for a time when family and friends can meet together, when hearts are brave again and arms are strong.  But I'm under no illusion that everything will be perfect forever once that happens.  Things are hard right now for a reason, you know.  They're hard, and even when things get back to easy again, that's not the natural state.

Knowing this means that you can't wait for peace as the world gives.  Jesus, in speaking to his disciples close to the end of John says to them 'My peace I give to you.  I do not give as the world gives.'  And it's a good thing too.  The world gives not only an uneasy peace, but it gives a very temporary peace.  It doesn't last, and right now, as worn as we are, we should know and understand that.  But the peace that Christ gives us is something that doesn't depend on the world and the material conditions of it.  If it did, if you were just counting on Christ to get you through this disease, this ennui, this grind, I have some bad news for you, because you're just getting ready for the next one and the one after that. The world lurches from crisis to crisis, from outbreak to outbreak.  The world lurches between problems, wars, famines, diseases, natural disasters, essentially constantly. That's what we do.  And if we're asking Christ for a return to normal, it'll be to a normal that is between these problems until they manifest themselves again. Which they certainly will.

John baptized with water for repentance.  That's a material condition for the world.  Being baptized into repentance means that you have looked not only at the material conditions of the world and found that they are wanting, but that you have looked at your own material conditions, and found the same.  You've looked at yourself and realized that you lurch from crisis to crisis as well.  The wars and rumors of wars in your own life, your own famine and heartache, your own strife with your fellow humans, these things are a micro of the macro of humanity.  Being baptized into repentance only means that you are baptized into a realization that the world is the way it is because we have made it that way.  

John points out, though, that we are not baptized into repentance only, but are baptized with the Holy Spirit.  God himself is bestowed upon us in our baptisms. And what that means is that we are not baptized into repentance alone, but into salvation.  We are baptized into forgiveness.  The peace that the world gives is a peace that is always stumbling between various crises or disasters or difficulties.  The peace that the world gives is always a brief peace between problems, and that's the peace that we have on an individual level as well.  But the peace that Christ gives, not as the world gives, is that he reached down into history and washed you clean of your sins.  The guilt and shame, the problems and divisions, the things you didn't do that you really should have, all those things have been taken away. And because your baptism is a thing that is not of the world, you can return to it over and over again, and make a powerful and bold claim that you are baptized into Christ Jesus. Baptized into a death like his, and baptized into a resurrection like his. He rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven, and death no longer has dominion over him..  No more scarcity, no more want, no more misery.  Just the presence of the Lord God whose peace does not stumble from crisis to crisis, but instead is peace unbound.  A forgiven peace.  A redeemed peace.

That's what lets you renew your strength, to stand up boldly and to proclaim the name of the Lord, to grow stronger even as the exhaustion sets in, because you're not dealing only with worldly things to satisfy you.  You're counting on things divine.