Second Sunday of Advent: What God Are We Preparing the Way For?

Today's Scripture Readings

Malachi 3: 1-4 (NRSV)

See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight-- indeed, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?

For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap; he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the LORD in righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the LORD as in the days of old and as in former years.

Canticle 16 (BCP., p. 92)


Philippians 1: 3-11 (NRSV)

I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart, for all of you share in God's grace with me, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness, how

I long for all of you with the compassion of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.

Luke 3: 1-6 (NRSV)

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah,

"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:

'Prepare the way of the Lord,

make his paths straight.

Every valley shall be filled,

and every mountain and hill shall be made low,

and the crooked shall be made straight,

and the rough ways made smooth;

and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.'"

Blog Reflection

This weekend I attended the Trinity Wall Street's 42nd National Theological Conference with speaker Sr. Joan Chittister, OSB.   During this conference the question was raised: What is the Radical Christian Life?   In her answer to this question, Sr. Joan referred to the evolutionary God.  The God that is forever changing our understanding of who God is, and what God is doing as one age dies and another is coming to life.

There were two statements Sr. Joan made that struck me among many, that I think are relevant to today's mediation on this Second Sunday of Advent as we read about St. John the Baptist preparing the way for God to come.  

1. We have to be careful about how we summarize God.

2. What we believe about God is how we relate to God.

Now to break them down a bit.

1. We have to be careful about how we summarize God.  If we believe that God is the One who has no beginning or ending, then all of what we write or say that tries to define God will always fall short.  Many languages, cultures and religious traditions have made many attempts to define a Being who is beyond ourselves and yet very close to us.  Whether we define God in Christ as Christians do, or as Allah as the Muslims might do, our definition is our own.  What may be true for one, may not be for another.  

Does this mean there is no God to believe in?   Or a God who came to us in the Person of Jesus Christ?   No, it does not mean that there is no God, or that God did not come to us in Christ..  As Christians we do believe in a God who is real, tangible, and who became God's perfect revelation in a Man of Nazareth, born of Mary and Joseph and changed the world forever more. 

What we have to be careful about is how we define (or prepare the way for) a God by our own definition.   The God who is the vending machine who we pray to, to give us what we want, will always disappoint us.   The God who is defined by Biblical literalists who want to continue to subordinate women, oppress LGBT people, people of different cultural or religious practices, because "that's the known law of God" will always leave them, disappointed and feeling that they must martyr themselves, when things do not go their way.

2. What we believe about God is how we relate to God.    If all we believe about God is that God is a vending machine or the mighty law giver, the writer and author of the Bible as God's sexual penal code, etc, then that is how we will relate to God.   It is also how we will relate to others who do not see things our way.   We will never be satisfied with newer understandings of who God is, because God fits into a nice Pandora's Box, and so does everyone else.   We form a sense of self-righteousness and arrogance.

But if we believe that God is calling upon us to be the John the Baptist's of the second decade of this the 21st Century, who are preparing the way for the evolutionary God, we will be open to the movement of God's Holy Spirit.   We can read the Bible, celebrate our traditions and look forward to new developments as opportunities to encounter and become re-acquainted with God who comes to us in Christ, anew and ready to welcome all who want to come to him.  We will be the one's who speak out about the abuse of the environment through global warming and the neglect of the sick and the poor.    We will look for ways of working towards a greater equality fo LGBT people, women, people of different races, religions, economic statuses etc.  Because God is always evolving upon us to prepare new places for God.

As we prepare to welcome the Christ child at Christmas this year, we would do well to pray for ourselves to be open to receiving Christ in however he shall come to us.  That we will never let go of Emmanuel "God with us" and realize that whatever new and evolutionary means by which God makes God's Self known to us, that our hearts, our minds, our prayers and our lives are ready to embrace, receive and make her/him find at home in us.

What God are we preparing the way for?

Amen.


Prayers

Merciful God, who sent your messengers the prophets to
preach repentance and prepare the way for our salvation:
Give us grace to heed their warnings and forsake our sins,
that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ our
Redeemer; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy
Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (Collect for the Second Sunday of Advent, Book of Common Prayer, p. 211).


Gracious Father, we pray for they holy Catholic Church. Fill it
with all truth, in all truth with all peace. Where it is corrupt,
purify it; where it is in error, direct it; where in any thing it is
amiss, reform it. Where it is right, strengthen it; where it is in
want, provide for it; where it is divided, reunite it; for the sake
of Jesus Christ thy Son our Savior. Amen. (Prayer for the Church, Book of Common Prayer, p. 816).