12-8-2024 ADVENT 2 In the name of Love, who makes all things new

John Bellaimey

Advent 2, St. John’s Episcopal Church

Dec 8, 2024

John Bellaimey

In the name of Love, who makes all things new.

Actually, what Love does is make old things new, and we often don’t have enough time to see it happen. For example, I’ve been in a book club for a really long time, and like all groups, we tend to have our roles. I was one of the founders, and every few years I have to remind people about how we agreed to do things, and so far, I still get away with it. One guy, a retired college teacher, goes on a bit too long about how only indigenous people really knew how to live and the rest of us are messed up. He has a point. But he makes it over and over.  Another one of us old guys just wants us to read a good story, well-told. He’s always right about that.

After all these years the guys know pretty much what I’m going to say. It’ll be optimistic, but at the same time skeptical about anything ever really being new. Typical me: yeah, that’s not new, the Greeks had a name for that. Or, okay, but the Mongols did the very same thing in the 1200’s. I’m kind of a spoilsport. A know-it-all. It must be tiresome. But that’s a community for you. Our virtues, Lynnell likes to say. I’m an optimist, yes, but that’s because I have faith that eventually, things are going to get better. And I hope I’ll live to see it. I have just a few main ideas that I make, over and over, as many of you will already know.

1. [slide]There is nothing really new under the Sun. Things aren’t new. They just seem
2. [slide]God is Love, and everything is evolving back toward Love. Evolution involves plenty of death, but we should look for the resurrection.
3. [slide]Worry is not Preparation. But we keep worrying. It doesn’t work.
4. [slide]Speaking of which, You wouldn’t worry so much about what others think of you if only you realized how seldom they do.
5. [slide] We don’t see things as they are. We see them as we are. This is why we mistake the old for the new. Why we don’t trust in Love. Why we act hopeless.

[black slide] My book club has only two religious members, me and my old pal Rex. Most admit to being “spiritual.” A couple won’t even concede that. Just science, they say. Nothing supernatural. They believe in the power of fiction, but just for entertainment. Believing in a God or a soul or a heaven is foolish. Even dangerous.

Today’s sermon is basically Point Number One: There is nothing really new under the Sun. Back in Biblical Times, things were messed up, too. Government, land ownership, unwelcome refugees, distribution of wealth, and religion, to name a few.

Sonia just read Malachi’s prediction about that:

[slide. Give people a minute to read it] In Malachi’s time, the priests in the Temple were popularly seen as corrupt. The worst priests were grifters out to make a buck from sincere people who needed something from God and believed that you needed a proper go-between. Regular people couldn’t get God’s ear. God was too Holy and too Up There. However, folks were catching on to the con: the ceremonies didn’t work. Sounds familiar, right? But don’t give up on the priests, Malachi said, a messenger from God was going to come who would purify the priests.

Then we just heard Luke’s story about a young hippie named John the Baptist. He predicted, not a messenger to come, but God’s own bulldozer!

[slide of bulldozer] Making paths straight, flattening hills, and filling in valleys. The One To Come would be seen by all living beings. Not just known to the priests in the Temple. John should know about the limitations of priests. His own dad became famous in the Gospel story for failing to believe.

John’s prediction was mostly wrong. The guy who showed up was Jesus. He didn’t need a priest for a parent, because God was his abba, daddy.  But the only bulldozing Jesus did was a few tables in the Temple. Of course, John was not being literal about path-straightening; plenty of people who lost their leprosy, or blindness, or paralysis would testify that Jesus certainly made the path of their lives straighter and more sure.

[black slide] Our little church, and I’m talking about us people, not this building, we’re facing big changes, too. We are not as endangered as most Episcopal churches in Minnesota. We have enough money for now, and God bless the new families that are joining. We have a great building in a healthy but overpriced neighborhood, and so like all the houses around here, this place costs money every year. But a community needs third places, more than ever, as we hunch our shoulders looking at screens for hours at home and at work.

We need third places so we can be a second family. Families need the equivalent of grandma’s house; and for 35 years, St. John’s has been grandma’s house for our family, with a big enough kitchen, a gathering space with interesting bulletin boards, and a “living room” like this one, where we behave a little more formally and we sing together. Where people tell stories about the old days, about what it means to be part of this family, and why the glue that holds this particular family together is Love.

Jesus called Love “Father.” Others call Love “Mother Earth” or “Creator.” Cautious ones call it “The Universe,” which is fine with me, though I prefer the more human metaphors.

For the rest of the week, the stories we hear at St. John’s feed us. Also the laughs, the melodies that get stuck in our head, the worries, and the symbolic snack of bread and wine. Feed us so we can learn. Or mostly re-learn, since there is very little new under the Sun: Specifically, here are nine things I have re-learned from you guys lately:

1. That’s it’s past time our generation handed tasks over to “the kids.” Including preaching and teaching.
2. That “the kids” don’t necessarily believe that this is their house yet. They may not feel it’s time to take leadership.
3. That “the kids” don’t have enough money like we did.
4. That “the kids” are actually so worried about the future of the planet that they walk here, at least when it’s not too cold. They wonder why we have an old boiler instead of solar.
5. That Casa Maria may not have a ton of people in the pews on Sunday, but they have plenty of volunteers to repackage and hand out food on Saturday.
6. I’ve heard lately that a lot of us wish we knew more about religion, about the Bible, about church history, and about other religions.
7. That some folks love talking about the news, and some hate it, but most don’t want us sneaking partisan social analysis into our sermons.
8. Over and over I re-learn that singing together sometimes makes us cry, and there is something really sacred about tears.
9. And I re-learn that we are suffering, and most of us would like to talk about it, though maybe not just at coffee hour. Because talking about it somehow helps.

None of these things I’ve learned is really new. That’s why having an organization like a church is so great! We are dedicated to contemporary and traditional wisdom. Church is still a great idea.

Lynnell and I love traveling, but there’s no place like home. It’s fun to learn Italian or Indian or Vietnamese cooking, because it makes our home cooking better. It’s new to us, but not new. We travel to learn the history of another place, and figure out how that’s different and similar to here. We love recognizing our children’s faces or our daughters-in-laws’ laughter in our grandchildren.

[slide, baby announcements] They are new people, an evolving new generation that will take over from the one we taught. We hope our kids’ generation of humans make different messes from the ones we made.

[slide, Carter and Forest] And their children will have to deal with those messes. With God’s help, and ours. Church is where we learn how to be better helpers.

[black slide] So here’s the point. For those of you keeping score, this sermon has been 75% point 1 and 25% point 2. Church continues to try to be a second family, a third place, a gathering and a gathering place celebrate the Power of Love so we can walk the Way of Love. We follow old wisdom and translate it into new words and actions.

Malachi predicted a simple solution: the priests would someday fix the human mess. And John the Baptist predicted Jesus would fix it. We learn each other’s stories so we can use Love to keep one another from surrendering to our messes. They are mostly nothing new, but neither is Love. It’s just hard to do, and we need all the help we can get.

Amen

 

10am Service