O come, O come, Emmanuel. Amen.
By
definition, a psalm is a song of praise to God. Generally, we sing one of the
psalms from the book of Psalms on Sunday, but today the lectionary presents us
with a psalm that is found in Luke. Generally, psalms are named based on their
first word in Latin, so today’s psalm is commonly called the Benedictus.
In today’s gospel text,
Luke records that John the Baptist quotes from the prophet Isaiah about the
voice crying out in the wilderness. The last line is “and all flesh shall see
the salvation of God.” You might say that sentence is a summation of the
entirety of Luke and Acts. And it is noteworthy because Luke takes a bit of
editorial license in his quotation of Isaiah, as he changes the words slightly.
Isaiah says that all flesh shall see the glory of God, but here Luke changes it
to salvation; and this is not simply a coincidence. For Luke, a central message
is that Jesus is God’s salvation to all the world. Zechariah’s song offers a
sort of commentary on what it means that all flesh shall see the salvation of
God.
As
a refresher, there was an older couple, Zechariah and Elizabeth, who very much
wanted to have a child, but had not been able to. Zechariah was a priest in the
Temple, and one day while serving there, the angel Gabriel appeared to him and
announces that he and his wife will have a son. Zechariah questions how this
will be so, given their age. Gabriel says that God will do this, but because
Zechariah has doubted, he will be unable to speak until this came to pass.
After the child is born, it was time to name this child and everyone assumed
that the child would be named Zechariah, after his father. But Elizabeth
insisted that they name him John. The relatives protest, saying that John isn’t
a family name. Zechariah motions for a tablet, and writes “his name is John”
and everyone was amazed. Zechariah is then able to speak again, and immediately
opens his mouth and sings today’s psalm.
It is very fitting that
during the season of Advent, we are presented with the Benedictus, as it
encapsulates the whole story of Advent. There are two movements to the
Benedictus, just as there are two aspects to Advent. In the first half of the
psalm, Zechariah recounts God’s past faithfulness; and in the second half, he
conveys an expectant hope for God’s future salvation. As I mentioned last
Sunday, Advent is a season in which we both celebrate that Christ has come and
also await the culmination of all things in Christ.
Names
in the Bible are important. If you know someone’s name, you can generally
predict what their story will be, and Zechariah is no different. His name, in
Hebrew, means “God remembers.” As he opens the psalm, he refers to God’s past
acts of salvation: saving the people from Egypt in the Exodus, restoring them
out of the Exile in Babylon, and sending them prophets to pronounce God’s favor
and decrees to Israel. At this time, there was also hope that the next chapter
of God’s salvation was about to come in the form of liberation from Rome.
It
is crucial to remember that God remembers. Jesus is not a Messiah that dropped
in out of the sky, but rather he was a Jewish Messiah for Israel, and through
Israel, for the world. Jesus comes out of a tradition of God’s faithfulness, of
God’s salvation, of God’s action in the world. God is no one-hit wonder, as God
has saved over and over again. Too often though, we tend to skip over Jesus’
Jewishness, and in doing so, we lose an important part of the story. This is
what’s so wonderful about the new tradition that the children and youth of St.
Luke’s are doing with the Jesse Tree.
I
don’t know what your Christmas tree looks like, but mine has some religious
ornaments on it, but it also has its fair share of reindeer, snowmen, and
souvenir ornaments. And those are fine, as they have a lot of wonderful
memories attached to them. But this Jesse Tree helps us to remember God’s
promises. The Jesse Tree reminds us about people like Amos, Noah, Micah,
Abraham, and Moses. It reminds us that we are part of a larger story of God’s
love and redemption.
And it is because God has
acted faithfully in the past that we have confidence in God’s future salvation.
All flesh shall see the salvation of God. Advent builds on these past
experiences of God’s salvation. So the question put to us is this- do we see
God’s salvation among us? Or do we seem gloom and walk in darkness? How aware
are we of God’s actions? Martin Luther King once said that the “moral arc of
the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” Do we see that arc bending?
How often do we give thanks and praise, like Zechariah, for all that God has
done for us? The Benedictus is an invitation to pay attention to God’s saving
hand throughout history. And I’ll mention that it’s also really important that
we all do our best to read Scripture on a daily basis. If we do not root
ourselves in the story of God it will be that much harder to see ourselves as
part of the branches. So this Advent, use the Jesse Tree at home, or read
Scripture, perhaps starting with the first chapters of Matthew and Luke.
It is upon this
foundation of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, of Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba, that
Jesus comes as the fruition of God’s promises through the prophets. In some of
the most beautiful verses in all of Scripture, Zechariah proclaims “In the
tender compassion of our God the dawn from on high shall break upon us, to
shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our
feet into the way of peace.” In this part of the Benedictus, Zechariah speaks
about the hope for the Messiah, whose way his son will prepare.
Salvation is such a
loaded and complicated topic, so we really have to pay attention to the text.
Notice that nowhere is hell, damnation, or punishment mentioned as things that
we are saved from. Instead, salvation is about being lead into God’s peace. The
hymn, “O day of peace,” captures this image of salvation by saying “Then shall
the wolf dwell with the lamb, nor shall the fierce devour the small; as beasts
and cattle calmly graze, a little child shall lead them all. Then enemies shall
learn to love, all creatures find their true accord; the hope of peace shall be
fulfilled, for all the earth shall know the Lord.” Salvation, according to Luke
and Zechariah, is about all people being transformed as they come out of
darkness and into light.
It’s also important to
notice that salvation is always communal. All of the language here is plural.
Salvation is not about my soul or yours, but rather about all of Creation. John
the Baptist doesn’t announce that “some” flesh shall see the salvation of God,
but that all will. An early church theologian notes that God’s salvation is not
coming to save a select group of people, but rather God’s salvation is in
making all people his. Too often Christianity gets sidetracked by trying to
decide who is in and who is out. Just as sunlight shines on everyone, God’s
salvation is not complete until this dawn from on high breaks upon all of
Creation.
Given that the Benedictus
is about the promises of God, hope becomes an important part of our Advent
journey. Woody Allen one said “I have seen the future and it is very much like
the present, only longer.” That is the opposite of hope. If you listen to
public discourse, you’ll hear a desire for things to return to the “good old
days” or you’ll hear language of wanting to take our country “back.” But the
Benedictus speaks of a new dawn, not an old one. God beckons us forward into
God’s promises, not backwards to rest on our laurels. At no time has humanity
ever gotten things right – there has always been injustice, and so hope always
calls us forward, not backwards. But as it was to Herod, God’s hope can be
unsettling.
Hope is a passion for
what is possible in God, not an expectation that we will be our own saviors.
Hope that doesn’t look forward to God’s promises is also often idolatrous. We
hope that once our political candidate of choice gets into office that things
will change – but we all know that is a false hope. Hope isn’t about us getting
it right one day, or overcoming strife, or understanding things fully. Our
Advent hope is that Christ will come in judgment, and power, and justice, and
love to redeem the world. Zechariah’s proclamation in the Benedictus isn’t just
a birth announcement, it is a call for a reformation, a proclamation that
something new is about to happen.
A lot of companies this
time of year have capitalized on the word “believe.” They want you to believe
in magic and holiday cheer. And that’s fine, they’re trying to make a profit
and have come up with some good marketing strategies to do so. But up against
the vague notion of “believing” is this faithful sort of hoping. Belief is
about optimism, but hope is about trust. Hope stands not on human effort, but
divine action. The Benedictus reminds us of those promises of God in the past,
and invites us to expectantly hope for God’s new promises to dawn upon us.
Zechariah and Elizabeth
hoped for a child. What do you hope for? Remission, a Christmas dinner without
a fight, a month without a mass shooting, a return of civility in politics,
parents to stop fighting, not be bullied at school? The hard part about hope is
that to hope is to risk heartache. To hope is to be vulnerable. Hope knows
disappointment and failure.
This hopeful longing
though creates a holy space for God to be born anew in our lives. These hopes
are the fertile soil in which salvation takes place. The hopes and fears of
all the years find their peace in God’s promises, both old and new. We hope
because we know that God has been faithful to promises in the past, and so we
yearn for God to come again and save us. We trust in the promises of God because
God had enough hope for the world to come into it. And so, in faith, we join
with Zechariah in blessing God.
O come, O come, Emmanuel.
O God, we give you thanks for your promises of old and for the legacy of our
faith. You have acted to save us throughout history, and for that we bless your
holy name. As Zechariah proclaimed in the Benedictus, we also hope for the light
of your salvation to come upon us. Make us to know of your desire for us to walk in
peace, help us to be aware of your light that shines upon us, and give us grace
and courage to embrace the new dawn that you are ushering in, especially when
it is uncomfortable. O come, O come, Emmanuel. Amen.
