"A Presence" December 29, 2013

Isaiah 63: 7-9 Hebrews 2:10-18 We, people of faith, are a strange lot, trying to keep up with the world, and be faithful. While all the world made lists of gifts, buying and shopping for Christmas, we planned. Some were sorting costumes and rehearsing parts. Some setting platforms and building stables. Some going over and over the Halleluia Chorus. Some taking down stables to put up Pointsettias. Some running off bulletins and sorting candles. Some collecting hymnals and putting out new. Some making trips to the hospital. Now, in the days after Christmas, the world absorbs the depression of debt and Christmas presents being over, while we question how we are to live our lives differently with God's presence with us? The distinction is as simple as this, the world is concerned with finding the perfect tree, covering it with decorations, and gifts, the anxiety of how we will get through four days with family; while in faith, we are concerned with preserving the ornaments, collecting addresses from cards, and adjusting to the bare spots without the tree, stockings, family. Its funny, worshipers always wonder “Who picked the hymns?” Why could we not sing Christmas Carols in Advent, but now that Christmas is over, we sing “Go Tell It On the Mountain” and “Joy to the World”? When preachers wonder at the motivation of those who pick the Bible verses for the Lectionary? Because one of the purposes of a lectionary is that all the churches read the same texts, yet on this Sunday out of the year, the Catholics have different passages, than the Episcopalians, and both different from the Revised Common Lectionary of the Presbyterians, Lutherans, Baptists and Congregationalists. But also because they carefully pried out of context, the most up-lifting and positive words, from Isaiah 63-64 which describe God's anger and destruction of that which God loves. This part of Isaiah describes the Dark Side of God. Almighty God is a Warrior with PTSD. For thousands of years, this Warrior has been the one fighting evil, been the one fighting Pharaoh for us, been the one who knew how hard our own hearts are, so fought for values and freedoms that might not be respected by us when they got home. This All-knowing, All-powerful Warrior God, somehow justified and allowed the drowning of everyone except Noah, Permitted Pharaoh's abuses, King Herod's brutal genocide of children, and God did not prevent the Assyrians, the Babylonians, or the Holocaust of WWII. The text is specific that instead of sending an Angel or providing a Burning Bush for people to See and prevent devastation, God was present with the people in life. These parts of Isaiah and Hebrews identify the Presence of God Not as our Protector; but as our Liberator, our Savior who suffers for us, our Companion, and the Pioneer of our Salvation. There is a difference between God and Cartoon Superheros. Our Fictional Superheros always get the Girl, always arrive in the nick of time, always win so there will be a happy ending. God is Real, we know this because life is at times tragic, and God does not spare us that, God is present in our wounded-ness as well as our victories. There are a lifetime of memories of Christmases gone. Like putting away the ornaments from the tree, saving the addresses of friends and family. There was the Christmas where we sent our children their ornaments. There was the first Christmas with new puppies. There was the first Christmas we spent alone. There was the Christmas when we came to Skaneateles and found a tree all decorated for us. There was the first Christmas with each child. There was the first Christmas after we were married, trying to be present at both our parents' homes. There was the Christmas when we traveled all night to get home from College. In the Lindsey household there is also memory there was the Christmas after Grandpa died, when Grandma lived near-by. Grandma was quite advanced in age, needing a wheel chair, her voice having gone to barely a whisper, and she had to have a companion whom she referred to as a Housekeeper. Grandma knew she needed the Housekeeper to perform chores like cleaning, to drive her places, and carry things for her, but she did not trust the Companion to have labeled packages correctly and imagined at times she intentionally mixed everything up. So it was that after the gifts were bought, after packages were wrapped Grandma changed the labels around. On Christmas morning, we rushed downstairs and Father turned on the lights on the tree. Grandma's companion had Christmas day off, so Grandma had spent the night with us, and sat watching as we tore into gifts. Imagine the scene when my Father received GI Joe Action Figures? My 12 year old brother received a Silk Robe called a Smoking Jacket, though he had been chided against smoking. The 10 year received a Stop-Watch. At 6, I received slippers, and our 4 year old little brother received a subscription to Boy's Life Magazine? My father was totally bewildered, as his mother softly whispered “No, that's not right.” But we were all together, opening gifts, and truly sharing them, as each had been given to another, and Grandma was present with us one last time.