Year A, Advent Four

Theme: Babies and Stars: Promise or Potential?

Quotes

Potential has a shelf life
Margaret Atwood

All we are not stares back at what we are.
W. H. Auden

Revised Common Lectionary Readings

Isaiah 7:10-16
Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19
Romans 1:1-7
Matthew 1:18-25

For complete texts, please see Vanderbilt Lectionary Resources: Revised Common Lectionary Texts

For commentary on original texts, please see Chris Haslam’s Commentary on the Revised Common Lectionary Texts

Alternate Readings

Words to Introduce the Reading(s)

When we are told we are fragile, we live into the definition. When we are told we are strong, we live into the definition. When we are told we are stupid, we live into the definition. When we are told we are wondrous, we live into the definition. When we are told we have the power to create evil or beauty, we choose which it is into which we will live.

Reading(s)

For the information of the Reader

Brandon Sanderson writes science fiction and fantasy and for young readers. His books include the Mistborn trilogy, Alloy of Law, Warbreaker, and The Way of Kings. As a child, Sanderson became disillusioned with reading as the material offered him was of no interest to him. In Grade Eight, a teacher had the insight to share with him the book Dragonsbane which set him on his life’s path. Sanderson detoured a bit before his first book, Elantris was published, studying bio-chemestry and achieving his Masters degree from Brigham Young University.

Reading

Those candle flames were like the lives of men. So fragile. So deadly. Left alone, they lit and warmed. Let run rampant, they would destroy the very things they were meant to illuminate. Embryonic bonfires, each bearing a seed of destruction so potent it could tumble cities and dash kings to their knees.
Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings

For the information of the Reader

John C. Parkin is the son of two Anglican clerics but spent most of his life studying and practicing the principles of Eastern religions. He recognized during one challenging moment of his life, that expressing himself with the words, “Fuck it”, released much of his tension. He argues that his use of the phrase is not gratuitous but teaches the user to let go of unachievable results and engage fully in the present. This reading has an expletive in it, as does the title of the book; feel free to edit or include it as you feel is appropriate for your audience.

Reading

It goes something like this: I am one person among 6.5 billion people on Earth at the moment. That’s one person among 6,500,000,000 people. That’s lot of Wembley Stadiums full of people, and even more double-decker buses (apparently the standard British measurements for size). And we live on an Earth that is spinning at 67,000 miles an hour through space around a sun that is the centre of our solar system (and our solar system is spinning around the centre of the Milky Way at 530,000 mph). Just our solar system (which is a tiny speck within the entire universe) is very big indeed. If Earth was a peppercorn and Jupiter was a chestnut (the standard American measurements), you’d have to place them 100 metres apart to get a sense of the real distance between us.

And this universe is only one of many. In fact, the chances are that there are many, many more populated Earths – just like ours – in other universes.

And that’s just space.

Have a look at time, too. If you’re in for a good run, you may spend 85 years on this Earth. [We’ve] been around for 100,000 years, so you’re going to spend just 0.00085 percent of [human] history living on this Earth. And [our] stay on Earth has been very short in the context of the life of the Earth (which is 4.5 billion years old): if the Earth had been around for the equivalent of a day (with the Big Bang kicking it all off at midnight), humans didn’t turn up until 11:59:58 p.m. That means we’ve only been around for the last two seconds.

A lifetime is gone in a flash. There are relatively few people on this Earth that were here 100 years ago. Just as you’ll be gone (relatively) soon.

So, with just the briefest look at the spatial and temporal context of our lives, we are utterly insignificant. As the Perspective Machine lifts up so far above the woods that we forget what the word means, we see just one moving light. It is beautiful. A small, gently glowing light. It is a firefly lost somewhere in the cosmos. And a firefly – on Earth – lives for just one night. It glows beautifully, then goes out.

And up there so high in our Perspective Machine we realize that our lives are really just like that of the firefly. Except the air is full of 6.5 billion fireflies. They’re glowing beautifully for one night. Then they are gone.

So, F**k it, you might as well REALLY glow.
John C. Parkin, F**K It: The Ultimate Spiritual Way

Response to the Reading

Reader: Offered as wisdom for the journey
All: May we walk in its light

Focused Moment

From my every vantage point,
the world spills out before me –
beautiful and paltry
together in an instant.
I take it in,
devour its sights, sounds, smells,
and work some feat of transmutation
upon them,
intent on enveloping
my little life
in meaning.
Painted thus – a neurological alchemy –
the world I move through
is of my own making.

Is it even possible
to wean ourselves away
from what has been our greatest flaw –
this sense of disconnectedness
that keeps us from a greater view?
Are we so hard-wired,
imprinted with the evolutionary stamp
of preservation,
that the worlds of others
will remain ever lost to us,
our chance encounters
and grand collisions
ever failing
to envelop life itself
in meaning?

I cannot know
and have no claim nor art
to make such grand illusions set themselves
in equal parts within what lays before us all.
I cannot save us from the loneliness
of singular perspectives
and the withered truths
they ever tell.

But I can refuse
 to hold my vision as a fortress,
refuse to lock it down,
my sole perspective
given its triumphant isolation.

I can refuse
to block out every image
that might cast a shadow
over something held, revered, my own.

Bring me stories;
paint me pictures;
touch my hand, my mind, my heart.
Draw your world upon my own,
bring its shadows, shed its light
press it in upon my privileged landscapes
and we will change the world forever,
keeping faith with this,
our greatest truth:
as long as we’re together,
we will never be alone.

Image:

Full size image available on Unsplash: Pebble People

Hymn

May We Cast the Vision

Tune: King’s Weston, Ralph Vaughn Williams
Popular Hymn: At the Name of Jesus

Are we not still dreaming
of a world of peace,
where all live in freedom
and all hatred’s ceased?
Are we not still hoping
for a fair new day,
one for which all suffering
long before did fade?

Have we not the knowledge
that can feed each child,
shelter ev’ry family,
nations reconcile?
Have we not the wisdom
to look back and see
all that’s come between us
throughout history?

Can we not be faithful
to the call of love;
all it builds between us,
is that not enough?
Can we not find reasons
to reach out and share –
all we own, together –
all because we care?

On this day, we’re dreaming
of a world made bright,
freed from all its sorrows,
living into light.
May we feel the courage
stirring deep within.
May we cast the vision
and this work begin.

© 2017 gretta vosper

Thoughts and Additional Resources on the Week’s Theme

Standard Outline

Theme:

Given the theme and readings, where do you want to take the message this week? When exploring it with your congregation, what is the ultimate point you wish to bring to them to consider? Think this carefully and have a good idea what you want to say before continuing.

Relevance:

The following questions are meant to help you personalize and deepen what you will be offering your community. Because you have clarified the focus of the message already, it remains central and is strengthened when imbued with or attending to the realities in the lives of those who will hear you.

• What may be happening in each or any of these constituencies that may be relevant? Be sure to allow yourself to consider each one independently of the others; on occasion, one might tend to overwhelm the others, but all are significant. Your effort is to be relevant to the people, not to list a host of connections. They are able to make their own connections
  • the congregation
  • the congregation’s neighborhood/municipality
  • your country
  • the world

Grounding:

The purpose of your message is to provide meaningful insights and inspiration in the lives of those who gather before you. Closing is often difficult if times are challenging, and most of our times seem to be. This carefully but simply constructed outline gives hearers straightforward pieces to take with them and is based on consideration for self, others, and the planet. Consider that they leave asking themselves:

• How does what I have heard today make a difference to me?
• How does it allow me to see and act differently toward others?
• How does it call me to be in relation to the planet?

Video

Astronomers in Chile capture the birth of a new star.

Further Reading

Please share if you use relevant readings so that I might share them, crediting you for their inclusion in the project.d

Celebration of Commitment

Into this place, you bring your hearts, your minds, your hopes, and your sorrows. As we present our offerings for the work of this community, may it be our hearts that are lifted by these prayers, and our love made real through these gifts.

Commissioning

Tell your stories;
paint your pictures;
touch one another’s hands, minds, hearts.
Draw your worlds upon each other’s lives;
cast their shadows and their light
upon our differing realities
so we might change the world
by keeping faith with this,
our simplest truth:
as long as we’re together,
we will never be alone.

—

Bonus

Sermon Notes
Based on a Perspective(s) shared by Gretta Vosper at West Hill United Church.

Baby and star – Christmas story

• two of the main images of the Christmas season are a baby’s birth and a star
• lying behind both are prophecies: that a child will be born and that there will be signs in the sky
• scholars have long held that Christian interpretations of Hebraic prophecies of the Nevi’im – the prophets – were written into the text by people looking for them
• Infiniti ad campaign consisted of a picture of one of their very high end models and the words, “Start rationalizing”
  • why? because it is considered something bad: we shouldn’t be spending so much on a car; rationalization let’s us do that without feeling badly about it
• much of Christian story is embedded in the rationalization of a worldview: things might look bad in this scenario but things will get better; this is why …..
• point of the stories were to persuade people of a storyline that privileged the author’s perspective: this baby, born this way, would save us all
• that baby was likely the one that King Ahaz’ wife was pregnant with and the story told to calm the masses, telling them that before the baby was big enough to tell the difference between right and wrong, their enemies would no longer be bothering them; we won’t be in danger anymore

Babies

• Sanderson’s reading compares the lives of humans to a candle flame – and every potential parent should consider this a warning:
  • “Left alone, they lit and warmed.” Babies are adorable – share a personal story. People simply glow around them.
  • “Let run rampant, they would destroy the very things they were meant to illuminate.” Toddler crazies; adolescent self-absorption … Left alone, children can be …..
  • “Embryonic bonfires, each bearing a seed of destruction so potent it could tumble cities and dash kings to their knees.” On a large scale you end up with a Pinky or a Brain. The Brain, a megalomaniacal mouse hoping to take over the world. Pinky – the brilliant mouse who is always trying to help but who never seems to get the full picture. “Are you pondering what I’m pondering?”  “I think so, Brain, but first you’re going to have to ….”
  • Just having babies and continuing the human race cannot and will not ensure a positive future; it takes great skill to raise a child – greater yet to raise a species.

Stars

• John C. Parkin’s perspective gets us out there: so out there we appear totally meaningless.
• Explore the meaninglessness in nihilism that can freeze us into immobility
• Expand on the idea of the focused moment: that we create our world through the compilation of sensory data about it – neurological alchemy
• the birth of a star is a violent reality; how has Christianity changed the face of the world? for better? for worse? how do you tally the violence and when would you say it ended or might end?
• bring Parkin’s perspective into juxtaposition with Sanderson’s: what happens to the process of raising the human species when we see it against the massive backdrop of the totality of everything?
• we can see our generation as an “embryonic bonfire”, the potential for something horribly horribly horrible or the potential for a beautiful warmth, something lovely

Fortune-telling

• make us see the world a different way – good or bad
• would it make any difference to our choices to tell ourselves a story about the future?
  • good – we don’t have to do anything but keep on doing the great stuff we’re already doing! Yay!
  • bad – start rationalizing? Explaining why it is going to be thus and so in order to save ourselves the trouble of changing – we get what we want and explain away what might yet come
• raising children – would we guide our child-rearing by a prophesied vision?
• raising humanity – by what should we guide our species-raising?

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A Whole Lot of Broken

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