Daily Devotions

The Roses

It’s nice to remember the true meaning of Christmas. If we truly have a desire to serve others, God will put those people in our path. Keep your eyes open and your ears open to the spirit guiding us to those who need us most.

Bobby was getting cold sitting out in his back yard in the snow. Bobby didn’t wear boots; he didn’t like them and anyway he didn’t own any. The thin sneakers he wore had a few holes in them and they did a poor job of keeping out the cold. Bobby had been in his backyard for about an hour already. And, try as he might, he could not come up with an idea for his mother’s Christmas gift. He shook his head as he thought, “This is useless, even if I do come up with an idea, I don’t have any money to spend.”

Ever since his father had passed away three years ago, the family of five had struggled. It wasn’t because his mother didn’t care, or try, there just never seemed to be enough. She worked nights at the hospital, but the small wage that she was earning could only be stretched so far. What the family lacked in money and material things, they more than made up for in love and family unity.

Bobby had two older and one younger sister, who ran the household in their mother’s absence. All three of his sisters had already made beautiful gifts for their mother. Somehow it just wasn’t fair. Here it was Christmas Eve already, and he had nothing. Wiping a tear from his eye, Bobby kicked the snow and started to walk down to the street where the shops and stores were. It wasn’t easy being six without a father, especially when he needed a man to talk to.

Bobby walked from shop to shop, looking into each decorated window. Everything seemed so beautiful and so out of reach. It was starting to get dark and Bobby reluctantly turned to walk home when suddenly his eyes caught the glimmer of the setting sun’s rays reflecting off of something along the curb. He reached down and discovered a shiny dime.

Never before has anyone felt so wealthy as Bobby felt at that moment. As he held his new found treasure, a warmth spread throughout his entire body and he walked into the first store he saw. His excitement quickly turned cold when salesperson after salesperson told him that he could not buy anything with only a dime. He saw a flower shop and went inside to wait in line. When the shop owner asked if he could help him, Bobby presented the dime and asked if he could buy one flower for his mother’s Christmas gift.

The shop owner looked at Bobby and his ten cent offering. Then he put his hand on Bobby’s shoulder and said to him, “You just wait here and I’ll see what I can do for you.” As Bobby waited, he looked at the beautiful flowers and even though he was a boy, he could see why mothers and girls liked flowers. The sound of the door closing as the last customer left, jolted Bobby back to reality. All alone in the shop, Bobby began to feel alone and afraid.

Suddenly the shop owner came out and moved to the counter. There, before Bobby’s eyes, lay twelve long stem, red roses, with leaves of green and tiny white flowers all tied together with a big silver bow. Bobby’s heart sank as the owner picked them up and placed them gently into a long white box. “That will be ten cents young man.” the shop owner said reaching out his hand for the dime. Slowly, Bobby moved his hand to give the man his dime. Could this be true? No one else would give him a thing for his dime! Sensing the boy’s reluctance, the shop owner added, “I just happened to have some roses on sale for ten cents a dozen. Would you like them?”

This time Bobby did not hesitate, and when the man placed the long box into his hands, he knew it was true. Walking out the door that the owner was holding for Bobby, he heard the shop keeper say, “Merry Christmas, son.” As he returned inside, the shop keepers wife walked out. “Who were you talking to back there and where are the roses you were fixing?”

Staring out the window, and blinking the tears from his own eyes, he replied, “A strange thing happened to me this morning. While I was setting up things to open the shop, I thought I heard a voice telling me to set aside a dozen of my best roses for a special gift. I wasn’t sure at the time whether I had lost my mind or what, but I set them aside anyway. Then just a few minutes ago, a little boy came into the shop and wanted to buy a flower for his mother with one small dime.”

“When I looked at him, I saw myself, many years ago. I too was a poor boy with nothing to buy my mother a Christmas gift. A bearded man, whom I never knew, stopped me on the street and told me that he wanted to give me ten dollars. When I saw that little boy tonight, I knew who that voice was, and I put together a dozen of my very best roses.” The shop owner and his wife hugged each other tightly, and as they stepped out into the bitter cold air, they somehow didn’t feel cold at all.

(From Bruce Green, via Ecunet Sermonshop)

As we move toward Christmas, I want to share with you some of the stories that come my way via email. No doubt many of you have already seen them – some of you were the ones who sent them to me! And no doubt many of you will find them sappy and sentimental. They are – but if they work for me (and they do) they will work for anybody.

The Envelope

It’s just a small white envelope stuck among the branches of our Christmas tree. No name, no identification, no inscription. It has peeked through the branches of our tree for the past 10 years or so.

It all began because my husband Mike hated Christmas- oh, not the true meaning of Christmas, but the commercial aspects of it – overspending, the frantic running around at the last minute to buy a tie for Uncle Harry and the dusting powder for Grandma – the gifts given in desperation because you couldn’t think of anything else.

Knowing he felt this way, I decided one year to bypass the usual shirts, sweaters, ties and so forth. I reached for something special just for Mike. The inspiration came in an unusual way. Our son Kevin, who was 12 that year, was wrestling at the junior level at the school he attended; and shortly before Christmas, there was a non-league match against a team sponsored by an inner-city church, mostly black. These youngsters, dressed in sneakers so ragged that shoestrings seemed to be the only thing holding them together, presented a sharp contrast to our boys in their spiffy blue and gold uniforms and sparkling new wrestling shoes.

As the match began, I was alarmed to see that the other team was wrestling without headgear, a kind of light helmet designed to protect a wrestler’s ears. It was a luxury the ragtag team obviously could not afford. Well, we ended up walloping them. We took every weight class. And as each of their boys got up from the mat, he swaggered around in his tatters with false bravado, a kind of street pride that couldn’t acknowledge defeat. Mike, seated beside me, shook his head sadly, “I wish just one of them could have won,” he said. “They have a lot of potential, but losing like this could take the heart right out of them.”

Mike loved kids – all kids – and he knew them, having coached little league football, baseball and lacrosse. That’s when the idea for his present came. That afternoon, I went to a local sporting goods store and bought an assortment of wrestling headgear and shoes and sent them anonymously to the inner-city church. On Christmas Eve, I placed the envelope on the tree, the note inside telling Mike what I had done and that this was his gift from me.

His smile was the brightest thing about Christmas that year and in succeeding years. For each Christmas, I followed the tradition – one year sending a group of mentally handicapped youngsters to a hockey game, another year a check to a pair of elderly brothers whose home had burned to the ground the week before Christmas, and on and on. The envelope became the highlight of our Christmas. It was always the last thing opened on Christmas morning and our children, ignoring their new toys would stand with wide-eyed anticipation as their dad lifted the envelope from the tree to reveal its contents.

As the children grew, the toys gave way to more practical presents, but the envelope never lost its allure. The story doesn’t end there. You see, we lost Mike last year due to dreaded cancer. When Christmas rolled around, I was still so wrapped up in grief that I barely got the tree up. But Christmas Eve found me placing an envelope on the tree, and, in the morning, it was joined by three more. Each of our children, unbeknownst to the others, had placed an envelope on the tree for their dad. The tradition has grown and someday will expand even further with our grandchildren standing around the tree with wide-eyed anticipation watching as their fathers take down the envelope.

Mike’s spirit, like the Christmas spirit, will always be with us. May we all remember Christ, who is the reason for the season, and the true Christmas spirit this year and always.

Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke this prophecy: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us. Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors, and has remembered his holy covenant, the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham, to grant us that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins. By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” The child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day he appeared publicly to Israel. Luke 1:67-80

Whether we realize it or not, who we are influences how we read the Bible. Earlier this week, I suggested that poor people might hear an entirely different message in Mary’s song than those of us who are rich. Where they would hear good news in the idea of God turning the rich away empty, we hear a threat.

So it is that I can’t help but hear the Christmas story as a father. I read about Mary and Elizabeth celebrating together and I think about what Joseph and Zechariah were up to. I well remember the often helpless feeling of being a father-to-be. Watching my wife struggle with back pains and weight gain and morning sickness and worry. Knowing there wasn’t much I could but eager to do what I could. I wonder if Zechariah and Joseph had those same thoughts.

Now Christmas is suddenly just around the corner. Pregnancy is like that for fathers to be. Nine months fly by and then BAM it’s time. This particular Christmas season I have two pastor friends who are close to my heart, both of their wives are pregnant, and I wonder how this is affecting their walk through the Christmas season.

What I’m saying today is that this whole story, this whole season, is simply very human. And that’s the point. Jesus comes to “dwell among us” but not just that, Jesus comes to take on human flesh and become one OF us as well as one WITH us so that he could live his entire life as one FOR us. It’s an amazing story.

The story doesn’t change. But as we go through life, we change, and as we change, we see the story changing with us.

Zechariah was an old man when his long awaited son, John, was born. So he sings this wonderful song as he celebrates the birth. He sings ancient poetry of promise for he recognizes a time of fulfillment dawning upon humanity, but he looks as well to a different kind of hopeful future.

And so it is that I look at my son, now a strapping young man. Last night he and I looked at old baby pictures, toddler pictures, Michael the little kid. I see him still through Zechariah’s eyes, beholding a gift from God. And I find myself hoping that my son will live in the promises of his baptism, that he join all who prepare the way for Jesus to enter the lives of those he meets along the way.

This is our story. “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us.”

Let us pray: Dear Lord, give us your grace that we never lose the eyes to see the wonder and the promise of your birth and life among us. Be born among us still, bringing hope to the hopeless and peace to wounded lives. May your light so shine within us that we prepare the way for you in the life of the world. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days. Therefore he shall give them up until the time when she who is in labor has brought forth; then the rest of his kindred shall return to the people of Israel. And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God. And they shall live secure, for now he shall be great to the ends of the earth; and he shall be the one of peace. Micah 5:2-5a

Remember the old television commercial featuring Andy Griffith and Ritz crackers? “Do you ever get that ‘what am I hungry for?’ feeling? How about something on a good Ritz cracker. Uuummmmm. Good cracker.”

One of those hungers is for peace.

Peace. Simple peace. Resolving differences with words, not wars. Living with our neighbors without stealing our neighbor’s stuff or they stealing ours. People dying of natural causes. Children unafraid to play outside of the house. How long have people hungered for peace?

Certainly Micah and his readers longed for peace. Micah told of One who would come, from the little town of Bethlehem, who would reign over peace in Israel, a peace that would extend to the ends of the earth.

The gospel writers remembered those words. They saw Jesus, born in Bethlehem, as the one who would bring peace on earth and good will to all.

I visited Bethlehem. I saw the Church of the Holy Nativity. Two features will stand out for me forever in that visit. The first is the door into the church off of Nativity Square. The door was bricked in so that it is only about 1/3 the height of a normal door. You have to bend low to enter it. But not out of respect for the space. It was bricked in to prevent mounted soldiers from riding in on horseback to attack those inside. Illusive peace.

Second, the Church of the Holy Nativity is controlled by three separate Christian groups – the Armenian Church, the Roman Catholic Church and the Greek Orthodox Church. It isn’t much of a working relationship, more of a demilitarized zone with strict lines of demarcation. Just two years ago a fight broke out among priests of two of the groups when one person allegedly placed a ladder just across a dividing line while everyone was cleaning up after the Christmas celebration. The fight lasted an hour and was broken up by Palestinian policemen, two of whom were injured. Still hungry for peace.

Where is this peace?

Who among us is waging peace?

Or will we always think that “I’m hungry for something” feeling will be filled with anything other than surrendering to the Prince of Peace and laying down our arms?

Let us pray: Gracious Lord, the world longs for peace, still longs for that peace promised long ago in Micah, expected in Jesus, but experienced by so few. Another Christmas is coming and the world is still at war. Soldiers are dying far from their families. People live in suffering upon suffering. Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” And Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home. Luke 1:46-56

Perspective is an amazing and mysterious thing. It leaves you wondering what changed. When I was a kid, every doorway in our house had fingerprints on it from me jumping up, first trying to touch it and then proving that I could touch it. I can’t remember the last time I tried to jump as high as I could. Then it was the challenge, today I’m more interested in keeping the doorways clean. My perspective has changed.

We look at things differently as we move through life. The ‘60’s radical is now a conservative newly retired person. The executive has forgotten how he used to think that executives were so out of touch with the real world on the manufacturing floor.

Christmas was the high point of a child’s life. As an adult worrying about credit card bills and keeping their job…not so much.

So it is that Mary’s song challenges our perspective about the Christian faith. Left untouched, it is easy for us to look at the rich, the powerful, the well fed, the successful…and see in their lives the blessing of God.

Then we move through life that way. We leave hotel rooms with hardly a thought about the chambermaid stuck cleaning up our mess. We look down on the homeless man standing at the intersection, silently asking where in his life did he go wrong that he ended up here, deciding not to hand a dollar out the window. We think ourselves blessed but are jealous of those who seem to be even more highly blessed – as we continue to measure what we think it means to be ble$$ed.

Mary’s song turns it all around for she sings from the perspective of her place in life. She is poor, young, not quite married, pregnant girl. She sings of the proud being scattered, the powerful brought low and the lowly lifted up, the hungry fed and the rich sent away hungry. She sings of a God who turns everything around – and would turn us around as well.

From Luther’s explanation of the Magnificat in 1521: One should honor Mary as she herself wished and as she expressed it in the Magnificat. She praised God for his deeds. How then can we praise her? The true honor of Mary is the honor of God, the praise of God’s grace . . . Mary is nothing for the sake of herself, but for the sake of Christ . . . Mary does not wish that we come to her, but through her to God.”

Let us pray: Dear Lord, we think we have life figured out but are so often wrong in so many ways. Help us see life through your eyes. Help us see what is real rather than what we want to be real or what we think is real. Thank you for the witness of Mary, for her selflessness and her willingness to be used to your glory and the welfare of your people. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” Luke 1:39-45

It is such a common story to hold such a miracle.

What could be so common as Mary traveling to spend some time with Elizabeth? That’s what women do. Pregnancy is a communal event. As overwhelming as it is, no one can keep it to themselves. Everybody gets excited. Everybody has an opinion and everybody has a story. Showers and decorating and advice are as much about being pregnant as cells dividing and clothing that no longer fits.

Maybe there is a bit of shame in Mary’s visit as well. We read too quickly if we bypass the questionable nature of this pregnancy. It wasn’t planned. The timing wasn’t right. When he first heard of it, Joseph’s knee-jerk reaction was to call the whole thing off. There was a day when such pregnancies included a young woman having to “go away for awhile” for the sake of her family’s honor.

But there was nothing shameful in the greeting that met Mary – “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” Blessed are you, in the best sense of that word. For Mary had indeed been blessed, and through her, the world would be blessed as well.

For centuries now, Christians praying the Rosary have remembered this specific moment in the faith, this meeting of two women, both chosen, both blessed, both literally carrying the promises of God, one carrying Jesus.

To remember this moment in awe and wonder, not just this moment but the simple women who shared it, is to see not only them but also God with an insight we ought never lose. The Creator of the Universe bends low to meet us where we are.

In his Christmas sermon in 1531, Martin Luther said of Mary: “[She is the] highest woman and the noblest gem in Christianity after Christ…She is nobility, wisdom, and holiness personified. We can never honor her enough. Still honor and praise must be given to her in such a way as to injure neither Christ nor the Scriptures.”

Such a common event which contains such a miracle. So it is.

Let us pray: Gracious Lord, as we continue to walk ever closer to the memory of your birth among us, we give you thanks for doing such uncommon things through such common women. May the joy of Elizabeth and the humility of Mary create room in our lives so that this Christmas season might come to us as if for the very first time. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Lift up your eyes on high and see: Who created these? He who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name; because he is great in strength, mighty in power, not one is missing. Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the LORD, and my right is disregarded by my God”? Have you not known? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint. Isaiah 40:26-31

Driving home in Houston traffic is quite the experience. I love to drive and I’ve driven all over the country. So I know that there are only a few places that rival the sheer mass of car payments that clutter the roads of Houston during “rush three hours.”

As a former pastor of a suburban parish, I often thought about what a mark it left on the lives of the people I served knowing that many spent at least 45 minutes every morning, and 45 minutes every evening, crawling through bumper to bumper traffic. Snarling, cursing, accelerating, braking, swerving, stopping again and again. Every work day began and ended with a vehicular wrestling match.

The anxiety of knowing you had to get to work to PRODUCE could only have been compounded by that drive. The guilt at having been away from the family all day sat next to you in the car at home right next to a “to do at home” list that you knew full well couldn’t be “ta done” before crashing exhausted into bed only to do it all over again the next day.

Not to mention how much worse it gets when it rains, or gets icy, or you look ahead to see the ominous signs of blinking yellow lights and the curse of road construction.

So it is that the faint, the powerless, and the exhausted wonder why they feel so spiritually empty so much of the time. Human beings are limited. We only have so much energy, so much time, so much perspective, and it all has limits. We grow faint and weary and sometimes we forget on the way what the drive is all about.

Have you not known? Have you not heard? There IS one who does not faint or grow weary. He created the stars but is not merely found out among them. He knows the way to the ends of the earth but even that can not separate him from knowing us intimately, personally, and loving us just the same.

The invitation here is to wait with patience. The invitation is to extend the invitation to the One who reminds us who we are and whose we are and the real journey we travel each day. Wait for this One, wait with this One, for the promise is sure.

He shall renew our strength, that we might do what needs to be done and leave the rest to itself. We shall run and not be weary. We shall walk and not faint. We will make the best of the time we have for it is the only time we have.

We’ll turn off the radio and sing. We’ll let others merge into our lane. We’ll share the journey with others and rejoice.

Let us pray: Dear Lord, it is so easy to get discouraged and feel undone by the burdens of all that challenge us as we make our way through life. Give us the grace to turn to you, not only when we are at the end of the line but even at the beginning of each day of the journey. That we might draw strength from your power and live. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings; lift up your voice with strength, O Jerusalem, herald of good tidings, lift it up, do not fear; say to the cities of Judah, “Here is your God!” See, the Lord GOD comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep. Isaiah 40:9-11

The first congregation I had the great pleasure of serving was named “Zion Lutheran Church.” It didn’t take long to discover how handy the name “Zion” was. No trouble at all finding Bible verses or hymns for special occasions. When I finally realized that there really wasn’t a significant mountain in Israel called “Zion” – it was a metaphorical name for the site of the temple in Jerusalem – it was actually better.

I wish I could talk to those pioneers back in 1914 who chose the name. What were they thinking? Was it merely marketing? Did someone have a memory of a previous church home with the same tag? Or was there a deeper vision, a more profound hope, of creating a space for people to discover God?

The one problem I had with “Zion” as a church name was the inevitable lean toward being a place for gathering up those who were already on the team. People who aren’t much interested in religion don’t catch the biblical allusions of Zion. They don’t consider the psalms of ascent sung by the Jewish pilgrims of old as they lugged it up the hills for yet another annual religious celebration. “Oh Zion haste, your mission high fulfilling” wasn’t the kind of ditty one might whistle while walking through the mall.

Which, of course, was also a problem with Mount Zion itself. God had been crystal clear to Abraham. The blessing God extended to Abraham was not simply about declaring Abraham, Sarah and their descendants to be terribly special, the blessing was to be extended to all people, all nations, for all time. There were specific provisions in God’s law for the care of strangers and outsiders. Solomon remembered those provisions in his prayers for the dedication of the first temple.

How easily, though, we forget.

The good news to be shouted according to this message from Isaiah is both God’s power and God’s love but especially God’s presence. God is the One who comes among us. Who comes among us, not to establish a holy throne before which we bow, but the announcement of God coming among us who would rule with justice, who would feed and gather us, carry us and be gentle with us. One like a shepherd.

The great corrective lies in the definition of “us.” If “us” is an already identified flock like the “people of Israel” or the “members of Zion Lutheran Church”, then we have missed the point. Do that and our temples become boxes (cages?) and we worship ourselves (See what fine buildings we have built?)

But if “us” includes those sheep who are lost, those sheep who have been hoodwinked by thieving shepherds, those sheep who are in peril whether they realize it or not, then Zion becomes a new kind of safe refuge and those of us who have found a home there now have a mission to reach out and gather in those who have not.

How often have we realized that the utter destruction of the magnificent temple in Jerusalem didn’t hinder God’s mission in the world for a second?

Let us pray: Gather us in, Good Shepherd of the lost sheep. Bring us home to yourself that we might find all that is needful. Protect us from those who would steal our lives, from the alluring voices which tempt and divert us from finding ourselves in you. Fill our mouths with praise, our hearts with joy and our days with your purpose. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

A voice says, “Cry out!” And I said, “What shall I cry?” All people are grass, their constancy is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the LORD blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand forever. Isaiah 40:6-8

We all know the old saying, “The only sure things in life are death and taxes.” Cute saying. But it isn’t true. There are lots of things in life that are sure and certain – we need air to breathe, the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, the Vikings will never win a Super Bowl. And human beings die. We live under the reality that our time will probably end long before time itself runs out.

But Isaiah tells us the “Word of our God will stand forever.”

The other day I was driving down the road listening to an interview of a playwright named Athol Fugard whose latest work was soon opening at a theater, I think, in Los Angeles. He was from South Africa so I was enjoying his accent when he surprised me by saying two things I didn’t expect to hear.

He said he was fascinated with words, with language, and with the various ways that we pronounce words and wrap their meanings up into how we say what we say, not just in speaking certain words. He said he learned that from his mother whose native language was Afrikaans. She also spoke English but with a fascinating spin on how she spoke the words as well as the words she chose to speak. I’ve never really looked at it that way before.

He also said that he had learned as a playwright that he could never really know what his plays were truly about until they became alive once handed to actors and a director. He said he had often been surprised to discover deeper meanings and subtle nuances that he never intended to emerge from his words – but once acted, his words came alive in ways he had never imagined.

Which brings me back to the writer of Isaiah and his words. His trust in the power and goodness of God runs deeper than his anxiety at the brevity of life. In telling us, encouraging us with the good news, that the Word of God would last forever he is saying far more than he realized he was saying.

In my tradition, we understand the term “Word of God” in three different ways. The written Word of God stands before us in the pages of the Bible. The incarnate Word of God walked among us in the person of Jesus. And the living Word of God still comes to us in prayer, praise, and preaching. There is far more to the “Word of God” than ink on paper.

Not only that, but there is power in the Word of God. The power to transform our lives. The power to indict us for our complicity in the brokenness of the world. The power to release us into new life through the spoken and lived reality of the forgiveness of our sins, between us and God and us and one another. The Word of God kills and makes alive. It is our compass and our hope.

Like most of you, I’ve seen the grass of human existence fading before my eyes. I’ve stood next to people as they took the last of the millions of breaths of their lives. And in those moments, I’ve seen the power of the promises of God’s Word breathe a new kind of life, even in the face of death.

The Word of God is sure and certain.

Let us pray: Gracious Lord, keep us mindful of the brevity of life that we might make the most of each day that you give us. Keep us mindful as well of the eternal reach of your love and the promises you have graciously bestowed on us. Speak to us through your Word that we might speak words of encouragement and hope to others. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid, that she has received from the LORD’S hand double for all her sins. A voice cries out: “In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” Isaiah 40:1-5

I hear three voices in reading this passage from Isaiah. I hear the richness of the tenor voice singing this passage from Handel’s “Messiah.” I hear the stirring cadence of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. encouraging his hearers with the promises of the God who will make all things right in a universe that curves toward justice. And I hear, this time only in my imagination, the words of John the Baptist welcoming pilgrims to his wilderness chapel by the river.

Comfort.

One of my best friends has been unemployed since last February. He spends every day combing the internet for job listings, sending out resumes, hoping to get an interview and a new job. He has been trying to get into a class to add some skills but the classes he needs have long waiting lists of people just like him. He needs comfort. He needs hope.

Our eyes were drawn to Fort Hood with the senseless slaughter of soldiers waiting to be processed before deploying to war. Now the “news” has turned in other directions but their families are still torn up as the Christmas season comes upon us. Comfort. Healing.

I’ve been watching the health care debate raging in the halls of decision-makers. Less than two months ago, knowing that my job is the source of our family’s health insurance, the debate about things like pre-existing conditions and the age limitations for children on the policy mattered a great deal. I spent a night in the emergency room with my son and I saw the diverse and downtrodden crowd waiting for hours for care. So the people cry out for comfort, for hope.

So many people are so quick to point out so much that they see as broken in our world today. So much is bent, so much is rough, so much is low, so much is high. We’re hungry for hope, for answers, for justice, for that Word which makes all things right.

So it is that we need to hear that voice of promise. That voice of encouragement. For we are now in the season of hope and expectation. The season of waiting.

Let us pray: Dear Lord, let our voice join those who cry out to you for hope, for help and for healing. So many of the difficulties of our lives are of our own making, so we cry out for forgiveness. So much is rooted in hate, fear and ignorance, so we cry out for insight and open minds. So much is broken, so we cry out for comfort. Come to us, Emmanuel. In Jesus’ name. Amen.