Delivered Dec. 10, 2006
by Pastor Eric Henderson
We're preparing to celebrate the birth of Christ. Here's our advent wreath and decorations. We bake cookies, candies, and special meals, plan church activities, sing Christmas carols, attend or host parties, wear special cloths of bright colors, and send cards or letters. Villages and cities prepare for Christmas by hanging lights, hosting Santa, having parades.
Preparation for Christ's birth is often trying to create a special nostalgic atmosphere with children being and doing cute things, softly singing Silent Night, Away in a Manger, a Crèche or two with quiet Mary, Joseph, animals and a contented smiling baby Jesus smelling of sweetness and spice and everything nice.
Malachi's call to prepare for coming by repenting - warningThen into our preparations to celebrate Christ's birth comes the prophet Malachi saying,
You have wearied the LORD with your words.
Could he be saying that we weary God with our parting words to have a Merry Christmas, or the thousands of Christmas songs and hymns, extra worship services both contemporary and traditional, surely not my sermons on the PMC website? Malachi must be referring to TV or radio talk shows that weary God.
But since we're unsure of what the prophet Malachi means, he asks for us,
How have we wearied him?
Prophet's response"All who do evil are good in the eyes of the LORD, and he is pleased with them" or "Where is the God of justice?"
And the LORD Almighty responds to us through the prophet saying, "See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the LORD you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come. "
We quickly defend and justify ourselves by muttering either that we've never said such a thing, or what are you talking about?
Don't feel badly for asking what the prophet is talking about - I was mostly clueless, until I looked in some of the fat books we've got. It seems Malachi was accusing people of believing that the God of Israel was no different than the gods of other nations. Jeremiah described the gods of other nations as scarecrows in a melon patch, idols that can't speak or walk, that can't do harm or good, frauds that have no breath in them.
Malachi announced that some believe God is pleased with evil or he's impotent-unable to do anything about either good or evil. Where is the God of justice? He doesn't exist. If he did he would set things right.
Some reasons that God is dead - or impotent because a loving God would not allow nations to bomb other nations without punishment, or allow millions of innocent children to die of starvation, AIDS, endure abuse of all kinds, or allow catastrophic storms.
Do Christians ask where is the God of justice by expending great effort to legislate morality - or asking the gov't to judge - to be the god of justice? Do we call God's existence and activity in our lives into question when we live without prayer and scripture reading? Do we call God's existence into question by seeking healing of mind and body from the "professionals" before God?
But who can endure the day of his coming?
Who can stand when he appears?
For he will be like a refiner's fire
or a launderer's soap.
He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver;
"So I will come near to you for judgment. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive aliens of justice, but do not fear me," says the LORD Almighty.
After hearing Malachi, we might take a deep breath and recommend that Malachi submit to some counseling to deal with the delusion that God is anything like a refiners fire, or a heavy duty laundry detergent for God's people. So we move along to Zechariah a man much closer to Jesus actual birth. Zechariah the father of John the Baptist helps us prepare for Christmas in a way that makes us feel good. He proclaims, Luke 1. 68-79
"Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us, salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us - to show mercy, and to remember his holy covenant, and to enable us to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days."
Then Zech. talks about John the Baptist who will be called a prophet of the Most High: going before the Lord to prepare the way for him. to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.
We say, "There's what we need to hear to prepare us for Christmas. We want to hear that Jesus is coming to redeem, to save and rescue us from enemies, to show mercy, to be the light in the world of darkness, and to guide us in the path of peace. Now please pass me another cookie, sing of sweet baby Jesus, and peace on earth."
John the Baptist proclaims the need to repent and join the movement of God in the world.
But after Zechariah, even closer to Jesus birth we get John the Baptist with his wool underwear held together by a belt around the waist, exotic desert diet of locusts and honey, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
Supposedly he's fulfilling what the prophet Isaiah said:
"A voice of one calling in the desert, Prepare the way for the Lord, And all mankind will see God's salvation."
There is that thing about prepare the way for the LORD and repent. If we need to choose preparing for Christmas with Zechariah's words, or Malachi and John the Baptists, we'd most likely take Zech. every time. Should we pull a Thomas Jefferson, who took a sharp knife and simply cut out the parts of the Bible that didn't fit his theology? We could just skip weird old Malachi and eccentric John the Baptist's message and bask in the glow of Zechariah's rejoicing in the hope of Jesus coming to bring salvation, redemption, mercy, and light.
But we're Mennonites - we're Christians who believe that God has spoken to us in various ways through the prophets and through Jesus. And all scripture is profitable for us. Besides, according to Matthew and Mark, Jesus followed John the Baptist preaching "The Kingdom of Heaven is near, Repent!"
Is it possible that a call to repent-confess our sins, changing attitudes and practices or forgiving others that sin against us, prepares us to rejoice with Zechariah who reveled in Christ's gift of salvation, redemption, mercy, and light?
With labored breath, a man in his late 60's admitted that he was afraid of the future, afraid of dying, but recognized that his previous way of life, had caused the Emphazima and divorce of his wife and the strained relationships within the family. He had been a self-centered workaholic and was now paying the terrible price by slowly suffocating, almost alone.
Had this man heard Malachi's warning that God will some day judge our lives and had he submitted to God's refining his life - changing his self-centered sin filled ways - the ending may have been more peaceful and hopeful.
It is God's love that sent Jesus to the mess, manure, chaos, war, pain and suffering of our world to show us a new way of life.
It is God's love that shouts to us, "Repent - change from a self-centered, sin-filled life so that with Zechariah we sing and shout, Rejoice in the LORD, for he has come near to redeem, to save, to show mercy, to enable us to serve him in righteousness."
A chaplain on a hospital Mental Health unit became acquainted with a bright, intelligent woman in her 60's who believed in God, regularly attended church, had memorized passages of Scripture, and eventually allowed the chaplain to pray for her. As the drugs cleared the woman's psychosis and her trust in the chaplain grew she admitted that her father had abused her and her sister, therefore her sister was crazier than she. The chaplain risked an angry response by asking the woman, "Have you ever begun the hard work of forgiving your father?" The angry response did come, "I know all about the process of forgiveness and the consequences of unforgiveness. It's like a cancer that eats you up inside. But I'll never forgive my father for what he did to me or my sister!"
A great injustice had been committed against this woman which may have been the initial source of her Mental Illness. She was saying in essence, God did not and will not judge of punish my father, so I will. However, by her unwillingness to forgive the great sin against her, she was a prisoner to the pain and suffering caused by that sin.
It is God's love that sent Jesus to the mess, manure, chaos, war, pain and suffering of our world to show us a new way of life. To invite us to forgive as we have been forgiven.
It is God's love that invites us to prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ by doing the hard work of forgiving those who sin against us so that our lives are open to the light, the joy, the love that Jesus desperately desires to bring.
Petitcodiac Mennonite Church