Sermon notes from December 5th
Several years ago now, my first work in professional ministry was at a hospice home in the Midwest. There are many things I remember about this time, as you can imagine, but there was a certain moment on a certain day that I always remember during the season of Advent. One morning, I met a resident to pray together before she was scheduled for surgery. I asked how she was doing or how she was holding up or something ridiculous like that, and she responded: “I am in the wilderness.” I am in the wilderness.
The interesting thing is that while each one of us might picture something different when we think about a wilderness - a desert, a frozen tundra, an untamed forest - we all have a sense of what “wilderness” feels like. The wilderness is unknowable. There are things about it that we cannot master or subdue. The wilderness is more powerful than we are, and our humanity - it’s goodness and its serious need - is suddenly and wildly exposed. The wilderness is landscape without profit. There is nothing to buy or sell or steal. There is nothing to hide us from God, and yet nothing to stop us from trying anyway. It is also an equalizer. You may be stronger or weaker or a little more prepared than someone else, but eventually, in the wilderness, we are all equally vulnerable before God.
A hospice is a sort of wilderness. Trauma is a sort of wilderness. A hospital waiting room. Depression. Addiction. Discernment. Pregnancy. Prayer. Pandemic. Creating something. Loving someone. It’s as if this life of ours as human beings together on earth is a series of wildernesses, one after the other like smudged out maps stitched together, direction and destination unknown. We may be stronger or weaker or at times more prepared, but eventually, there we are: equally vulnerable before God.
But there is good news about the wilderness. God is there. In the desert, certainly. In the tundra, the forest. In the place of powerlessness and desolation, we find that there is not only uncertainty and dread, but also the urgency of a wild and rich desire. In the wilderness, it becomes clear that the thousands of years of unbridled human need - our lifetimes upon lifetimes of stretching our hands toward the edges of something better and more true - every prayer our ancestors or our children have prayed for deliverance, all of this longing - all of it - is answered by someone. Jesus meets us there. Jesus, who himself went into the wilderness to pray. Jesus, who contended with the devil and overcame temptation in the desert. Jesus, whose birth itself was out near the forgotten places, whose holy family traveled across the wilds that his ancestors once crossed in their journey to freedom. In Jesus, our time in the wilderness becomes not merely a time of wandering, but a pilgrimage.
"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low.” John the Baptist cries out in the wilderness, proclaiming the arrival of the Messiah. In Luke’s Gospel, John is introduced in the very same way as the Old Testament prophets: Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, Micah, Haggai, Zechariah. The text itself positions John to step into the light as the one who will be the last prophet, the one singing the final hymn of preparation and imminent redemption. John has been called the bridge between the Old Testament and the New - the one who extends a hand backward toward Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the other hand forward to us, joining us in praise of the God who answers our prayers.
It is that answer that we cling to in this season. The Advent season is its own sort of wilderness where we wait for the Lord in the desert and the tundra. We wait for news about pandemics. We are wandering, as a planet, in a time of uncertainty. Waiting, wandering, longing.
And yet John, beloved friend of Jesus and of us, reminds us that the rough ways will be made smooth. Our longing will be fulfilled and is now being fulfilled. Clear the brush from the path. Clear away any doubt that the savior of the world does not remember your name. Quiet your heart and look into the places of great silence. Know yourself to be not a wanderer, but a pilgrim toward that holy day when “all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”
Preached by Mother Brit Frazier
Advent II 2021
Saint Mark’s, Locust Street, Philadelphia