Isaiah 49:1-4; John 1:35-42
We
have spent the better part of the last 45 days celebrating Christmas. On the
surface, this Christmas was no different than the last ……. except that it was.
Christmas is all about searching for a messiah. We search through our songs,
our stories and particularly through our life changing moments. For some, this Christmas
was celebrated through the anticipation of a reversal of fortune and the
promise of capturing a very elusive dream. For others, Christmas hardly
mattered because their dream appeared to be lost. Confused? Well we don’t like to talk about politics in
church so sometimes I’m forced to speak metaphorically.
Using
Biblical language, America has spent the entire 21st century in exile
and we are trying to figure out how to come home. The image of two towers
crashing to the ground is burned in our collective memories. We have struggled to
find the correct, dare I say “holy” response to a parade of headlines that have
left us broken and divided. We each define this brokenness from our differing
political perspectives. I preach, standing on the shoulders of one whose
birthday we celebrate this day. To quote Dr. King, “An individual has not
started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his
individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.” But King is
not the only voice in the room. Solutions to our nation’s exile cross a wide political
spectrum. As we struggle to find answers, we quiver with fear as communities
become more and more isolated by voices speaking their own brand of truth.
How
ironic that John the Baptist was identified as a voice in the wilderness. This
was not complimentary. John was seen as crazy old loon singing the praises of a
man with no legitimate resume. And if the man of whom John spoke stood on
anyone’s shoulders, perhaps it was that lonely voice identified by Second
Isaiah as The Suffering Servant.
Listen
to these words from Second Isaiah. “Here is my servant whom I have chosen and
in whom my soul delights. My servant will be an unextinguished flame burning
against the darkness. My servant will not grow weary until justice has been
brought to the nations.”
So
begins the journey of Isaiah’s suffering servant. The exiles have returned home
from Babylon. These folks have heard the stories of past greatness and long to
once again establish the kingship of David. They desire a messiah, but they
want a messiah who will conform to their vision. The poet reminded the people
of Jerusalem that God is always at work in the unfolding of human history and
this unfolding will be enacted by human hands. But the hands chosen to do God’s
work might not be celebrated by those whose vision is deplete of the justice
and righteousness that must always characterize the actions of a grace-filled
God.
Tomorrow,
as a nation, we have set aside a day to celebrate the vision of one such man. He is quoted so often and honored in so many
ways our children have no idea who Martin Luther King Jr. actually was. Like anyone
larger than life we are either prone to proclaim him as a Messiah or hold him to
an impossible standard. Martin lived a flawed life in a flawed society. Like a
moth drawn to a deadly flame he was drawn to women other than Coretta. He
distanced himself from the invaluable council of Bayard Rustin because of Bayard’s
sexual orientation. He chose not to press forward on the third march across The
Pettus Bridge in Selma, losing the support of many young blacks who saw him as
a coward. By 1968 he had grown tired of protest and marches. His sermons
condemning the Viet Nam War caused many folks to look for different leadership.
Perhaps King would not be remembered today if it were not for April 3rd,
1968.
Martin
Luther King was no Messiah, but he was a suffering servant. Beyond his flaws
were moments of bravery, eloquence, self-sacrifice, justice and righteousness
that caused even Presidents to tremble. After each sermon there were folks
hiding in the darkness waiting for the opportunity to cause him great personal
pain. With each dream there was the nightmare of his phone ringing with death
threats, the nightmare of the four girls killed at the 16th Street
Baptist Church, the nightmare of time in prison, time in despair and time of
self-doubt. He was no Messiah but his
voice, his hands, his compassion were deeply rooted in the voice, hands and
compassion of Christ.
When
John the Baptist proclaimed, “Look, the Lamb of God”, a moment in time never
before witnessed and never since replicated took place. To use the words of the
Gospel John, “The word became flesh and lived among us. Through Jesus we have
seen the glory of God.” The sad truth is the world did not know him. Even folks
looking for the messiah did not recognize him. It is only in retrospect that we
have declared that particular moment in time to be a moment by which all other
moments are defined. Yet we continue to yearn for a Messiah. In fact sometimes
we fool ourselves into thinking we are the incarnation that holy moment.
I
have a good friend who is a workaholic. He operates at such a hectic speed I
would get tired just watching him set an impossible pace. He not only did his work but was determined
to do the work of everyone else. We would work together on Habitat projects and
while his energy was heroic, Craig often became a danger to himself and anyone
near him. He refused to take breaks,
never drank water and thought lunch was a waste of time. I once went up to him
and said, “Craig, I’ve got two pieces of good news. First, the Messiah has come.”
He looked at me as if I had lost my mind.
Then I continued, “And you are not him.”
As
much as I admire the sermons and courage of Martin Luther King, he was not the
messiah. As excited as many of us became eight years ago, our current President
was not the messiah. Neither is our President-elect. The messiah has already come. What we need
are suffering servants, that is, folks who are willing to emulate the Lamb of
God.
Teresa
of Avila was a 16th century mystic/poet who lived in Spain. She had
a powerful personality that often got in the way of her potential. Then Teresa
learned to pray. First she prayed primarily for herself but she eventually
learned to pray for others. She spoke of prayer going beyond words. She claimed
true prayer is what we do rather than what we say. Many of you are familiar
with the prayer I eluded to a few minutes ago. Near the end of her life she
gathered her friends around her and said,
Christ
has no body now on earth but yours,
No hands but yours,
No feet but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which to look
out on Christ’s compassion to the world.
Yours are the feet
with which he
is to go about doing good.
Yours are the hands
with which he
is to bless folks now.
Those
words were spoken centuries ago but they are just as powerful today. How are
you willing to touch another in a way that gives them hope? How are you willing
to listen to another who is seldom recognized or heard? Can you really shut
your eyes to the misfortune of another? How will you embrace the compassion of
Christ through acts of mercy and grace? It might be a hardship. Carrying wood
to the back porch of a stranger or getting down on the floor to help a child reads
makes us reach for the Advil when we get home. Listening to stories which are
not our own to only takes patience, it is downright inconvenient. Worse yet, it
can break our heart. When the sun is
shining there are a lot of other things we might like to do rather than
listening to people, healing people, forgiving people or even sitting quietly
with people who are ready to die. We are not the Messiah! But we can become a
suffering servant. We can be the one who proclaims, “Behold the Lamb of God, I
want be like him.”
In
all that you do, be the hands of Christ.
In
all that you do, be the feet of Christ.
In
all that you do, be the compassion of Christ.
By
doing so you will dream beyond yesterday and even today. By doing so you will
dream into God’s tomorrow.
Amen.
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