Advent 2 Year C

May I speak in the name of God, Creating, Redeeming, Transforming. Amen

When I was about 9 years old, my big cousin Jane married Robert in Glasgow. I don’t remember much about it, but I do remember the MC at the reception formally announcing everyone as they arrived. I’d never witnessed anything like it, so when it came to our turn to be announced I had no idea of how amazing it would feel to have our presence declared with such gusto and drama to the crowd. Kate, Janet and Rachel Bevan-Baker! In my 9-year-old mind, we were, for that moment, the centre of the world’s attention, and I almost expected everyone to shout and cheer. I felt important, and I loved it.

The opening verses of today’s reading from Luke are a bit like a trumpet fanfare for an A-list of earthly powers; an emperor, a governor, three tetrarchs, and two high priests. Collectively they hold all the authority and might that wealth, military prowess, or ancestry can command. Luke seems to be saying to us, ‘Look at the world at this time. Look at the powerful leaders, both in politics, and in religious life’.

But here we have the word of God not given by those announced with great fanfare, but given to and proclaimed by John. John, who lives a simple, we might say a frugal life, in the wilderness.

Chapter 1 verse 80 of Luke’s gospel tells us that the child John, ‘grew and became strong in spirit, he was in the wilderness until the day he appeared publicly to Israel.’ John has been living in the desert for many years; not really part of society, and yet growing through those humble years in understanding of who he was, and what his vocation, his calling was.

And I think there’s for a second reason Luke tells us of these great worldly leaders; he is reinforcing for us that God is not active in an abstract or theoretical way, but in concrete events, real people, in actual places.

God does not reside in a fantastical land, like Narnia, Middle Earth, or that of the Wizard of Oz in the Emerald City at the end of a yellow brick road! God is present in the mess and corruption and complication of historical events and situations. This message feels particularly important in these days; in the mess and corruption and complications of the world’s social and political sphere today.

In Luke’s Gospel, we have already been introduced to John the Baptist, partly because of the Benedictus, the song, that Zechariah, John the Baptist’s father, sang following the birth of his son, and which we read in place of our Psalm today. Those who gather for Morning Prayer each day recite this canticle every morning, through every season of the Church year. It is the perfect Advent canticle, for Advent is a time when we seek to rediscover the nature of God, and to rediscover who we are, as God’s children. This canticle expresses something of both.

So who is God as expressed in this Canticle?

‘He has come to his people and set them free’

God sets us free. For many of us, we carry deep rooted fears that we are not free but are enslaved; by demands of life such as work, family, survival; by pain and distress, physical and mental; by others’ expectations of us; by our personal histories, mistakes we have made, regrets we harbour, harm we may fear we have caused to others. God sets us free; is a God of liberation.

Second, God raises us up, which can be interpreted in two ways. Firstly, and reflecting Mary’s Magnificat which comes earlier in the first chapter of Luke, God’s heart is always drawn to the lowly, the hungry, the oppressed, the downtrodden, the despised, and God lifts them up in body, mind and spirit.

Also, for Christians, particularly through this Advent season, we anticipate that as the Holy Spirit raised up Jesus when he was oppressed, downtrodden, and alone even to death, so will all God’s children - that is to say every human person - ultimately be raised up. God is a God who cares, and lifts us up to a place of hope.

Then, ‘He promised to show mercy ... and to remember’

God is merciful. We often speak of God as a God of justice, but this is inseparable from God's mercy; one without the other is perhaps how we humans work out breakdowns in relationships, but not God. God is merciful, hand in hand with God's justice, even to those who have done wrong (and who among us has not?) This is not a whitewash – it is not a pseudo-mercy that overlooks injustice. It goes beyond justice, to the place of mercy and love, in which all can be transformed.

And God remembers, which again has more than one meaning. Specifically within the canticle it refers to the covenant of God with his people throughout time; and these promises remain.

But possibly more personally meaningful to each of us today, it means that everything that ever happens in our lives is valued and treasured. All that we have been, and all that we have done; all our best moments, alongside our most humiliating moments of apparent failure and times we regret. All are healed and transformed, and all are brought back together, are re-membered, in God’s eyes, and ultimately within us through God’s mercy.

Zechariah’s song teaches us: God sets us free; God raises us up; God shows us mercy; and God remembers, long ago and in the very midst of our lives today, in the bleakest, most hurting places of our world.

The second half of the canticle offers us Zechariah’s prophecy for who John the Baptist will be, but is also a beautiful illustration of who we are called to be. Prophets. This Advent season is a time for us to hear God’s call to us to be courageous in seeking to hear God’s call. Paul called to the Philippians to grow in love to be disciples of Christ in their day. John the Baptist lived life in the desert, a life of poverty. But what is my call?

A helpful way to think about it might be to look at what the issues are in today’s world that evoke a strong reaction within me, perhaps of distress, perhaps of anger, perhaps of longing? God calls to us through our emotions; and calls us to respond.

So to what or to where is God calling you this advent? What moves you? Cruelty or injustice? Social Inequality? Exploitation? Climate catastrophe? Hostility shown to strangers? I encourage us all, listen for that call, for we can be sure God is calling.

The Benedictus ends with a call for us to be light that shines on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death. This canticle recognises the human truth of times of darkness, of pain, of living in the shadow of death, of being in some way deadened. And how are we to respond? To trust that the tender compassion of God will ultimately bring the break of dawn.

But within times of darkness, we are called to sit with the other until that dawn breaks. To guide feet into the way of peace. To be people who do not force, but by remaining alongside another who is in darkness, align ourselves with God's patient, dependable, and transforming love. God desires to bring reconciliation, peace, and the tender light of hope within us, and between us.

Be courageous in listening for God’s call; be people who continue to trust in the breaking of dawn even in the darkest of places; and be people living in, and guiding others to peace.

So, in this season of Advent, let us each seek to rediscover who God is, and who we are. May we be part of the preparation for the coming of Christ. As we remember his coming as a little baby, may we also be part of preparing the way for Christ’s return in our midst, in the real world, and at the heart of all Creation.

Amen