SunDec112011
Scripture: ISAIAH 61:1-4, 8-11
It won’t be too long before we hear again those incredibly comforting words of Christmas: “And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom God favors’” (Luke 2:13-14). “Glory to God.” It’s a huge and prevalent theme in the Bible—some 642 instances, in fact, of some form of the word “glory,” and 434 uses of the word “praise.” That’s a lot of glorifying and praising in the Bible!
In today’s passage from the prophet Isaiah, we get a variation on that theme. “I will greatly rejoice in the LORD,” says Isaiah, “my whole being shall exult in my God” (61:10). Rejoicing and exulting—giving glory, praising—are the only appropriate response to the God who has, as Isaiah puts it, “clothed [us] with the garments of salvation, [who] has covered [us] with the robe of righteousness” (61:10). And it’s the thing to do, not just because of what God has done, but because of the promise of what’s to come: “God will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations” (61:11). Because of what God has done and will do for us, and because of the justice God will bring about for those who are poor, in other words, because of all that—past and future, grace and justice—we celebrate.
On the third Sunday of Advent, as we await the coming of God, we celebrate joy, we rejoice. And as we do, we give glory to the provider of that joy, the giver of all blessings, the bestower of the justice that works through us to make the world right. Even though much of life is a muddy mess, we still give glory to God. The bottom line is not our pain and frustration; it’s not the grotesque inequalities that divide rich from poor; it’s not the distrust that so often divides Christian from Muslim; it’s not the fury and annoyance that can mark holiday visits with families. As real as those things certainly are, the bottom line, the central lens through which to look at the world, is that all of life is a gift and that the only proper response is one of praise and celebration, a stance of joyful gratitude that gives glory to the source of it all. We give glory because we have life at all, and because each instant is dotted with grace enough to sear our souls with beauty and love. We give glory because of the holiness at the heart of the universe, the gracious benefactor who showers us with a radiant shimmer.
A woman named Kathleen Hirsch remembers a Christmas of not too long ago. “I was potting the last of the jam when my [little] son disappeared from the kitchen. I heard rummaging in the living room, then the metallic tinkle of ornaments on the lower boughs. Minutes later he was standing beside me, a solemn three-year-old holding a stuffed red heart that he’d taken from the tree.
“‘Mommy,’ he announced. ‘Pretend that I am Gabriel.’
“I looked at the chocolate around his lips, the sleeves of his Henley rolled up for wings, and his utterly sincere and serious eyes.
“‘Kneel down, Mommy,’ he instructed me.
“I obliged. Gabriel and I were face-to-face, inches apart, in front of the stove.
“‘Mary,” he addressed me. ‘You shall have a son. And this,’ he extended the plush red heart toward my face. ‘This is your holy.’
“Here he paused for emphasis. ‘You must carry your holy with you always, Mommy—even around your neck—so that Jesus will know that he is holy too.’
“I looked at the heart offering, velvet and gold, resting in my hand. What to do with the hot coals of a prophet?
“Then, perhaps overcome by the force of his own inspiration, my Gabriel turned and fled back to the crèche to distribute more of the ‘holy’ to the creatures assembled there.
“Slowly I got to my feet. For a moment my son had seen heaven and had offered me a glimpse. Not long out of diapers, he had lanced the literal with the intuition of a sage. Truth’s vital core, the beckoning center of everything, is its holiness. Without the holy, life—even simplified, even with terrific gingerbread and jam—is dust. . . .
“Who deserves such breathtaking moments? Certainly not I . . . Holiness is wilder [than my daily life] and less easily corralled . . . It erupts into the mundane order of our days and reveals whatever inside of us is on intimate terms with the divine. This was what my son had been trying to tell me. . . .
“God needs our witness to the holy, needs us to uphold the sacred . . . Without our tangible gestures, our rituals and icons informed by faith and wonder, we’ll again become mired in the realm of common sense, estranged from mystery by mere knowledge.
“That New Year’s Eve we were invited to the home of friends. While the adults polished off a curry supper, my son and his friend Perry enjoyed a scavenger hunt and a run of combat, then curled up to watch 101 Dalmatians and Benjamin Bunny . . . By ten o’clock the children were limp with exhaustion, and we found them tangled in sheets on the floor of Perry’s bedroom. As I knelt down for a goodnight kiss, my son took my hand.
“‘Christmas is long, Mommy,’ he said, suddenly alert. ‘What are we going to do with all the years?’
“After we get a good night’s sleep, I told him, we’ll be ready to watch for more sightings of the holy in the morning” (Christian Century, Nov. 29, 2011, pp. 10-11).
Holiness is here. And it’s always preparing to be born—in our homes and workplaces and gyms and neighborhoods. With our help, it’s ready to remake the world. And so we say and sing the words of the angel, and somewhere deep down, we “rejoice and [are] glad in it” (Ps. 118:24): “Glory to God in the highest.”