Since the start of Advent in mid-November, we’ve been asking an honest question: How does a weary world rejoice?
Just exactly how do the pale and downtrodden – everyday folks like you and I – find good reason to shout for joy and bang the drums over the arrival of Jesus in Bethlehem? Particularly so when everything in and around feels anemic, worn out, and bound for hell in handbasket?!
By the Spirit came some surprising answers.
Rejoicing arises from weariness when you first admit, perhaps even aloud, that you are, in fact, weary. Reason to celebrate blossoms – surprisingly – when you name the grief, rage, and hopelessness that we all carry, even as we together affirm that the Lord created us for joy – his and ours.
Rejoicing further arises from weariness when you find joy in connection. In community, your joy expands! And when you can’t rejoice, you can carry each other’s joy. That’s what Elizabeth and Mary do for each other in the months leading up to the births of Elizabeth’s son, John the future Baptist, and Mary’s son, Jesus. United by unplanned pregnancies, their spirits together rejoice in the Lord.
Rejoicing continues to arise from weariness when you allow yourself to be amazed.
After Elizabeth gives birth, her neighbors, friends, and family share her excitement and join her celebration – the common tie of amazement wrapping all into one body. When time comes to name the newborn, Zechariah affirms the name spoken by an angel and by Elizabeth. And in that moment of affirming God’s promise, Zechariah’s speech is restored, and everyone is filled with awe! So, allow yourself to be amazed.
A weary world rejoices – experiences a thrill of hope – when you sing stories of hope! As soon as his voice returns, Zechariah’s first words resonate with gratitude in a song of hope: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them” (Luke 1:68). After Elizabeth showers blessings upon Mary, Mary then croons, “My soul magnifies God; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (Luke 1:46-47).
There’s rejoicing in seeking healing for yourself or providing healing for another. And you rejoice when you make room – playing not the role of the innkeeper whose “no vacancy” sign shouts “get lost,” but rather the role of gracious proprietor whose threshold bids welcome – the one whose deep love wraps weary travelers in extravagant hospitality.
Where do we find strength to make sacrifices like that? Well, as disciples who rejoice, we root ourselves in holy ritual, and from our sacred past find the pluck to move forward courageously into new chapters of life and onto roads less traveled.
Now this morning we ice the cake:
A weary world finds reason to rejoice in trusting our beloved-ness. When all is said and done, our joy is rooted in our adoption. We belong to God.
In the story of Jesus’s baptism, which we’ll experience together shortly, the heavens part wide, and the voice of God blankets Jesus in joy and loving care. Some translations of our Scripture lesson read, “In you, I find happiness and delight!”
So, since the Spirit makes us one with Christ in common baptism, it’s no stretch to believe that we too are sources of God’s joy! When you trust your own beloved-ness, you live and give fully – compelled by the Holy Spirit to treat all Creation with tenderness and care. When you trust your beloved-ness, you have endless reasons to rejoice.
That said, consider the observation of spiritual writer Henri Nouwen:
“It certainly is not easy to hear that voice [of beloved-ness] in a world filled with voices that shout: ‘You are no good, you are ugly; you are worthless; you are despicable, you are nobody – unless you can [show otherwise].’ These negative voices are so loud and so persistent that it is easy to believe them. That’s the great trap. It is the trap of self-rejection.”
With the Spirit’s help, free yourself from the sharp, pointed jaws of that vicious trap and experience the freedom and joy that come when you trust the One to whom you belong.
Listen to the Word that God has spoken, listen even if – like many of us, you don’t understand.
[T]he word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.
He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “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, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”
John said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”
And the crowds asked him, “What then should we do?”
In reply he said to them, “Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.” Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, “Teacher, what should we do?” He said to them, “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” Soldiers also asked him, “And we, what should we do?” He said to them, “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”
As the people were filled with expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Messiah, John answered all of them by saying, “I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people.
But Herod the ruler, who had been rebuked by him because of Herodias, his brother’s wife, and because of all the evil things that Herod had done, added to them all by shutting up John in prison.
Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” (Luke 3:2-22)
Luke well describes the frenzied goings-on along the banks of the Jordan.
But his telling of Jesus’s baptism is brief and vague. Jesus is baptized among “all the people” by an unnamed baptizer.
Not until Jesus prays does the iconic scene become remarkable: The heavens open; the Holy Spirit descends as if a dove, and a voice booms affirmation from above. It’s hard to wrap your head, much less your heart, around all these things. Even more goes unspoken and implied!
Yet one moment that stirs my imagination comes when Jesus splashes underwater. Holding his breath and kerplunking into the river, Jesus for a brief moment is completely suspended, embraced, and upheld by the water of baptism.
Above his head, the water’s surface is choppy; what lies ahead is unknown and precarious. Jesus’s new path is lonely and formidable, eventually leading to his suffering and death. He’s about to step out the door and into his calling, and spectacular affirmation from no less that God the Father in Heaven is what fuels Jesus’s first step.
Even so, despite what is to come, Jesus reaches toward the surface.
That’s what it means to trust your beloved-ness: Bone and muscle relieved of gravity’s burden, serenity, weightlessness, oneness with Creation; the warmth of God’s love permeating every cell of your body, every nook and cranny of your soul.
In the effervescent of baptismal water, you sense assurance that you belong to God. You are God’s handiwork – fearfully and wonderfully made, created in Jesus Christ for good works, and filled with the Holy Spirit, which God offers as earthly life’s guardian, guide, and stay. You are created, called, and commissioned by baptism, and that alone should fuel your joy as a child of God and a believer in your beloved-ness.
And don’t for one minute think you’re being selfish or egotistical when you claim your beloved-ness. Because claiming your own beloved-ness and blessedness always stirs deep desire to bless others. Again from the pen of Henri Nouwen, “It is remarkable how easy it is to bless others, to speak good things to and about them, to call forth their beauty and truth, when you yourself are in touch with your own blessedness. The blessed one always blesses.”
Poet Sarah Speed calls acting on such blessedness “The Bravest Thing We Can Do.”
Trust your belovedness.
Let it be a protest,
an act of resistance,
a song of celebration.
Trust your belovedness in a world
that is rarely satisfied.
Wear it like a badge of honor.
Speak it as confidently as your last name.
Tattoo it to your heart.
When outside forces
chip away at your sense of self,
when life asks you
to hand over the keys,
remember the water.
Remember creation.
Remember how it was good,
so very good.
Let that truth hum through your veins.
Sing it so loud
that it drowns out the weariness of the world,
for the bravest thing we can ever do
is trust that we belong here.
And to God!
Listen to the Word that God has spoken. Amen!
Pastor Grant M. VanderVelden shared this message during worship on Sunday, January 21, 2024, at First Presbyterian Church in Waukon, Iowa, USA. It is the final message of his Advent-Christmas-Epiphany series, “How Does a Weary World Rejoice?” Scholarship, commentary, and reflection by Cecelia D. Armstrong, Brené Brow, Hannah Garrity, Lisle Gwynn Garrity, Henri Nouwen, Lauren Wright Pittman, Sarah (Are) Speed, and Anna Strickland inform the message. Artwork: Beloved by Lauren Wright Pittman, SantifiedArt.org.