Nov. 28 Sermon: Expect Hope
Expect Hope
Rev. Kate Hurst Floyd
Holy Covenant UMC
November 28, 2010, Advent 1
Luke 1:5-25
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Shut up! Shut up. No, you shut up!
Have you been told this before? How does it make you feel?
Probably not very good. This phrase is used to make us feel insignificant, isolated, silenced. When I was growing up, my brother and I weren’t even allowed to say “shut up”. It was a bad word in our house. Or, as my mother would say, as women in the south are wont to say: it’s ugly talk. Don’t use such ugly language.
When we hear this phrase, we hear more than these two words: “shut up”. We hear “What you have to say doesn’t matter, doesn’t count”. Or “What you have to say does matter, but I don’t want to hear it”.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons we’re so scared of silence….because we’re scared of not having a voice. We wonder: If we live into silence, will it mean we are invisible? I don’t need to tell you that we live in a world saturated with noise, with non-stop communication. From hundreds of television stations to instant updates on Facebook and Twitter, the ability to have music and podcasts streaming through earphones night and day, wherever we are…we’re a culture that’s afraid of silence. We don’t want to be invisible.
So we post on Twitter where we are, what we’re doing, what we ate for breakfast. How much homework we have left to do or the state of our cold. It’s easy to make fun of these means of communication, or lament that they are taking over our lives and making us even more self indulgent than we usually are. I often critique these methods and use them, at the same time.
But at the root of our culture of noise and constant communication, I think, is something deeper than mere self-consumption—at our core, we want to be heard. It’s a basic human desire. And in 2010, we have more ways than ever to communicate.
It’s one way of saying: hey, world, you can’t tell me to shut up. I’m worthy of being heard. We need to have a voice.
Well, then, we can only imagine how Zechariah feels. Here’s a man, a priest of God, who has been faithful his whole life. Been righteous in the ways of God. Prayed at the right times, sacrificed on the appropriate occasions, kept the laws of God without complaint.
And in his old age, the pinnacle of his career, chosen by lot to go into the temple alone and pray, he finally has a vision of God. Meets an angel. And not just any angel, the angel Gabriel, the angel he knows from the Hebrew Scriptures, the very same angel who spoke to the prophet Daniel. And what does he say to him? “Zechariah, shut up!”
What? It sounds like ugly talk. Ugly talk from an angel.
He didn’t use those words, exactly, but I’m sure the sentiment was the same and Zechariah felt deeply silenced. What’s going on here?
Zechariah and Elizabeth were faithful people, observant Jews, who were near the end of their lives. They had a good marriage, worthwhile activities, close relatives; overall, satisfying lives. But the one thing missing was that they were never able to have children. And this pained them both. When they were younger, and trying, they would look longingly at babies around them; children of their friends, or strangers on the street in strollers. They would want those sweet giggles to fill their house, they longed for sleepless nights just to feed a hungry child, would have given anything to teach a little one to walk and talk. And as they got older, and their hope grew dimmer, they wished they were taking a child to soccer practice, wondered what it would be like to tutor a girl in Algebra, prepare a boy for his first school dance.
Finally, they reached a point in their lives where they gave up hope…this hope, anyway, of a child. Zechariah and Elizabeth reoriented their expectations about their lives. They were realistic, but never quite lost that longing.
Well we meet them in our Gospel lesson, the very beginning of Luke, the very beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, this old, faithful, childless couple. Living their day to day lives. Zechariah is at work, just like he is every other day…and for the first time in his old life he is met by an angel. This is startling! Can you imagine? Going to work, your same old routine of making coffee, riding the el, walking into your building…and there at your desk is an angel of God? He must have been in shock. He was scared, terrified, the scripture tells us.
But it gets even more shocking…for the angel says to him: Zechariah, don’t be afraid! I am here to answer your prayer. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. My prayer? For a child? He thinks…why I haven’t prayed that prayer in 40 years. I gave up hope and started praying for other things. I’m having a child? By Elizabeth? This just can’t be.
But that’s not all, in the midst of Z’s doubts, the angel continues to speak, telling him that this won’t be just any child. No, this child is special. So special that he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before his birth. He will be a prophet who prepares the world for the coming of the Messiah. He will be filled with the Spirit and Power of Elijah!
Well, Zechariah just can’t believe it. He says to the angel: How can this be? How can I believe you and know this is true? Elizabeth is far past childbearing years. How can I believe you?
And Gabriel’s not having any of it. He retorts back: Because I’m an angel, messenger of God, that’s how you can believe me. I’m Gabriel. Duh. For questioning me, for doubting God, you will be mute right now and throughout Elizabeth’s pregnancy. You will be shut up for this period of time, until you fully believe and God restores your speech.
Can you imagine? Such good and overwhelming news, and you have to keep it to yourself?
Z leaves the temple and goes back to his colleagues, priests gathered, and he can’t say anything. They can tell, though, that he has had a vision of God.
Well the prophecy comes true, Elizabeth does conceive a child, a boy, and she goes into seclusion for five months. Elizabeth in seclusion, Zechariah mute.
If they had lived in 2010, things would have been a lot different. Z would have posted on Twitter: I’m having a baby! A boy! On Facebook, he would have posted: What’s on my mind? That I knocked up my 80 year old wife! And I spoke to an angel! How’s your Monday been? Elizabeth would have posted pictures of her growing belly, at 10 weeks, 15, and then every week after that so the world could track her progress.
But instead, they were forced into silence and chose seclusion. We don’t know what Zechariah was thinking or feeling, much less what he ate for breakfast each day. They had to wait for John to be born. The world had to wait to know that this child would be a prophet. To wait to know that the Messiah was on his way. We have to wait, as readers, to know what happens next…
Today is the first Sunday in Advent, the season when we wait, with great expectations, for the birth of Christ. Like Zechariah, we do know this birth is coming. But we don’t know how Jesus will change our lives, will change the world. We’re not in control of the timing. Our challenge as Christians is to truly spend this season, these four weeks, waiting and anticipating, rather than jumping to the birth. In spite of the trees and Santas and manger scenes all around us, we have to “shut up” for four weeks about the birth of the baby Jesus, and wait.
Waiting is hard. Silence can be painful. Yes, because we are afraid of not being heard. But also because it means we have to recognize that we are not in control. Of life events, of timing, even of saving the world. The birth of Jesus isn’t ours to create. The conception of John was not in Zechariah’s control, and so it wasn’t his to announce with pride.
For words are powerful and we live in a world that cares more about declarations than about truth. If we say it, it makes it true:
Iraq has weapons of mass destruction
If you use this deodorant, women will flock to you.
Obama is a Muslim.
I have 700 friends on Facebook, so I must not be as lonely as I feel.
We delude ourselves into thinking that we are the ones in control. In control of our life and of greater truths.
We need to move away from all those voices out there that create false realities, and dwell instead on God’s reality. There are voices telling us: you have to get a successful job by 25, be in a committed relationship to be fulfilled, have 2.5 children in order to be complete; or that an escalation of war and violence will eventually bring peace; or that we should feel free to consume and throw away trash, because it has no effect on the planet; that tell us who we should love or that our worth is dependent on how much money we have, or in what country we’re born. And if we’re not careful, we’ll find ourselves mirroring the culture and speaking too quickly. Participating in these false realities, without taking time to think. And pray.
And when we start being consumed by all that noise out there, instead of listening to God first, it’s easy to give up hope. Like Zechariah and Elizabeth. To speak human-created truths instead of centering ourselves in God’s good word.
And just when we are at the point of giving up hope, that’s when God swoops in and gives us a big, fat “shut up”. Not to silence us, not because what we say doesn’t matter, but because God loves us so much.
When the “shut up” comes from God, it’s not about silencing our needs, desires, and voice. Quite the opposite: For God, more than any person on earth, always, always, ALWAYS hears us and knows us more intimately than we know ourselves. God created our voice, so of course God wants us to be heard. God encourages silence so that we make room to listen to God, rather than just ourselves. Or all those talking heads we pump into our ears.
For when we rely on ourselves alone, and talk without first listening, we’re not being authentic to who God calls us to be. And we’re living out of self-reliance rather than hope in God. Don’t be afraid of silence, God is telling us.
If Zechariah had been allowed to speak immediately, he probably would have said: “hey, dudes, buy me a cigar and pour me some scotch: I’m gonna be a father! Elizabeth is finally preggers, after all these years. Look what I did!” And then for those 9 months, he would have shouted, every moment of every day, from the rooftops about his fatherhood. But all that shouting would have left little time and room for prayer.
Instead, with a profound period of silence, prayer, and discernment, he grew closer to God. And rather than being silenced, he found his voice.
For God doesn’t want us to end in silence. Rather, silence is the beginning that leads us into speech. For when John is born to Elizabeth, nine months later, and Zechariah is given back the gift of speech, he uses his voice. And we have one of the most beautiful pieces of poetry in all of Scripture. Listen, listen, to what Zechariah finally says after his period of waiting:
67 Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke this prophecy:
68 ‘Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,
for he has looked favourably on his people and redeemed them.
69 He has raised up a mighty saviour for us
in the house of his servant David,
70 as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old,
71 that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us.
72 Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors,
and has remembered his holy covenant,
73 the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham,
to grant us 74that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies,
might serve him without fear, 75in holiness and righteousness
before him all our days.
76 And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,
77 to give knowledge of salvation to his people
by the forgiveness of their sins.
78 By the tender mercy of our God,
the dawn from on high will break upon us,
79 to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.’
So beautiful, this movement from silence to speech. God wasn’t trying to shut Zechariah up, but to help him find his voice, centered in God.
The question for us, then, is how can we use this season to dwell in silence so that we are moved to speech? Not speech about our daily habits, or that mirrors the culture, but speech about the hope we have in God. For the good news is that new life will come, to each and every one of us, and to the whole wide world. We don’t know what exactly it will be or when it will happen. But the promise of the Gospel, from the beginnings of birth right through the gift of resurrection, is that new life comes. Not in our timing or control, but in God’s. And when we wait, with anticipation, for the hope of God, the new life will be so much more beautiful than anything we could control or try to create on our own.
This Advent, may we find a little time to shut up and expect hope.
May we spend this season practicing silence, practicing waiting, practicing listening.
So that when it is time for us to speak, for new life to be born, poetry will spill from our lips.
For this is the good news:
When Jesus comes (and he WILL come):
78 By the tender mercy of our God,
the dawn from on high will break upon us,
79 to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.’
May it be so. Thanks be to God!
Tags: Kate
