SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT

 DECEMBER 5, 2021

Scripture Readings

Malachi 3:1-4 (NIV)

3:1 “I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,” says the Lord Almighty.

2 But who can endure the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears? For he will be like a refiner’s fire or a launderer’s soap.

3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; he will purify the Levites and refine them like gold and silver. Then the Lord will have men who will bring offerings in righteousness,

4 and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the Lord, as in days gone by, as in former years.

Luke 1:68-79 (NIV)

68 “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his people and redeemed them.

69 He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David

70 as he said through his holy prophets of long ago,

71 salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us

72 to show mercy to our ancestors and to remember his holy covenant,

73 the oath he swore to our father Abraham:

74 to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear

75 in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

76 And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him,

77 to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins,

78 because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven

79 to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.”

Luke 3:1-6, NIV

3:1 In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar—when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, Herod tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Traconitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene—

2 during the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, son of Zechariah in the wilderness.

3 He went into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

4 As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet:

“A voice of one calling in the wilderness,

‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.

5 Every valley shall be filled in, every mountain and hill made low.

The crooked roads shall become straight, the rough ways smooth.

6 And all people will see God’s salvation.’”

The Message
from Pastor Sharon Sargent

Would you pray with me:

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, our strength and our Redeemer. Amen

Have you ever wished you had an extra pair of hands to wrap up all the gifts and do all the holiday tasks?

Do you ever find yourself wishing there were more hours in the day? Are you struggling to get things done that need to be done before Christmas? I, like many of you, feel the pressure of the holiday season as we count down the days to Christmas. There is so much to do! We want everything to be perfect for our Christmas celebration.

We try to find the right gifts for the special people in our lives, hoping that our gift will bring joy on Christmas morning. And doesn’t it sometimes feel like we are running ourselves ragged, trying to get everything done?

But when you stop and think about it, what is it, that really matters to us at Christmas? What are we hoping for?

Perhaps we need to take a moment, to look at what our priorities are during this season of preparation.

In today’s Old Testament reading from the Book of Malachi, the prophet announces to the people:

 “I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,” says the Lord Almighty.[1]

This prophetic message announces that there will be a messenger who comes to prepare the people for the day of coming of the Lord.

​In much the same way today, as we celebrate the Advent season, we are called to prepare for the coming of the Lord. Advent helps us to prepare for Christmas when we will celebrate the Incarnation, the birth of the Christ Child- the birth of baby Jesus. But do we recognize that this is also a time for us to prepare for the second coming of our Lord and Savior, who has promised that he will come back and take us to be with him.[2]

The season of Advent provides an opportunity to take inventory of what our priorities are in this life. Will we be ready for the Lord’s arrival? For the Lord is surely coming. The promises of the Lord are always fulfilled.

In our Gospel Lesson today, from Luke chapter 1, verse 2, we hear that John, the son of Zechariah, was the messenger crying out in the wilderness: “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.”[3] John, the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth is more commonly referred to as John the Baptist. He was the messianic “forerunner”[4] sent ahead to prepare the people for the arrival of the promised Messiah. He was a prophet of the Most High who came to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of sin.[5] He called the people to repent, to turn from their sinful ways, and to turn their hearts back to God. He baptized them with water, proclaiming the good news that the promised One would come to baptize them “with the Holy Spirit and fire”.[6]

Now to understand who John the Baptist was, we must first understand that both of John’s parents were of the priestly family of Aaron. Only those born of the Aaronic line were allowed to be priests and to serve in the temple.

When John’s father Zechariah was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, he went into the temple to burn incense and was visited by an angel.[7] The angel Gabriel said, “do not be afraid,” and told him that his wife Elizabeth would bear him a son, and that he was to be called John. [8] But Zechariah did not “respond to Gabriel’s announcement with faith in the miraculous intervention of God and as a result had been struck dumb.”[9] On that day, Zechariah was made silent, unable to speak, because he questioned how could this be since he and his wife were along in years.[10] And yet, just as promised, despite being along in years, Elizabeth bore a child. And on the eighth day after his birth, when circumcision of a Jewish male is performed as a covenant sign with God, the child was named. Now, “the expectation” as was Jewish tradition, was that the child would be named after his father Zechariah. But “Elizabeth knew the child was to be called John,”[11] as revealed to her through a revelation. And against the custom of her day, Elizabeth spoke out, “No! He is to be called John.”[12] And he was named John in accordance with God’s will. With “the terms of Gabriel’s judgement now fulfilled,”[13] Zechariah, who had been silent for those nine months, likely contemplating “his unbelief” and coming “to faith in God’s plan” was set free and “he began to speak, praising God”[14]

​The second reading you heard earlier today from Luke, chapter 1, verses 68-79, is Zechariah’s inspired prophecy, which is distinctly characteristic of Old Testament praise to God as our deliverer. Yes, God fulfills God’s promises, and Zechariah prophesized that his son would go on before the Lord to prepare the way for the Lord, sharing the knowledge of the salvation that was to come.[15]

​In our Gospel lesson today, Luke provides us with a historic context regarding when this event occurred in human history by naming the Roman rulers and the Jewish high priests. Though the names of these historic figures are captured in the text of the Bible, does anyone really pay much attention to them? For their time upon this earth was but a fleeting moment, and their names insignificant in relation to God’s plan. It is the name above all names that we remember. It is the name above all names that we confess as Lord. For it is Jesus Christ, born an infant in a lowly manger, fully human and fully divine, who would forever change our world. And it was John the Baptist, who announce his coming, who was the last of the prophets of old.

​When we think about the people living at the time when Jesus lived, they like us were rather busy, bustling about with their everyday lives with their routines, chores and tasks at hand. I wonder how many of them paused for a moment, to think about what had been told to them by the prophets of old, about the coming of the Messiah who would deliver them. It had been many years since the voice of a prophet was heard in the land, and here we find John, “the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’” But what does that really mean? How can every mountain and hill be made low, the crooked roads straightened, and the valley be filled in, with the rough ways smoothed? With God all things are possible. But our Gospel lesson today is not speaking of the landscape terrain, but rather about our hearts. As we heard in today’s Advent candle lighting ceremony, the road home can be rough for some. We all have memories, some fond others not so fond. And we each perceive things from a different perspective. We see things from our perspective, not always recognizing that others may have a different perspective from ours. And often without even realizing it, there have been times when we have hurt the people we love, and we have also been hurt by them. Sometimes we feel as if we don’t measure up to their expectations, or we may not have felt loved at times. Many of us have faced rejection, hurt, sadness, disappointment and struggles in our lifetimes. Even our best laid plans don’t always come to fruition.

​Yet we have hope. The prophet Malachi tells us that God refines us like gold and silver. Through the Holy Spirit, our hearts are purified and made acceptable to the Lord. God heals the rough terrain of our hearts. God forgives us of our sins, forgives the harm we have caused to others. And God heals the brokenness we hold within, healing our wounded hearts. Our egos like mountains and hills are laid low, when recognize how small we truly are in comparison to our all-powerful God. The crooked roads are made straight, as we turn our hearts to the Lord and follow in the ways of Jesus. And the valleys caused by the pain we have endured is filled in with God’s love. Yes, the rough ways are smoothed by forgiveness, and we are restored to right relationship with God.

And by the grace of God, even our relationships with others which may have been rocky over the years can be healed. “The road home is always under construction.”[16] We just need to set our priorities in order and determine what is most important in our lives.

Would you pray with me:

Loving God who touches our hearts as we prepare for your coming, transform us, that we may be refined and purified, strengthened in our faith and belief and trusting that with you O Lord all things are possible.

Fill us with your love in this time of preparation and help us to set our priorities so that we will be ready when you come again. Amen

​

[1] Malachi 3:1, NIV

[2] John 4:3, NIV

[3] Luke 1:2,4, NIV

[4] Grant R. Osborne, Luke Verse by Verse (Bellingham, WA:Lexham Press, 2018), 25.

[5] Luke 1:76-77, NIV

[6] Luke 3:16, NIV

[7] Luke 1:8-10, NIV

[8] Luke 1:11-13, NIV

[9] Grant R. Osborne, Luke Verse by Verse (Bellingham, WA:Lexham Press, 2018), 51.

[10] Luke 1:18-20, NIV

[11] J. L May, The Harpercollins Bible Commentary, Rev. ed. (New York: HarperOne, 1988), 931.

[12] Luke 1:60, NIV

[13] Grant R. Osborne, Luke Verse by Verse (Bellingham, WA:Lexham Press, 2018), 53.

[14] Ibid., 53.

[15] Luke 1: 68-79, NIV

[16] Derek Weber, “Advent Candle Lighting Liturgy 2021” Discipleship Ministries of The United Methodist Church, December 5, 2021, https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/articles/advent-candle-lighting-liturgy-2021.

​

Works Cited:

Grant R. Osborne, Grant R. Luke Verse by Verse. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2018.

May, J. L. The Harpercollins Bible Commentary, Rev. ed. New York: HarperOne, 1988.

Weber, Derek. “Advent Candle Lighting Liturgy 2021” Discipleship Ministries of The United Methodist Church, December 5, 2021.

     https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/articles/advent-candle-lighting-liturgy-2021