Sermon: 4th. Sunday of Advent (C)
(Micah
5:1-4; Hebrews 10:5-10; Luke 1:39-44)
The time is at hand: soon Christmas will be here. In today's readings we are given some
background to Israel's expectation of, and joy in, the promised Messiah, and
through that we can catch a glimpse of the true Christian joy that should be
ours as we look forward in hope towards Christmas.
The prophet Micah tells us that, before the coming of the
Messiah, there would be a time of sorrow
Marshal
your troops … for a siege is laid against us.
The horrors for a city under siege in those days could
indeed be catastrophic: supplies of food and water being cut off first of all;
then stores laid by running out; finally, rain alone being insufficient to
provide enough water for all those crowded into a city filled to overflowing
with weary troops and terrified people from the surrounding country villages
pouring in for shelter before the invading host:
O city
of troops, a siege is laid against us;
so terrible was such a siege that it could even result in
the strong eating the weak, and mothers their infants!
Eventually, Micah foretold, Zion herself would be taken and
the nation robbed of all its dignity and respect:
They
will strike the judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek.
Israel's state of subjection and dependency would last
long, because the Messiah was to come out of Bethlehem not Jerusalem, the city
of Israel's great king, David. David had
been taken from shepherding his father's flocks by Samuel in the name of God
and anointed as king to shepherd God's chosen people. So too, as you heard, the prophet foretold of
the coming Messiah that he:
shall
stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord.
But he would not come out of Jerusalem, Zion, the city of David,
because Israel's ruler will have been humiliated -- "struck on the cheek with
a rod" -- for so long that survivors of the house of David will no longer
be found anywhere in the capital city, only a remnant remaining in the abject
surroundings of Bethlehem:
But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,
though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come
forth to Me the One to be Ruler in Israel.
Those long years after the terror of siege and conquest,
those long, long, years of humiliation, were acknowledged to be the result of
Israel's sin, and God's consequent hiding of his face from her had been
foretold:
He shall give them up, until
the time that she who is in labour has given birth.
When, however, the expected Messiah came, He would indeed
be a wonderful figure, like David:
He shall stand and feed His
flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord His
God; and they shall abide.
Indeed, He would be even greater than David, the prophet
foretold:
For now, He shall be great to
the ends of the earth; and this One shall be (our) peace.
David's kingdom had been quite small; he had brought some
worldly glory to his country, indeed, but he had not brought peace, for war had
never been far from Israel's borders in David's days.
Above all else, however, the Messiah would be no mere human
being; He would be far more than even a great and successful hero, because He
would be, the prophet proclaimed:
One
whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting.
In other words, Micah confirms what Isaiah also had
foretold, the Messiah would be divine.
Then indeed, in His days, Israel's humiliation would come to an end and
her glory be revealed to all mankind.
Surely, therefore, you can imagine something of the joy,
expectation, pride, and hope which the Messiah's birth held out to pious
Israelites; and it is there you can find some idea of the true nature of the
Christian longing as we draw close to Christmas, the birth of Jesus Our Lord!
However, to have a closer, yet truer, idea of the nature of
our Christian expectancy near the end of this Advent season, we have to bear in
mind what our Christian evangelists and prophets tell us about the Messiah in
addition to what the Old Testament prophets had foreseen and foretold, and
therefore we now turn our attention to today's second reading from the letter
to the Hebrews:
Therefore, when Christ came
into the world, He said: "Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a
body You have prepared for Me. In burnt
offerings and sacrifices for sin you had no pleasure.”
Jesus, our Saviour, was not coming to do everything the
Jewish Messiah might have been expected to do, for most Jews would have
envisaged the Messiah offering sacrifices in the Temple, and they certainly would
have wanted and expected Him to lead their army to victory over their
oppressors and enemies: ultimately, indeed, they longed for a return of the
‘glory days’ associated with King David.
Jesus, however, was not – as I said -- coming with the
express purpose of radically improving Israel’s political situation of
dependency and subjection; He was coming to renew Israel’s relationship with
God: He was coming with that one purpose in mind, and in a body that would
replace the traditional sacrifices and offerings.
In burnt offerings and
sacrifices for sin You had no pleasure. Sacrifice
and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me.
He was coming, then, with a love for His Father, Israel’s
God, that was divine, but in a body that was truly and fully human, and
therefore subject to the weakness of human nature:
Behold, I have come – in the body
You have prepared for Me -- to do Your will, O God.
And that yearning, aspiration, for the fulfilment of God’s
will, most certainly would not satisfy the popular hopes and aspirations of
most Jews! How could a suffering,
sacrificial, Messiah give them that hoped-for military triumph over, and
revenge on, the Romans, which would lead to political sovereignty and independence,
together with fondly-imagined social prosperity?
Popular desires and expectations have never determined
God’s providential counsels and plans; and certainly, the prophets and those
who were most pious among the sons and daughters of Israel, such as Simeon,
Anna, Elizabeth, and above all, Mary, desired simply and solely that the sin of
Israel -- her disobedience and hardness of heart before God -- should be
redeemed. It was that ever-growing corporate
sinfulness which had brought on Israel all the suffering and shame she had had
to endure for centuries, she had not lived worthily as God's Chosen People, she
had been unfaithful to the covenant made with Yahweh in the desert; and therefore,
the faithful remnant of Israel looked for the coming Messiah to redeem Israel
from the disgrace and the poison of her own sinfulness, rather than to lead her
armies into war against the secular power of Rome.
Let us just listen to some of the most sublime expressions
and manifestations of their joy at the prospect of this holy Messiah, those
which provide us with the truest and most authentic model for our Christian,
Christmas, joy and hope:
When Elizabeth heard the
greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with
the Holy Spirit. Then she spoke out with
a loud voice and said, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the
fruit of your womb! But why is this
granted to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For, indeed, as
soon as the voice of your greeting sounded in my ears, the babe leaped in my
womb for joy.
That was the joy of John the Baptist, joy that One had come
to Israel who would indeed purge Israel of her sin, just as He had filled his
own mother with the Holy Spirit; One whose way he, John, would prepare by preaching
repentance of sin:
And he went into all the
region around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission
of sins. (Luke 3:3)
Such too was the joy of Simeon who received the Infant in
his arms from Mary:
Lord, now You are letting
Your servant depart in peace, according to Your word. For my eyes have seen Your salvation which
You have prepared before the face of all peoples: a light to bring revelation
to the Gentiles, and the glory of Your people Israel. (Luke 2:29-32)
And Simeon, who knew the people he had long lived among,
recognized that this glory that rejoiced his own heart would not prove to be a
cause for popular joy in Jerusalem, indeed, worldly Israelites would reject it:
Simeon blessed them, and said
to Mary His mother, "Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and
rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against.”
(Luke 2:34)
This spiritual glory, this cleansing from sin, is what Mary
celebrated when she proclaimed the holiness of God:
My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Saviour.
For He has regarded the lowly state of His maidservant; for behold,
henceforth all generations will call me blessed. For He who is mighty has done great things
for me, and holy is His name. (Luke 1:46-49)
Therefore, dear People of God, you who have been chosen in
Christ, let us all look forward with joyful anticipation to Christmas, but let
us look forward to what God offers, not what human desires suggest. In this holy season, our joy should -- first
and foremost -- be simple and sincere; a joy which enables us to open our minds
and hearts, to offer our very lives, to the One who comes to do His Father's
will; a joy that compels us to ask Him to teach us His ways and bless us with
the power of His Spirit so that we too -- as His disciples -- may seek and
delight to do the Father's will in all things.
Father,
Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.
