Introduction
This weekend marks the one
year anniversary of the massacre in Newton, CT at Sandy Hook Elementary
School. I remember thinking to myself
last year at this time: “Certainly THIS
horror – this sacrifice of our most innocent children – will awaken the hearts
and souls of those who wield power to grieve and then act in bold ways for the
well-being of all Americans.” But I was
too generous in my assessment and too quick in my hope. According to the most careful and
conservative analysis, there have been 11, 372 gun deaths in the United States
in the past year and precious little has changed.
· Well, that isn't entirely correct: while it would be fair
to say that precious little has changed when it comes to our leaders’ hearts
and official actions, I sense that it is also true that at both the personal
and grassroots level small changes are taking place that will one day yield blessings. I think of the
crusade to challenge America’s gun violence organized by Captain Mark Kelly and
Gabrielle Giffords; slowly and carefully, wisely and effectively they are both
educating Americans about common sense gun laws and systematically taking on
the big money interests that benefit from our inaction. I think of the parents and friends in Newtown
who have created the Sandy Hook Promise who are equally grounded in changing
the gun culture of our land from the bottom up.
These efforts are small and
personal – they are slow-brewing and long-baking - much like the season of
Advent. And over time I believe they
have the potential to bring to birth things we cannot even imagine this
year. Like the late Nelson Mandela used
to say: Some things always seem
impossible until they are done! Remember
when most Americans smoked in public? It wasn't that long ago that we couldn't imagine living in a smoke-free
environment, but now it is the norm. Or
South African apartheid: who could have
imagined how fast that brutal regime would collapse once Mandela was released from
prison? Some things always seem
impossible until they are done.
Such is the subversive and
quiet wisdom of Advent: we practice
trusting and waiting in the darkness until we know in our souls that in God’s
time the light will come. It is beyond
our control. It is beyond our
comprehension. And at times we feel like
John the Baptist in this morning’s gospel asking Jesus: ARE you the one we have been waiting for or
must we look for another Messiah? Are
you the one who will bring us peace? Are
you the one who will give us God’s healing grace? Are you the one or must we wait for another?
Insights
You see, what Mary shares
with us today is a song. Yes, it is a
carefully constructed theological song that has roots in Hebraic culture and
the needs of the early church. And to be completely candid, we know that what
Mary actually sang was likely very different from the words that have been
recorded in the gospel according to St. Luke.
But like the scholar said about her study of the ancient myths: While we know this isn’t historically
accurate, it is still true. And there
are three things about spiritual songs that we need to call to mind lest we
miss the beauty and truth of Mary’s Advent wisdom.
· First of all, singing is the only truly embodied
art form we have. Drumming comes close but when you sing it is just
your body that makes the music not an exterior instrument. You bring air into your lungs, it passes over
your vocal chords and comes out of your mouth in a way that makes YOU an
instrument of the Lord’s peace.
Small wonder
that the Mennonites consider singing to be a sacrament – an outward and visible
sign of an inward and spiritual grace – an action in space and times that gives
shape and form to what St. John wrote at the start of his gospel. In the beginning was the word… and the word
became flesh… and dwelt among us full of truth and grace. Singing is incarnational theology – making
the ideas and truths of the sacred real – through our flesh. Duke professor of theology and sacred music,
Jeremy Begbie, put it like this: Sound…
is the only major medium of communication that can vibrate perceptibly within
the body… the lungs, the sinus passages, the mouth that vibrate in sympathy
with the frequencies of the vocal chords… are a truth that can be felt in
addition to being heard for sound… enters the body and IS the body. Singing
is incarnational theology.
· Second, because singing is incarnational, it helps us
feel and then express
what we are thinking and praying and hoping for in life. When you sing
a lament, it feels sad and you know that pain in your gut. When you sing “Joy to the World” you can’t
help but want to dance and celebrate. In
fact, sometimes singing is the only way to express to God and one another what
is going on in our soul.
When the
first openly gay city council person, Harvey Milk of San Francisco, was
assassinated, thousands of people took to the streets singing “we are an angry,
gentle people and we are fighting, fighting for our lives.” When the American civil rights movement found
itself backed up against a wall, attacked by police dogs and water cannons,
they sang: “Ain’t gonna let nobody turn
me around, turn me around, turn me around…”
In South Africa as Mandela led his people towards a new day that could
not even be imagined in a popular consciousness shaped by apartheid, black and
white sang together in Zulu: “Siyahamb' ekukhanyen' kwenkhos…” Last
year as our church in Newtown buried some of the children from Sandy Hook – and
no words could capture the full truth of that moment – they sang. And what they sang is instructive: O come, o come Emmanuel and ransom captive
Israel, that mourns in lonely exile here, until the Son of God appear: rejoice, rejoice Emmanuel shall come to Thee o
Israel.”
· First, singing is doing theology in an embodied way;
second, singing gives shape and form to what is in our hearts; and third
singing helps us experience and taste what living into God’s kingdom really
means. There is harmony in our music, there is beauty as well
as rhythm, humor and humility. There is
energy to our songs and the poetic promise of what God desires but we have not
yet begun to imagine. For, you see,
when we sing to the Lord like Mary, not only do we give voice to our prayers, we
enter into that blessing for a moment of time out of time. Singing gives us a taste of what God intends
for us within the everlasting kingdom – it doesn’t last – and it is fleeting,
but it is real. Now I don’t know if you
have ever experienced that kind of ecstasy before, but I’m not making this up.
Sometimes when you’re singing or listening to Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” it
happens, right? You are lifted up and
beyond yourself in a blessed way.
I’ve had that happen at a U2
concert, too. What’s more, I have been
lifted up and beyond the pettiness of this world into something sacred when
Garth Brooks sings “We Shall Be Free” – a good old country boy singing about
racial harmony and marriage equality - or Springsteen singing about the martyrs
of September 11th in “The Rising” or even Montgomery Gentry tearing
up the house in their prophetic “Hell Yeah” that reminds us that all too often
bars and pubs are more hospitable to broken souls than churches, synagogues and
mosques.
Those are kingdom moments for
me when I am brought into a time beyond time and the ancient promise of Isaiah
is realized for a moment: The
eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped; the
lame shall leap like a deer and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. Consider what is happening in
Mary’s canticle: not only is she articulating
the promises of the Lord but she is entering them, too. Preacher David Lohse has written:
Like Mary’s songs, I have come to believe that our songs don’t simply
express spiritual blessings for another time, but they actually pull us into an
experience of the new reality. Do you
know the old hymn, Blessed Assurance? Blessed
assurance, Jesus is mine, o what a foretaste of glory divine? Like Martin Luther used to tell his students,
not only does the Devil flee from joyful songs, but we pray twice whenever we
sing to the Lord. Singing is a way to
live into the promise of God’s changed world.
It is a way to experience and embrace the wisdom of Advent so that we,
too, bring something of the Lord to birth within and among us.
So what I want to do with you right now is take a few moments to sing,
listen, feel and pray five key songs from our faith tradition that have opened
me to something of Advent’s wisdom as I encounter God’s kingdom of peace,
compassion and healing like Mary.
Because, let me be very blunt here: I don’t know about you but I need some
blessing these days. It is so easy to
grow weary and afraid for so many reasons. And even though I know in my head
that God’s light is coming into the darkness, I still need some
encouragement. Are you with me? What did the old soul say to Jesus: I believe, Lord, help my unbelief? I think singing is one of the ways to do just
that.
· + So let’s start
with hymn #36 – In the Bleak Midwinter – and we’ll sing
just the first and last
verse… What do you hear of the Lord’s love in this song? What is our prayer? And what is our encounter with God’s
presence?
· + Now try this
one: # 97 – Go to Dark Gethsemane – and
we’ll do the first and last here, too: what does this song feel like to
you? If “In the Bleak Midwinter” felt
desolate, this one feels like Sandy Hook Elementary school to me – only anguish
– except… the one who has been sacrificed will teach us to trust beyond even
our feelings.
+ What do you experience with hear this one – It Is Well with My Soul – When peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll; whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say, it is well, it is well with my soul. What’s going on here?
+Two more: #260 – A Might Fortress Is Our God – first and last: what’s going on here?
+ And then #309 – Of the Father’s Love Begotten – all three: what do you experience here?
Conclusion
Each of those songs brings me into both the promise of God’s grace
and the power of God’s promise. When I
find myself discouraged – or afraid – or confused or agitated as I often do, I
find myself drifting back to one of those five songs. And like Mary, when I sing them, I enter into
a new reality and my heart is refreshed.
Not all at once – and it doesn’t last forever. But it helps.
Mary is a quiet and often overlooked prophet. She isn’t as bold as Isaiah nor is she as
loud and demanding as John the Baptist.
But like her place in today’s liturgy, quietly hidden amidst all the
furor, she offers a better way – a healing way - a way that brings hope and
light to our hearts when we don’t know what to say. When John the Baptist fretted if Jesus was
the one he had been waiting for, the Lord replied: go tell John what you see - the blind receive
their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead
are raised and the poor have good news brought to them.
credits:
1) vivificat1.blogspot.com
2) bloomingcactus.typepad.com
3) fraangelicoinstitute.com
4) www.patheos.com
5) www.patrickcomerford.com
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