"Prophetic Joy"
Isaiah 61:1-4,8-11; John 1:6-8, 19-28
Rev. Laura J. Collins
December 15, 2002
The call came on Christmas Eve morning. Ron's father was not expected to make it through the next day and his sister wanted him to come. He didn't really want to leave his wife and kids on Christmas. His father hadn't recognized him in years. Occasionally he had been somewhat coherent, but even then Dad had called him Wesley -- the name of his brother who died in Vietnam. His father couldn't hear at all -- and even when he had been able to, he'd never really listened to Ron. But his father was dying, so he went.
Flying stand-by, Ron had to wait for three flights before he got a seat and then rent a car to drive the remaining fifty miles to the nursing home. During the trip he had time to remember his dad as he had been when he was a boy. He was a strong, gruff farmer. As the younger son, Ron rarely felt noticed by his dad. He remembered the Christmas of 1967. In November they received word that Wesley had died in a prison camp in Vietnam. After that his father, always a very religious man, stopped going to church. He stopped saying grace at dinner. He even tried to stop their mother from taking them to Sunday School, but she persisted.
Christmas came and Ron, only 9 at the time, had a solo in the Sunday School program. He was so excited. So were his mother and sister. But his father wouldn't go. His mom tried to persuade him, saying how proud he would be to hear Ron sing so well.
"Then sing it for me now. Right here." He said.
So Ron began to sing, "There's a song in the air ..." He became frightened as he continued singing. He watched his father become slowly enraged until, midway through the song, he slammed his fists on the table and screamed, "Lies! Lies, it's all lies." He grabbed his son shouting, "Don't you know what the world is like? There are no pretty angels flapping around -- just hate and suffering and cruelty!" Then he yelled at his wife, "Why do you fill their heads with this nonsense? The air is not full of music -- it's full of bombs and screaming!"
Ron's mother straightened up and said quietly, "The song is louder." His father began cursing and yelling. Ron ran out of the house and kept running. Through the dark, moonless night, through the freezing cold, he ran and ran until he couldn't run anymore. Then he realized he was lost in the woods. He wandered helplessly, cold and afraid, until he saw a single light and began to run toward it. It was his father, come to find him. They walked home together without a word, but they had already missed the Christmas program.
When Ron arrived at the nursing home, his sister told him that he'd come too late. His father was completely unresponsive now. "But earlier tonight he was talking -- he wasn't coherent, but he was alert. He spoke as if Mom was still alive. He said, 'Tell mother the song is louder.'"
Christ is about to be born again and the song is still louder. The drums are beating for war, but the song is still louder. With corporate greed leaving many jobless or pensionless; with snipers subdued, but death penalty advocates aroused; with bombings in Kenya and violence in the Ivory Coast; with homeless people struggling against the cold in the richest capitol on earth; while mansions are well heated at the expense of the earth; with Arctic drilling just moments away and biological warfare no longer relegated to science fiction; with hatred in the Middle East and racists in the Senate, it can be hard to hear the song.
But the promise of Christmas is that the song is still playing.
The song of Christmas is that God is alive in the world. And our Biblical texts today speak of the prophetic promises about what it will mean when God's justice finally reigns on earth.
Isaiah declares that the brokenhearted will be healed, the captives and prisoners will walk free, the oppressed will find justice, those who mourn will be rejoice, the ruined cities will be repaired.
These words from Isaiah are the very ones that Jesus chose to read in the synagogue when he began his own ministry. They define his mission. Which is to say, they define God's mission at Christmas time: justice, freedom, restoration, peace.
John's gospel puts it simply: The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.
In all our texts today, the sub-theme is joy. In our opening Psalm, the mouths of those who have been exiled are filled with laughter. Isaiah says that the year of the Lord will bring the oil of gladness instead of mourning and rejoicing as at a wedding. And the image the prophet uses to explain how God's justice will be accomplished is a natural, believable one: For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations. We don't even need to make a leap to angelic hosts singing hallelujahs. We simply need to watch the earth and learn from it. God is sowing peace. The seed falls into the dark earth and seems to die and be lost. But the seed is not dead. It is gettin ready. Peace will grow.
May those who sow in tears, reap with shouts of joy.
Neither the Psalmist, nor Isaiah, nor John the Baptist were speaking from the luxury of an ivory tower. All were speaking from the reality of being refugees, of living in an occupied land, of knowing poverty and violence. They spoke as people who had, indeed, walked in great darkness. And yet they proclaimed, The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.
The joy of the prophets is not a glittering joy, a superficial ornament to be taken out at Christmas time and displayed for a time. The joy of the prophets is a deeply refined joy, having endured the fires of affliction, knowing intimately the pain of hardship. It is joy in the face of injustice, knowing that justice will endure. Mahatma Gandhi once said, "When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall -- think of it, always."
The message of Christmas is that the seed for oppression's end has already been planted. And we who celebrate Christmas are called to the community of gardeners, who know what has been sown, and who till and keep the ground in faith.
Christmas is a time to remember what God intends for the world. The promise of the incarnation is that God does walk in our shoes -- and into our hearts. The power of Christmas is Emmanuel -- God is with us. The possibility of Christmas is that the song is louder.
The song of peace is louder than the roar of war.
The song of hope is louder than the sighs of despair.
The song of justice is louder than the cries of corruption.
The song of joy is louder than the sobs of sorrow.
The song of Christmas is louder, stronger, more persistent.
For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations.
Christ is coming. There's a song in the air. Can we hear it?
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