Tag Archives: kelli parrish lucas

Ecumenical Disability Advocacy Network, Day 1

by Rev. Kelli

I have spent today talking with and listening to people with and without disability who advocate for inclusion for people with disability (PWD) in their/the church context. These are people from around the US, and we will soon be joined I am told by persons from Canada. These are people who have physical disabilities and people who work with persons with intellectual disabilities and parents of children with disabilities.

We have gathered to for the Ecumenical Disability Advocacy Network (EDAN) for North America. EDAN is a program of the World Council of Churches. We have been joined by Samuel Kaube and his wife for this historic meeting in Denver. Mr. Kaube is the Executive Director of the EDAN program for the WCC. Mr. has graced us with his knowledge of the work being done by PWD and their allies around the world to gain understanding and inclusion in the churches around the world–the very Body of Christ. He has shared some with us about the work that other EDAN groups have done in other areas of the world; he has shown us the books about disability theology that have been written in other areas of the world and told us of how parts of India and Asia are starting to include the area of disability awareness in theological institutions.

I love this, it is part of what I feel called to do in my life and in my ministry. But it also raises a good number of questions for me. One of the new ones of which is, why is North America so behind the rest of the world when it comes to organizing for access and inclusion within the churches? Given the fact that the Americans with Disabilities Act is now over two decades old one might think that the issue of accessibility and inclusion in the American churches is an issue long since solved. WRONG. Churches and institutions owned by them are exempt from the ADA, and have long failed to meet their moral and ethical obligations to PWD. I have said it before–the churches are among the most inaccessible places in America due to both physical and attitudinal barriers (discrimination). Yes, I said there is discrimination against PWD in the American churches. If you are shocked I am glad, and I hope you will start to raise the question of why in your own church setting. PWD in the churches need allies. If you are not shocked I am probably preaching to the choir–when will we get loud?

Another question, as one of the participants here put it “where are our allies” and “why is this not seen as civil right’s issue”?

Yet another is why have we not begun to formulate a disability theology, or even theologies, pertinent to the North American context? Is there something about the religious history of America or the decisive role religion has played in American culture over the last twenty years that is preventing us from doing so? And why, Why, WHY, is it that nearly thirty years after PWD were guaranteed access to education that PWD are still not included in the greater histories of the American people, and that disability perspectives are not taught at any level in our educational system, and that  our theological educational systems not only fail to include disability as a theological lens to be explored in diversity but do not even encourage their faculty to be aware of how disability has been studied and/or addressed by every facet of theological education?

There are several people at this meeting who have been doing this work for much longer than myself. At times I feel dwarfed by their work. I have had moments when I wonder if I am too emotional, if I have been hurt too deeply by the system that disregards PWD to effect change in any meaningful way and yet, I find myself drawn to this work and I have been in invited to participate. I am looking forward to where the conversation goes and, meanwhile, I hear the poets and theologians from whose work I have learned urging me to write on…and yet I am still listening for the inspiration of the words that are to come.

WHAT?!?

by Rev. Kelli

This blog is about women in ministry and what is real for them. THIS, may seem petty but it is a very real issue for me professional, personally, culturally, and spiritually.

So I’ll make this to the point….

What the heck do i do with this recent article? Plus–mainstream media pays attention to efforts to end the R word. Minus, aka ‘I need to scream loudly’–the media equates cerebral palsy, which is actually a physical disability (occasionally coupled with intellectual disability which would also be a separate diagnosis), as being solely an intellectual disability which makes my efforts to be an ‘out’ professional with CP more difficult by creating a false stigma I now have to dismantle on an individual basis, without media assistance….So, I ask, what am I to do with this that does not throw my ID brothers and sisters under the short bus? “Thanks CNN” for trying to shove me back in the freak closet, and ‘thanks’ for using your media power to create false stigmas about disability! I think we REALLY need anti-discrimination laws about this; journalists should not have the right to spread blatant falsehoods about disability in an age where a quick internet search would clarify effects of specific disabilities–if one bothered to pay attention to what one was writing for general consumption !!!!!

Questionable article about PWD     http://www.cnn.com/2012/03/07/living/end-r-word/index.html?iref=obnetwork

Bearing Witness

by Rev. Kelli

Sometimes I feel like I live on the road. I commute, I travel to people’s homes to do chaplaincy. My car is my office. I live in southern California–traffic is horrible! While I have thought of getting a catchy licence plate or clergy bumper sticker I have hesitated to do so. Why? Because I drive 500-700 miles a week on southern California freeways…and people do stupid things on the road… and I, well, I like to use my horn! I try to be polite on the road. I know that the time I arrive is not as important as how safely I arrive. I do drive through some beautiful areas and I try to enjoy the scenery. That being said I have seen road rage, perhaps I have even felt rage on the roads at times. I do not like driving as much as I do. Yet this is a necessary part of the work that God seems to want me to do right now–and that’s a whole ‘nother blog!

What annoys me most are those big traffic slow downs. You know the type. Traffic just slows down and seems to come to a halt; and then you realize that all this is due to some looky-loos staring at an accident on the side of the road rather than driving like they should. These slow downs annoy me because they seem completely unnecessary and all they do is slow me down when I already have too little time for the important stuff.

Recently I found myself stuck in one of these slow downs as I drove home from work. It was the dark side of dusk and I saw in the distance the red and blue flashing lights of a police personnel on the side the road with more than one car, a sure tip off that it was an accident and not a traffic stop. Come on people, you can do nothing about it. Keep moving. Mind your own business. I want to get home already. I thought as I approached the scene. And then as I passed the scene, I looked over and saw the people on the side of the road with the bumpers torn off their cars and a new wave of compassion came over me. And I realized, what if the other drivers slowing me down are not just annoying looky-loos looking to peer onto another person’s misery, or looking for a bloody scene? What if they are bearing witness to the trauma and pain of the people on the side of the road who had had an accident?

Now that’s a thought. As I reflected on this idea of looky-loos bearing witness to the troubles of others even as they are keeping me away from home longer on an already too long day it became apparent to me that there is some theology going on here, some moral and ethical working of the post-modern age taking place right before my eyes. Its true there was. Even in this age (are we still in the post-modern age or is it post-post-modern? well what ever age it is), even in this age when we are so seemingly glued to our individual experiences and mediating relationships through cell phones, text messages, smart phones, and ipods, it seems that we still respond to the misfortunes of others. And, that is hopeful. For here it was before my eyes, four our five lanes of bumper to bumper traffic slowing down as if in acknowledgement of the pain being experienced, in that moment, by the stranger they were in the process if passing by. And is not the call to bear witness to our fellow human begins not central to core of our biblical teachings? I mean bearing witness is the first step in “doing unto others”, to helping those with need, being the good Samaritan, to being our bothers’ and sisters’ keeper. Wow, I thought. That, thought. That’s something. Maybe, just maybe there is still hope that we have not, even in this technological and individualistic age, driven to far off track.

The Wisdom of Women

by Rev. Kelli

I must confess, Epiphany is my favorite day of the Christian year. It is ripe with possibilities that often go overlooked. It also has deep personal meaning to me because of the tradition my family of origin created to celebrate the arrival of the “kings.”

The three kings, found in only one gospel, add a mysticism to the Christmas story that I venture to say we find no place else in the entire Advent-Christmas-Epiphany story. It is the kind of mysticism that may only exist in one other place in Christianity, namely the Resurrection.

Epiphany—realization. It’s the story of the arrival of the “kings” into the presence of the babe called Jesus, and his parents. It’s a story not only of realization but one of being equipped for the holy journey. Here we have the three “kings,” scholars from afar, arriving to welcome the child of a young and unknown Mary and Joseph. Mary and Joseph we know had been told in visitations and dreams that there was something of celestial destiny associated with their child. But the then there was the arrival of these strange kings who had held audience with the local ruler in their search for Jesus. It does not seem strange to me that scholars, kings, paying attention to the signs of their time and heeding the leading of the divine in their own lives would seek Jesus out. Indeed, I think the grown Jesus once spoke of the need to heed the signs of our own time.

We too, I believe, are each in some way to be equipped for the journey ahead of us, be it a journey we anticipate or not. There are signs of our coming reality that we may not always see for what they are. Perhaps one of the reasons I love Epiphany so much is that each January 6th of my school age years, I would awake to find three wrapped gifts at the foot of my bed. They were not Christmas gifts, and although they were wrapped, they were never shiny toys designed to delight. No, they were shoes, socks, a shirt…usually things that needed to be replaced at that time of the school year. I looked forward to these gifts sometimes more than gifts from Santa, and often I was allowed to discover what lay inside the wrapping in the privacy of my own room—no family snapping photos, no requests to model what might lay inside. Simple gifts designed to equip me for the journey ahead. It would be some where in my twenties that I would realize one of the reasons behind my visits from the wise men was the fact that—living paycheck to paycheck—my mother could not always buy what she wanted to get me for Christmas at one time and this was her way of “making up” for what seemed to her—not me—as meager Christmas mornings. Mother’s wisdom.

As I think about the story of the three kings, it really is strange that they would give Jesus gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. What strange gifts. Yes, we get that they were valuable, but what is a baby from a poor family to do with those? Ah, yes, the family was soon to flee into Egypt to escape from Herod. Gifts of wealthy to empower refugees fleeing for their lives. The gifts the wise men gave equipped Jesus’ family for the journey but the gifts were also over-the-top extravagant. They were gifts in the ancient tradition; gifts of tribute given to a king—a person of great power in the world. And in this sense the gifts were ones of recognition of the arrival of the person come in the form of a babe to live among the marginalized in an occupied land.

—A babe whose ultimate omnipresence in the world we just celebrated at Christmas. Wait, what? Usually we think of God as omnipresent in the world, not Jesus. Yes, I hear the theologians among you complaining. And I protest. My thought for Epiphany 2012 is this: the gift we received in Jesus’s birth was Jesus bringing God to us and showing us how to bring out the recognition of the Holy Spirit into the world in return. It was the gospel and work of the grown Jesus to invite in the poor, the disabled, the women, the children, those who had no voice in society into the conversation, to demand that they be heard and that they be fed both literally and with justice. Christmas is the beginning of that, Epiphany the recognition of it, and the rest of the church year is a discussion on how to live into and out of the babe recognized by kings.

This is hard work. It is being shaken to the core, ceased by the spirit, and acting upon completion. As I write this, I am returning from a denominational meeting in which the discussion of diversity and inclusion not only left out but further marginalized people with disabilities. In the meeting, I was sitting and processing how to respond. But then a lone woman stood up, interrupted the meeting, spoke out for justice, and sat down. Then I stood up and spoke on the same topic. Then a third. And the church was silenced into the realization that Jesus is still present and calling for the inclusion of the marginalized, and the Spirit is still moving within the church with an overpowering wind when necessary. Woman-Spirit in partnership with wisdom.

As we close this devotional season at Women Who Speak in Church, I invite you to take this realization of the omnipresence of Jesus calling for liberation of the marginalized, and the knowledge that the Spirit is still blowing the winds of God’s justice with you into this new year. May we all live fully, knowing that we have been somehow equipped for journey ahead.

Amen for Epiphany!

Who Do You Say This Child Is?

by Rev. Kelli

I love the celebration of Epiphany! I love the celebration of recognizing that God is among us in the world. For this is what January 6th on the Christian calendar means. This is what I have always been taught. This year, however, as I have journeyed through the Advent/Christmas season I find myself questioning the meaning of this festival.

If what we celebrate on Epiphany is the recognition of God with us, then what does that say about the rest of the Christmas story? Let’s review.

  • There is Mary, who is informed by Gabriel that the child she will conceive will be the Son of God.
  • There is Elizabeth, who recognizes who Jesus is (still in utero) via the reaction of the child in her womb.
  • There is Joseph, who is visited in dreams (also while Jesus is in utero) and told who Jesus is.
  • There is Zechariah, who is told by Gabriel in the holy of holies who Jesus is to be, and who experiences the holy power by being forced into silence for nine months.
  • There are the shepherds who are visited by the angels in the field and told that Jesus the Christ child has been born—this is why they take leave of their fields and rush to the manager on the First Noel.
  • There are the three Magi, informed of Jesus’ birth not by angels but instead by a star.
  • And there is even King Herod, who searches out the newborn “king” so desperately that he massacres a whole generation.

Are the spiritual experiences and revelation of who Jesus is prior to the arrival of the Magi somehow invalid? Do I need to get liberation on this story?

There seems to actually be a lot of recognition in the gospels about who the baby Jesus is, very apart from the reference to the Magi—which is only in the Gospel of Matthew after all. Both before and at his birth there seems to be something widely known to be special about this Jesus. Really, are all babies visited by scholars, politicians, and night watch security guards as they are attracted to this new life?

On Epiphany we traditionally celebrate the recognition of Jesus’ being something divine come into the world. Perhaps this had to do with the divinity of the star in the story of the Magi. As the celebration of Feast of the Magi—Epiphany—approaches it occurs to me that the Magi are but the last in a series of persons to learn who baby Jesus is. Many people were already aware of the birth of Jesus and somehow aware of the significance of his birth. These were not just any people—they were the parents, family, workers, and outcasts of Jesus’ world come to pay homage to the “newborn King.” In some sense the arrival of the Magi is just the signal that all those outside Bethlehem and Israel are to be affected by this child.

In the lead up to this Epiphany, I am aware that the recognition that something special had arrived to all the Earth occurred long before the arrival of the Magi. And, after all, why do we need to wait for them? But this also reminds me that it is up to each one of us to recognize the holy come into the world; the Christ child in our midst, and to respond to the world out of that reality. It comes down to a question Jesus will later pose to his disciples, and bears recalling at this season: who do you say that I am? Who do you say this child is?

Oracle of Possibility

by Rev. Kelli

It almost seems fitting that the last day of the calendar year would come to us with such a richness of daily lectionary texts that it is hard choose much less move on into what may lay ahead. With that in mind let us begin to begin.

One of the lessons for today is from the prophetic book of Isaiah:

Lift up your eyes and look around;
they all gather together, they come to you;
your sons shall come from far away,
and your daughters shall be carried on their nurses’ arms.
Then you shall see and be radiant;
your heart shall thrill and rejoice,*
because the abundance of the sea shall be brought to you,
the wealth of the nations shall come to you.
A multitude of camels shall cover you,
the young camels of Midian and Ephah;
all those from Sheba shall come.
They shall bring gold and frankincense,
and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord.
All the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered to you,
the rams of Nebaioth shall minister to you;
they shall be acceptable on my altar,
and I will glorify my glorious house.
Who are these that fly like a cloud,
and like doves to their windows?
For the coastlands shall wait for me,
the ships of Tarshish first,
to bring your children from far away,
their silver and gold with them,
for the name of the Lord your God,
and for the Holy One of Israel,
because he has glorified you.

—Isaiah 60:4-9

This text reminds us that liturgically we are in the season after Christmas, the season in which I always eagerly await Epiphany—keep reading your WWSIC advent devotional for that story. As I read this text, the oracle telling of people coming from “far away” on “camels of Midian” with “gold and frankincense,” I can not help but think of the three scholars or kings who followed the star to find the baby called Jesus. As a hospice chaplain who knows that music touches us in deep ways we do not fully understand I find I have been singing the hymn “We Three Kings” quite a lot this week and will continue to do so next week. There is one verse from this hymn that stands out as shocking to me, it goes:

Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume
Breathes of life of gathering gloom
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying
Sealed in the stone-cold tomb

It is as if our tradition really wants us to understand that the good things yet to come only do so with the death of what currently is.

It is of course not the best policy to read the Hebrew Bible through the lens of the New Testament, historically this has lead to many problems. So I had to look into this text to see if it was hinting that the old must go away to make room for the new. As I look at the scholarship on Isaiah 60:4-9, I note that David Peterson in his book The Prophetic Literature: An Introduction comments on the “global religious perspective” of the oracles in Isaiah with reference to these verses and earlier chapters of the book (78). Marvin Sweeney (whom I will always call Professor Sweeney) in his book writes that Isaiah 60:1-9 is an “announcement of restoration directed at Zion concerning the return of YHWH’s glory and the approach of nations who will return Zion’s son’s and daughters and bring gifts and sacrifices to YHWH’s altar” (81). In some ways, the text today is an oracle of hope and peace, the return of God’s Kindom on earth. And, yes that does seem to indicate a change—from what is to what will be.

What does change mean to us? On the micro and the macro levels, certainly this is something we are all considering this week if not today and tomorrow. Here we have an oracle of change, and oracle of hope and restoration from what for the people and context the oracle was given to was complete destruction. Let us think about that for a moment….Few of us in the modern context know total destruction and exile as behind the context of this text. There does seem to be growing recognition in our American society however that the social and economic structures we live with are not working for us as they once did. Might this oracle also be for us? Might it also bring a message of hopeful change to us as we stare into the sunset of 2011? It is possible there could be that hope for us, too, in this text? Look again at the text. It is not grace freely given here, but grace after surrender, grace after intentional move toward the Kindom of God. I wonder what it is that we need not just to surrender, but as Sweeney suggests “sacrifice” and allow to die so the new may come into being? For this is what both the Christian and the secular traditions of New Years Eve suggests. What is it we must we let go of in order to bring our gifts and riches to the Kindom of God to proclaim the glory of God?

***

“Kindom of God” is not a misspelling of Kingdom of God, but a known and accepted feminist interpretation of that ideal. Read our Feminist Eschatology for more information.

The Face of Emmanuel

by Ed

I think it’s genius! This season is so rich in spiritual meaning that over the years it has become a fantastic tapestry made up of humanity’s various threads of hunger for meaning and vitality in a confusing and harsh world. A bit narrower than that, I think it’s genius how Christmas was paired up with a date that was already deemed of cosmological significance prior to Christianity’s arrival. And a bit narrower still, I think it’s wonderful how that ebb and flow of darkness and light has played out in my own life, and maybe it is time to marvel at my own awareness of it.

Let me just take this to a personal level here for a bit. Bear with me. I’m not a woman and I don’t really speak in church. But I’m married to one wonderful woman who sometimes does speak in church, and who, ten years ago, became the return of light to my life, with a couple pivotal dates falling just about solstice time in 2001 and our subsequent embrace of our newfound relationship in 2002, even after we’d known each other for over a decade before that. I’ve spilled a lot of pixels on my blog about the details. For our purposes here, I just want to celebrate this in a place where I know it would be appreciated—both among people educated and attuned to the special nuances in this kind of story, and among friends of hers who know her personally.

The state of things a decade ago was one of massive dysfunction on the family front. In a lot of ways, the light had gone dim. That year Kelli and I shared grief around the murder of an old friend, and September 11 was a crisis that forced everyone into mourning and (hopefully) deeper questioning. It did for us. The overlapping disasters that constituted the year 2001 drove me back to a life I was familiar with but that I had left for about a decade. Kelli was a lifeline to that world during that time. But in late 2001, I was beyond my own means to make sense of the world. Kelli and I grew closer and I began to attend church again where the deeper stuff of life was the lingua franca. What resulted was a decade of constant change, but now with a devoted partner with a vast depth of character and compassion. Kelli’s presence did not stop the change or the turmoil, but she did make it safe to face it with new resolve.

This Christmas Eve, with the waiting and the hoping almost exploding in us after weeks of Advent’s buildup, I recall that time one decade ago when the light was going out, out, out—until the glimmers led to flickers that led to an increasingly steady flame. Kelli embodies the solstice for me. Light will follow darkness. Or, using the language of Christianity, she’s the face of Emmanuel for me. Her presence in my life is as clear a sign as I have that God has smiled on this speck of dust too, who a decade ago used to scoff at God-talk and such silly notions of the miraculous.

It has to be the stuff of miracle. Nothing I did earned this. Nothing I knew or believed mattered. This is grace, folks. At Christmas, the great gift is given indiscriminately to all by the shamelessly generous Giver, who doesn’t really care what you were, what you used to believe or not believe, or how you used to think. Just like none of us can stop the solstice from happening, none of us can stop God’s compassionate giving of the divine Self. And, I might say that Christianity’s enhancement of an already-great festival written into the cosmos is that whereas the solstice is just an annual event in a given hemisphere, Christmas isn’t limited that way. Every day is Christmas! Every day can be the day when the God-gift can be given and received. But for me, having such a great thing happen in my life at solstice time will always make this season special upon special.

Merry Christmas to my beautiful wife Kelli who has opened my eyes and softened my heart, and to all of you. Thanks for your submissions to this special series. It’s not over yet, though! Read on through Epiphany, and then stay around to see what follows.

The Power of Silence

by Pastor Mary Jo

Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke this prophecy: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them. He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we would be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us. Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors, and has remembered his holy covenant, the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham, to grant us that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins. By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

—Luke 1:67-79

He was not the first Zechariah to prophesy the mercy of God and deliverance from enemies. It had been some five hundred years since the writing of the prophetic book from which his name derived, and nine months since he had been able to speak. Perhaps in those months of enforced silence he had found himself listening not only to the Holy Spirit but to his people as well, and perhaps he heard their laments as they labored under the harsh hand of the occupier. We will never know; but those nine months of silence brought Zechariah to obedience—nine months of silence that broke like the sudden and forceful eruption of a geyser. In that moment he recognized that his own son would be a prophet to usher in the reign of the Prince of Peace. “A light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it.”

PRACTICE: You are invited this day to sit in silence for some time. To ponder. What is it that God puts before you to recognize in this season of your waiting? What is it that God is waiting for you to recognize? How can you proclaim that to the world in celebration the arrival of the Christ Child? —Kelli Parrish Lucas

Death and Advent

by Rev. Kelli

Why should I fear in times of trouble,
when the iniquity of my persecutors surrounds me,
those who trust in their wealth
and boast of the abundance of their riches?
Truly, no ransom avails for one’s life,
there is no price one can give to God for it.
For the ransom of life is costly,
and can never suffice,
that one should live on for ever
and never see the grave.

When we look at the wise, they die;
fool and dolt perish together
and leave their wealth to others.
… Mortals cannot abide in their pomp;
they are like the animals that perish.

—Psalm 49: 5-11, 12

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,
to bind up the broken-hearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and release to the prisoners;
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor,
and the day of vengeance of our God;
to comfort all who mourn;
to provide for those who mourn in Zion—
to give them a garland instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.
…I will greatly rejoice in the Lord,
my whole being shall exult in my God;
for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation,
he has covered me with the robe of righteousness,
as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland,
and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
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.

—Isaiah 61:1-3, 10-11

I must admit I am composing this devotional afresh just before it is to be posted. I had to. The mixed metaphors of this holy season have caught up with me. Advent, a season of waiting, formerly a season of penance, is full upon us today as we enter the midpoint of this season. I have been struck in reading the devotionals written for WWSIC (particularly those that follow the daily lectionary) at how the advent season is so admixed with the passages of Jesus’ death and ultimate resurrection bringing new life into the world, even life after death.

Life and death. Are these not the crux of the Advent season? In the time of year when we witness the “death” of the sun and foliage; in this time of year when Earth herself seems to go into hibernation, it is hard to not be reminded of the realities of death. I think of this both figuratively and literally.

As Psalm 49 from today’s lectionary reminds us, none of us shall live forever. Rich or poor, we are but creations of God, and no matter how wise or wealthy we may work to become, “Mortals cannot abide in their pomp; they are like the animals that perish.” And yet, many of us find ourselves in a culture that wants us only to seek knowledge and wealth. Moreover, we find ourselves in a cultural season that celebrates overconsumption and greed. If we find ourselves not pondering physical death this season, we may be pondering spiritual or financial demise. And, just where in a season of joy, hope, love, and peace are we to sit with such woes? In Advent we await the birth of Christ and all that means. But this does not mean that all is “well with my soul” in the waiting. In the waiting we find the realness of life: the aches, pains, fears, and contractions that come before birth, particularly when it is unknown how the labor may go.

The season of Advent is dark. The love, hope, joy, and peace we yearn for may not yet have come. Still we wait. It is a wonder to me how and why we do this. Professionally and personally, I am keenly aware this season of how myriad emotions of the human experience—particularly loss—changes the waiting. And I’m aware how experiences of injustice and oppression make the waiting seem like it will simply go on and on, and that change to finally bring relief may never arrive.

And there it is in the lectionary this week: the presence of death in the season of Advent. It is a reminder that we do not live forever. But it also a reminder of God’s promised work in the world. In the passage of Isaiah for this week we are told that God intentionally sends one to help the “oppressed,” “broken-hearted,” “captives,” “prisoners,” and “all who mourn.” It is a promise that even when the world seems most troubled, God is still working out a way out of no way. It is a hopeful text, telling us that God is seeking to liberate those who have been exiled for years—even generations—in a foreign land; that God is coming even for those in a culture that leads them to believe that materialism and greed is all that exists. And God is not only coming for those who mourn—for loved ones or beloved values—but God is going to provide all who mourn “a garland instead of ashes.”

What stands out to me most from this week’s Isaiah text is the promise that God has already “clothed me with the garments of salvation / covered me with the robe of righteousness.” It is a comforting promise, even as I mourn a colleague, and as I am reminded of all those whom I/we have lost this year. It is comforting to me as I think of a friend fighting for life in the ICU even as I write. It is promising to me, this promise that God is not only coming but has already provided garments and robes for me, and all people, at our meeting, the way a mother prepares for her newborn. As the darkness of the season deepens it is comforting to know God is sending someone to meet me on the way, someone who will bring good news and will make me—and all of us—welcome even in the darkness. In the end, it is a mixed metaphor of both death and birth, of waning and waxing.

Prepare, Be Silent.

by Rev. Kelli

In the days of King Herod of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly order of Abijah. His wife was a descendant of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. Both of them were righteous before God, living blamelessly according to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord. But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were getting on in years. Once when he was serving as priest before God and his section was on duty, he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord and offer incense. Now at the time of the incense offering, the whole assembly of the people was praying outside. Then there appeared to him an angel of the Lord, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was terrified; and fear overwhelmed him. But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. He will turn many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” Zechariah said to the angel, “How will I know that this is so? For I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years.” The angel replied, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.” Meanwhile the people were waiting for Zechariah, and wondered at his delay in the sanctuary. When he did come out, he could not speak to them, and they realized that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He kept motioning to them and remained unable to speak. When his time of service was ended, he went to his home. After those days his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months she remained in seclusion. She said, “This is what the Lord has done for me when he looked favorably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my people.”

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary.

—Luke 1: 5-27

During Advent we hear a lot about the coming of the baby Jesus, and that coming is the cause for our celebration at Christmas. On this second Monday of Advent, however, Jesus is not yet here. But there is another Advent baby who is already here. It is John the Baptist whom we often hear of in Advent. John the Baptist who as a grown man will cry from the wilderness, “prepare the way of the Lord!”

But who is the John the Baptist? Where did he come from? The first chapter of Luke tells us that John is the son of Zechariah, a temple service priest, and Elizabeth, a cousin of Mary. We often come across the text, during Advent, in which the pregnant Elizabeth and the pregnant Mary meet and the baby in Elizabeth’s womb is said to leap at the approach in the womb of Mary. It is a scripture from later in Luke that points not only to the divinity of Jesus but that divinity being present and recognized before Jesus’ birth.

We seem to know Elizabeth, cousin of Mary, bearer of the prophet who proclaims the divinity of the human Jesus. But who is this Zechariah? Well, he is a priest—so what do the clergy know? And are they not the ones who will later bring Jesus to Pilate? Well, yes this is true. But, Zechariah is not just a priest; he also has a profound spiritual experience in meeting the Angel Gabriel not just in the temple, but behind the veil of the temple in the Holy of Holies—where only a priest could approach. It is here that Gabriel approaches Zechariah, as opposed to beside the kitchen table where Gabriel approaches Mary. And Zechariah, being the priest he is, argues with the angel, wanting to know how this can be so, wanting to know how the impossible can come to be true. We have no way of knowing how the angel emotionally reacts, if he is angry or annoyed with Zechariah; likely for an angel it is none of these emotions, as we understand them. What we do know is that Gabriel admonishes Zechariah for questioning rather than believing, and then proclaims that Zechariah will be silent until this child is born.

The story of Zechariah can be read as a harsh critique on the clergy and perhaps it should be. We clergy need to remember we do not know it all, just as those we minister to sometimes need to be reminded that we are not perfect. Perhaps this is so, but in the season maybe there is a more seasonal meaning to draw from the text. Perhaps it is a reminder to all of us to listen and prepare for the most unexpected impossible event of all time.

Perhaps this text is an invitation to listen to God. To ponder not just the words in our own hearts, but to ponder the words of God, and to ponder those individual spiritual experiences we are blessed to have. Perhaps we even need a harsh a reminder to be silent and to watch and listen for what God is doing. For only then can we be prepared to welcome, and respond to and with God in the world.