St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD
December 19, 2021
Year C: The Fourth Sunday of Advent
Micah 5:2-5a
Psalm 80:1-7
Hebrews 10:5-1
Luke 1:39-55
Visitations
The other day I was telling someone about the very first class I took in seminary.
Back then, I was still a high school history teacher, and Sue and I had only been members of the Episcopal Church for a couple of years.
But, in that short time, the joy I felt in our new church reawakened in me an old sense of call to the priesthood – a call that was exciting, scary, and, frankly, more than a little inconvenient.
And it was a call that couldn’t be ignored. So, I decided to enroll in a class as a non-matriculated student at General Seminary in New York City, just a short train ride away from our home across the river in New Jersey.
The idea was to see if I liked it, if I could imagine myself as a student there, fitting in with the others – and to see if I could do the work.
So, one afternoon at the start of the fall semester, I headed over to New York for my very first class. I remember it was pouring rain as I waited outside the seminary, my stomach fluttering with what felt like a swarm of butterflies, as I tried to work up the courage to step inside.
Well, I loved that first class – it was called Christian Spiritual Practice, taught by a wise and kind professor.
It’s true that at first, I felt a little intimidated by the other students who seemed to know much more than I did, but I also thought, with some preparation maybe I could catch up.
By the time class was over, the skies had cleared and it was a beautiful evening in New York. I was so excited as I walked those long crosstown blocks back to the train. I couldn’t wait to tell Sue all about it. It felt like I could see my new life unfolding before me.
God is always present but there are times when God feels especially close. That night, it felt like God had visited me and was now walking by my side.
The date was September 10, 2001.
The next morning – that impossibly clear blue morning - I was still thrilled by what felt like the first step into the rest of my life. I brought a couple of the books for the course with me to school, hoping to look them over during my free periods.
And then, out my classroom windows, my students and I saw all hell break loose, and suddenly the excitement and hope of the night before seemed long ago and far away.
God is always present, but there are times when God feels distant.
Where was God now?
Throughout the Old Testament, there are times when God seems to visit God’s people, when God feels as close as the person beside you, or closer even than that.
Think of God leading God’s people during the long exodus from slavery in Egypt to new life in the Promised Land – there was God – a cloud by day and a fire by night.
But, there were other times when God seemed to have stepped back – the days of invasion and defeat, the long years of occupation and exile, times when God seemed to have abandoned God’s people or, even worse, rejected them.
The psalmist wrote:
Restore us, O god of hosts; show the light of your countenance, and we shall be saved.
Which is a poetic way of saying, “Hey, we’re in trouble here. Where are you, God?”
The first century - when the Romans occupied Judea - when crucifixion was a common occurrence – that was one of the times when people were frightened and angry, when people called out to God, when people yearned to see God’s face, when people waited with expectation, hope, and maybe some impatience, too – waited for God to visit again.
For the past two Sundays, we have been spending time with a grown-up John the Baptist, that fiery and compelling prophet who offered a baptism of repentance, calling people to change direction, a change that for them began in the River Jordan.
Despite, or maybe because of, his tough message, John appealed to many of his fellow Jews in first century Judea, so much so that lots of people thought that he was the messiah – the long-awaited savior of Israel who would liberate the people from Roman tyranny.
But, John insisted that he was simply preparing the way for the Holy One who was soon to come.
And now, today on the Fourth Sunday of Advent we back up to before John and Jesus were born, back to nearly the start of our story.
It’s the Evangelist Luke who tells us that John and Jesus were family, related through their mothers Elizabeth and Mary.
And it’s Luke who tells us that both Elizabeth and Mary were blessed with miraculous pregnancies – both of these women, one old and the other young, became profound signs of what God always offers: new life.
Not long after she said “yes” to God, we’re told that pregnant Mary journeyed to the Judean hill country to visit her pregnant kinswoman.
I love this encounter between Mary and Elizabeth, a moment that’s often called “The Visitation.”
The Visitation is intimate – it’s just these two women – it’s just these two women who were not at all important or powerful in the eyes of the world – just these two soon-to-be mothers carrying their unborn miracle sons.
The men seem to be absent – there’s no sign of Zechariah or Joseph - it’s just these two women marveling at God’s goodness, while trusting that God will be with them through the trouble ahead – and there is always trouble when God brings down the powerful and lifts up the lowly.
This is how God visits us – not with pounding drums or flashing lights, not with spectacle, but quietly, as quiet as two women greeting each other in wonder, as quiet as a lullaby or a held hand, as quiet as a newborn child falling asleep in a feeding trough meant for animals, the best that Mary and Joseph will be able to do for the Son of God.
On the evening of September 11, Sue and I walked from our house to our church, St. Paul’s, where the Rector, Dave Hamilton, had invited the whole parish to a service – a service for what exactly, I’m not sure he or we could say.
We all wanted to pray for the dead and the missing, of course, for all the heartbroken and frightened – and I’m sure some of us wanted to pray for vengeance, too.
We cried out, “Hey, we’re in trouble here. Where are you, God?”
But, most of all, after a day of so much fear and loss and sorrow, it seemed important that we should all be together.
I don’t remember very much about that service, not much about whatever words Dave managed to say. I think we celebrated Holy Communion, but I’m not entirely sure.
But, gathered there in that old holy place that already meant so much to me, there in the dark and in the quiet, it felt like God was visiting once again – not the euphoria of the night before during my crosstown walk – but something deeper, something that felt more permanent – a sense that somehow God would be with me, with us, through the troubles of that day and the days ahead.
And now, for us, in our time of trouble, the days of hope and preparation and waiting are almost over.
The four Advent candles are burning bright.
It’s almost Christmas.
If you’re in town, I sure hope you will be here for our Christmas celebrations.
There are a few things I know for sure:
The music will be glorious.
The sermons will be relatively brief.
And, while God is always present, especially in this old holy place, God will surely visit us – God will feel especially close, in the Christmas joy that we will share.
For some of us, these are busy and distracting days – and for others this can be a lonely and sad time, but whether we feel overwhelmed by our many tasks or worn down by the blues – or maybe both - I encourage all of us to take up one important Christian spiritual practice: be on the look out for God to visit us, not with spectacle or flash, but in the quiet.
As Mary and Elizabeth learned, God visits us quietly, always offering us new life, reminding us that God will be with us through it all, no matter what.
Amen.
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