Hope

Scripture Lessons: Psalm 25: 1-10 and Jeremiah 33: 14-16 Sermon Title: Hope Preached on November 28, 2021 I’ve titled this sermon “hope,” which is a simple title. Just one word, but what is hope? How would you define it? What does it look like? What does it mean? It’s one of those words we often use, yet how do you put your finger on hope? Around this time of year, we use the word “hope” a lot. Out of the four Sundays of the season of Advent where we prepare ourselves for Christ’s coming, the theme of this Sunday, the first of four, is hope and so you heard the word in the Advent Candle Lighting, among other parts of the worship service. In addition to worship today, we often speak of hope in the context of Christmas morning: ‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there. That’s a happy and hopeful poem that we read this time of year, and we all know that the children hung their stockings by the chimney, because, while they didn’t know for sure, they hoped that St. Nicholas soon would be there to fill those stockings with something special. They hoped their Christmas wishes would be filled. They hoped for toys and candy. And their sense of hope is so strong it borders on certainty, for no child hangs her stocking by the chimney thinking that there’s just as much a chance that a family of mice will move in as Santa Clause filling their stocking with presents. Santa Clause saves kids from the dreadful outcome. He fulfills the hope of many, and it breaks all our hearts to think of any child to wake up without anything to open on Christmas morning. Why does that thought break our heart? Do we think toys are just that important? No. The thought breaks our hearts because hope is precious. Hope is the belief that tomorrow will be better than today. Hope is the thought that our wishes will come true. Hope is the idea of a dream fulfilled, a wish materialized, and what’s more tragic than a child whose hopes have been dashed? That’s what Santa is all about. Santa Clause brings presents, yes, but in so doing he preserves the hope of children. On this first Sunday of the Season of Advent, this Sunday when we light the candle of hope, I ask you: if Santa is there to preserve the hope of children, who is there to preserve the hope of grownups? Who’s there to save us from disappointment, cynicism, and despair? Like hope, despair is another word that we use but is hard to define. Author Brene Brown has a new book coming out this week, where she defines so many human emotions. She claims that most people are only able to label about three of their emotions: happiness, sadness, and anger, while, we humans can feel about 100 different emotions, including despair, which she defines as, the “feeling that life is too difficult.” Despair is not a fleeting feeling that work is just too hard or that a phone call too uncomfortable. You might label the emotions we feel in such circumstance as frustration or heartache. We get frustrated that we can’t put a new bike together or when we must sign up our kids for lacrosse and end up signing up ourselves (to share a real-life example of a time I felt frustrated). More than frustration, despair is the feeling that we just can’t make it and it stays and stays. Think about despair as the feeling that you feel when you have to wait for 45 minutes for your COVID booster, and as you’re waiting you get a phone call from your daughter, the ICU nurse, who tells you that she can’t come home for Thanksgiving, because while she hasn’t had a vacation in 18 months, has watched all her friends quit, is trying to care for 5 beds instead of 1, and is sick and tired of watching people who refused to be vaccinated die under her care needs to keep working through the holiday. That’s despair, that life is demanding too much of someone you love. Despair is the feeling that you feel when watch the news and a story about politicians squabbling over how to gerrymander is followed by a report of a local murder, then rising gas prices, and finally, turkey shortages. That’s despair, that life is getting worse and not better. Despair is something like how someone described raising twins. “It’s not twice as hard as having one child. It’s like treading water in a pool and someone hands you a couple of babies.” Not every parent raises twins, but every parent has felt like their life is just too much, and has wondered: how will I make it? That’s despair. Despair is the feeling that you feel when your country has been invaded, your king has been executed, your temple has been destroyed, you’ve been carted off to live in a foreign land, you used to be a doctor but now you peel potatoes, and you keep trying to get ahead but you’re tired of pushing so hard and you’re thinking of giving up because life is just too much. That’s who Jeremiah was writing to, for reality for the group of people the prophet Jeremiah addresses had been and continued to be absolutely heart breaking. It was so heart breaking that even a visit from Santa Clause wasn’t going to cut it, so, the prophet reminds the people about another who is on the way: The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise, I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David. Jeremiah tells us about this righteous branch right after Jerusalem was destroyed, right after the Holy City was cut down like a tree by the Babylonian army who invaded in the year 587 BCE. The invasion was so massive, so complete, that the Temple was demolished, the king deposed, and so many of the survivors shipped off to live in exile. According to the prophet, Israel was a tree, a great tree rooted in a place, among a people, nurtured by God, only to be floored by the ax of Babylon. And like that tree, all around him people who survived were still falling by the ax of despair. How could they look to the future with hope? After such devastation, all they could imagine was that life would get worse. That having experienced such trauma, more would be on the way. The bad things happened and would surely keep happening. As Babylon invaded Jerusalem, the siege is said to have lasted for 30 months, and when the armies finally left, what remained of the great tree that was the Holy City? Only a stump. Only a stump was left, but as the smoke lifted and the dust settled this great prophet saw a shoot spring forth. Now that’s hope. For a fresh shoot is enough to convince us that tomorrow may yet be better than today, that old dreams may yet be fulfilled, that ancient promises might be kept. Can you see it? And think about it for just a moment. Think about how inevitable it is, really. We’ve all killed our fair share of houseplants, but have you ever had a plant that just wouldn’t die? For some reason, in high school, I explored the resiliency of plants for a couple science fair projects. Once I managed to get grass to grow upside down. The next year I attempted to study the negative effects of an oil spill using a couple pansies. I watered them with motor oil, only they wouldn’t die. I took pictures of them day after day for my presentation, yet they wouldn’t die, so I pulled their leaves off to prove my hypothesis, only I left the green leaves within the frame of the picture. You could still see the leaves in the picture I took and glued to my three paneled poster, and that’s how I earned a D on my project. Likewise, think about English Ivy. Or Kudzu. Think about shoots from a Bradford Pear stump. Hope is not fragile but inevitable. Hope is as inevitable as crabgrass in your lawn. It springs forth all around us. Can’t you see it? In our Second Scripture Lesson the Prophet reminds the Jewish people in exile, telling them that hope springs forth, yet this is hardly the only reminder or the only time the people needed to be reminded of hope. For thousands of years the Jewish people have faced such violence. They’ve been the targets of prejudice. They’ve been victimized again and again. The Temple which was destroyed by the Babylonians in the time of Jeremiah was rebuilt and dedicated again more than 2,000 years ago. The celebration of the Temple’s rededication is called Hanukkah, which begins tonight. So now I ask you: if God can rebuild a Temple, won’t he rebuild your life? What’s rebuilding a relationship compared to returning a people from exile? When candles are lit, do they not break the darkness? Does a shoot from a stump not defy the power of death? For death gives way to life. Despair flees at the sight of hope springing forth. Therefore I say, our tomorrows will be better than our yesterday’s. How do I know it? Look to the stump. New life springs forth! That’s hope and that’s Jesus. A new branch growing out from an old stump. A new baby growing inside an unmarried virgin. A hope that grows from nothing at all but rises to rule the world. This is Christmas. Not the dried-out tree that’s already losing needles in your living room. Not the trash can filled with crumpled paper after the presents have been opened. No, the righteous branch that springs up for David. And he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safety. And this is the name by which it will be called: “The Lord is our righteousness.” So, as Christmas approaches, be ready to give up on giving up. Consider that feeling we all feel not just frustration but despair and look at how death will not have the final word for the light shines in the darkness, new shoots rise from old stumps, a baby will be born to the virgin. That’s our Lord, hope embodied. Persistent life even amid what appears to be death. Gather around his light and rejoice.