WELCOMING THE HOLY CHILD… TO OUR HOMES

Isaiah 40:1-11; Psalm 85:1-13

December 4, 2011 - Rev. Janet Duggins

The idea of “home” and images of home figure pretty prominently in the way we think about this season of the year. “There’s no place like home for the holidays” one song says. “I’ll be home for Christmas” says another. Never mind that many of us have never lived in a house with an open fire, and probably wouldn’t have a clue how to roast chestnuts on it anyway… these word pictures somehow tap into deep feelings about being in a place where we belong, are loved, and feel at home.

These may be idealized visions that don’t reflect the reality of our homes and families, but we still feel the tug of longing for that place, that experience, those feelings, those kinds of relationships. This is a very Advent-ish feeling, actually. Advent is all about acknowledging the longings and needs that are ever-with-us but often buried. So no wonder this time of year evokes a desire for that environment or experience that represents a true home for us.

But … there are a couple of big obstacles to be reckoned with.

One is a seemingly simple question: where is home? More and more of us these days aren’t entirely sure of the answer to that question. My daughter says she never quite knows how to answer when people ask her where she’s from. And she’s not alone. It’s said that the typical American can now expect to move about 14 times in his or her life. So “where is home?” isn’t an easy question.

Is it where we live right now? Is it the place we grew up, or where we raised our children? Is it where our parents are, or our children, or our siblings? Is it where someone beloved is buried? Is it the place we lived the longest? Is it where you spend the summer, or where you spend the winter? Is it a community or a circle of friends we belong to? Is it a particular house, or town, or landscape that is familiar and loved? Is it a place that somehow just captures your heart and calls to your spirit? Will we feel more at home, happier, in some other, better place than where we are right now? Or is home more of a state of mind, what T.S. Eliot called “the still point of the turning world”?

The challenge of these questions isn’t limited to those who’ve moved around a lot. Even those rooted in the same place for a long time can wonder where home is. How many times have you heard someone say “This area has really changed. It’s not the same place anymore.” ? A subdivision has taken the place of the woods you played in. What used to be farm fields is a now a Wal-mart parking lot. There’s a carwash where your favorite restaurant stood. The old school has been torn down. Streets are wider, busier, noisier. There are a lot more people, but they are different people. It’s not the same.

But it is the same story for many people in many places. The world is changing around us, and that often leaves us feeling unsettled, alienated, and wondering where we belong.

I’ve heard some people say that as we are becoming a more mobile society, as constant change and frequent relocation become more the norm, the idea of having a place to call “home” isn’t going to be important or relevant anymore. After all, we can stay in touch over the internet with people all over the world. But I don’t believe it. All you have to do is watch House and Garden TV for a couple of hours to see how powerful the desire to find and create a home is for people. It’s questionable whether granite countertops, walk-in closets, space for entertaining, or a snazzy living room make-over will make anybody as happy as they anticipate, but in every show the expectations are touchingly optimistic.

We try, of course, many of us, to be at home wherever God has put us right now. We do our best to connect with our place and the people around us, to appreciate what we have, and to have a philosophical attitude about changes that inevitably come along. And in our homes we strive to make something that looks or feels like those images we have in our minds that say “home.” There are all kinds of ways we do that: creature comforts, familiar or beautiful objects, pictures and other things that hold memories for us, routines and rituals, places and opportunities for family and friends to be together, house rules for how everyone will behave together, peaceful places to be alone. Whatever those things may be, making a home is important to most of us, whether we live in a household of one or a large family.

But that brings me to the second obstacle standing in the way of the experience of home we long for: We live in homes inhabited by human beings. Our spouses and children sometimes disappoint us. We’re disappointed in ourselves for the ways we’ve failed, and don’t know how to forgive ourselves and move on. We all have bad days, baggage, faults, and unhealed hurts we can’t let go. Those of us who are parents have discovered that parenting is a lot harder and more complicated that we thought, and we have less patience and less control than we expected to have. Our homes are cluttered with stuff and our days are filled up with activity that doesn’t always fulfill us. We would like to welcome friends in, but aren’t sure what we have to offer is good enough. We want home to be a place of peace and safety but sometimes – often – it’s not. Many of our homes are shadowed by depression, anger, addictions, exhaustion, and endless stress. I could go on but you get the idea. Even if these painful realities aren’t part of daily experience where you live, I’m quite sure you are aware of many homes in which they are.

“There’s no place like home for the holidays” could as easily provoke us to despair as to joy and anticipation.

And there you have the season of Advent in a nutshell ….

In Isaiah, we overhear God speaking to the prophet, saying: “Comfort, comfort my people.” It seems to me that our ears always perk up when we hear those words, because we are in as much need of comforting as Isaiah’s people were, and for many of the same reasons. This part of Isaiah comes from a time of dislocation in the life of the people of Israel. They witnessed the collapse of their social structures and institutions. Those who were deported into exile in Babylon lost their homes and their land. They didn’t necessarily suffer extreme deprivation; the Babylonians allowed them some freedom and many of them eventually prospered economically… but they still carried with them the sense of having lost their home and their “center.” Something was missing. They had a longing that I think is not unfamiliar to us, distant though we are from them in time and space.

Into that longing, God speaks a word of grace.

It is not about everything being put back the way it “used to be.” This word looks to the future, not the past. It’s not about the better life that they “deserve.” The hard truth is that to a certain extent their “lostness” is of their own making, a consequence of choosing to pursue a way of life that wasn’t God’s way. It is also not about the people getting their act together and making a better life for themselves. This text is fully aware of the limitations of human beings and our inability to bring ourselves back from lostness and create for ourselves that place of safety, comfort, and belonging.

That place of peace, and rightness, and love is where God is. That place IS God. The restless longing and dissatisfaction we so often feel is really a searching for God, though we don’t always realize it.

Don’t you love that picture Isaiah ends with, of God gathering the lambs in his arms, holding them close and carrying them? That’s us; we, God’s people, are the lambs in God’s arms… in the place we belong. But how to get to that place, when it feels so far away?

That’s the interesting thing about the message of Isaiah. He describes the situation of the people as a “wilderness” – always a poignant image for the people of Israel. But while we might expect a prophet or preacher to offer a pep talk with encouragement to keep going on that journey through the wilderness until they are home again, that’s not at all what we get here. Instead, who’s making the journey? It’s God; God will come to them, Isaiah says. Be ready. Clear the paths. (Or shovel the sidewalks!) Put aside the things that distract. Don’t stay mired in despair or guilt; don’t make the mistake of thinking you can go it on your own. Don’t be misled into substituting other good but inadequate things for what you really need. Open the doors. Set the table. Tell the others. Be ready.

In Advent we hear again the word of grace God speaks to us. John’s gospel puts it like this: “The Word [of God] became flesh and dwelt among us.” Dwelt among us. Lived with us. Made a home with us.

We have a hard time finding our way to our true home with God, so God has made God’s home with us. Yes, in our homes, even the messiest and most tension-filled, even though all of the people who live in them are imperfect and needy. God’s Word – Jesus – is there saying what God has said from the beginning of time: “Let there be light,” pushing aside the darkness and chaos and making a little more room for beauty and hope. God’s Word – the Holy Child – is there to comfort the little child in all of us who needs to be embraced in love. God’s Word – Christ – is there in the midst of all the daily routine; it is this meeting of the “ordinary” with “the holy” that transforms our lives, gives us hope; and keeps us rooted in our true home, no matter how unsettling the journey may be.

And God is at home with us as we share bread and juice together… here the holy meets the ordinary, and we know the grace of God which has made a place of belonging for each one of us at this table. There is no place like home.

Amen.

Resources

Searching for Home: Spirituality for Restless Souls, M. Craig Barnes