New Years Day Communion 2023 "Look Back, Look Ahead, Look Now"

Readings; Psalm 34:1-10, Philippians 3:7-14, Deuteronomy 4:5-10, Matthew 7:7-12.
Preached at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, NY, January 1, 2023

It's amazing how much importance we place on one single night. The sun sets on 31st December and when it rises the next morning a New Year has begun. Everything from the last year has passed and gone and the New Year is here. New possibilities, new hopes, new ideas and dreams.

 Are you are a resolution person? Some years I am, some years I'm not. Some years I can be kind of flippant about it, “This year I'll give up smoking.” Easy to do when you have never actually taken up smoking in the first place. Other years I'm serious and I'll commit to something like reading through the whole Bible in a translation I've never done before. I've managed to keep that one, but then I am a preacher and Bible reading is a discipline that's part of my job description. Sometimes I'll make resolutions about exercise or diet or to not do certain things, like stay up late watching mindless TV shows and I fail dismally to see them through.

Why do we put ourselves through that resolution thing? Maybe it's because New Year is an opportunity to do some thinking and take an inventory of our lives. We realize what unrealistic and complicated human beings we can be, so we take a breath and contemplate that, maybe, we could do better. Sometimes it works. Sometimes we've already lost sight of our new ideals before we’ve remembered to write the right year at the top of our checks. 

The month of January gets its name from the Roman god Janus. Janus is pictured as a two-faced man. One face looks towards the past and the other towards the future. As we think about New Year’s resolutions we can look, not in two, but three different directions: looking back, looking ahead and looking at now.

Looking Back

The Hebrew people were no strangers to looking back. They were constantly challenged to remember their heritage and God’s dealings with them. Moses once encouraged them with these words: “Be careful and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your hearts as long as you live” (Deuteronomy 4 v 9).

It’s important to face yesterday and the year that has closed. If we don’t our resolutions won’t last. How many times have we made completely unrealistic resolutions because we didn’t take seriously whether last year had left us? We need to face it honestly, not with rose-colored spectacles or seeing shadows everywhere so it might be painful. Last year might have been one you don’t particularly want to remember. On the other hand, it might have been so good you’re now worried that it can’t continue.

Whatever the last year has held, I'd encourage you to spend some time remembering. Pull out your calendar or look at some old photographs. Scan through some posts on your Facebook page. What were the highlights? What were the low points? Where did you feel God's presence in those moments?

As much as we might want this year to be a completely new start, it doesn’t start in a vacuum. It follows what’s been. And what’s been, has brought us to where we are. Our resolutions can be flawed because they don’t look backwards first. Think about the past year. What can we be thankful for, what is there to be pleased about, what was hard, what did we learn, what habits do we want to get out of, what habits are good ones to keep doing?

If we don’t learn lessons from what we’ve seen and heard, then it’s like looking in a mirror and then forgetting what we just saw. The past is important, we can learn a lot. If we don’t learn, we’ll find things repeating themselves. God doesn’t intend us to live in the past. Looking back is intended to root us firmly in the rich soil of faith, which provides the environment in which we can grow into new things. Paul writes in Philippians 3:13 “Forgetting what is behind, and straining toward what is ahead, I press on towards the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenwards in Christ Jesus”

Looking Ahead

We can't spend our whole time looking back and reminiscing about days gone by. Looking backwards all the time can be dangerous. You may well bump into things you can't see and cause yourself serious harm. We need to focus on where we are going.

Remembering what you have learned from the year gone by, and full of hope for what might be, what are you aiming at this year? It has been rightly said that if we aim at nothing, we have 100% chance of hitting it.

It might be that we want to know our friends better by this time next year, or to have grown closer with God, our spouse, our family, to be healthier, fitter, slimmer. Whatever, think about tomorrow, the kind of person you want to be, the kind of friend, mother, father, sister, brother, employer, employee, friend, neighbor you'd like to be.

What are your dreams for your faith community this year? What steps will you take to make those things happen? You know, in church life, I've often had folk come to me and say that they think this should happen or that should happen and what am I going to do about that?

Friends, it's not about what I'm going to do, but what you are going to do. God has given you that vision for a purpose and the reason is not so you can get somebody else to do something about it, but so that you can live into it! If God gives you a vision, it's because it's one that God wants to equip you to fulfill.

So, look ahead. Be prepared to dream. But also, be prepared to act upon your dreams not re-assign them to somebody else. That's the tricky part about resolutions. We must resolve to take personal responsibility for seeing them through!

Looking at Now

If our aim is to be healthier, how can we do it? How do you eat an elephant? Answer, one bite at a time, inch by inch. But, to be clear, I don't recommend eating elephants. If you want to get fitter, certainly don't eat an elephant. What can you realistically do?

If you want to develop relationships, then do it in manageable time segments. If it's with your children, then why not resolve to spend an hour more a week with them doing things they want to do. If it's with your spouse set a date night once a month.  If you want to grow in your relationship with God, don’t resolve to spend every hour of every day praying, make a resolution to spend at least some portion of the day in meditation, bible reading or prayer. Listen to an audio devotion on the way to work, join a bible study group or volunteer to help out at the Food Pantry.

I’m not saying don’t stretch yourself. I want to encourage us all to set our sights high, and work hard at those things in our lives we feel are most important, but let’s be realistic. Because then we can be optimistic. Reachable goals are far more likely to be attained than unreachable ones!

Certainly, as your pastor, I would encourage you to make this year one in which you grow in the grace, love and faith of our Lord Jesus Christ. I'd encourage you to be a regular supporter and attender of our worship services. That's only about an hour and a half out of your weekly schedule. This hour when we gather can really set the agenda for every other hour in our week!

In particular, I would invite you to make the most of this wonderful privilege we have once a month to come around the communion table. Communion speaks to us in ways preachers can never do. The sacrament communicates not just though words, but though touch and taste and smell and memory.

Jesus was completely purposeful in telling us to remember Him in this way. It calls to mind His Cross. It calls to mind His promise. It reminds us that unless we feed upon His love, our own love quickly fades, our resolve quickly falters and we easily become disconnected to our passion and pursuit of higher things.

So I encourage you this New Year to look back to all that last year was, to look ahead to all that you want to do and to be in this new year, and to face today, to work out how you’ll get there. Don’t just seize the day, seize the year, and all to the glory of God. Amen.

The Reverend Adrian J. Pratt B.D.

Advent 4 "Between Ordinary and Extraordinary"

Readings: Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19, Romans 1:1-17, Isaiah 7:10-16, Matthew 1:18-25
Preached at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, NY, December 18, 2022

The early Christian church were not slow in capitalizing on ancient festivals. In the light of already existing festivals that celebrated the end of winter and the coming of the light of a New Year, they saw an opportunity to mark the end of December as a time to celebrate the birth of Jesus, the Son of God, who came to bring light for our darkness.  Today the Christmas experience remains a strange mix of pagan, religious and secular traditions that over the centuries have become intertwined and create an ever-evolving festival.

In this week’s passage Matthew gives us Joseph's side of the birth story, as well as Jesus being given the name “Emmanuel” which means “God is with us.” It's all rather condensed and if you sneezed, you might miss it.  You don't want to miss it.

It is a story about extraordinary things happening to ordinary people. And the vision behind the story is that it invites ordinary people, like you and me, to be open to the possibility of doing extraordinary, heavenly inspired, kingdom related things. We are called to be light in the darkness. How can we do that? Because God is with us.

The darkness is real. I don't just mean the nights coming in earlier, that's bad enough, I mean that other darkness that none of our lives are immune from. We have troubles and struggles and situations that we are working through. We have imperfect families and compromised lives and there is tragedy and death and illness and unwelcome surprises that throw us into a spin. Is God mad at us? No. It's just life.

Christmastime can be tough for many people. It can be dark for any of us, and it can be especially dark for the least and the last and the left out in our world. It is meant to be about peace and love and hope and joy, and if our lives are lacking in those things, the gap between where we would like to be and where we are seems like an insurmountable chasm. Some memories blight rather than bless. It is supposed to be this extraordinary time of the year. But we, like Mary and like Joseph, are ordinary people.

In our reading Joseph is going through a dark time. He has just found out that the woman of his dreams is pregnant, and he can't figure out how. In their culture engagement was a lot more than engagement is today. It was a done deal. A legal contract. Those who broke it faced a harsh penalty. Stoning. Game over. You broke the rules, now you will pay. With your life.

Joseph loved Mary way too much for that. He was an ordinary guy with an extraordinary crush on the object of his affections. The text tells it rather matter of fact. “Being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, Joseph planned to dismiss her quietly.”

Understatement! The guy’s world had just come crashing down around him. And, righteous or not, he was not going to do what the law required. For sure Mary had tried to explain that what was happening to her was tied up with God's plans. Really? God would plan to use ordinary people like them to fulfill some higher purpose? None of it made sense.

He decides to sleep on it. While he sleeps, he has this vivid dream. The kind of dream that seemed more real than his waking moments. The kind of dream he would have again... and in the future it would result in his family’s salvation from a murderous King, their relocation to Egypt and finally settling in Nazareth. An angel tells him “Take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.”

When the Holy Spirit moves upon or within a person’s life, you just don't know what the outcome is going to be. You just have to go with it. I've been a pastor long enough to observe things I honestly cannot explain, rationalize, or dismiss. Events that just all fell into place. Things not turning out as they should. Deliverance from natural events. Coincidences that can only be God-incidences. Healing that the doctors could not fathom. These things are way beyond me. I observe. The Holy Spirit works, and I've learned to let it be. Let it go. Because if I try and make sense of it, I have no words.

Mary came to be with child. Joseph couldn't make sense of it. Neither can I. The angel tells him, “The child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” Joseph, gets out of bed, gives up trying to figure it out and just goes with it. He puts into practice the faith that the angel has asked of him. “The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is practice.” When we practice the faith that God seeks to release within us, ordinary people start to experience extraordinary things.

The reason it is all happening, and the thing that can also turn our lives around, is that Jesus is now in the picture.  Isn't that what we celebrate at Christmas? Is not that what we sing in our carols? “Joy to the world! The Lord is come: Let earth receive her King.” “Silent night, Holy Night, Christ the Savior is born!” “Good Christian Friends rejoice, Christ is born today!”

The next significant thing that happens in this passage is that the angel tells us the name of this child being birthed by the Holy Spirit. “You are to name Him Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.’ All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet:  ‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel’, which means, ‘God is with us.’”

What's in a name? I've seen billboards and bumper stickers declaring the simple message, “Jesus saves.” I have also heard wonderful testimonies of people telling how Jesus saved them from their sins. But sometimes I walk away thinking, well that's great what Jesus did for them back then, but what is God up to in their lives now?

These are not the easiest days for many, many traditional churches. There is a tendency for congregations to keep looking back to their glorious past, and forget the Christmas message, that the God of the past is still with them in their present and quite capable of birthing new things for their future. 

In Hebrew, the name “Emmanuel” is a phrase, rather than a static word. Its meaning is not simply “God is with us,” but can also be rendered “God is in community with us” or  even “God is one of us.”  The Gospel of John captures it's meaning when in his prologue he writes “The Word became flesh and lived among us.” (John 1:14)

 “What if God was one of us?” asked a songwriter some years back. The startling revelation of “Emmanuel” that not only has God been with God's people throughout the ages but remains in the midst of the community of God's people, totally identifying with their struggles and with their darkness... as one of them.

This was Joseph's struggle. It wasn't just that Mary was to have a child, it was that he and Mary were just the same flesh and blood as all humanity and the very notion that God could birth something extraordinary into the heart of their incredibly ordinary lives was hard to accept.

Such remains our struggle, both as church communities and individuals. Can God's Kingdom work of salvation and healing and peace and justice and hope and love, really be actualized though ordinary people like you and me? The answer Christmas offers to us is a huge resounding, out loud and proud “Yes” because that is why Jesus came.

So much in this story would not have happened if ordinary people had not made a practice of putting their faith into action. I'm sure you know the musician’s joke. “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?” “Practice, practice, practice.” The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is practice.

Be present for your families. Be present for those whose needs you can meet. Be present in worship and service. Be present in prayer. Be present in your stewardship. Be present in those tasks to which God is calling you, be present in the midst of the ordinary everyday life that we live, because it is when we practice our faith that extraordinary things can happen. The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is practice, practice, practice.

At a moment of great personal darkness and confusion, in a dream an angel appeared to Joseph and said “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid.”  Our dreams remain flights of fancy until we act upon them. It is because Jesus is with us, as one of us, that we can find the strength to move forward. It is because God's Holy Spirit is still able to birth things in our ordinary lives beyond our comprehension, that we have hope and see possibilities where others see only problems.

The seasons shall follow seasons. There will be light. There will be darkness. The sun will set, and the sun will rise. And every new day is an opportunity to practice our faith. The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is practice. 

To God's name be all the glory. Amen.

The Reverend Adrian. J. Pratt B.D.

ADVENT 3 "Prisoners, Preachers and Prophets"

  Readings: Psalm 146:5-10, Isaiah 35:1-10, James 5:7-10, Matthew 11:2-11 

Preached at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, NY, December 11 2022

Our reading today began with somebody on death row. Technically he is a political prisoner; the radical prophet whom we know as John the Baptist. He is sitting in darkness with his mind in overdrive. Throughout his life he had staked everything on the belief that Jesus, from Nazareth, was the promised liberator of his people. But now doubts are overwhelming.

The prophets who came before him had told of the Messiah that would come. The circumstances of the birth of both John and Jesus had created a situation where the events of the Messiah’s birth had started to become reality. John had leaped for joy in his mother’s womb, when his mother Elizabeth encountered Mary who was bearing the Christ child.

John was the one who had baptized Jesus in the River Jordan and heard that proclamation from heaven “This is my beloved Son.” John was the one who had exclaimed to Jesus… “You want me to baptize you? I’m the one who should be coming to you!” John was the one who had described his relationship to the Messiah along the lines of “I am hardly fit to untie his shoe-laces!”

John was the one who had initiated the religious movement that led many to come down to the waters of the Jordan to be baptized as he proclaimed, “Repent the Kingdom is near.” John, when he saw the Pharisees and Sadducees wanting to get in on the act had angered them by proclaiming "You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance.” (Mat 3:7-8)

According to Luke, it is because of John’s criticism of Herod that he now lay in jail. “Herod the ruler, who had been rebuked by him because of Herodias, his brother's wife, and because of all the evil things that Herod had done, added to them all by shutting up John in prison.” (Luke 3:19-20).

Herodias had been Herod’s brother’s wife… and Herod had taken her for himself. While there were many who wanted John out of the way, and would have approved of his incarceration, declaring Herod’s actions were not the way for rulers (or anybody else) to behave, was the specific act which had landed John in jail.

You can imagine how he had his doubts as he lingered there. What could he do now? Hadn’t he done the right thing? How could his being imprisoned help the cause he had devoted his life to? He did not know that his end was near. That he would become a martyr for the cause of the Kingdom.

He sends a message to Jesus, asking a desperate question. "Are you the one?” Are you really the promised Messiah? Did I do the right thing placing all my hopes in you?

Jesus sends back messengers with these words; "Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.  And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me.”

John is told ‘The lame walk…’ ‘the lepers cleansed…’ The words are a quotation from the prophet Isaiah, Chapter 35. It’s part of a passage that is concerned with the restoration of Israel. It finishes with verse 10 “And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”

When John heard those words surely, they would surely resonate deep down inside of him. He was being invited to look beyond his prison walls and see how God was working out God’s purposes through Jesus Christ. He was not forgotten. He was part of something so much greater than his current predicament.  Jesus tells the crowds about John. “Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist.”

Hopefully Jesus words to John blew away all his doubts. They were spoken to give him strength. To let him know that he had not been mistaken in telling people that God’s promised One had come and was at work in their midst. To remind him that he was fulfilling the words of preachers and prophets who had come before him. That he was at the center of God’s plans for God’s people.

Prisons are not just places made of stones, high walls and barbed wire. Many people though outwardly free are hemmed in by numerous things that keep them captive. Doubts. Fears. Addictions. Debts. Lifestyles. Shame. Grief. Regret. Sickness. People are still wondering, “Is Jesus really the One who can save us?”

What can the words of Jesus to John mean to us, as we head towards Christmas?

They call us to recognize that Jesus Christ, born in Bethlehem’s stable, 

Truly is the Promised One of God!

Today we swim in a sea of ‘isms!’

•    Rationalism, the belief that we can work it all out with our minds and through scientific deduction
•    Skepticism, which doubts that is the case… indeed doubts anything is the case
•    Pragmatism suggests it doesn’t matter what we believe if it works for us.
•    Materialism, “He who has the most toys wins”;
•    Hedonism, “If it feels good do it”.  
•    Atheism, “There is no god”,
•    Agnosticism: “We can’t know if there is a god”;
•    Deism, “There is a God but don’t get excited because God has left the building”.

So, amongst all of that how can you know? When we are imprisoned by doubts and fears and worries what can get through to us? Listen again to what Jesus said.

"Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me."

I have been in ministry now for many moons and over the decades I have observed the impact the gospel can have upon peoples lives.

I’ve seen people who were blind, not physically, but blind to where their life is going. I’ve seen them be embraced by the grace of God and find a whole new way of seeing.

I’ve witnessed people, not whose way of walking was disabled, but who in almost the whole of their life had become lame and crippled. I’ve witnessed them be influenced by the gospel message in such a way as they now walk through their lives with a fixed purpose and a solid stride.

I’ve encountered people whose testimony is that they were complete outcasts, (‘lepers’ so to speak) to their families and friends, had been cut off, and despised, sometimes through their own actions, but then the light of Christ has broken through to them and it’s cleansed them of their shame, and they are on track to being whole again.

Since being in ministry I have observed  people who have ignored the Bible all their life, thinking it was just a bunch of outdated prejudicial mumbo-jumbo go through a crisis or some challenge to their way of being and, in that situation, they have turned to its ancient writings and found that God is speaking right into their situation in a way that has dramatically melted their hard hearts.

I have observed people who were on a road to nowhere but the emptiness of a cold, dark grave, being embraced by the life that is Jesus Christ and become such different people that you just can not believe they were ever in such bad shape.

There are many inspiring stories of folk, throughout the centuries, who have had their lives transformed by the gospel message. But maybe those examples are not where some of us have been in our lives. Or where some of us are. Not everybody has a Damascus road encounter like St Paul experienced.

Maybe we have simply been aware throughout our lives that, somehow God was with us and watching over us. We have sought to be faithful in the way we live our lives, and we can’t really remember a time when we felt totally outside of God’s love. But when things haven’t gone the way we expected, for sure we have had our questions.

Disappointment and failure, or even just the daily grind of every day being the same, can get to us. We may not adopt some other belief or become atheists or deists or follow any other “ism” that the social scientists can come up with. But we all have days when we question if “faith in Jesus” is really what can get us through.

John sat in a prison cell and asked “Jesus, are you really the one who can save us?” I’m here to declare that Jesus Christ, born in Bethlehem’s stable, truly is the promised one of God.  I’ve seen the way His love changes lives today!

I’m here to say whatever we are going through, wherever our lives are right now, whatever we may be facing, God is there for us. I’m here to say that “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.”

And I invite us all to place our life into Gods hands. To come with all our doubts and misapprehensions and hear some good news. Jesus Christ IS the Savior! His love CAN be born into the midst of our life circumstances.

I’ve witnessed many times way the work of God’s Holy Spirit can shine the kind of light that adds a new dimension to our daily living. I am aware that I am who I am, and where I am in my life right now, entirely by the grace and goodness of God.

I believe we can all have that sort of assurance, that we are God’s children, and that God is with us. That’s what John needed to hear in his prison cell. That’s we need to hear as we navigate what being a 21st century disciple is all about. And it’s all because of events that took place in a stable in Bethlehem all those years ago. The events to which Advent is but a prelude.

Believe it.
Listen to the songs of the angels.
Jesus Christ is the Savior.

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him may not perish but may have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

Amen!

The Reverend Adrian J. Pratt B.D.

Advent 2 "Stumps and Shoots"

COMMUNION SERVICE
Readings: Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19 , Isaiah 11:1-5; Romans 15:4-13,  Matthew 3:1-12
Preached at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, NY, December 4, 2022

In Chartes Cathedral in France is a beautiful and unique stained-glass window dating back to the thirteenth century. Known as ‘The Tree of Jesse’ it is based on the genealogy of Jesus that appears in Matthew’s gospel, tracing His family tree from King David’s Father (Jesse) to his birth in Bethlehem. At the base of the window is a picture of Jesse with a tree sprouting from his body. At the top of the window is Jesus, the generations of his descendants lining the branches.

Our Old Testament reading gave us this messianic verse;- “Then a shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse, And a branch from his roots will bear fruit.” The description of Jesus being from the root of Jesse, or the root of David appears a number of times in the New Testament. (Romans 15:12, Rev 5:5, 22:16).

Jesse had an important part to play in the history of Israel. He fathered eight sons at a time when Israel was going through great changes.  It was a time in history when they had moved from being a nation governed by priests and judges and had instituted a monarchy; the first ever King in Israel being King Saul.

But all was not well. King Saul had not turned out to be a King who always had the things of God in mind. Though he had many positive qualities, in some significant areas he was sadly lacking. A new King would be anointed, a newly chosen one, and it turned out to be Jesse’s youngest son, David.

You may recall the bible story of the prophet Samuel coming to Jesse and lining up his sons one by one, but each son receiving the thumbs down from the prophet because they were not the one God had chosen. Then David, who had been left out in the fields to take care of the sheep was sent for, and he turned out to be the one on whom God’s favor rested.

There was considerable conflict before he ever ascended to the monarchy, family jealousies and giants to be overcome, but when he did, Israel enjoyed a time of prosperity never seen before or since.

By the time Jesus was born, such a time was a distant memory. The Romans were the dominant power. Israel was fragmented and without a cohesive political or religious system to hold them together. They still had a king and priests and a palace and a temple, but it was a mere shadow of the glory that had been around when David, the son of Jesse, had reigned in Israel.

Then appeared, on the banks of the Jordan, a prophet, like the prophets of old, with a stern, yet inspiring, message to the people. His name was John, the original  Baptist, who called people to repent for the Kingdom of God was at hand; to turn around because God was doing something new and unexpected. From the dry stump of the Israelites ancient religion, a new, green shoot was rising up and it would grow to be a strong and powerful branch whose glory would be greater than that of the tree from which it came forth.

That image of Jesus rising up from the dying stump of Judaism is captured in the words of this 15th Century Advent hymn;

“Lo, how a rose e’er blooming, from tender stem have sprung,
Of Jesus lineage coming, as men of old have sung...,

Isaiah twas foretold it, the rose I have in mind...,”

That ‘Rose’ of course was Jesus Christ.

As we look forward to celebrating Christs birth, let’s explore Isaiah 11:1;
“There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.”
 (Revised Standard Version).

The Stump

The gospel authors were keen to include all those lists of names and genealogies in their Good News.  Like a great tree that had been cut down so that only the stump remained, at the time of writing, the ancestry of Jesus represented in David and his father Jesse had been reduced to obscurity and insignificance.  

It was important for people to understand, that though Christ was born in the poorest of circumstances, in a little-known town, in a distant corner of the Roman Empire, He was the inheritor of great promises. His life was intimately tied into the work that God had been doing since the dawn of Creation. His roots were deep in the salvation history of Israel, a history that her own people had forgotten and abandoned. From out of that stump, from that forgotten root, would come hope for the world.

There is nothing particularly attractive about a stump. It is all that remains of a once proud and lofty tree that has been cut down.  Sometimes they become covered with ivy so you can’t really see them, If you have one in your yard it can function as something to put a potted plant on. They don’t look good, just left bare, sitting there without a purpose.  People tend to either uproot stumps altogether or to cover them up.

You know we’ve all met people who can identify with the stump.  Life has cut them down and so they either try to cover up the hurt or just let others use them.  They feel all beauty, all sense of attractiveness has gone from them.  But why just talk about other people?  What about ourselves?

We all involve ourselves in ways of thinking and being and doing, that stunt our growth in the grace and love of Jesus Christ.  We have all been at some time or other cut down by what life has thrown at us; bad experiences, stupid actions we later regret, unkind words, misunderstandings.  As scripture describes our situation, We are all sinners who fall short of the Glory of God. There are so many things about being human that cut us down to size.

It’s not possible to uproot and move on, because our roots run so deep.  We cling to what we have, because whilst it isn’t all that it could be, it’s all that we’ve got and all that we are.  To prevent our sinfulness being revealed we have numerous mechanisms for covering up, ranging from religion to role playing.

That’s one reason why John the Baptist got so mad at the Pharisees and their like.  They were stunted, stumped people acting like Cedar Trees looking down on everyone else. They needed to acknowledge their real selves. Hear John’s blistering words in Matthew 3:10 “And the axe is already laid at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire”.  Better, it seems, to recognize your own faults than be cut down for them!

The great Advent hope in this verse?
Out of stumps can spring fresh shoots that grow into strong branches.

The Shoots

Because Jesus came to us, our stunted lives can blossom with fresh shoots that cause us to grow and become strong. That can cause us to rise up and stand tall.

Jesse was a regular guy, a farmer, living his life as best as he could.  He never expected that God would bless his family in the way that history has revealed.  He never dreamed that to his family line would be born the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Yet we read,

Isaiah 11:1;
“There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.”

This Verse has 3 applications.

a) It applies to Jesus.
He is  one this  prophecy refers to. He is the one who came from the root of Jesse.  He is the one on whom the Spirit rested mightily and whose life was filled with wisdom and understanding, with knowledge and an awesome appreciation of His Father God.

b) It can be applied to us.
We are the ones who are stunted and often stumped.  We are the ones that life has cut down to size.  We are the ones with low expectations and who feel frustrated and unfulfilled. Through the Grace Christ offers, we can build something new.  Through the love of God, we learn to love others and allow ourselves to be loved.

Under the living touch of the Holy Spirit, whatever is lost can be saved, whatever has died can be reborn, whatever has been bankrupted can be redeemed, whatever has been cut down can sprout with new, tender, green shoots that grow into strong branches.

c) It applies to God’s Church.
Isaiah’s words were addressed to a community of faith.  Churches, like people, can become stunted and stumped.  But if their roots are in Christ, then new shoots can spring out in all directions.  

Being an active member of your church is not an obligation, it’s a privilege.  God places God's children in families of faith, so that they can grow, so that they can be nurtured and together bring the things of Christ's Kingdom to people who need some good news in their lives.

Conclusions

Jesus loved the unlovely. God looks at the stump and says, “I can see shoots coming out of that thing, I can make that branch grow, I can work with this, just give me some room!” That’s what Advent is about.  Making room in our lives for the love of Christ. Preparing to receive the message of Christmas in such a way as it changes the way we live.  

This image of the Jesse tree is a wonderful reminder that the story neither began with us nor will end with us. The family line of Jesse led to the birth of Jesus. On the branches are pictured many characters whose stories we often forget and may never learn.

As we break bread and share wine, we are taking part in something the church has been doing ever since Jesus first invited His followers to remember Him in this way. It is an opportunity, as John the Baptist suggested, to turn around and get our lives back on the right track. To consider the legacy we will leave to those who come after us.

We can be stumped. We can be stunted. Yet under the touch of God's Spirit, when we place ourselves in God's hands, new life can blossom. And our lives can be branches that bear good fruit for the Kingdom, to the glory of God! Amen.

The Reverend Adrian J. Pratt B.D.