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The story really begins in a moment of
poignant understatement. The story begins after the “but.”
Somewhere along the way, someone told me, “Nothing matters
before the ‘but.’” You know, when people say:
“I agree with you, but…”
“I loved the anthem today, but…”
“Oh, that was a great sermon, but…”
Luke gives this glowing introduction of
Zachariah and Elizabeth:
Division of Abijah, daughter of Aaron,
both righteous before God, walking in the commandments of
the Lord blameless…but…they had no children
because Elizabeth was barren.
Nothing else really mattered in a culture
where it was believed that children were evidence of God’s
favor, and therefore, the lack of children suggested God’s
disfavor; in a religious faith which had no clear notion of
the afterlife, and the only way one could endure beyond
death was through their posterity. So without children there
was no hope, no future, no reason for living.
Barren. The word itself
rings hard and cold against our ears, doesn’t it? Those of
us who live in this part of the northern hemisphere know
what “barrenness” is all about, don’t we? We understand what
it means for fields to lay fallow. We know the darkness of
winter, the hardness of frozen fields, the lifelessness of
dried out cornstalks blowing in the freezing winter wind.
The carol writer describes it with such eloquence:
In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind
made moan,
earth stood hard as iron, water like a
stone;
snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on
snow,
in the bleak midwinter, long ago.
(UM Hymnal, Page 221)
That’s what winter barrenness feels like,
doesn’t it? And of course, in the Bible, “barrenness” is not
just a symptom of the weather and not just a matter of being
childless. It is a metaphor for a condition of the soul, spiritual
barrenness:
·
times when the heavens seem hard
as iron, when God seems distant and we feel frozen out at
heaven’s gate
·
the hardness of heart that keeps
us from really feeling the hurts of others
·
the hollowness of hope when we
can’t even imagine a better world or better future
·
the sterility of folks who are
closed to the possibility of new birth and new life through
Jesus Christ
·
the infertility of self-centered
saints who care only for their own salvation and have never
had the joy of bringing someone else to birth as a child of
God
·
the frigidity and rigidity of
those who simply can’t believe that God has the power to do
anything new, anything creative, any birthing of new
possibilities in our lives or in the world
In my
brother’s Advent devotional booklet, he says:
As we begin this Advent journey, some of
us might confess that one of our deepest fears or
frustrations in our faith life is that we sometimes feel as
if all our praying, hoping and working for a better life and
more peaceful world are nothing more than “visions of
sugarplums dancing in our heads.”
(Jim Harnish, Rejoicing in Hope,
Abingdon, page 6)
That’s spiritual barrenness, and my guess
is there were days when Zachariah and Elizabeth felt it—felt
their prayers just bouncing off the ceiling, nothing more
than fanciful, wishful but barren thinking.
In my files, I came across an old sermon
from one of my predecessors at Ann Arbor First, the
incomparable Hoover Rupert. Well into his eighties, living
in a retirement home in Maryland, he still teaches a Bible
study class and reports he is working on writing another
book. Preached in the late ’60s, the sermon’s title is “When
Life Seems to Have No Meaning,” and the first section is
“The Problem of Emptiness.” He says he believes our basic
problem is one of emptiness and boredom. He quotes Dr.
William Hubbard, then head of the U of M Medical School and
member of First Church, who told a pastor’s conference:
Humankind is experiencing a decline in a
sense of satisfaction and a growth of uncertainty and
impatience, of frustration and, in my opinion, worst of all,
boredom.
(Ann Arbor News, Jan. 17, 1967)
Emptiness. Boredom. Life without meaning.
Spiritual barrenness. Ever feel like that? My guess is that
some folks have even felt that way in church.
And that brings us to Zachariah, in the temple.
Luke tells us he was a priest of the
Abijah, a good man, doing God’s work, carrying out his
duties. There were so many priests, they couldn’t all be on
duty all the time, so they served in rotating teams. And
during each rotation, there were so many priests in each
team, they couldn’t all have the plum job of entering the
Holy Place and offering the incense, so they cast lots,
rolled the dice. On this day the lots fell to Zachariah. It
should have been the highlight of his career as a priest.
Many priests never had the opportunity to carry out the high
and holy task of offering the incense, lifting the prayers
of the people to God. It should have been a time of great
joy and a moment of spiritual exhilaration. But my guess is
he came to that moment with the weight of his own
disappointment weighing heavily on his heart:
·
feeling the pain of Elizabeth’s
embarrassment
·
questioning his own standing
before God: “No children must mean God is pretty well
displeased with me. What kind of a priest am I and what have
I done to deserve this?”
·
doubting the power of prayer even
as he offered them on behalf of the people
Emptiness. Boredom. Spiritual barrenness.
So he just kept going through the motions
of worship, keeping the ritual, following the traditions,
but expecting absolutely nothing. And my guess—no, my
experience—is that he was not the last priest to come to
worship like that.
But then suddenly, unplanned, totally
unexpected, he heard the last word he ever expected to hear:
“Zachariah, thy prayer is heard. Elizabeth will bear a
son.”
Here, right in the midst of their boredom
and barrenness, right at the point of their deepest
disappointment and in the face of doubt and guilt and the
feeling of faithlessness: Shazam! The unexpected surprise of
God and unanticipated advent of the Spirit, the unbelievable
encounter with the Holy. He was so shocked, he was, quite
literally, speechless! And he stayed that way for nine
months! (My guess is Elizabeth might have been pleased with
that!)
Do I give away my age when I remember the
classic TV show with the familiar tag line? Allen Funt would
end the show with the reminder: “Someday, when you least
expect it, someone will say, ‘Smile! You’re on candid
camera!’” And that’s how God often comes. Someday, when you
least expect it.
·
Moses, just tending his flocks,
when suddenly the bush was burning and he took off his shoes
because he realized he was on holy ground.
·
Isaiah, just going through the
motions of worship in the temple, when suddenly it seemed
the whole house was filled with smoke and he saw the Lord
high and lifted up. God’s glory filled the temple and
Isaiah’s life was touched with fire.
·
The woman at the well, just
minding her own business drawing water for the day, and lo
and behold, she discovered living water and she knew she
would never thirst again.
My friend, Gary Haller, preached a sermon
at Grand Rapids First which he entitled “The Amazing
Godwink.” Gary calls it the unexpected, surprising, amazing
moment when it seems God winks and life can never be the
same. (Gary Haller, “The Amazing Godwink,” Grand Rapids
FUMC, June 11, 2006)
That’s what happened for Elizabeth that
day in the kitchen, going about her chores, carrying her
sorrow, trying to dispel her disappointment and suddenly:
Shazam! God winked and she discovered the stirrings of new
hope, new life and new promise for her future.
That’s what happened to Zachariah that
day in the temple. Bored with his priestly duties, barren in
spirit, he was just going through the motions, feeling that
his faith was a fraud and his prayers were nothing more then
smoke, when suddenly: Zap! God winked and all of life was
new.
Now, I can’t tell you when it will happen
for you. I can’t predict when God will break in with a
fresh, new insight, a renewed sense of hope in the face of
despair, the new birth of new life in the Spirit. If I could
tell you, then it wouldn’t be unexpected. All I can tell you
is that if you watch and wait, if you listen, someday when
you least expect it: Smile! God winks and all of life can be
new.
All I
can say is, “Expect the unexpected.”
With many of you, I love the writings of
Frederick Buechner. His own conversion story parallels that
of Zachariah and Elizabeth. He tells of his student days in
New York when he was not a Christian and had very little in
the way of a church background. But for some reason he had
been drawn to attending church, listening to the great
George Buttrick preach. Week after week. Sermon after
sermon…
…then there came one particular sermon,
with one particular phrase in it that does not even appear
in the transcript of the sermon someone sent me 25 years
later, so I can only assume he must have dreamed it up and
ad-libbed it on the spot.
He said that Christ is King because again
and again he is crowned in the hearts of people who believe
in him. And that inward coronation takes place, said
Buttrick, “amid confession and tears and great laughter.”
Buechner writes:
It was the phrase “great laughter” that
did it. Did whatever it was that must have been in the doing
all the years of my journey up till then. Here, at the end,
I am left with no other way of saying that what I found was
Christ. Or was found. It hardly seems to
matter.
(F. Buechner, Sacred Journey, page
108)
Just a phrase…“great laughter.” Just a
word…one which the preacher seemed to conjure up out of thin
air. And in an instant—unanticipated, unplanned,
unexpected—God winked and his life took an entirely new
direction.
I can’t tell you when or where it might
happen. It might come as it did for Elizabeth, in the midst
of barrenness and brokenness, at the point of her greatest
disappointment. It might come as it did for Zachariah, while
going through the motions, in emptiness and boredom. It
might come as it did for Buechner, in an unplanned phrase or
barely spoken word. All I can say is, expect the unexpected.
Because someday, when you least expect it: SMILE! God will
wink and life will become new.
How silently, how silently,
the wondrous gift is given;
so God imparts to human hearts
the blessings of his heaven.
No ear may hear him coming,
but in this world of sin,
where meek souls will receive him,
still the dear Christ enters in.
Notes:
Dr. Hoover Rupert’s sermon, “When Life
Has No Meaning,” has no date on it, but it was preached at
First Church Ann Arbor in the late ’60s. The most recent
reference is this quotation from Dr. Hubbard in the Ann
Arbor News, January 17, 1967.
Frederick Buechner’s conversion story is
told in a couple of his books. I reference it here from
The Sacred Journey. Several of his books are available
in the Circuit Rider bookstore, or you can go to the
“virtual bookstore” on our website (www.fumcbirmingham.org)
to find a full listing of his works.
My brother’s Advent devotional,
Rejoicing in Hope, is also available in the Circuit
Rider bookstore or the virtual bookstore. |
