#hannah serves so much when she goes to NY

[knowthatiloveyou]

Hannah out here looking like a Christmas snack

[firstumcschenectady]

“Hope in God” based on Isaiah 2:1-5 and Luke 1:26-38

This Advent we are Waiting in Hope, and our guides for that waiting are going to be Isaiah and Luke. All too often we jump into Luke chapter 2 on Christmas, without examining Luke chapter 1 to prepare the way. This means we are going to spend Advent with Mary, with Elizabeth, and with Zechariah.  Which means that we need a content warning for Advent.

Luke 1, not unlike Genesis, spends a lot of time dealing with issues of fertility and infertility.  These are tender topics for many people, and I will be seeking to deal with them tenderly.  However, you are not obligated to stay present if these topics are simply too much for you right now, and I am available to talk if you want to.  (Or, I'm willing to find you someone else to talk to if you'd prefer.)

Luke starts by telling the story of Zechariah, an old priest, and his wife Elizabeth.  They had no children.  This is a VERY common story in the Bible, in fact it feels like a throw-back to the matriarchs and patriarchs who all had trouble conceiving until God intervened.  (And this is part of why these stories are so hard.  If infertility could be solved with prayer alone, there would be much less of it.)  This story rings of Abraham and Sarah, of Issac and Rebecca, of Jacob's wife Rachel, of Hannah and Elkanah. This is a familiar story.  An angel tells Zechariah, while he is serving in the temple, that his prayers have been heard and Elizabeth will become pregnant.  Zechariah expresses some disbelief because of their age, which is punished with being unable to speak until the baby is born.  The baby to be born will be, according to Luke, John the Baptist.

A few months later, with Elizabeth pregnant, the story is interrupted with our reading today.  This story is NOT familiar.  It doesn't sound like the Hebrew Bible at all – although it does sounds like its contemporary Greek stories.  As far as the Bible goes, though, this is a brand new account.  And it is breaking into an old, old story. In this new account a young woman, who has been legally married to her husband but is still in the one year waiting period in her father's house before she joins her husband in his house, is greeted by that same angel.  The angel says “‘Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you,” and the story says that Mary is perplexed.  

This make sense, I think.  By the standards of the world, Mary wasn't favored.  She was poor, she was young, she was female, she had very little power, and she lived in an unimportant little village that was outside of a city that had recently been ransacked by the Roman Empire.  She was, by no means, favored by anyone nor anything.  Nor was their any previous evidence that she was favored by God.  R. Alan Culpepper writes in the New Interpreter's Bible, “'Yet, Mary, God's favored one, was blessed with having a child out of wedlock who would later be executed as a criminal.  Acceptability, prosperity, and comfort have never been the essence of God's blessing.”1 Mary seems to still be processing this.

She is, however, wise enough to keep her objections to herself – unlike Zechariah.  So the angel continues to tell her about her upcoming pregnancy with the child who would be named Jesus, “the rescuer”, and would claim a unique connection to the Divine.  This time Mary expresses her confusion, indicating that she understands how conception works and thus that it shouldn't be happening to her. Perhaps because she doesn't ask for proof, she is given it, in the form of Elizabeth's pregnancy.

At this point, the story comes to one of the greatest acts of courage I know about.  This impoverished young woman, with everything to lose by taking this risk (including her own life), responds “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”  I know that this story is Luke's creation, Luke's intentional foreshadowing of the Jesus story.  I know this didn't HAPPEN.  And yet I can't help but be stuck by this line.  It feels like the sort of answer that the woman who raised Jesus and taught Jesus of God would give.  It feels true in a way that is deeper than the story itself.  Mary is a risk-taker for God.  She trusts in the Divine even when it makes no sense and by all reasonable standards should be done.

In this story, through this brief interaction, Mary moves from confused at the idea that she could be favored by God to an unquestioning willingness to do whatever it is God needs of her.  The foreshadowing of Jesus couldn't be much better.  This unique story about Mary has echoes all over it of Hannah and her faithfulness.  These are the stories of the women's faith, the women who raised men of great faith.  The men didn't come to their faith alone.

We will come back to Mary next week, and to her extraordinary courage and unique insight.  But for now we're going to transition to the vision of Isaiah, a vision that came when everything else looked like it was going downhill.  Most of the time first Isaiah (the first 40 chapters) has to warn the people of what will happen if they don't trust in God, but this vision is an after vision.  Of what will come SOMEDAY, one way or another.  The more I examine it, the more striking it is.

Many of us are familiar with the closing lines,

“they shall beat their swords into ploughshares,    and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation,    neither shall they learn war any more.”

but it really struck me this week that these lines are about much more than peace and a lack of a need for war. These lines are about not needing defenses anymore, about not needing borders anymore, about being unafraid for safety, and a sense of deep security.  

The only way that people could be so secure is if they AND EVERYONE ELSE already had enough, and resources were already fairly shared, and there was no injustice or inequality that needed to be rectified. I'm told that the threat of violence is what allows for income inequality.  Thus the opposite must be true, where there is equality there is no need for violence.  Furthermore, this has to be widespread equality and equity, because there is no fear that outsiders will break in wanting to share in the prosperity – because they have it too.

Now this makes perfect sense as a correlation to the earlier parts of the passage.  It has already said that YHWH-God has become acknowledged as THE Sacred one, and EVERYONE is worshipping YHWH-God. Furthermore, they're all learning God's ways.  Well, God's ways is a way of speaking of the Torah, the first 5 books of the Bible, which contain a vision of a just and equitable society.  In that society land is distributed to all so all can provide for themselves, those who struggle are helped by their family and community, anyone in need is cared for by the excess of those who have enough, and justice itself is blind to power and influence.  This is the society that God dreams of, and this is what people would be studying as “walking in God's ways.”  

In Isaiah's vision, this message is shared far and wide AND God's self is the judge arbitrating between people – so justice is definitely just. So, yes, this is a reasonable set up for what otherwise feels like an overly idealistic vision of peace.

In this context, it is the reasonable extension.  If everyone buys into God's vision and enacts it, of course there would be equity, equality, justice, and peace.  Of course weapons of destruction could become tools of creation and means of food production.  That's what God is capable of doing.

And this got me to thinking.  Do we dream this dream deeply enough?  Do we consider what it would be like to be fearless?  To feel safe?  To live in peace?

I haven't spent nearly enough time living into this dream.  What would it be like to assume that all people, as they age, will have enough resources to be cared for with tenderness and love in ways that respect their humanity and maintain their freedom?  What would it be like to know that all children, whether or not they have living and able parents, will be nurtured, played with, fed well, have safe places to sleep, clothing appropriate for the season, and access to great education to help them thrive in body and spirit?  What would it be like to remove locks from all doors, knowing that no one aims to do us harm, and no one would have a need to take anything we have? What would it be like to know that all people, regardless of their employment status, or marital status, or socio-economic status, could receive great healthcare when they need it?  What would it be like to know that people all around the world shared all these gifts, and no one in any other nation wished us harm because of harms we'd caused taking resources we needed?  What would it be like to know that there were no guns left in the world, and no one had motivation to make any more?  What would it be like to live without the threat of nuclear war, nor biological warfare, nor even internet viruses????

What if we weren't afraid, and didn't need to be?  What if we could all care for each other, and support each other, and grow together?

Friends, that's the sort of hope we're preparing ourselves for in this season of Advent.  Not because we necessarily expect to see it in our lifetimes, but because that's what we're working for and we have to keep God's vision in front of us so we can be a part of enacting it. May we, indeed, beat swords into plowshares, nuclear warheads into flower gardens, and study war no more – because it isn't needed! Amen

1Alan Culpepper, “Luke,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible Vol. 9 (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1994) 52-3.

Rev. Sara E. Baron First United Methodist Church of Schenectady 603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305 Pronouns: she/her/hers http://fumcschenectady.org/ 
https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

December 1, 2019

[viviansjourneytotruelove-blog]

GHO Goes to the DR - DAY 3: 3/20/17 -- Clinic Day 1 in El Dique (Dental Assistant/School Trip)!

This morning, I did manage to have breakfast (an omelette and some hash browns) and we had devotionals before going to the clinic. Paula Cunningham, the wife of the medical director (Tom Cunningham) and a registered nurse, shared about trusting in God. She talked about how she homeschooled her children and so they were able to take their four children with them. She was worried about the safety of her children but ultimately realized that she had to just trust in Him. Robin, the RN that’s in charge of triage, also shared. Afterwards, We made our way to the clinic and at first, it took a little bit of time to get set up. Everyone got set up in their own stations. Outside under the tents were triage people. On the first floor was counseling, the pharmacy, and dentistry. On the second floor were the doctors and reading eyeglass clinic. On the third floor were more doctors and the lab station where we do urine dipsticks, urine pregnancy tests, and glucose finger sticks. The fourth floor was the bathroom and cafeteria, which served as the children’s ministry when we weren’t eating there. I was assigned to dental that morning. Dental took a particularly long time to get set up because they had a sterilizing machine and suction machine to put together. I was paired up with an 18 year old pre-dental student named Aysia Cooper. We filled up tubs with water for washing instruments and also a tub with what I assume is similar to the Cidex we use at Charles B. Wang before we sterilize the equipments. They also brought metal equipment so those were the ones that went into the sterilizing machine. All dirty equipment went into the tub with soapy water first. Then we rinsed off the soap in the next tub. Plastic equipment went into the Cidex-like chemical for 30 minutes before being rinsed and dried for re-use. Metal equipment were simply air dried and then put into the sterilizing machine for 15 minute sessions. Dr. EJ, a dentist and Dr. Ken’s wife, had me pray for some of her patients. She had told me that the patient had just accepted Christ and so I prayed for them as a translator helped me translate. We are partnering with local churches and high schools that send students and volunteers to help translate for us. It really is beautiful to see an entire team of brothers and sisters in Christ work in unity for Him. I was so surprised because Dr. Mike, the other dentist on our team, was doing surgical teeth extractions and it was just so mindblowing how we were doing that right in a church-turned-clinic. At 1PM, it was lunch time and I was by Bob that he volunteered for me to go to a local school to share my testimony. Then I had remembered that I deleted my testimony from my e-mail drafts folder the night before. I decided that it must have been a part of God’s plan for that to happen and I just went on the fly. I went to the public school with Brandon, Cameron, and Vinnie. Brandon was brought to another school that was walking distance away and we waited for 3PM and thought about what we were going to say. We were given a classroom of about 20-30 children each and were told to tell them about Jesus. God really worked through us. Although it was a public school, the principal allowed us to come because she wanted to instill “morals” into the children of the school. Diones, the pastor of Oasis church, told us that this neighborhood, Los Minas, was filled with a lot of drugs and fatherlessness. Right there and then, I knew God had called me there for a reason. I ended up in a class of 7th graders. There’s a group of young kids who used music to try to reach out to nonbelievers. They went first with their songs and I was blown away by how amazing they sounded. A high school senior named Maria translated for me. I told the class my testimony and honestly, at first, I was a little discouraged. They all just seemed to stare blankly at me but I did my part and trusted that God would do the rest. At the end, one of the staff asked them who liked my story the best and all of them raised their hands enthusiastically and my heart melted. I also met another translator named Noemi, a 29-year-old who teaches at the Oasis church’s school. She and I really clicked. She told me that she goes to Queens, NY from time to time since her dad is there so hopefully she and I can reunite before we go to heaven someday. By the time we got back, it was about time to leave so we packed up and Day 1 at the clinic was finished. It’s simply so amazing how much you can feel like family with people you’ve just met and I dare say that nothing else can take credit for that except for God’s sovereignty and power. We came back to the hotel, ate a buffet dinner, and had devotionals at 7:30. This time, Dr. Brad Allen shared a little about his struggles with pride. He says that he had always struggled with pride and allowing God to sit on the throne in his life. So many times, he finds himself taking the throne back from God and it’s important to remind ourselves that we must put God there instead. Brandon Gilliland, a soon-to-be first year medical school student, also shared. He talked about Colossians 3:2 - “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” Everything we do, we must remember who and why we are doing it and this missions trip was no different. After devotionals, I changed to go swimming. Hannah and Aysia joined me even though it was raining outside. We all  ended up in the sauna with David and Brandon and had a few good laughs. Went back to my room, took a shower, and got some rest for clinic day 2.