Just words?

(1) A congregation member, a Stephen Minister, or the pastor stops to see a home-bound member of the parish. The visit goes well, and the visitor can tell that the other person is trying to prolong the stay.

“Tell me more,” he or she says in effect.

It doesn't matter so much what the subject is, but rather simply that the visitor stays longer.

It is a hunger for a personal companionship to combat the loneliness of daily life in front of a television set.

(2) It is very easy to run into the scantily clad folks striking provocative poses on television, internet, magazines, and on the street.

Part of the reason is simply juvenile shock behavior, part is crass commercialism, which is making money from our base instincts.

But deep down, I think that there a degree of loneliness: “Hey, look at me; I'm alive, I need somebody, I need you.”

(3) I'm a supporter of Covenant House in New York, a place where thrown-away teens can be safe in a dangerous city.

I regularly read the stories of those who come to the door of Covenant House, who need not only food and shelter but also the message that they are worth something, that life is worth living, that they are valued as persons in ways beyond sex and drugs.

Those are three very different situations, and yet they have some things in common.

--They are situations of profound loneliness.

--They cry out for someone or something to break that prison of silence.

--They need words backed by a person, en-fleshed words.

--They need words that open up a different future than that which they experience now.

And now a fourth situation:

Scripture only gives us hints, but we can imagine the loneliness felt by Joseph in those months of engagement to Mary.

“What do I do now?” he must have asked himself.

“I wish her no harm, I love her, and yet the baby is not mine.

If I ask anyone else about it, they will say to bring her to trial, which will surely result in her death.”

What a terrible loneliness he faces!

It is in a dream that Joseph finally gets a hint of what he should do.

It begins with his continuing to establish the marriage and home.

But he must wait for the full word; it will be en-fleshed in the child born to Mary, whom he is to name “Jesus.”

It is a common name.

It has ties to Israel's history, because Moses' lieutenant was named Joshua, which is the same name.

The name comes with a meaning attached, “God saves.”

Is it just a word, just a name?

No, it is a name that will be filled with God's intended meaning: He will save, God does save.

Life for Joseph will forever be different because he has heard this word in a dream and because he acts accordingly, because he trusts that the name is a true name for the child.

And then the Gospel writer adds his own comment, recalling the words of the prophet Isaiah which we heard in the first lesson today, that the long-expected one is to be named Emmanuel.

Since his readers may not know Hebrew, he translates the meaning of the word as “God with us.”

Emmanuel is one of the seven titles for the Messiah that we have been using in Morning Prayer throughout Advent. Emmanuel, God with us.

The loneliness of Joseph, the loneliness of those three situations we mentioned at the beginning, or the loneliness of each one of us shall not be the last word in our lives.

Emmanuel, God with us.

90 years ago, James Weldon Johnson wrote a sermon in verse about the Genesis 1 account of creation.

[The poem begins:]

And God stepped out on space,
And he looked around and said:
I'm lonely --
I'll make me a world.

[Then, much later in the poem:]

And God looked around at all that he had made...

And God said: I'm lonely still.

Then God sat down --
On the side of a hill where he could think;
By a deep, wide river he sat down;
With his head in his hands,
God thought and thought,
Till he thought: I'll make me a man!

[and the poem concludes]

Then into it he blew the breath of life,
And man became a living soul.

The poet has the right instinct.

So when God announces Emmanuel, it is for his purposes and not ours.

To be sure that we get the message, he says it in flesh, in the person of Jesus.

As we follow Jesus through the Gospels, what he does again and again is not just to lecture at crowds, but to talk directly with persons,

to pull them out of whatever dark corner they had wandered or been driven by illness, hatred, estrangement, or circumstance.

And the conversation is not to just pat them on the head “There, there, everything is OK with you.”,

but to change things in their lives, to re-orient them to the Father and to each other.

Christmas is coming, Christmas came, Christmas is come even a little bit now!

Christmas is not about nostalgia, or about the sweetness of a little baby, or only about a baby long ago.

It is about God doing everything that is needed to get our attention:

“Hey, you, yes you in the second/middle/any pew:

I'm talking with you, I want to talk with you, I find you endlessly fascinating.

I created you for this conversation with all of your joys and sorrows,

your discoveries and curiosities,

your prayers, your praise,

your thanksgiving.

I want to hear it all; I want to reshape it all.

I want to set you on a different path than you may have walked before.

I want my kingship to find expression in what you think and say and do, in such a way that others are enticed into this continuing conversation as well.”

That is the kind of thing God says.

That is what is going on with Christ Jesus come in the flesh, among us.

Jesus and Emmanuel They are not just a name and a title, any old name and title,

but are a name and a title which God intends to fill full of meaning in action. God saves, God with us.

We know what lonely Joseph did: listened to the message, wed Mary, made a home,

pondering it all the while.

What about the others mentioned at the outset?

Perhaps the lonely home-bound person will discover telephone companionship.

Perhaps she can manage a smile to a caregiver or a murmured The Lord be with you to someone not expecting to hear such a greeting.

Perhaps the lonely one making money from our worst instincts will realize what damage he is doing to himself and to the community, and use his energies a different way.

Perhaps the lonely teens thrown-away by their families will genuinely accept the new community that is offered to them at Covenant house or other such places, thrive in it, and extend it to others.

Perhaps...because things change when God is with us, God saves.

They're not just words; they are the pointers to the new creation in us, too.

Watch out! Christ is coming! and whenever he gets hold of us, our loneliness is shattered and replaced with the word, the title, the conversation that matters. Amen.

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.