Advent 3A + Discernment + 12.15.13

(From: http://lemonandraspberry.com/2013/05/a-seed-of-inspiration-animal-vegetable-miracle/)

M. Campbell-Langdell

All Santos, Oxnard

Advent 3A, 12.15.13

(Isaiah 35:1–10; Magnificat; James 5:7–10; Matthew 11:2–11)

“Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains. You also must be patient. Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near (James 5:7-8 NRSV).”

Patience.  Since moving to Oxnard, I have learned a bit more about farming and growing things.  I have learned from Reyna and the folks at our community garden.  I’m still no expert, but I do get the impression that growing things takes a whole lot of hard work and patience. 

A couple of months ago, I listened to the audiobook version of Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: Our Year of Seasonal Eating. It is about how her family lived for a year largely on what they could grow on their own land.  Gone were the bananas from far away, or anything else that takes fossil fuels to transport, if they could help it. They learned lots of patience as they ate with the seasons.  Sometimes they had very few veggies that could be grown because the weather was chilly, and sometimes they had such a bounty they hardly knew what to do with it all. 

During zucchini season, Kingsolver hilariously describes how all the neighbors try to foist the green squash on each other, since everyone is up to the eyeballs in the stuff. ^[1] This book really helped me understand that when you are growing things, you have to have such patience.  It is like the little basil plant Alene and I have next to our dining table.  It keeps growing, ever so slowly…  We have to be so patient.  When we grow things, we become aware that we are not in control.  That there are seasons, weather, etc. and that ultimately God is in control.

I think that this kind of patience also teaches us a lot about discernment.  About listening to what God is telling you about your life and what God wants you to do. Speaking about discernment, Renee Miller, a priest, says:

“Think of Mary when she was visited by the angel and told that she would bear God’s Son.  Her response was immediate.  She didn’t say, “Gosh, you’re asking me about something really important.  I need to do some discernment around this.  Can I get back with you next Thursday?”  Rather, she said, “Let it be to me as you have said.”  One of the reasons that Mary was able to answer so quickly and decisively was because she was living a life of discernment.  She was probably much more accustomed to listening to her everyday life than we are in the 21st century.”^[2]

How can we live a life in which we listen to God better?

We can see discernment in the interactions between John and his disciples and Jesus also.  John is obviously in a quandary. He thought he was right about Jesus being the Messiah, but that was before this prison business.  Before he was in danger of being killed. John may be preparing the way for Jesus, but he is still a product of his Jewish heritage and he still expects the Messiah to be triumphant.  The Messiah’s preparer of the way should be helping lead folks into the new reign, not stuck in prison! Unfortunately, following Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean that you are safe in this world. John is asking, are you the one I’ve preached about, or do we wait for another? Because this doesn’t look like what I was expecting.

Discernment happens individually, but it also happens in community. Even before his imprisonment, you can see John collaborating with his disciples.  And in the Magnificat, the Virgin Mary’s song, you see her both saying she is blessed, but also talking about the communal result of the coming of the Messiah.  Rich, poor, all will be affected.  Discernment is about being sensitive not only to yourself but to your community.

Listening well to your life also has to do with listening to how your story, your moment, relates to the broader human story as we know it in the Holy Scriptures.  I don’t know if you noticed something about Jesus’ response to John the Baptist. Did he say “yes” or “no”?  (Pause)

No, right?  Because if he had said “yes,” it would have been sure proof he was an imposter.  Instead, he gives John proof, citing that what he has been doing—the healing, the raising of the dead, all that—is exactly what is foretold in Isaiah and other prophetic scriptures.  Looking at a harmony of the Gospels, one also sees that in Luke, right before this moment is the raising of the widow’s son at Nain.  So truly, the dead are being raised, and this has John the Baptist’s attention more than anything because it’s obvious that Jesus is no ordinary healer.^[3] Just like John the Baptist, when we see what is happening in the context of the broader biblical story, it becomes much clearer what God is trying to tell us.

But the flip side of this is that in discernment we learn that success doesn’t always look like success. John the Baptist looks like a washed up sort of preacher right now, proven wrong and down on his luck. But here in Matthew it is interesting that Jesus picks the moment when John the Baptist’s disciples are leaving (but may not be out of earshot yet) to say, “Just because he doesn’t look like a success, you still saw a prophet, and more than a prophet.”  This, Jesus says later, “is a modern-day Elijah,” someone very important for laying the groundwork.  So there is no shame in doing the work of God, as John the Baptist and his disciples did, even if you may not always look like a success.

So, you may ask about now, “Why is she talking about all of this?”  Well, I believe it has something to do with our discernment here at All Santos.  We are discerning our future together as a church.  You all have been so patient with me, and I have striven to be patient too and listen to the Spirit. We can also look to the scriptures to see what our story looks like in light of them.  I think about imagery of renewal—of green and water lapping up where we had desert or weedlands around our campus. I think about how we can see many good things happening here now, but that we might pass through a season together in the future when the fruits of our labor are less easy to see.  And that is natural.  Successful ministry doesn’t always look like worldly success. For example, what are these people doing, going into prison to minister this afternoon?
But in and through our listening, both individually and communally, we can hear the Spirit’s guidance. Together, we can set priorities.  During the last Mutual Ministry Review, the vestry focused on several things, including supporting Bread of Life and growing the church, over the next year or so.  Well, the truth is, no church really grows just in and of itself. But we can provide programs and services that attract people. We can invite friends and build a community where people are fed in body and spirit.  An important day for our work in community will be our Annual Meeting on January 26^th when we will elect three new vestry members and delegates for convention.

And thus we can walk in our own holy way.  Patiently.  Taking in the bigger picture with the help of scripture.  Knowing that success may not look like worldly success.

This work of being church is tough sometimes. But it is life-giving work.  It can transform a desert into a place of springs. And we know that we do walk that Holy Way, the way of Jesus, the way that is Jesus. And thus we will work and we, the ransomed of the LORD, shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon our heads. Amen.

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[1] Barbara Kingsolver and family, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: Our Year of Seasonal Eating, 2010.

[2] Renee Miller, “Discernment,” http://episcopalcredo.org/wellness/continuing-credo/along-the-way/discernment/.

[3] Orville E. Daniel, A Harmony of the Gospels (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1996), 64.