SCRIPTURE: Isaiah 61:10-62:3
TEXT: 10a&b I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my whole being shall exult in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation… THEME: dressed for Freedom INTRODUCTION This passage is like instructions, for something we got at Christmas. It is an owner’s Manual of how to make the best use of the gift of the Christ Child. SCRIPTURE The People of God are being held captive in Babylon. Taken by force from their ancestral home, to live in a foreign land. Generations have passed and it seems that God has abandoned them, but the prophet Isaiah is giving them news of their return home. Home is no longer a distant memory, but a dream of the past. The Prophet Isaiah gives them news that they get to return home and instructions on what this means. Each point, is a touchstone to our own experiences that will inform us of how to receive this gift of salvation as well as to receive in the Christ Child. What do we wear? What are the clothes of rejoicing? Think about it, the clothes of rejoicing are Shorts, T shirt and Rubber slippers. Being back home in Hawaii, at the beach, relaxing, not judged by our appearance, confident in who we are, comfortable and ready for action. This makes us think of clothes that they haven’t been able to wear while captive, like those of a wedding. Imagine having to put your life on hold. Suppressed, confined, and then being freed to live your own future. The simple act of marriage, self-determination, a choice towards a covenantal future, is worth up dressing for. During our COVID-19 Facebook worship broadcasts from home, I wore an aloha shirt, shorts and bare feet. But when we went back into the sanctuary, I put on long pants and shoes. Not because it was the most comfortable, but because I had the opportunity to respect God with what I wore. To have a sense of how things used to be. To protest having to have been sheltered in. To be my casual best. When I pastored on Molokai, Cissy Kaupu would greet me every Sunday with a lei. An act of love, an expression of respect, and reflection of the beauty of God. The Ilima leis she sewed, took 2000 of those thin petals, picked and sewn in the early morning to be ready for our morning service. Sometimes ginger, or the blossoms of the dwarf poinciana tree. A garment of salvation, a Garland of celebration. Like how a bride accents her beauty with jewels. We are valuable to God, precious, and decked out. Their release from Babylon has the potential of new life for the Israelites. I severely trimmed the bougainvillea hedge in front of my house in preparation for painting. There was not a single leaf left hanging and I thought I might have killed it. It took two weeks before I started to see, shoots being pushed out from the branches. I didn’t kill it, it is springing to life with new leaves, branches and flowers. This is the chance freedom gives the people of God in returning home. For a new life, new potential, new ways, new patterns and renewed relationships with God and each other. A relationship with God on our own effort is futile, but not when God is the initiator, as with Christ born of Mary, all we need to do is to let God love us. What God is able to do through Israel is an example of the love of God that is available to us. Israel’s relationship with God is a light that shine as an example of what is possible. Light is more powerful than darkness, but somehow darkness always seems to get there first. The light God is shining though us needs to be proclaimed. During one of our Christmas shopping expeditions, we found humming bird ornaments. One of the recipients of this ornament googled ‘Humming Birds’ and found them to be a symbol of the resurrection. A humming bird’s heart rates can slow down to imperceivable levels giving the appearance of death, until they are roused and flitter away. These ornaments have become talking point to proclaim the resurrection of Jesus. The God of Israel is not just for the Nation of Israel, but is for all nations as they witness to the way they live, and work with their God. Their prayers, their holidays, their worship, their food and their dress are all about God and exited our interest in what knowing their God could mean for us. On one of those rabbit holes on Apple News, took me to the story of Sarah Culberson. She is an American actress and dancer who discovered through a DNA test, that she was a princess of Sierra Leone, of West Africa. She was orphaned as a child and adopted by a couple in West Virginia. Her discovery of royalty did not come with an inheritance, but with responsibilities that she has not turned her back to. She has helped to restore buildings in Sierra Leone, she is an advocate for education and has championed the rebuilding of High Schools, she is promoting Mask wearing to slow the spread of the COVID-19 virus, and is developing safe and clean sources of water for villages. She says, “If it doesn’t make a difference, it’s not worth doing.” She has taken the responsibility of being a princess for these people, and is using the resources available to her, to make a difference for good, as a person of faith and a daughter of a king. Children of God, we are children of the king. We shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord our God. APPLICATION Our salvation is found in the love of God. That’s why the prophet Isaiah uses the analogy of a wedding. The birth of Christ is an expression of love from God to us, where our response is to be in love and enter into a covenantal relationship with God and each other as a Bride and Groom. The Christ at Christmas will change the way we dress, will bring shoots forth of new possibilities and a new future, is so exciting that we can’t stop saying something about it or living in a compelling way with our God and our community, we will be called Christian, Children of God, heirs, citizens of the Kingdom of God, The people of God. We will be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord our God. CONCLUSION As we went around this Advent season, we stopped and chatted with people that we haven’t be able to talk with in a long time. My family committed to a Zoom meeting each week to light an Advent Candle and the Christ Candle on Christmas Day. Our greatest joy and salvation are with those people we stay connected with, our family, our church, our friends, people we know, people we meet, our neighbors and our God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Our relationship with God, through Jesus and the Holy Spirit is lived out in each relationship that we are a part of. Salvation is not just about being freed from sin, although it does include all of those elements of forgiveness, reconciliation, renewal and restoration. Salvation is more about a love, being loved by God, loving God and loving others. So, we are not Dressed as Free, which was my first definition of salvation, but we are dressed as loved, as seen in our experience with Jesus, the babe, conceived by the Holy Spirit, born in a manger, the Son of God.
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