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Presentation of our Lord, 02/02/2020
Sermon on Luke 2:22-40, by David H. Brooks
As you may know, the yawning holes in the biography of Jesus has led many creative types over the years to try their hand at filling in what at least one song called “Jesus…The Missing Years” (with a tip of the hat to John Prine). These efforts have appeared almost from the beginning, such as ancient texts like The Infancy Gospel of Thomas, which has the boy Jesus breathing life into mud-pie birds and killing a playmate with a well-placed curse. In our modern era, many authors tried their hand at solving the problem of the gaps, creatively expanding the biography of Jesus, stuffing the “missing years” with stories and ideas that typically reveal more about what the author thinks is important or necessary or holy or right than anything interesting about Jesus himself.
In our own lives, we may wonder about what Jesus was like as a boy or what he did growing up, but we tend to try our creative hand at a different, although related gap: we fill our ignorance about what Jesus is about and what he calls us to do with our own surmising, and the result is similar to those Jesus biographers and novelists: we insert what we think is important or worthwhile about life than really chase after what’s important or worthwhile to Jesus himself.
In short, we do not know our Lord.
One possibility may be because we do not really believe he is alive and at work right now, among us. We may, despite our creeds, actually believe that Jesus is dead, buried and returned to dust long ago, and how can we really know a dead guy? The point, therefore, is simply to do our best to carry out what we “think” Jesus “would want” if he were actually around. But, since he’s not around, we simply consult ourselves—after all, we each know what we want, and it’s not like Jesus can do anything about it.
Now, maybe that option isn’t accurate, at least not for those gathered here today. Certainly you’ve come this far, and why get up, dressed, and come to a place where we’ll talk for an hour or more about a dead guy as if he’s only mostly dead? So, the fact that Jesus is alive may be at root in more of us than at first glance.
But if Jesus is alive, then we have to reckon with the possibility that he—like you, like me—has likes and dislikes. Things he enjoys doing. Preferences in clothing, food, beverages, books and stories, sections of the country, and yes, even people. Forget what would Jesus do; what does Jesus like?
We have a problem of the gaps.
This fact has become more acute in recent decades because we do not know the stories we do have about Jesus. Consider the story today, of the presentation in the Temple. Keep in mind that Mary and Joseph, shaped by the stories that they knew of how God acted and what God asked, show up at the temple, dare we say, dutifully. They do what is expected of them. They are not storming the ramparts of the Temple courts with their demands. They are not self-styled rebels wresting from the religious authorities the blessing to which they believe themselves entitled. Rather, they are conventional, and the ramparts of the Temple and the blessing come from unexpected places and only as a gift. Their contribution to this entire experience is an act of obedience which arises from their knowledge of how God has acted in the past. They don’t show up expecting a Simeon, an Anna, but both of these encounters, these moments of blessing come to them because they have shown up at the right place at the right time and are therefore ready when God does something unanticipated but wonderful.
I can now tell you something else that is wonderful: this Jesus, meant for glory and sorrow, is alive and he likes you. After all, he has called you here, to this place, to this gathering, to this life. And in the Scriptures, you and I can find out how the Lord works, where he likes to go, what he likes to do (admittedly, food and drink will have to wait for a time yet). To read the Bible is to be like Mary and Joseph of old—conventional, maybe even dutiful. To be regularly present in worship is to be just that—regular, even ordinary. To sit with others at their bedside or in their home, to teach someone about the faith, to share time with a neighbor, to give of what we have—all of these are perfectly ordinary, respectable things. Yet each of them is a moment, a chance to be present and ready when God does something unanticipated, unexpected but absolutely wonderful to fill the gap in your life. Amen.