Holy Name

Holy Name 2017

Numbers 6:22-27; Psalm 8; Gal 4:4-7; Luke 2:15-21

                                                           Rev. Adam T. Trambley                                  

January 1, 2017, St. John’s Sharon

This morning we celebrate the feast of the Holy Name, when the Son of God’s human parents named him Jesus as the Archangel Gabriel told them to. According to Jewish custom, that naming took place on the eight day after birth at the baby’s circumcision. (Curiously, most Christmas pageants feature Christmas shepherds and Epiphany kings but skip right over the circumcision occurring in between.)

Names are important because true names tell us important things about a person.  Jesus was chosen to be the Son of God’s name because that name, meaning “He Saves,” says something about the core of who Jesus is and what he is about.  At the same time, Jesus is not the only name for the Son of God.  We can’t hope to understand the enormity of God’s being in one human word, so we rely on multiple names -- inspired names and names that speak the truth -- but nevertheless multiple names, to tell us about the breadth of God’s being. 

A colleague of mine tells a story about being on a plane. He was sitting next to an African-American gentleman who was writing in a notebook. When he asked what he was writing, the man said, “Every day, I read my Bible. After I read my Bible, I write down all the names of God I learned that day. I have already filled three notebooks. When I get to heaven and I see God, I want to recognize him and know his name.”

We all need to spend enough time with God in prayer and in the Holy Scriptures so that we can find the names of God he wants to reveal to us. Without offering a shortcut to that work we all need to do, I want to use this beautiful cross-stitch that Becky Yoho did to talk about names of Jesus found in scripture.

Prince of Peace comes from prophecies of Isaiah looking forward to the end times when the lion would lie down with the lamb and the wolf with the kid.  This name speaks to Jesus not only as the one who ends all war, but also the restoration of all creation to harmony.

Messiah, Christ. Messiah is the Hebrew word and Christ is Greek word for anointed.  Kings and priests were anointed, and the Messiah was to be the person that God anointed to usher in his coming Kingdom who would act as both the King and the High Priest for God.  Christ ends up becoming one of the key terms for Jesus in the New Testament precisely because he is anointed by God in a special way, carrying out the Kingly task of ruling the universe and the priestly task of atoning for the sins of the world beyond anything any earthly king or priest could accomplish.   

The Way.  Jesus called himself the Way, the Truth and the Life.  In the book of Acts, early Christians called themselves followers of the Way.  Following Jesus actually leads us on the path that somehow is also Jesus, who brings us truth and life as we live out the life of Christ.  Jesus is not some static being that we can paint a picture of leave on a shelf.  The Way indicates a dynamic movement that is part of how we come into deeper relationship with God.   

Redeemer.  When someone had committed some sort of offense, they might be enslaved or even killed unless as certain ransom was paid.  A redeemer was a person who could pay off their debt and have them released.  Jesus is our redeemer because when humanity sinned and became slaves to sin and death, Jesus paid the price that allowed us freedom and life again. 

Jehovah.  In the Old Testament, God gives Moses his personal name.  Eventually the Jewish people felt it was too holy to say, so they read out loud either LORD or GOD whenever that personal name was written in the scriptures.  Since Hebrew has no written vowels and the pronunciation was lost, all we have is the four written letters Y-H-W-H.  Early English translators decided that they wanted to have something for the name of God, but didn’t want to use what might have been close to the true pronunciation out of respect for the name’s holiness, so they chose to use Jehovah which kept the same basic consonants.  Today, most translations either use LORD or GOD in all capital letters, or translate the name as Yahweh, which is likely closer to the original pronunciation. 

Kurios. The New Testament was originally written in Greek and Kurios is the Greek word for Lord.

King of Kings.  King of Kings means the greatest of the kings.  Interestingly, in the Old Testament it is used for kings such as Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon or Artaxerxes of Persia.  In first Timothy and Revelation, however, it refers to Jesus, who is risen from the dead, who has put all powers and principalities under his feat, and who is coming back.   Revelation 19:16 even says that “King of Kings and Lord of Lords” is inscribed as a name upon his thigh.

I Am.  In the account of Moses at the burning bush, God actually gives Moses two names that are related.  One is his personal name, Yahweh, which is related to the Hebrew verb to be in some manner, and the other name is I AM WHO AM.  God is clearly all about being and helping others exist.  Jesus takes this name for God and applies it to himself in various contexts, including referring to himself as “I AM.”  He also uses I AM to say the following about himself as God: I AM the bread of life; I AM the light of the world; I AM the good shepherd; I AM the way, the truth, and the life; I AM the true vine; I AM the resurrection and the life. We could spend time talking about all those names, as well, but that would be another sermon.

Star of Jacob. I was not familiar with this name.  We might assume it refers to the star the magi followed, but this name actually comes from an oracle uttered by Balaam in Numbers 24 and is akin to the name King of Kings or Messiah.  Balaam was a powerful, but not particular trustworthy prophet, whom Balak hired to curse Israel.  Balaam found he could not, and blessed them instead.  His final prophecy talked about a star coming out of Jacob who would rule the entire area.

Alpha and Omega. These first and last letters of the Greek alphabet are used in Revelation to refer to Jesus because he was the in the beginning and all things were made through him, and he is also the end and the fulfillment of all things.  Nothing existed before him or will exist after him or exists now that is not part of him.

Eternal Word.  John’s gospel starts by saying that in the beginning was the Word.  The Son of God is the word that God spoke that created everything and links God to his creation.  As God’s Word, Jesus is also how we know and recognize God.  This particular name has overtones of Greek philosophy and Platonism also, that is, again, a sermon for another time.

Son of God. Son of God speaks to Jesus’ existence on earth as the only-begotten of God the Father, as well as his existence everywhere as the second person of the Trinity.

Elohim. Elohim is the Hebrew word for God.  The form Elohim is actually plural, and means literally “gods” but many other forms of the word are also used in scripture for God in different places.  The base root “El” is the same word used in Arabic, a sister language to Hebrew, for God, “Allah.”  In fact, Arabic speaking Christians also use Allah for God the same way we use God to mean God, whether we are talking of the Father, or the Son, or the Trinity. 

Wonderful Counselor, along with Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace, are all names Isaiah gives to the child who will be born for us on whose shoulders authority rests.  Jesus is understood to be wise and powerful.  He can help us know what to do when we need counsel and he can accomplish what he wants to do, as well.

The Anointed One is just a way to say the Messiah or the Christ in English.

Light of the World is one of the names Jesus gives himself, and it refers primarily to the ways in which he allows people to do the works of God instead of stumbling around in the darkness of sin and death. It also refers to all the other ways God’s light comes to us allowing us to live– from knowledge and wisdom to the energy, heat, and the ability to see.

Son of Man, which is literally “Son of Adam,” can mean a human being, and often means for us that Jesus was born of a human mother.  It also seems to mean in some cases simply “myself.”  But Son of Man also refers to a prophecy in Daniel where one like a Son of Man comes down from heaven and is given all glory and kingship forever by the Ancient of Days.  Parts of the Book of Revelation show Jesus as fulfilling this prophecy.  

Emmanuel or God-with-us, is another prophecy from Isaiah about the Messiah, and the name is picked up by Matthew.

Root of Jesse is a name we talked about during Advent, and refers to the fact that the Messiah was the one who created the entire line is King David.  Jesse was David’s father, so Jesus, who is David’s descendent through Joseph, is also the one who brought forth the kings of Israel. 

King of Glory is a term from Psalm 24 which instructs Jerusalem to welcome this mighty king who is also called the Lord of hosts.  Jesus here is not just the king, but the king who has conquered all his enemies and comes back to us victorious. 

Savior is probably one of the key names for Jesus, however, because Mary and Joseph say, as instructed by the Archangel Gabriel, that His name is Jesus, and Jesus means “He saves” or “The Lord Saves”.

Of all the names for that could have been given, Jesus must speak most powerfully about who he is.  Jesus is the savior of the world.  Jesus saves us from darkness and sin and reconciles us back to God.  Even if the Savior does cover the entirety of who the Son of God was, Jesus is really where we need to start.  We cannot recognize Jesus as our Lord or as our King or as almost any of the other names on this or any other list until we realize that he has come to save us.  That he has come to save me.  That in the midst of whatever darkness I am stuck in; that in the midst of whatever wreckage my own sins and brokenness have caused; in the midst of whatever muck broken humanity has tossed me into; that in the mist of wherever I am, Jesus is coming to pull me out of it.  Jesus saves me in the broadest sense of that word.  He is the light that leads me out of my darkness.  He is the lifeguard that keeps me from drowning.  He is the doctor who heals my deepest wounds.  He is the one who forgives all my sins.  He is the bridge that takes me from the life of meaninglessness and purposelessness and pain into a life of meaning and purpose and love and joy and peace.  He is the one who breaks down the walls isolating me from God and other people to restore me to health and sanity in the presence of God and the communion of saints.  He is crucified and risen one who brings me from death into life everlasting.

Jesus saves me.  And he saves you.  And he saves anyone who lets him.  Nothing really happens in our life of faith until we come to know him as that great savior and healer and physician.  Then, once we accept his ministry in our own lives, we can come to know him more and more in all the aspects of his being.  We can learn and appreciate all of his names, whether revealed in scripture or to us personally.  We should spend time like our friend on the plane, learning as many of his names as we can, so we have a deeper relationship with him now and so we recognize him more fully when we meet him in heaven.  But we need to start by coming to know Jesus.  Our savior Jesus.   

Advent Waiting

Advent 1 A 2016

Isaiah 2:1-5;Psalm 122; Romans 13:11-14; Matthew 24:36-44

                                                           Rev. Adam T. Trambley                                  

November 27, 2016, St. John’s Sharon

Waiting.  Advent is a season of waiting.  The very word Advent means that something is coming, that something is moving toward us, that something will be here. 

But not all waiting is the same, not even all waiting during Advent.

We know the waiting we will do for Christmas.  Not for the first Christmas – it is hard to wait for something that has already occurred, although we can prayerfully and liturgically enter into that first incarnational event.  But we wait for our next Christmas, December 25, 2016.  The season of preparation and waiting for that day really began a few days ago on Black Friday, but we can transfer the feast to this First Sunday of Advent.  This waiting for Christmas is a particular kind of waiting because we know when and what we are waiting for.  In four weeks, there will be a beautiful Christmas service at church, there will be celebrations according to our own family traditions, and there will be exchanges of gifts.  Depending on our age and our particular outlook, we may wait for those events with different degrees of excitement, preparation, or even trepidation. 

Part of waiting for Christmas is knowing what we should be doing while we are waiting.  Make the Christmas lists.  Buy the presents.  Send the Christmas cards.  Bake the cookies.  Wrap the presents.  Put up the Christmas tree.  Decorate the house.  Take some cookies to the priest.  Go to Christmas services.  Box up all the cookies and gifts and go to the Christmas party. 

All of these preparations can be overwhelming, but we know how to do them.  And we know what we are expecting when Christmas comes, at least generally.  Sure, some Christmases are better than others, but we always hope for the best ones.  When we get the toys that we want.  When the snow is beautiful on the grass but not on the streets so all the family can get home.  When uncle Joe comes to dinner before he started drinking instead of after.  When everybody gets along and the food doesn’t burn and the little ones are happy and we hear our favorite carols and all seems right with the world, at least for a while.

This Christmas waiting is important and takes place during the Advent season, but it’s not the same as Advent waiting.  Advent waiting is a different kind of waiting. Advent waiting is waiting for a day that we can’t mark on our calendars.  Advent waiting is waiting that doesn’t steadily rise to a peak of excitement and get cleanly resolved like a Hallmark Hall of Fame holiday movie.  Advent waiting is not waiting for the child’s gift but waiting for the deepest longing of mature hearts that have become all too familiar with the world’s brokenness and pain.

Advent waiting is the waiting for the Messiah to return, and such waiting is the work of nothing less than a lifetime.

We practice this waiting in a particular way during Advent, because the preparation of God’s people for the first coming of the Messiah is the same kind of waiting we are called to do today. As we read the prophets poetry describing the details of the great Day of the Lord, we can see parallels of our own deepest desires.  For four weeks, we focus on stoking the flames of our imaginations as we hear holy language pointing our hearts in that heavenly direction. 

This morning Isaiah lays out a particular longing of his people preparing for the coming Christ.  Looking around at the wars laying waste to the house of Jacob, as well as all the nations of the world, Isaiah envisions a time when swords will be beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks.  When the Caesars and the Pharaohs, the despots and dictators, and all those relying on violence to consolidate power and privilege will come to Jerusalem to attend Sunday School classes.  Well, maybe Sabbath School classes, and maybe not the way we think about them, but Isaiah depicts them coming to the Mount of the Lord for instruction on how to live according to the God’s commandments so the world aligns with what the prophets are waiting for.  For the time, as the prophet Amos describes, when justice will roll down like mighty waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream or the time when, as the psalmist writes, the needy will not be forgotten nor the hope of the poor be taken away.  This vision of the great day of the Messiah’s coming is the deepest longing of people who have seen violence and war and injustice and oppression, where cities are destroyed, the innocent killed, and the needy sold for a pair of sandals.  Those of us who have seen war or lost loved ones in war or have been in countries under the control of violent dictators know the longing for the coming of the day of the Lord that Isaiah and the prophets describe.  With that longing comes the knowledge that treaties come and go, alliances and cease fires come and go, prosperity and what passes for peace come and go.  Events during the course of our life may be better or worse, but they are not ultimately what we are waiting for.  We are waiting for the day Isaiah describes, but we can’t put that date into our Google calendar and start a countdown.  Our waiting for that day is advent waiting.

Wednesday our parish lost David Bricker.  Friday was the twelfth funeral so far this year, and a number of other parishioners are currently in hospice care.  Most of us have lost loved ones – and some of us have lost spouses, children or others whose deaths have taken a significant part of our own hearts with them.  We know that life continues, that we can still find moments of joy and love, and that new life continues to be born into our families, but we also know a loss remains that will not go away.  That pain and emptiness points us to the longing for the new life of resurrection.  Our deep desire for that resurrection directs our hearts to that day when the trumpet sounds and the resurrected Lord returns, bringing the dead up from their graves into the fullness of life in the new and eternal Jerusalem.  Yet our own preparations can’t hasten that glorious day.  Waiting for that day is advent waiting.

We could all probably look deep inside and find those places where life has scarred us, scarred our families, and scarred our communities.  Places where the brokenness of our physical bodies, of our emotional health, and of our longed-for relationships seem impossible to heal.  Places where we have done all we can do, yet where undeniable damage remains.  In those places, we either give in to despair, or we learn the waiting of Advent.   We can open our minds and hearts to the possibility of a power greater than ourselves who can actually bring healing and new life.  We can come to trust in the promises of the power of God, not for the Pollyanna pleasures of a time or a season, but for the recreation of the cosmos at the end of the long arc that bends towards justice, for the forgiveness of sins that allow us to live together in an eternal community, and for the resurrection of the body that allows us to integrate our own scars and stigmatas into an imperishable body living where there is no pain nor grief, no tears nor sorrow, but where all eat of the fruit of the trees for the healing of the nations and drink from the springs of the waters of life.  We can cry out with our entire being for this day of salvation, but we can’t order it from Amazon Prime for two-day delivery.  We have to wait for it, and we have to wait for it without knowing when it will come, what exactly it will look like, or how we will be changed as we wait.  But we will wait for that day regardless. 

Waiting for that day is Advent waiting, waiting for a time we can’t know, for gifts we can’t wrap, and with a guest list we can’t even imagine.  Advent waiting is waiting for what is entirely in the hands of our heavenly Father.

However, while we wait with deep longing for that day, our readings advise us to do two things.  The first comes from Paul, who tells us not to fill that space inside us that longs for Christ’s coming with distractions.  He says to put away revelry and drunkenness, debauchery and licentiousness, quarrelling and jealousy.  We are always tempted to fill up the painful parts of our lives with food, drugs, violence, greed, and anything else that provides a strong enough stimulant to dull our pain.  Don’t do it, Paul says.  Instead, wake up and actively wait for the day.  Let our longing propel us to pray harder and get closer to Jesus.  Let the holes in our hearts be hollowed out into the shape of the Messiah such that no one and no thing but Jesus could possibly fill them.  Let us learn to reject anything less than the final fulfillment of our Advent waiting.

Then in the gospel today, Jesus says that people will be going about their daily lives when he does finally come.  People will be marrying and working in the fields and doing all the various things we do.  We have to do all the stuff of life while we are waiting.  But he also tells us not to forget to wait.  The work of this life is important -- it just isn’t a substitute for the Advent waiting for the next life.  We are to go about our business, but not forget to practice waiting while we do so. 

Advent is the time for us to practice waiting.  We wait for the return of the Messiah.  We wait for the fullness of the Kingdom of God.  We wait for the resurrection of ourselves and those we love.  We wait without knowing the day or the hour or precisely what that day or hour will look like.  We wait knowing we may leave this life before finding the fulfillment of what we are waiting for.  This Advent, however, ultimately we wait, because we know that Christ is coming.  Come Lord, Jesus.  We are waiting for you.