Peace on Earth - a sermon for fourth advent

Peace on Earth

Sermon for the Advent of Peace

Rev. Alison Longstaff, Dec 14, 2014

Bath Church of the New Jerusalem

Isaiah 9:2, 6-7; Luke 2: 8-14; Heavenly Secrets 8455

Heavenly Secrets 8455

Peace has within it confidence in the Lord, that He is in charge of everything, and is taking care of everything, and that He is leading to a good outcome.  Those who practice this confidence experience this peace; they fear nothing, and no worry about the future disturbs them.  So far as you and I grow in love to the Lord, so far do we experience this state of peace.

The angels proclaimed to the shepherds, "Peace on earth and good will toward all human kind." Some translations render this, "Peace to all whom God favors," but this implies a sort of "gonna find out who's naughty and nice," God—a God who has favorites and who leaves coal in the stockings of the rest of us. That doesn't align with a God of radical grace and love.

It is we humans who expect God to exclude some of us from His love. It is we humans who like to think that some of us are more worthy of God's favor than others. But worthy/unworthy doesn't apply to God's immense and all-encompassing love. God's love is available always and without condition, the way the sunlight shines unceasingly in the heavens. It is barriers inside and around us that make it seem as though God's favor is inconstant. Things in our life can block our ability to feel God's love just the way the clouds sometimes block the sunlight; still God's love shines perpetually and without ceasing, just waiting for our clouds to dissipate once again.

So I believe God desires "Peace on earth, and good will for all human kind," not just a few lucky ones.

But unfortunately current events show that peace and good will toward all human kind is far from the status quo in our world. Indeed it is even far from the status quo in our nation. Would you say that peace and good will exist in this state? In this town? This congregation? How about in your home? What about inside your very heart?

Because they are all connected.

When I think about the decided lack of "peace and good will toward all human kind" on earth, I can get very discouraged. Listening to the news and the choices being made by some of the world's leaders, I can get impatient and frustrated and angry. I want to shout at the idiots who are making the choices that create all the strife and cause so much harm.... Surely we know better by now! Surely we should have learned from our past mistakes and stopped doing such idiotic things to our planet and each other?

But one fact of human kind is that the more anxious we get, the less "mindful" or enlightened we behave. The more threatened we feel, the more the rational mind shuts down, and our less evolved coping strategies take over. It doesn't matter what I may know "with my whole head;" all wisdom will go out the window the minute I am under duress unless I have made an intentional practice of mindfulness and peace-keeping. Peace requires deep trust in the Lord, deep compassion for the neighbor, and intentional peace-keeping behaviors.

So as much as I might enjoy blaming the idiots "out there" for their choices, this probably isn't my most helpful response. It serves the purpose of giving vent to the hurting I feel inside over the human suffering and injustice, but it probably also just contributes to the problem. To quote loosely a Canadian radio comedy, "Tom, Tom, Tom. Do you really think you're going to get greedy, short-sighted, and arrogant people to amend their ways by calling them 'greedy, short-sighted, and arrogant'?" (Dead Dog Cafe) In other words, accusations and name-calling rarely evokes the response we desire. Shouting indignant accusations is often our most immediate response to injustice, but it just makes people defensive, and defensive people are not good listeners.

Now, before I proceed further, I want to talk about true peace and fake peace. True peace comes from a heart at rest—one without malice, that trusts completely in God's providence. There is a reason we call peace "resting in the Lord."

Smiling and saying things are fine when they are not is not true peace. Not allowing dissenting voices does not allow true peace. Covering up unhappiness and silencing complaints creates only a false peace.

True peace requires that all sides have the courage to address the conflict. True peace can be found when all sides probe with compassion the deep sources of the pain and then work to resolve them. True peace can only be found when we become willing to see our own part in the conflict and to make the necessary changes in our response. It requires that we be trustworthy, even when we are not sure the other parties will also be trustworthy.

I am sure we have all had encounters with the person who smiles to our face and then complains to everyone else behind our backs. Perhaps we have even been this person?

It is the default human response to discuss our outrage with anybody but the offender, to lick our wounds and bolster support. It feels much safer to do this. But it is a problem. It takes real courage to address the issue with the one who offended us and try to work it out before we start recruiting others to fortify our side. Taking our problem to a third party and recruiting them against the other "side" is called "triangulation," in counseling circles. This behavior is common, but it is rather unenlightened. Triangulation is by definition a conflict-escalating behavior because it reinforces the impression of opposition. It asks for loyalty to one's own story against the other side's story sometimes before the other party even knows there is a problem.

When you or I are the one who is being whispered about, we may have no idea there has been a problem until a whole army shows up on our doorstep, so to speak. By that time the triangulator may have such an investment in being the injured party that it is often too late to defuse the misunderstanding or make easy amends. By that time we already have a sort of war on our hands whether we like it or not. Poorly chosen words have become a cherished wound, the defenses are up, and the injured party is taking no prisoners.

Does this dynamic sound familiar? Has this happened to you? I know I have experienced both sides of this dynamic. I have been the outraged triangulator (I hope I have learned since then!) and I have been the one who has had no idea there was a problem until it was far too late and the grudge was well and truly entrenched.

What versions of this scenario have you experienced? How did you like it? Were you the triangulating injured party or the oblivious offender? Or perhaps you have been sucked into the conflict of one triangulator against another triangulator and you didn't know how to get out of the middle. In any case, triangulation creates a mini war. It is different from big war only in scale. It is not the way of peace.

The hardest part of divorce on children is not the divorce itself, but the ways the parents can try to recruit the children against the other parent. This is deeply unfair to the children and creates a terrible inner conflict for them. In some cases, it is a form of abuse. Yet until we discipline ourselves into more enlightened behaviors, triangulation is our first go-to coping mechanism when we are hurt or threatened. We humans tend to "go to war" as a default, and in war innocents get killed. They are the first and worst casualty of every war whether global or personal.

Sometimes our wars are cold or silent. We may be so conflict-avoidant that we choose to dodge all interaction with the "problem" person. Perhaps we harbor resentment towards that person, holding arguments with them in our heads, though we would never actually attempt the imagined conversation in reality. Resentment feels like we are getting back at the other person, but it actually only harms us. "Resentment is like eating rat poison and expecting a rat to die," they say. It eats us up inside, not the one we are mad at.

Bearing a grudge, holding resentment, pretending everything is fine, and simply avoiding the problem all create a false peace, because the conflict remains inside us. There is a knot of unresolved negative energy that stays with us wherever we go, affecting us, and not the one with whom we are in conflict. And it will not go away until we change ourselves—not the other, ourselves. Passive aggression is still aggression. It is just pretending to be nice. It is fake peace.

To quote Jeremiah 6:14: "They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. 'Peace, peace,' they say, when there is no peace."

So how do we change our default response of attack and defense to something entirely other—to something that transcends the war impulse and taps a deeper wisdom?

Today's reading from Swedenborg says that peace comes from trusting God. We must cultivate a deep confidence in God's all-powerful and benevolent providence that is so strong we cannot be shaken "though the earth be removed, and the mountains be swept into the midst of the sea" (Psalm 42:6). In fact, I believe today's verse from Luke is also showing us the way to peace. When it says, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will to all humankind," I believe we can read it as when we "glorify" God in the highest (which is to adore and put our absolute trust in the most-powerful and most-high God) the result is peace in our natural lives ("on earth") which comes from a cessation of ill-will. When we deeply trust that God has everything under control, we realize we have nothing to fear. When our soul is at peace and we have nothing to fear, we truly do begin to wish well to all of God's created children, not just the ones who have pleased us. This is the Prince of Peace born in us indeed.

It is the nature of our earth-bound mind to be attached to temporal outcomes and worry about short-term goals. It can't help it. It can't help but think it is alone, and that every outcome is its responsibility. It is run most often by the ego. Resistance and struggle and "victim" are its default.

But according to the 'Borg, (Swedenborg) "Resistance is futile." We can fight the flow of Providence or relax into it. It will carry us toward the happiest outcome that we will allow, regardless.

When you go from this place today, I ask you to cultivate an attitude of peace. I ask you to work on an ever-deepening trust in providence, no matter how much the ego-mind scoffs.

Yes, this life may sometimes give us very scary situations. Trusting Providence does not mean this life will be easy. Rather, trusting in providence changes what we pay attention to. It shifts our attachments from earthly values to spiritual ones. It makes earthly disappointments much easier to bear, and opens our eyes to coming joys we never even imagined before. So, no matter what comes our way in this life, we are at ease, because we know that God is always turning everything into the best possible spiritual outcome, no matter how things look temporarily in this life.

To quote the mystic Julian of Norwich, "And all will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well. Trust in God, and all indeed will be well.

Let the Prince of Peace be born in your heart, and then you will find "peace on earth and good will toward all human kind." Amen.

The Readings

Isaiah 9:2, 6-7

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned

 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
    Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end.
He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it
    with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

Luke 2: 8-14   Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid. Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.  And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.”

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:

“Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward all humankind!”

Small Joys in a Big World - a sermon for third advent

Small Joys in a Big World

Sermon for the Advent of Joy

Rev. Alison Longstaff, Dec 14, 2014

Bath Church of the New Jerusalem

Luke 2: 1-7; John 15:9-17; Heavenly Secrets 543

These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.  (John 15: 11-12)

The small, snuffling sounds of a newborn.  The solid weight of that new bundle in your arms.  All the promise inherent in that new life.  Enter the presence of a newborn and it is hard NOT to feel delight and joy.

Swedenborg says that the highest angels are with a newborn from conception.  I believe we can feel those angels when we are around a newborn. We all get a little softer.  We can’t help but smile.  Maybe we can even feel a subtle peace, an ineffable sweetness, and a gentle JOY.

If we are to believe Swedenborg, that joy is present because the angles with that baby live in constant joy.  Their sense of God’s love and protection, their absolute trust in God’s providence, and their deep wisdom from years of experience have made them able to sustain that deep, deep, peace and joy on a constant basis. 

God plans for each of us to live in that bliss—a bliss that we ALL knew once when we were newborns. We too were surrounded and cared for by the highest angels, and that experience is imprinted on our souls.  It is a gift from God.  And it contains part of the road map back to that place of deep peace and joy.
 

Because you see, that innocent joy doesn't last.  It can’t.  According to Swedenborg, as we become more and more self-aware, these highest angels must pull away from us and be replaced by lower angels and then still lower angels to respect our spiritual freedom. This protects us from being overwhelmed by the intensity of their love.  And so, as you and I grow up, our surrounding spirits are gradually exchanged from more exalted ones to less exalted ones until we are surrounded by spiritual beings much closer to our own level of spiritual development—closer to what we can tolerate.

These lower guardian beings are still angels.  They still far surpass our capacity for love and wisdom and joy, but not so much so that we are overwhelmed.  They are advanced beyond us just enough to make good spiritual mentors; and their energy invites us to advance into our own love and wisdom—towards something closer to what they have—for the sake of our own happiness.  

The paragraph I quoted before the sermon from Swedenborg’s long work “Heavenly Secrets” essentially says that even the most intense joy you and I might experience today can’t even come close to touching the dullest joy of these lowest angels.  In other words, God gives us as much joy as we can handle, but not so much that it hurts.  We are on a continual path of spiritual growth, and as we grow spiritually more adept, God grants us deeper and deeper joy.  As we grow stronger, wiser, more loving, and closer to God, we become increasingly able to sustain this heavenly joy which is our birthright.  It is God’s plan for us.  But we must undergo a lot of preparation before we can handle it in its full expression.

So on this Advent Sunday of Joy, what is it that we must do to be worthy of this joy?  How do we grow stronger, wiser, more loving, and closer to God?  How do we prepare ourselves for the birth of this incredible joy into our lives?

Our scripture reading contains the answer.  We are to keep God’s commandments, particularly the command to love one another as God has loved us.

If only it were as easy as it sounds.

“Loving one another” is both very simple and very complex.  On paper it sounds easy.  But once we try it in real-life settings—once we get down to matters of division of labor and money, issues of trust and expectation, commitment and entitlement, loyalty and betrayal, it all gets rather muddy.  We realize we must learn the difference between “tough love”—which doesn't look like love but is, and codependency—which looks like love but isn't.  We must learn how to give without resentment, and how not to give without guilt, and when each is appropriate.  We need to develop great compassion and great clarity of mind—things which only come through time and experience and lots of personal work.

One terrific aid to help us along this learning curve is the Ten Commandments.  In them, God gave us a simplified break-down of how to love God and our neighbor well. (P.S. These rules and guidelines can be found in many other world spiritualities too, with slightly different wording.  This fits with the Swedenborgian teaching that God put into each world religion all that we need to find our way back to true loving-kindness and wisdom—aka “God”). 

These basic human laws of respectful co-existence provide the path back to joy, back to that heaven we experienced as newborns, and back to God.  They help mend our relationship with ourselves, with God, and with each other.  So how come we are not all living in peace and joy and love right now? 

It would be convenient and easy to say that life is not the blissful dream it should be because “bad people out there” in the world are ruining things for all of the rest of us and we are all victims of their dishonesty and greed and fear. There is some truth in that, but thinking that way is also “playing the victim card” which tends to trap us in hopelessness and helplessness.  A stronger and more empowering truth is that you and I have many ways we are complicit in the same dishonesties if on a much smaller scale. Therefore you and I working on and healing the ways we are contributing to the problem right now DOES make a difference.  

We only have the power to change ourselves.  In fact the only way we can truly ever change any “them,” “out there,” is to look for how the things we so dislike out there are also in our own skin, and to make them better inside us first.

Indeed, many spiritualities teach that me changing myself and you changing yourself for the better right here, right now, does move the whole world toward something better in a real way.  By acknowledging and correcting the increasingly subtle ways I am lying to myself, and any way I am doing harm to those I deal with, I make things better, even if it doesn't feel like it some days.  Each one of us becoming just a little more honest and kind does make the whole world more honest and kind, period.  Our greatest potency is rarely in fixing “them.”  It is found in what you and I can do in our small ways inside ourselves right here and right now.
   

Swedenborg, in the book True Christianity, says that the potency of the Ten Commandments lies in their deep spiritual application rather than in their letter.  It is the spirit of these laws that the angels pay attention to, not the simple words. 

“Thou shalt not steal” certainly means in the concrete sense “don't shoplift or mug or break into people's homes or cars to take their stuff.”   But more deeply it means “don’t steal” in your mind and heart and attitude.  Stealing in your mind and heart and attitude shows up as entitlement, taking credit for things not ours, and generally feeling more valuable or worthy than someone else. 

The cry “black lives matter” that has arisen strongly in the US over the last several weeks is calling attention to a deeply ingrained cultural attitude that steals human worth from one group or person and hands it to another.  We must stop this stealing as a nation.  In any way any one of us individually deems ourselves better than another, we too are stealing from that other.  An attitude of entitlement breeds contempt for that other and gives us permission to take what we like from them, because they are less than us.  A very real way you and I can work to heal this sickness in our nation is to be on the alert for how you and I individually deem ourselves better than or objectify any other human or group in our personal lives.  Yes, speak out against the injustices you see in the broader world.  But also look for and work on any injustices inside your own spiritual space that may show up.  Because that is the most powerful way you can help.

The saying that “if you break one commandment you break them all” (James 2:10) has a lot of truth to it.  My sick attitudes invite me into hurtful behaviors that I then justify. And because some part of me knows that I am not in integrity, I will feel a niggling unease.  Unwilling to hear or see the truth, I will lie to myself.  Do you see the pattern? Entitlement leads to stealing behaviors, which then leads to lying and covering-up.  In fact, I will develop an entire inner “public-relations team” to protect me from seeing my own dishonesty and lack of integrity.  One bad choice can start a whole spiral of bad choices, calling me into greater and greater self-deception, entitlement and denial.  It is easy to see this when it is happening in others.  It is harder to recognize it in ourselves.

But before we get too discouraged, let me remind us all that to the extent that we keep even one commandment, we are keeping them all.  The spiral goes in the other direction too.  It depends on where our focus is.  Are we generally lying and hiding, or disclosing and coming clean?

If we are focusing on being more honest, we will be open to seeing more and more the ways we have been lying to ourselves.  This will invite more personal integrity, which will open us to more compassion, more humility, and more honesty.  If we are working on not stealing, physically or emotionally or psychologically, we will grow in respect for ourselves and others.  We will see how we have been stealing from ourselves and our loved ones as well as from others—stealing integrity, stealing security, stealing trustworthiness.  And as we stop stealing, and we stop lying to cover up our stealing, we start to grow in trustworthiness, security, and integrity.  Intentional steps toward right relationship with ourselves and others and God starts a progressive cycle of right relationship in every corner of our being.

If we intentionally set our minds to chipping away at our blindnesses, God assures us that we will reach a state like that of the angels—so pure of heart and mind that we no longer lie, we no longer steal, we no longer need to invalidate (kill) any other to ensure our own sense of well-being.   And that is when our joy will be more full than we can possibly imagine.

That is why I like to see the Ten Commandments as the Ten Promises.  Because until we are completely angelic, we are pretty much breaking the Ten Commandments in small ways all the time.  We can’t help it and we can’t see it until we are ready.  We don’t even know we are doing it.  But fear not; we are not held accountable for the things we cannot yet see.  Genuine openness to seeing what we are ready to see and changing it as we are able is all God asks.

God wants our joy.  God wants it with every fiber of “his” being.  But God will never force on us anything we don’t want or aren't ready for.  And so the invitation stands open; the path is always waiting; and joy awaits us like gold at the end of the rainbow.

Meanwhile, these holidays are likely to be a mix.  There will be moments of exhaustion, discouragement, disappointment, and despair.  There will also likely be moments of delight and magic, heart-warming interactions and joyful connections.  All the while I invite you to trust in the promise—not that this season will be perfect—but that each holiday is moving us closer to heavenly joy so long as we are doing our inner work.  Good will to all human-kind is both the destination and the journey; and so long as we are taking the steps we can today, we have in some sense already arrived. 

Joy and delight. These are our birthright and our promise. May you be open to them in the coming days in big and small ways.  Indeed, may you be overcome with such joy, that you touch the joy of the angels at the Lord’s birth, if just for a moment.

Amen.

The Readings

Luke 2: 1-7   

In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.  All went to their own towns to be registered. Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David.  He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child.  While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child.  And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

John 15:9-17

“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.

“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another.

Heavenly Secrets 543

543. Certain spirits wished to know what heavenly joy was. Therefore they were allowed to perceive their own inmost joy, even to a point where they could not bear it. But even this was not angelic joy. It barely resembled the slightest of angelic joys. These spirits were allowed to realize this by sharing their joy. Their own joy was so meagre that it seemed rather tepid, yet they called it utterly heavenly since it was the deepest joy they could manage. From this it is clear that when we are allowed to experience our deepest joy this is for us heavenly joy. Nor can we tolerate anything deeper, as it becomes painful.

Is Love Alive? - a sermon for second Advent

Is Love Alive?

Sermon for the Advent of Love

Rev. Alison Longstaff, Dec 7, 2014

Bath Church of the New Jerusalem

Luke 1: 26-38, Matthew 1:18-25, Selections from Heavenly Secrets 1820:2

There is a bit of dark humor that really appeals to me.  And as it applies to today’s topic I will share it with you now. It goes like this:

“We are born naked, wet, and hungry.  Then things get worse.”

So, today I want to talk about the vulnerability of love, and just how vulnerable God was willing to become to deliver His message of love.  He didn’t show his love by being the mightiest, or having the biggest guns, or the most money, or the best Homeland security, but by being the most vulnerable.  He allowed himself to be tortured and murdered to show us in the most palpable way imaginable that love transcends even unjust arrest, torture, and death.  He chose to be vulnerable.  His strength was illustrated by his “weakness”.

So as we are celebrating His birth, with joy and gifts and lights and hope, can we remember what He chose?  How will it all end?  Will LOVE live?

Raise your hand if you have ever heard of a “Blue” Christmas service.

 

A “Blue” Christmas service is one that makes a space for those whose pain and loss during this “most wonderful time of the year” is too great for them to be able to join in the festivities.  When most of the rest of us are wishing each other “Merry Christmas!” or “Happy Hanu-Solsti-Bodhi-Kwaanza-kkuh!” a Blue Christmas service carves out a safe and sacred space for those who need to be with the truth of their emotional reality—sadness, sorrow, loss, homesickness, pain, separation, or bereavement.  It is a gentle, quiet space, not even pretending that everyone should be joyful.

Somehow, loss, separation, disruption, and bereavement are more sharply outlined during the holidays when all those around us seem to be celebrating.  One woman confessed to me recently, “Why does everyone have to tell me to have a Happy Thanksgiving?  It’s not a happy thanksgiving.  My mother died and we aren't celebrating at all.”  In her pain she heard, “Happy Thanksgiving” as a command, and it sharpened her sense of grief.  It is not uncommon for raw loss to come out as anger or bitterness.  And unless we have been trained to deal with such loss when we encounter it, we are likely to feel uncomfortable or guilty or maybe even judgmental of the one who is voicing such hurt and pain during the holidays.

My hope is that today’s message will open our awareness to include with compassion and comfort all the experiences of this holiday season—the joyful and sorrowful, the bright and the bitter, the sweet and the sharp—believing that somehow they are united by love and remembering that love makes a space for all sides of us. 

Suffering need not diminish the sparkling joy; nor does any delight and pleasure need to invalidate the sorrow.  They can live side by side in this season, but it may take intentionality to learn how to be comfortable with all of it.  Sometimes the joy and pleasure will be contagious and brighten the days of the sorrowful.  At other times the suffering is so acute that the surrounding joy must show respect in quietness, holding those suffering in love and patience.

According to Swedenborg, we are what we love.  Love is what drives us and motivates us and inspires us.  And love is what hurts most acutely when attacked. 

We love, and we love deeply.  Our greatest joy is when people we love are doing well, and when we hear news of new love and new life.  The toughest times are when something we love is threatened, or is suffering, or has been lost. 

Joy and love open us up.  Pain and fear shut us down.  Do you see the relationship?

To guard what is most precious to us, we build defenses around it.  We don’t want the things we treasure most to be hurt or threatened in any way.  Some defenses are reasonable and prudent. But sometimes, if we have been hurt deeply, we build bigger and bigger defenses, hiding from more and more of life, swearing we will not be hurt that way again.  It makes sense that we do this, but building stronger and stronger defenses will not serve us in the long run.  Because defenses, while protecting the things we love, also block love’s movement and expression, like a princess walled up in a tower to keep her safe; or like a light hidden under a bucket.  One’s defense mechanisms themselves can end doing more harm than good.

So let’s look at how today’s scripture selections speak to love and defensiveness and vulnerability.

In our first Scripture reading, we see Mary hearing the news that she would become the mother of God.  This promise was actually inviting Mary into tremendous vulnerability.  A woman when pregnant is far more vulnerable than she is ordinarily.  To be an unmarried pregnant woman in that culture was one of the worst fates Mary could face.  During labor she would be reduced to complete dependency on those around her for her life and the life of her baby.  Yet Mary essentially said, “So be it,” to all of it, even though her pregnancy could mean Joseph’s rejection. Mary said, “Yes,” even though she could be left alone with an infant and no means or support. Granted, she had an angel reassuring her, but still, Mary’s trust here is remarkable.

Then we see Joseph being asked to accept Mary even though she was pregnant. Joseph clearly wasn’t happy with Mary’s news, because he took at least overnight, and possibly longer to decide how to respond.  In fact, we read that Joseph had pretty much decided to cut Mary off “quietly” until the angel intervened. The Joseph side of our nature is like that.  It nearly says “no” to God’s birth into our lives because it is more cautious.  Joseph was afraid, or the angel would not have said, “Do not be afraid to take Mary to wife.”

But with the angel’s promptings, Joseph did eventually say “yes” to the care of Mary and thus to the birth of this Divine child into his life. 

In Swedenborgian theology, there are two sides to each of us, rather like the two hemispheres of our brain.  There is the open, connecting, creative, optimistic, inclusive side of us (or our right-brain side); and there is the protective, analytical, sorting, boxing and prioritizing side, (or our left-brain side).  Mary shows up here as our right-brain response to God’s advent into our lives.  She is the part of us ready to accept and gestate this Divine in-breaking with very few questions. That part of us simply says “yes” right away. 

Joseph is representing our left-brain energy.  His role will be to protect and provide for this child that is not his own.  He is hesitant and skeptical; he takes time to discern the risks and benefits. He nearly says no, before an angel speaks in his dreams and turns him around. 

When I think of these two energies and all the ways they show up in my life, one example that makes me smile is this church’s board, and the lovely mix of dreamers and money-crunchers, optimists and … well, the hesitant and careful.  We need both energies. One isn't better than the other any more than the left hemisphere is better than the right in our brains. To function at our best we need a healthy marriage between them, in our personal inner lives, and in our communities, and on every church board.  In every aspect of life we get onto trouble when the dreamers charge ahead without the consent of the careful, or when the careful stonewall every dream because of risk-aversion.  The two sides must work together as a team, trusting the wisdom inherent in each; and most of all, as in the story of Mary and Joseph, needing to remember that it is God’s direction and guidance that will accomplish the plan not their own dreams or prudence.  Neither Mary nor Joseph alone could have been able to birth, catch, hold, clean, swaddle and nurse this Divine expression of Love at his most wet and squirmy and vulnerable.

Love makes us vulnerable.  And loving someone small and defenseless who is relying on us for safety and survival makes us the most vulnerable of all.  

Our reading from Swedenborg says that evil attacks what we love most. Herod went after every single baby and toddler for miles around.  Our softness, our tenderness, our openness—these things are seen as a threat in a macho culture.  When we are all about our own ability not to get hurt, or to be the strongest, or to be “invulnerable,” anything seen as “weak” is anathema.  Everything is viewed in threat and risk terms, and everything that can make us vulnerable is the thing to be guarded against above all. 

That was not Jesus’ message nor his model. 

While it is a normal human response to react to pain and injury by throwing up defensive walls, defensive walls stop the flow of love.  They leave no room at the inn.  They create a space to hide, and hiding is not what we were brought here to do.

The experiences of sorrow and loss around this holiday are experiences of love too.  They express great love, or we would not hurt so much.  While the pain and loss can make us wonder if we will ever feel joy again, the answer lies in the pain itself.  The love is alive or there would be no pain.  It truly is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.  And where there is love, there is God. And where there is God, all things are possible.

So if you are feeling naked, wet, and hungry, and like things are just going to get worse, remember: Love has a way of accomplishing what it sets out to do.  It holds back nothing from those it loves. True vulnerability is the bravest and strongest part of us, no matter how things look, because it is willing to go into and through the darkness, trusting in the new dawn.

So this Christmas, let us try to say “Yes” to the birth of vulnerability in our own lives however that shows up for us.  When an angel asks us to take a risk for love, will we dare to say “yes” and trust that God has a plan?  Mostly, will we heed the call of love, and be brave enough to face the darkness even with all the feelings of vulnerability and pain?  Because that is the path love takes and the way to new life.  Amen

The following was the interlude:

Winter Song,By Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson

Bum bum bum bum, bum bum bum bum
Bum bum, bum bum bum bum
Bum bum, bum bum bum bum

This is my winter song to you
The storm is coming soon
It rolls in from the sea

My voice, a beacon in the night
My words will be your light
To carry you to me

Is love alive?
Is love alive?
Is love (pause)

They say that things just cannot grow
Beneath the winter snow
Or so I have been told

They say we're buried far
Just like a distant star
I simply cannot hold

Is love alive?
Is love alive?
Is love alive?

This is my winter song
December never felt so wrong
Cause you're not where you belong
Inside my arms

Bum bum bum bum, bum bum bum bum
Bum bum, bum bum bum bum
Bum bum, bum bum bum bum

I still believe in summer days
The seasons always change
And life will find a way

I'll be your harvester of light
And send it out tonight
So we can start again

Is love alive?
Is love alive?
Is love alive?

This is my winter song
December never felt so wrong
Cause you're not where you belong
Inside my arms

This is my winter song to you
The storm is coming soon
It rolls in from the sea

My love a beacon in the night
My words will be your light
To carry you to me

Is love alive?
Is love alive?
Is love alive?
Is love alive?

The Readings

Luke 1: 26-38  Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth,  to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary.  And having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”

 But when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and considered what manner of greeting this was.  Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.  And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name Jesus.  He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David.  And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.”

Then Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I do not know a man?”

And the angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God.  Now indeed, Elizabeth your relative has also conceived a son in her old age; and this is now the sixth month for her who was called barren.  For with God nothing will be impossible.”

Then Mary said, “Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.

Matthew 1: 18-25  Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.  Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly.  But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.  She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”  All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: “Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.”  When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.

Heavenly Secrets 1820:2, 5 portions

Since few people know what temptations really are, let a brief explanation of them be given here. Evil spirits only attack what someone loves, and the more intensely we love, the more fiercely do those spirits attack us. By attacking what we love most deeply, they attack every single thing about us, since each person’s very life consists in what we love. Nothing gives evil spirits more delight than to destroy someone; and they would attack what we love relentlessly if the Lord did not drive them away.