Make Room
December 10, 2023Pastor Travis Deatherage presented this morning's message, "Make Room." A video of the message is here.
Doubting Thomas isn't the only person for whom more and more miracles are needed. In fact, it's the human condition. Or put a little differently, the power of miracles to sustain human faith is very weak. The Torah makes that clear with example after example of miracles happening followed by quickly languishing faith.
There are many examples of this in the Exodus story alone. No sooner had the Israelites received the manna from heaven and experienced the delivery of the Ten Commandments at Mt. Sinai with all the associated smoke and fire and booming voice did they begin their complaining and dwindling faith. You'd think getting water out of a rock would help, too, but no. They actually wanted to go back to Egypt! Where the pots were full of meat. Free meat! Sad.
It's pathetic, actually, how humans so quickly forget miracles. Understanding this is one of the key messages of the Torah. How often do people pray "get me out of this mess and I'll..." and days later the promise is totally forgotten or ignored? A lot.
This is probably why we don't see the "big miracles" anymore. God has figured out their effect doesn't last long.
As for the Jews not expecting the Messiah that actually showed up... It's true. In a way. Some were no doubt misled, or at least misconstrued what they were taught. God of the Old Testament is a singularity, and a big deal is made of that. God and Man are totally separate. God and nature are totally separate. God is ONE. And there is no other god. The concept of a trinity would have been foreign if not downright blasphemous. There was also confusion as to where Jesus came from versus where they expected the Messiah to come from (e.g. John 7:41-42).
In addition, Judaism taught that the coming of the Messiah would be accompanied by world peace, the rebuilding of the Temple, and Jews returning to their homeland. None of those things came with Jesus. This is what Jews expected in the "end of days."
Interestingly enough, there are Messianic Jews, that is, Jews that believe in Jesus. There seems to be some discussion as to whether this is a Christian phenomenon or a Jewish one. For more info, see the Wikipedia article here. In any case, when I stumble upon writings by Messianic Jews, they are far more steeped in the Hebrew background than I expect from Christians and they tend to "appear" Jewish.
And as for the notion that "the Jews killed Jesus"... While technically true to some extent, I think much perspective is missing. Some group of Jews certainly influenced the Romans to put him to death, but the Romans have to share the blame, too. We also have no idea what percentage of the Jewish population led the charge. I suspect fairly small, much like today's rabble rousers often represent a small portion of our population. And there's no doubt in my mind that the movement to eliminate Jesus was led in large part by the Jewish elite, e.g. from within the Pharisees and Sadducees with whom there was conflict between as well. And of course, further complicating this, is the fact that not all Pharisees or Sadducees thought alike. There was division internally about Jesus. By the way, Nicodemus was a Pharisee who eventually "saw the light" and helped Joseph of Arimathea entomb Jesus' body (John 19:38-40).
And as simply taught by experience... Many times, we don't fully understand the current situation or its potential impacts until well after the event when the event's consequences become quite clear. Those consequences can take years to reveal themselves.
At the very end, Travis mentioned the Christmas song "Joy to the World," particularly in regard to the phrase "prepare Him room." It's a very popular Christmas Carol. At the risk of dating myself, I remember as a kid and to this day stopping to listen to a version of the song recorded by Julie Andrews. The song is an adaptation of Psalm 98, written by Isaac Watts and published in 1719. According to Wikipedia, he did not write the song to be a Christmas Carol as the lyrics do not reflect the virgin birth. Rather, his focus was on the second coming! The third verse of the song includes the phrase "far as the curse is found" alluding to Genesis 3:17-19 and Christ's victory over sin. Since the 20th century, again according to Wikipedia, "Joy to the World" has been the most-published Christmas hymn in North America.I wonder (as I wander, out under the sky) how many Christians will recognize and accept the second coming?
Bonus
Second Sunday of Advent - Love
I discovered this week that there is no one order to the themes for each Sunday of Advent. In fact, there are also many lists of themes. I've been working on (and will continue to use) this order for themes, from first to fourth Sunday: Hope, Love, Joy, and Peace (#2 below). There are also (at least) these sets and orders of Advent Sunday themes (from Wikipedia):
Hope-Faith-Joy-Peace
Hope–Love–Joy–Peace
Hope–Peace–Joy–Love
Faithfulness–Hope–Joy–Love
Prophets–Angels–Shepherds–Magi
Faith–Prepare–Joy–Love
The four candles in the Advent Wreath each represent one of the Sundays of Advent. Three are purple, referencing darkness or a period of penance leading up to the Savior's coming.
The other candle is pink, often lit on the third Sunday, and represents the "Rose of Sharon," Jesus. This comes originally from a text in Solomon 2:1, "I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys" (KJV). Sharon is a place in Palestine, and the person speaking in this text is a woman. Getting from this verse in Solomon to Jesus being the Rose of Sharon is something of an arduous path and is not entirely supported by scripture. The connection is that Jesus is the bridegroom and the Church is His bride, and the rose is the perfect flower just as Jesus is perfect, and roses are often given to the bride and Jesus is giving His perfect self to His Church. If you'd like to go further down that path, click here.
There is usually a 5th candle as part of the Advent Wreath known as the Christ Candle. It is white, and is lit on Christmas Eve.
So, in keeping with the path I started for myself, this Sunday of Advent is for Love. As with last week's hope, this is not a new theme in the New Testament. Love abounds in the Old Testament as well. Here are some examples just from the Torah:
Deuteronomy 6:5 (part of the Shema): Love God with all your mind, soul, and muchness.
Leviticus 19:18b: Love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.
Deuteronomy 10:15 "Yet the Lord set his heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them, you above all peoples, as you are this day."
Exodus 20:6 "But showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments."
Exodus 34:6 "The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness…"
Leviticus 19:34 "You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God."
Bonus2
(C)Han(n)uk(k)ah & Dreid(le)(el)(l)s
This time of year, while the Christians are celebrating Christmas, Jews are celebrating Channukah. There are many spellings in English, don't worry about that.
In short, Channukah (not "ch" as in chew, but a real guttural 'h' like when rolling an 'r') is a Jewish holiday celebrated in December that celebrates the 2nd Century BCE recovery of Jerusalem and the dedication of the Second Temple. The root of the word means "dedicate."
Channukah is also called the Festival of Lights. This references the 8-candle menorah plus a 9th candle for lighting. This particular part of the celebration commemorates the miracle of the 1-day oil supply in an oil lamp that lasted eight days. It's an important part of the celebration to make sure the menorah is viewable from the outside, that is, public in some way.
Interestingly, the only Biblical reference to Channukah is in the New Testament when Jesus attends a Hannukah celebration, John 10:22-23, "Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter, and Jesus was in the temple courts walking in Solomon's Colonnade."
The gist of it is... The Light of God's presence was in jeopardy. It would take a miracle...
During our Family Dinner this week, we talked about the 2nd Sunday of Advent and Hannukah. And for our little activity, we played the Dreidel game (also spelled in various ways) which is typically a part of Hannukah. During this historic time, the Greeks prohibited Jews from practicing their faith in any way, including studying the Torah. Kids would gather in hiding places to learn the Torah, and if discovered by Greek soldiers, would quickly pull out and play with a dreidel as if nothing else was happening. Our family game is what's pictured above.
Dreidel refers to the top that is spun during the game. The word's root means to spin or to turn.
There are four Hebrew letters on the dreidel as shown at right. All players ante into the pot, then roll the dreidel one by one. Depending on the roll, the player either gets none of the pot, half the pot, all of the pot, or has to add to the pot ("put in") as indicated at right. If all the pot is taken, everyone antes again. The winner is the last person to have any coins (or whatever tokens are used). The four letters are an acronym for "a great miracle happened there" (in Hebrew, of course). Here's the phrase: נֵס גָּדוֹל
הָיָה שָׁם. If you read from right to left, you'll see that the words start with each of the four letters: nun, gimel, hey, and shin.