Love's Memory is Long

Text: Luke 1:26-38, 2 Samuel 7:1-11

Focus: Love (Advent 4)

Function: To help people understand the love of God for us.

Form: Storytelling/

Intro:

Sometimes in the scriptures, we read of conflicts that happened between different people.

Some of those conflicts were born out of human greed. But at other times, those conflicts were born out of competing passions about the things that are important to God.

Paul, who wrote most of the doctrine of the NT, was not unfamiliar with conflict. Sometimes, Paul was right, and sometimes he was wrong.

Paul was a Pharisee. He was raised in an extremely legalistic and conservative environment.

His first, after conversion conflict was with Peter.

Peter's upbringing was also conservative, but since he was merely a fisherman, he did not have the benefit of the education that Paul had.

Both of these men grew in their faith. Peter, was rash, quick to action and in some ways, perhaps a little bit bull-headed.

And they came to a conflict. Peter was back and forth between the importance of the letter of the law. And he vacillated. When he was with Paul, the letter of the law was not so important.

When he was with the followers of the Apostle James, men who still regarded the letter of the law as very important. Peter switched back to what I would describe as the security of black and white rules.

And Paul publicly called Peter out about his two minded approach. Peter, grew in his faith. And a conflict between the two men was averted.

That doesn't mean that Paul was perfect. He too, was a little bit bullheaded.

John Mark, the author of the gospel of Mark, was a traveling companion with Paul and Barnabas.

But he was young, and on their first trip, he got homesick and abandoned his fellows.

Barnabas was known for his ability to encourage people. Barnabas is sort of my hero in this because of the way that he always made exception for people's weaknesses.

So, when Paul and Barnabas got ready to revisit the cites they worked in, they had a disagreement over taking John Mark.

Barnabas was quick to forgive. Paul was not so quick.

And, many theologians that God used the difference to separate the men and double the work.

Other's see it as the fact that even though we are forgiven, even though the Holy Spirit is in us and that Spirit is working with our conscience to do the right thing, sometimes we ignore God's prodding and do our own thing.

They divided.

And later on, near the end of Paul's life, we read how Paul repented of his unforgiveness toward John Mark and requests his presence back with him.

Love's memory is long.

His memory of John Mark was not of the disappointment, but of his value.

I love that story because I think of the times in my own life when I have been separated from others.

And I think of the way that God continues to work inside my own heart to forgo my pride and forgive. Or, to forgo my pride and repent.

As time goes on, instead of remembering the pain, or the loss, we remember the love and the beauty of the image of God inside others.

God heals us through love. And memories remind us to love others.

God's Love, God's promise, is long.

And that is sort of the beauty of the promise made to King David from the 1^st text we read this morning.

He is promised by God that someday the Messiah will be born from his bloodline.

And if you are Jewish, the hope of being the parent to the Messiah is one of the greatest hopes they could have.

God loves everyone. Everyone. There are no exceptions. God loves the greatest and the weakest. In my spiritual journey the last few years, I have had to remind myself that God loves both the oppressed and the oppressor.

That is hard for me to handle because inside all of us is a longing for Justice and a sense of mercy toward the oppressed. Isn't that why we come to worship?

God loves everyone.

But David responded to that love.

David was not afraid to say back to God: “I love you! Thank You! Praise You!”

And God made this promise to David. God said: “David is a man whose heart is after mine!”

God rejoices when we too take up His cause of justice.

As a matter of fact, it is the job that God has left the Church on the face of the earth to accomplish.

And so, 1,000 years later, God fulfills that promise to David.

But more than that, David was born around 1,000 years after Abraham. And God made the same promise to Abraham. For Abraham, it is now 2,000 years later.

I think about that.

Both David and Abraham are dead.

In our thinking, we say to ourselves, what good is a promise, what good is a hope, what good is an inheritance, if we die before it is given?

But God is not only the God of the living, God is also God of the dead.

Jesus told the Jewish leaders that their Ancestor, their Father, Abraham still held on to the promise of Jesus' coming.

God's promise, God's love is long. God remembers to keep God's promises.

I used to always consider the incarnation of Jesus to be this miracle of God's expression that,as we sing in O Holy Night: “To our weaknesses, no stranger, He knows our need...”

I always pictured the beauty of knowing that God has firsthand knowledge of humanities sufferings. And therefore, God can heal our pains.

But that just limits God.

It is much more.

I can't relate, but I admit I am a little bit jealous that I never got to feel life building inside of me.

Jesus, God, knows the intimacy of perfect protection as He heard Mary's gentle voice and sensed her heart beating.

Jesus, God, knows the intimacy of nursing at the breast and feeling that incredible bond that a mother and a child have.

Jesus, we surmise, experienced firsthand the wonder of human creation as he worked along side of his earthly father in Joseph's wood shop.

Jesus enjoyed the childhood innocence of playing games with other children.

I remember when I was finally old enough to see over the counter top in the kitchen as my mother was baking.

Then, she always made some extra pie dough for my twin brother and I to bake cinnamon-butter-brown sugar delights in a muffin pan.

God Himself experienced human love, and suffering firsthand in the incarnation.

Christmas season reminds me just how much God loves humanity.

And, when I think of the suffering aspect. When I think of the beauty of the baby's birth, and the terror and suffering of the cross, knowing that God experienced firsthand the Yin and the Yang of it all, I go back to the first Sunday of Advent. The Sunday of Hope.

Because of Love, the 4^th Sunday, we can hope.

To me. Hope is the biggest message of Advent. I am glad we start with it.

It does not minimize peace, because that is our mission as Christians.

It does not minimize joy, because that seems to be the expression of peace.

But hope is what we count on.

And Hope is proven in God's love.

We long for the day, like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when black men are no longer afraid to walk down the streets of our cities.

We long for the day when the world embraces our ideal that everyone is our neighbor and we cannot justify ourselves by excluding some because of the color of their skin, or where they were born.

With hope, we long for the day when true justice rules. With hope, we work for the day when true love binds the hearts of everyone.

And we do it because even though it took 1,000 years for David, 2,000 years for Abraham. God will not forget. God's love is long.

So, as we celebrate Christmas and enjoy the beauty of human love, connection and family, we also remember the mission and the purpose of the Incarnation.

And we too, pick up that mission.

AMEN?