Category Archives: Advent

Advent 4B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Dec. 24, 2023

The Madonna of the Magnificat

The Madonna of the Magnificat (1481), tempera painting by Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510), in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence. (Click image to enlarge.)

First Reading: 2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16

Advent ends on Christmas Eve this year. Our readings for the Fourth Sunday of Advent trace the Messianic line of King David that Christians follow down the ages to Jesus. In the first reading, David muses that it seems wrong for him to rest comfortably in a palatial house of cedar while God’s house, the Ark of the Covenant, rests in a mere tent. The prophet Nathan agrees that God should have a fine house, a temple, but God has a different plan. God lives and moves with the people, and needs no house! God, rather, will establish the house of David, the dynasty of God’s people. We hear this echoed in Luke’s Gospel for the day, as the angel tells Mary that Jesus will inherit the throne of his ancestor David.

Psalm: Luke 1:46-55 (Canticle 15)

The Magnificat, the surprisingly radical Song of Mary, which was offered as an alternative to the usual Psalm last week, returns as the Psalm of the day this Sunday. As we will hear in the Gospel, the Angel Gabriel has told Mary that she will give birth to King David’s heir, the Messiah. When Mary visits her relative, Elizabeth, who will soon give birth to John the Baptist, Elizabeth feels the infant move. Mary rejoices in a poetic celebration that echoes the words of the prophets; thoughts that, perhaps, her son Jesus would hear from his mother: “He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.”

Alternative Psalm: Psalm 89:1-4, 19-26

In harmony with our first reading, this Psalm portion celebrates God’s covenant with David and his descendants, a royal family that God established to last forever. Even through the devastation of war and the pain of exile, when Israel and Judah feared that God’s promise might have been revoked because the nation had broken its covenant by failing to be just and righteous, the Psalm sings of a new King David, a Messiah and King who would rule the land forever, “from the great sea to the river,” from the shores of the Mediterranean to the Jordan, the Galilee, and the Dead Sea..

Second Reading: Romans 16: 25-27

Throughout Paul’s powerful letter to the Romans, he gently encourages Rome’s Gentile and Jewish Christian communities, who had been separated during the exile of Rome’s Jews, to come back together in Christian love and unify as one. Here, in ringing verses that conclude the letter, he reminds them that God’s covenant with the people in the First Testament, as expressed by the ancient prophets, now extends to all humanity, all living forever in glory through Jesus Christ.

Gospel: Luke 1: 26-38

As Advent ends on Christmas Eve this year, we hear Luke tell the familiar story of the Angel Gabriel’s visit to a young Palestinian woman named Mary. Through God’s Holy Spirit this young woman will give birth to a son named Jesus, who will inherit King David’s throne and rule over an eternal kingdom. She responds to this amazing news with simple, trusting acceptance: “Let it be with me according to your word.” Just a few verses later in Luke’s Gospel, she will go on to utter the liberating poetry of the Magnificat, the Song of Mary, celebrating the God who casts down the mighty, lifts up the lowly, feeds the hungry and sends the rich away empty.

Advent 3B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Dec. 17, 2023 (Advent 3B)

Magnificat: La Visitation

Magnificat: La Visitation (1491), tempera painting on panel by Domenico Ghirlandaio (1448-1494). The Louvre, Paris. (Click image to enlarge.)

First Reading: Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11

On the Third Sunday of Advent it is customary to light the one pink candle on the Advent wreath, a hint of rejoicing in a season that we otherwise associate with preparation and expectation. Now our Lectionary readings for Advent shift from the fire and upheaval of an apocalyptic Judgement Day toward a different kind of expectation: A joyful hope that anticipates God’s restorative justice coming with the Messiah. In our first reading, the Prophet Isaiah – writing words that Jesus will later read and declare fulfilled in his presence when he speaks in the synagogue at Nazareth – tells the people that God will comfort all who mourn. God’s good news will come to the poor, the oppressed, captives and prisoners, turning them from mourning to gladness.

Psalm: Psalm 126

Just as Isaiah told the people in exile of God’s promise that justice and righteousness would be restored, here the Psalmist sings that God’s promise has been fulfilled. God has indeed restored the fortunes of the Temple on Mount Zion, the Psalmist exults. Throughout this short Psalm’s seven verses we hear shouts of laughter, joy, gladness, or praise. God has been good, the Psalmist sings. God has turned the people’s tears into songs of joy; their weeping into a bountiful harvest.

Alternate Psalm: Canticle 15

The Magnificat, the deeply meaningful Song of Mary (Luke 1:46-55), may be sung as an alternative to Psalm 126 on this day. Mary sings this powerful song as she greets her relative, Elizabeth. Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist, feels the infant move with joy inside her when Mary comes in. Elizabeth declares Mary the blessed mother of God, full of grace. In response, Mary sings these startlingly radical verses that echo the Isaiah passage and foreshadow Jesus’ own teaching. These are liberating verses of distributive justice. Mary praises a God who scatters the proud, casts down the mighty, and sends the rich away hungry, while filling the hungry with good things.

Second Reading: 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24

Paul concludes his short first letter to the Thessalonians with themes consistent with those that we heard in the first readings from 1 Corinthians and 2 Peter on the first two Sundays of Advent. He urges the people to rejoice always, pray unceasingly, and give thanks for all things, staying faithful and filled with the Spirit. Hold fast to the good and abstain from every kind of evil, he urges them, so they will be ready, “sound and blameless,” when Jesus returns.

Gospel: John 1:6-8,19-28

Following the story of Jesus with John the Baptist in Mark’s Gospel last Sunday, we now turn to the vision of John the Baptist as told in the Gospel according to John. This version makes no mention of the Baptist’s attire or his dietary preferences. Rather, it quickly moves into a tense scene in which the Temple authorities, worried about the noisy crowds surrounding John, want to know just exactly who John is. John replies that he is not a new prophet; nor is he Elijah. Repeating the Isaiah verses that we heard last week, John declares himself the voice crying out in the wilderness, calling on the people to make straight the way of the Lord. He baptizes with water, John says, to make way for the one who is coming after him, who is so much greater that John is unworthy to untie his sandals.

Advent 2B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Dec. 10, 2023 (Advent 2B)

St. John the Baptist

St. John the Baptist (1911), oil painting on board by Jacek Malczewski (1854-1929). National Museum in Warsaw, Poland. (Click image to enlarge.)

First Reading: Isaiah 40:1-11

The Messiah is coming! Get ready! The Messiah is coming! Make the way clear! Re-imagined in modern language, Sunday’s readings as we begin the second week of Advent might shout, “Roll out the red carpet for the Messiah!” The first reading from Isaiah – which may sound familiar, as Handel drew from it freely in his beloved oratorio, “The Messiah” – sings out comfort and hope to the people in exile. Jerusalem has paid doubly for her sins, the prophet declares, adding that although our lives are as short as grass and flowers, God’s word stands forever. Prepare the way! Make a straight highway in the desert, the prophet calls. Then the reading closes with the poetic image of a kindly Messiah who holds the lambs closely and gently leads the mother sheep.

Psalm: Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13

This portion of Psalm 85, edited to skip over several verses that express wistful doubt, shares the joyful hope of the Isaiah reading. The Psalmist remembers the people’s time in exile, rejoicing that God did, indeed, come to the people with comfort and peace. Even though the people had been sinful and broken their covenant with God, God forgave their iniquity and blotted out all their sins. The straight highway that was built at Isaiah’s command has become a path for God’s feet.

Second Reading: 2 Peter 3:8-15a

The short second letter in Peter’s name, the latest epistle in the New Testament, was likely written a century or more after the crucifixion. After so long, Christ’s expected return had surely become a concern for the early church. What did this delay mean? Perhaps God’s time is not like our time, the writer suggests in the letter’s closing lines. They echo a theme in the Isaiah reading: With God, “One day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day.” Be patient, the author urged. Live holy and godly lives. Be at peace, be prepared, and wait patiently for God.

Gospel: Mark 1:1-8

We will spend most of the coming liturgical year going through the Gospel according to Mark. The earliest and shortest of the Gospels, Mark seems to move at a headlong pace, beginning here with no mention of the birth of Jesus or his death and resurrection. Mark simply declares the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, then – proclaiming Isaiah’s prophecy of a messenger who will make the way straight for the Messiah – jumps right into the story of Jesus’s baptism by John the Baptist in the Jordan River. Jesus, John says, is so powerful that John is not worthy to stoop down and untie his sandals. John tells the crowd that he baptizes only with water, but Jesus will baptize with the Holy Spirit!

Advent 1B

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Dec. 3, 2023 (Advent 1B)

The Second Coming

The Second Coming (1560-89), painting by Jean Cousin le Jeune (c.1522-1595), the Louvre, Paris. (Click image to enlarge.)

First Reading: Isaiah 64:1-9

One clear idea rings through the Lectionary readings as Advent begins this Sunday: God is coming. God may come quietly, quickly; God may come amid fire and upheaval. We had better be ready. In our first reading we turn toward the end of Isiah’s great book of prophecy. The people are returning home to Jerusalem from exile at last, but they must face up to a difficult reality: This is not the city they knew, but a devastated place, a ruined city on a hill with its great temple destroyed and only a remnant of defeated people remaining. “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down,” the prophet calls out, urging God to show their might, restore the people, make them new and forgive their sins.

Psalm: Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18

The selected verses of Psalm 80 echo Isaiah’s call. This anguished cry to God goes up three times: “Restore us, O God of hosts; show the light of your countenance, and we shall be saved.” The people have suffered. God’s punishment has forced them to endure their enemies’ derision and laughter. They have eaten and drunk their own tears like bread and water. Send us a messiah, the Psalmist pleads – the son of man at God’s right hand – and the people will never turn from God again.

Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 1:3-9

Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is a deeply pastoral epistle that throughout its pages addresses many fractures in a small, passionate Christian community in a Greek seaport city. Paul begins with no hint of conflict, though. Writing in the formal style of ancient Greek correspondence, he sets the scene by greeting the people with grace and peace. He reminds them that grace has come to them through Jesus and enriched them, filling them with spiritual gifts. Because of this, Paul assures them, they will be ready, strong and blameless when Christ returns.

Gospel: Mark 13:24-37

In our first reading, we heard Isaiah’s prayer for God to come with justice after the first destruction of Jerusalem and the temple. Now, in phrases likely set down not long after the Romans had destroyed the city and the temple again, the evangelist Mark imagines Jesus coming again amid clouds, in power and glory. In an apocalyptic passage that echoes the Hebrew Bible’s Prophet Joel, Jesus foretells a time when the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the skies. This will be a tumultuous time, Jesus warns his followers, so they must watch for signs of his return: They must stay awake, ready and alert.

Advent 4A

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Illuminations on the Lectionary readings for Dec. 18, 2022 (Advent 4A)

First Reading: Isaiah 7:10-16

As we have gone through the four weeks of Advent, we have had the opportunity to deepen our appreciation for Scripture’s account of the coming of the Messiah, which Christians understand as the Incarnation, God becoming fully human and fully divine in Jesus.

The Nativity with the Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel

The Nativity with the Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel (1308-1311) tempera on single poplar panel by Duccio di Buoninsegna. Andrew W. Mellon Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (Click image to enlarge.)

Our first reading draws again from the prophet Isaiah, who understood the Messiah as a good king, a successor in the line of King David. Isaiah was speaking of his own time when he warned King Ahaz – an evil leader who had collaborated with the Assyrians – that as soon as the child was weaned (“eating curds and honey”), the king’s land would be conquered. Christians would later look back and interpret the birth story of Jesus in Isaiah’s prophecy that a child named Immanuel (“God with us”) would be born to a “young woman.” That Hebrew word,​ “almah,​”​ would be translated in the Pentateuch, the Greek Old Testament that was in common use in the time of the Evangelists, as “parthenos,” meaning “virgin.”

Psalm: Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18

In this psalm of lament over the destruction of the temple and the people’s exile, the Psalmist begs to be spared the divine anger that has left the people with “bowls of tears to drink” as their enemies laugh them to scorn. These verses echo the Isaiah reading in the hope that God will free the people and come with power to restore the kingdom and the Covenant. Send a man of God’s right hand, the strong son of man, the Psalmist pleads, promising that the people will never again turn from God’s way if only God will save them.

Second Reading: Romans 1:1-7

The opening verses of Paul’s letters follow formal patterns set in Greco-Roman culture, much like the “To whom it may concern, I hope this letter finds you well” that we might see in modern formal correspondence. Still, even these formulaic verses tell of Paul’s pastoral concerns for the Romans. Paul emphasizes that he is an apostle of Jesus, and that Jesus is the son of God, the descendant of David prophesied in Scripture – such as the Isaiah verses we read today. Paul assures Rome’s Christians that he comes in Jesus’s name to the Gentiles, who are God’s beloved, called to be saints.

Gospel: Matthew 1:18-25

It is the fourth and last Sunday of Advent, and our Gospel takes a decided turn toward Christmas as we hear of an angel visiting Joseph, who is described as Mary’s husband, at a critical moment. Imagine Joseph, a man of an ancient, patriarchal culture, discovering that his sweet young fiancee is pregnant, but not with his child! Who wouldn’t decide to call the whole thing off? But Joseph, a righteous man, prefers to end the engagement quietly, without scandal or gossip. But then, before things go off the rails, an angel arrives to assure Joseph that Mary is bearing a child of the Holy Spirit, a son who will save his people from their sins. Finally the angel repeats Isaiah’s prophecy, quoting the Greek Pentateuch: “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel.”

Advent 2A

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Illuminations on the Lectionary readings for Dec. 4, 2022 (Advent 2A)

First Reading: Isaiah 11:1-10

When we hear a call to repent and wait for the Messiah’s coming through this week’s Sunday Lectionary readings, don’t think of “repent” in the sense of guilty remorse. Hear it rather in its traditional sense: “Change your mind” or “turn back” in the New Testament’s original Greek and in the Hebrew Bible.

St. John the Baptist Preaching

St. John the Baptist Preaching (c.1665), oil painting on canvas by Mattia Preti (1613-1699). Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. (Click image to enlarge.)

If we are on the wrong path in our relationships with God and our neighbors, Sunday’s readings advise us, now is the time to turn back and watch for the light of God’s Kingdom. In our first reading, Isaiah envisions a time when the Messiah – the descendant of King David, whose father was named Jesse – will reign from the Temple on Zion’s holy mountain, where justice will prevail for the poor and the meek.

Psalm: Psalm 72:1-7, 18-19

The Psalmist seems to draw from the same wellsprings as Isaiah in this hymn of blessing for a new king. Tradition holds that Psalm 72 was written in memory of the coronation of King Solomon. In the verses chosen for Sunday’s reading, we hear the people call for a just and righteous king who will rule fairly. They ask God to provide a king who will bring prosperity to all the people; a king who will take special care to provide for the poor and the oppressed; a king who will reign as long as showers water the earth; a king who will bring peace on earth as long as the moon shines.

Second Reading: Romans 15:4-13

At the time of Paul’s beautiful letter to the Romans, the city’s Jews – including Jewish converts to Christianity – had been banished to exile. Paul wrote this letter when Rome’s Jews were coming back home after years in exile. There was tension between the Jewish remnant and the Gentile Christian community that had stayed home all along. Paul turns to the passage we heard from Isaiah to remember the Root of Jesse, presenting the verses as if they were an explicit prophecy of Christ as king over all humanity. In the memory of that time of return, Paul urges the Romans, “Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”

Gospel: Matthew 3:1-12

We met John, Jesus’s cousin, as an infant when we read the Song of Zechariah as a psalm on Christ the King Sunday. In that passage, John’s father – the temple priest Zechariah – regained his voice to foretell that the boy would grow up to become a great prophet. This Sunday we encounter John again. He has become a prophet indeed, a loud, wild prophet clad in camel’s hair robes and eating locusts and honey, urging people to repent as he baptizes them in the Jordan river. Matthew tells us that John is the fulfillment of another Hebrew Bible verse – Isaiah 40 – promising that a prophet would come to make way for the Messiah. That figure is coming, says John, speaking of Jesus; and he will baptize not with mere water but with the fire of the Holy Spirit.

Advent 1A

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Illuminations on the Lectionary readings for Nov. 27, 2022 (Advent 1C)

First Reading: Isaiah 2:1-5

Advent begins, and with it a new liturgical year centered on the Gospel according to Matthew. The name “Advent” is based on the Latin word for “coming.”

The World Before the Flood

The World Before the Flood (1828), oil painting on canvas by William Etty (1787-1849). Southampton City Art Gallery, England. (Click image to enlarge.)

During these four weeks we prepare for the coming celebration of the birth of Jesus, the Incarnation, on Christmas Day. We also consider the tradition of the final coming of Christ in power and glory. Sunday’s readings look forward to a bright Messianic future. In verses of poetic beauty in our first reading, the prophet Isaiah foresees Jerusalem and its Temple restored. It will be the highest of the mountains, the center of a world that recognizes it as the house of God. It will be a world of peace, a time when swords have been beaten into plowshares and there is no more war.

Psalm: Psalm 122

Psalm 122 closely mirrors the prophet’s hope in the first reading for a future of triumph and peace for Jerusalem, the city of God, the throne of the new King David, the Messiah. The House of David is a city at peace. It is a city on a mountain where all the tribes of Israel go up with gladness to praise God’s name. At David’s throne, the Psalmist sings, all the people can expect fair judgment. There the love of God is rewarded with security, prosperity and peace.

Second Reading: Romans 13:11-14

Paul exhorts the people of the young church in Rome to be prepared for the return of Jesus, an event that Christians of that time believed and prayed would come very soon. “The night is far gone, the day is near,” Paul writes to his Roman flock in this letter that we will hear during three of the four Sundays of Advent. In the meantime, Paul advises the people to behave well, live abstemiously, avoid quarrels and jealousy. These verses follow immediately after Paul’s urgent reminder to follow God’s commandments and love our neighbors as ourselves, a way of life that prepares us to “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Second Reading: Matthew 24:36-44

In all three years of the Lectionary cycle, the Gospel for the First Sunday of Advent is apocalyptic, anticipating the second coming of Christ. In Sunday’s Gospel according to Matthew we find Jesus talking with the apostles on a hillside on the Mount of Olives, looking across a small valley toward the Temple. In preceding verses Jesus has told them – in words similar to those we heard told by Luke two weeks ago – that the temple will be torn down amid a time of war and great suffering, before Christ comes to usher in a new age. Now Jesus warns them that only God knows when the last days will come, just as sinful humans in Noah’s time had no warning of the coming flood.

Lessons and Carols

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Thoughts on the readings for Lessons and Carols (Dec. 26, 2021)

Lessons and Carols is a service of worship that celebrates the birth of Jesus with readings from Scripture, carols, and hymns.

King's College Chapel, Cambridge, England.

King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, England. (Click image to enlarge.)

Lessons and Carols originated at the Church of England’s Truro Cathedral in Cornwall in 1878, and since World War I has been famously presented (and broadcast) every December for the past century by King’s College, Cambridge, England, and Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. The original service has since been adapted and used by other churches all over the world, not only in the Anglican and Episcopal traditions but in many other denominations as well.

The original liturgy consisted of nine scripture readings from Genesis and the Prophets. The current Episcopal liturgy in our Book of Occasional Services permits as many as nine readings, plus a Gospel.

These are the readings that St. Matthew’s Episcopal will use in Lessons and Carols on Sunday, Dec. 26, 2021.

Genesis 3:1-23
The happy time of Adam and Eve’s stay in the garden comes to an end in the ancestral origin story told in these verses: The serpent tempted them and they ate fruit that God forbade. When they heard God walking in the garden in the evening breeze, they realized that they were naked, and they hid, because they were afraid. When God found them, they blamed each other, and then they blamed the snake. Yes, God cast them out. But God came out with them, clothed them, and stayed with God’s people of free will and belief through the ages.

Isaiah 7: 10-15
Isaiah tells of God’s warning to David’s descendant, King Ahaz: His land will soon be conquered, but God will give the people a sign. A young woman will bear a child called Immanuel – “God With Us” – a child who will eventually show the world how to refuse evil and choose the good.

Luke 1: 5-25
In this passage we hear the back-story to Canticle 16, which we sang on the second Sunday of Advent: John the Baptist’s father-to-be, Zechariah, a priest of the Temple, refuses to believe an angel who came to tell him that his elderly wife, Elizabeth, had become pregnant after an angelic visitation. God struck him mute for his disbelief. He would remain unable to speak until eight days after the child’s birth, when Zechariah regained his voice to name the baby John.

Luke 2:1-20
We heard this familiar story of Jesus’s birth on Christmas Day. Now we hear again the unforgettable stories of Mary giving birth, wrapping the child in swaddling clothes and laying him in a manger in Bethlehem – the City of David – because there was no room in the inn. Here we have the beautiful scene of baby Jesus and his parents suddenly surrounded by shepherds and their flocks. Angels sing gloriously overhead while the Lord’s angel tells them that the baby is a Savior and the Messiah.

Hebrews 1:1-12
This poetic description of Jesus opens the letter to the Hebrews. Jesus, chosen as the son of God, is the perfect reflection of God’s glory, higher even than the angels. When Jesus was born, multitudes of angels appeared in the heavens to worship him. Because Jesus loved righteousness and hated wickedness, his throne is for ever and ever, and God speaks to us no longer through the prophets but through him.

John 1:1-18
“In the beginning … ” The first words of John’s Gospel exactly mirror the first words of Genesis: “In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth,” God’s Word, “Let there be light,” opened up creation. The Word of God that brought the world into being comes to us now as Jesus, the light through which we can see God. The Word was with God, and now lives among us.

Advent 3C

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Dec. 12, 2021

First Reading: Zephaniah 3:14-20

Our Lectionary readings for the Third Sunday of Advent shout out in joy and exultation as we light the pink candle on our Advent wreaths.

The Sermon of Saint John the Baptist

The Sermon of Saint John the Baptist (1566), oil painting on oak by Pieter Brueghel the Elder (c.1526/1530-1569). Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest . (Click image to enlarge.)

Our first reading is taken from the minor prophet Zephanaiah, who came before Isaiah and Jeremiah. Like the more well-known later prophets, Zephaniah foretold Jerusalem’s coming destruction and the people’s exile. These verses, though, anticipate a joyous time when God will restore Israel, rejoicing with its people in gladness and love. The prophet declares God’s favor for the oppressed, a theme of liberation that John the Baptist will echo in this week’s Gospel.

Psalm: Canticle 9 (Isaiah 12:2-6)

“Surely it is God who saves us. We will trust in God and not be afraid.” We often read this passage from the Prophet Isaiah in Morning Prayer. In these psalm-like verses, the prophet relates salvation with drawing water from a well, a striking image for people in desert lands. In biblical times, drought meant death and flowing water brought joy. Thank God with joy when we draw God’s precious, life-giving water from the springs of salvation, Isaiah tells us. Sing out your joy and praise, knowing that you are safe under God’s protection.

Second Reading: Philippians 4:4-7

“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.” In these brief verses, Paul tells the people of Philippi that they should rejoice, for the Lord is near. Pray and give thanks, he tells the people, and even in difficult times, “the peace of God, which passes all understanding” will fill their hearts and minds. In our world of stress and tension, what a blessing it is to enjoy a moment of peace. Imagine God’s peace, a peace so wonderful that we can’t even comprehend it!

Gospel: Luke 3:7-18

Picking up where last Sunday’s Gospel left off, the long-haired, ranting prophet yells at the crowds. He calls them “a brood of vipers,” and warns that God might chop them down and burn them up if they don’t repent. This does not sound like rejoicing! But John shouts an urgent message: Prepare the way for Jesus, the one to come whose sandals John is not worthy to untie. Prepare for the coming of Jesus: Share your clothing and your food with those who have none. Don’t cheat. Don’t be selfish! Jesus’ mother, Mary, also sang of filling up the hungry with good things; and Jesus himself will remind us, “When I was hungry, you gave me food …” This is Jesus’s way. We are called to make it our way …joyfully.

Would you like to browse through more of our Illuminations?
Click this link to browse more than two full three-year cycles of these weekly Lectionary reflections, online in our Illuminations archive.

Advent 2C

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Thoughts on Sunday’s Lessons for Dec. 5, 2021

First Reading: Baruch 5:1-9

In the second week of Advent, we turn from apocalyptic expectations of fear and foreboding to a more hopeful theme: A Messenger is coming to make the way ready for the Messiah.

St John the Baptist

Detail from the Ghent Altarpiece: St John the Baptist (c.1425-1429l). Oil painting on panel by Jan van Eyck (c.1390-1441). Saint Bavo Cathedral, Ghent, Belgium. (Click image to enlarge.)

In Sunday’s first reading from the prophet Baruch (one of the apocryphal books at the end of the Hebrew Bible) gives us his version of a more familiar Isaiah passage: He declares that Israel in exile will no longer need to mourn, for God will lower the mountains and fill up the valleys to make level ground upon which the people may walk safely home. In the Gospel, Luke will repeat the Isaiah verses in the voice of John the Baptist.

Or:

First Reading: Malachi 3:1-4

God’s Messenger is coming, and the people will delight in them, foretells the minor prophet Malachi, whose Hebrew name literally means “my messenger.” But it’s not going to be easy, Malachi warns the people. Because of their sins and their failure to walk in God’s way, the Messenger will have to cleanse the people with fire and strong soap, making them pure and pleasing to God. In words that Handel would make unforgettable in The Messiah two millennia later, the prophet sings, “Who can endure the day of his coming? He is like a refiner’s fire!”

Psalm: Canticle 16 (Luke 1: 68-79)

In place of a Psalm we sing a Canticle taken from Luke’s Gospel. These verses tell the story of John the Baptist’s father, Zechariah, a priest of the Temple. When Zechariah had refused to believe that his elderly wife, Elizabeth, had really become pregnant after an angelic visitation, God struck him mute. But his voice returned when he held the infant and named him John. This child, Zechariah declares, in words that we often read in Morning Prayer, is to be a prophet like Abraham, the Messenger who will “go before the Lord to prepare his way.”

Second Reading: Philippians 1:3-11

In affectionate words reminiscent of his letter to the Thessalonians in last week’s second reading, Paul starts his letter to the people of Philippi in Macedonia, Greece, with greetings, love, thanks for their friendship and prayers for their well-being. Writing from a Roman prison, Paul remembers their eager acceptance of the Gospel. He prays for this little congregation’s continued spiritual growth and insight, and he prays that this will lead them to a harvest of righteousness and justice in God’s love through Christ.

Gospel: Luke 3:1-6

In Sunday’s Gospel, Luke introduces us to John the Baptist, who we had met in the Canticle/Psalm as an infant in the hands of his father, the Temple priest Zechariah. The reading begins with a detailed roster of Roman and Jewish leaders of the time, a practice that we also see in the introduction of Hebrew Bible prophets like Ezekiel, placing the prophet in a specific time and place. Luke tells us that John, traveling in the regions along the Jordan, proclaimed a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Then Luke likens John’s prophecy to Isaiah’s call to “Prepare the way of the Lord … make his paths straight,” filling every valley and making every mountain and hill low so that all humanity may see God’s salvation.