Worship

Sermon Archive

Sunday December 20, 2009
11:00 am - Saint Thomas Church
Preacher: Fr Mead

Two Stories for Advent

Grace to you and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, whose Birth we celebrate in this service of Lessons and Carols. Greetings as well to those who may be listening to this service via our webcast.

Our Christmas services are for every one of you, no matter what your relationship to the Church and the Christian Faith may be; including those of other churches, other faiths, and perhaps no faith at all. And you are very welcome. It is ours to pass on: The welcome is from the Baby Himself.

[If you are baptized (whatever your denomination), and you would like to join us after the Carol service for Holy Communion, you are most warmly invited to stay on with me and receive the Sacrament. We will allow time for those of you who will be leaving after the carol service to go your way in peace. Please exit during the Voluntary through the Fifth Avenue doors, and may the Lord go with you. The gate to the Ambulatory will be closed during the Voluntary as we prepare for the Eucharist.]

Even though this is our Lessons and Carols Service, it is not yet officially Christmas. This is still Advent (note the purple vestments), the time of preparation for the Birthday of Christ which is December 25. Christmastide proper has Twelve Days, till the Epiphany on January 6. And then there is Candlemas, when, forty days after his birth, Christ as presented in the Temple by Mary and Joseph. So I figure we have till February 2 till our Christmas cards and presents are late and we have to take down the holiday decorations. These days before Christmas can make you crazy; so take a few deep breaths, relax, and take some time to appreciate what Christmas really is. Here are two Advent stories, literally and truly, from this very season of preparation for the feast.

Here is one story. He was an immensely successful and admired man, brilliant, charming. He made a great deal of money. He owned multiple houses and properties in prime locations. He was generous and gave great amounts of his time, talent and treasure, and he was a board member and trustee of august, powerful and venerable institutions. He was well liked and popular. He had lovers and friends and life companionship. Yet in the end he cut his life short by virtual suicide, by drinking himself into sickness and death. The search by his friends for reasons seemed strangely to point to a mysterious paradox: It is possible to have everything in the world, and yet to be unhappy.

Here is the other story. And there is no need to make it anonymous or to sterilize it, for it concerns a beloved member, warden and vestryman, of Saint Thomas, John Neiswanger. Fulfilling a decision he made some years ago in the midst of a four-year ordeal with cancer, his brother and sister-in-law recently took him home to Topeka, Kansas, to hospice there. He had a fulfilling and successful life in public relations. He lived alone, but he rejoiced in his family, his friends, his professional partner and his colleagues, and most certainly in his church family. After a grueling battle with the disease which had now spread to his brain, he was greatly weakened; but not so much that he was unable to say two revealing things.

The first thing John said was after receiving Communion in his hospital room in New Jersey. I had broken the two Hosts into eight neat quarters, and, at his request, his brother and sister-in-law, his business partner, and four of us from Saint Thomas all had Communion with him. After the prayers, he gave a testimonial of thanks for the gifts of life, of faith, of family and friends, and of his beloved Saint Thomas. We all cried, then kissed and hugged him, and said Goodbye.

The second thing John said I did not witness but heard. His brother took him to see his house in New Jersey for the last time. He was too weak to get out of the car, but he said that was ok; it was all right, he said, because “it’s just stuff.” “It’s just stuff,” he said. “People, relationships, love, that’s all that really matters. Let’s go.” And so they left. He is ready for Christmas, by which I mean the real Christmas, the coming of the Lord, face to face. He is ready

Two stories for Advent that in their stark differences illustrate the issue of the season.

Our King and Savior draweth nigh. O come, let us adore him.