Preached at Hanover Street Presbyterian Church
On December 11, 2005
By Pastor Thomas C. Davis

[1-7-06]

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to provide for those who mourn in Zion— to give them a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit. They will be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, to display his glory. They shall build up the ancient ruins, they shall raise up the former devastations; they shall repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations.

When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy; then it was said among the nations, "The Lord has done great things for them." The Lord has done great things for us, and we rejoiced. Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like the watercourses in the Negeb. May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy. Those who go out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, carrying their sheaves.
 

"Bringing in the sheaves, bringing in the sheaves; we will come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves." I never sang songs like that in the Presbyterian church when I was growing up, but I did at my great Uncle Paul’s mountain farm, where my mom’s large and religious family would gather for reunions. My great Uncle Chuck, brother to Great Uncle Paul, married a woman whose honor was in dispute, like Joseph did in the Christmas story. A child was born to them, my second cousin Cheryl. I suppose it might have been the shame surrounding the circumstances of her birth that drew her in mid-life to an extremely personal faith in Jesus. She and her dad particularly loved to sing old camp meeting hymns that I rarely heard elsewhere: "The old rugged cross, where the dearest and best for a world of lost sinners was slain." "I walk in the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses. . .He walks with me, and he talks with me, and he tells me I am his own. And the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known." "Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine. . ."

During my year in Vietnam cousin Cheryl sent me fundamentalist books, hoping to make a convert. She didn’t succeed, exactly. I had too much book learning already and too much experience of strange grace among my comrades in arms, who were Buddhists and animists and God knows what all, to be content with her ways. But Cheryl did persuade me to seek something I didn’t know I was missing, that is, a personal relationship with Jesus. I recognized later that that was the common theme running through those old hymns which she and her dad loved so: a personal relationship to a living Lord. Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine! We walk in the garden alone. He walks with me and he talks with me and he tells me I am his own.

Strange as it seems, no teacher in Sunday school had ever taught me that Jesus could be my friend-- someone to walk with and talk with. Cheryl did. She sent me literature that said: If you’re skeptical about this, just do an experiment. Ask Jesus to come into your heart. If you think this is just hocus pocus, give it a try. What do you have to lose? Now, I have always been one to try things for myself; and so, I went for it. I asked Jesus to come into my heart. And he did. I experienced deep peace and joy then, although nothing had changed around me. (I still had to go on patrol.) "My peace I give to you," says Jesus in John’s gospel, "not as the world gives." Wasn’t that the truth!--not just because the good book told me so, but because I had run the experiment, and found out for myself. Those old hymns tell about something very real and precious, a personal relationship with a living Lord. I’m grateful to my fundamentalist kin for awakening me to that kind of faith.

However, as I said, I could not be one of them. I could not bear to read the Bible in their literal way, and I could not stay fixated upon personal salvation. I suppose the Presbyterians had already steeped me in the conviction that the good news about Jesus is much broader than that. Jesus is much more than a friend, a counselor, a personal savior. He’s Lord of life, not just my soul. When Paul wrote that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Jesus, not powers or principalities, he meant to convey the truth that Jesus is Lord of politics, too.

Now, I know that some of you get upset when I mention politics from the pulpit; but if I didn’t talk about politics at least from time to time in connection with Jesus, then I would be shying away from an important dimension of life in which Jesus is Lord. Restricting Christianity to concerns about personal righteousness shrinks the lordship of Jesus. It also turns a deaf ear to a good part of our Jewish heritage, the prophetic part, which teaches that God saves a whole people, a people called out by God for a special purpose, a people from whom God demands just use of power. And what is the just use of power but good politics?

Last weekend a Jewish scholar, Amy-Jill Levine, lectured at Westminster church in Wilmington about the Christmas story. Amy-Jill is Jewish, but she has a deep respect for Christians, largely because she got to know Catholics as she was growing up--even audited a confirmation class with her Catholic best friend. Amy-Jill doesn’t experience Jesus as her personal savior, but she honors Christians who do. Christmas certainly is about God’s spirit entering into human consciousness in an incomparably personal way, she affirms. But Christmas is also about politics, she says; not partisan politics mind you, but politics understood as God’s demand that human beings use power justly. In other words, Christmas is every bit as much about social justice as it is about the advent of a personal savior.

What are some evidences of that? Well, when Mary hears from an angel that she is to bear the Messiah she rejoices and praises God (in Luke 2: 46ff). She sings:

My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior. . .for the Mighty One has done great things for me. . .he has scattered the proud. . .he has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty."

Now, if that isn’t political talk, what is?

Another example: When Christians started preaching the good news (evangelion) that Jesus was their Lord (kurios) and savior (soteros), they were taking the emperor’s language and using it for their own purposes. For you see, we know from an inscription on a lintel in the ruins of the ancient city of Ephesus that the Roman Emperor Augustus Caesar had already published the good news (evangelion) that he was the savior (soteros) of the world, and that he was Lord (kurios). Augustus, incidentally, also encouraged the legend that he was begotten by a god, and not in the usual way. So, the Christmas story can be understood as a daring anti-story rebutting the propaganda of the emperor. The good news to the people of the Roman Empire, therefore, was not that Caesar was their lord and savior, but rather, Jesus was.

The story of the three magi (astrologers) following the star to the place where the baby Jesus was born--that story, too can be understood in a political way, said Amy-Jill. For it was very common in the ancient world to look for signs in the heavens whenever something monumental was about to happen on earth. And what was the monumental event in the Christmas story? It was an anti-event: not that a promising baby was born to royalty, but rather, to an ordinary couple; and not that he was born in a palace, but rather, in a stable. Again, the details of the Christmas story must have carried inescapable political meaning for people who were being bombarded daily by propaganda that was designed to justify their subjection.

Our Advent passage this morning from Isaiah says: "The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God."

One has to work mighty hard not to hear the political intent in that passage. It’s all about social justice, the goal of good politics. The oppressed are going to be set free! The baddies are going to get what’s coming to them! That’s the same message we heard in Mary’s jubilant song. The old regime is about to end. Hallelujah! This is the stuff we customarily read just before Christmas, church. But if we are fixated on Jesus as just a personal savior, it’s bound to go right over our heads.

Now, as I’m about to bring this sermon to a close, I return to the title: "Bringing in the Sheaves." That doesn’t seem very political, does it? At first glance, Psalm 126, reads like a regular harvest hymn. Thanks be to God, who will bring us a good crop and security from want. "We will come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves"-- lovely thanksgiving hymn. Ah, but if we know the historical context of this psalm, we are likely to see more in it than a thanksgiving hymn. The psalm likely derives from the time when the weary Jewish exiles were returning home from Babylon. Resettling was mighty hard for them. Foreigners living there weren’t happy to see them return. They made their lives dangerous and miserable. That’s why the psalm says that the people of God were sewing in tears. There wasn’t any evidence that their labor would come to anything. All the evidence pointed in the opposite direction. A sensible person would have said: Why bother, let’s be done with this. Let’s get out of here! But the psalmist had faith in God. Not just faith that he himself would be saved, but that his people would be saved. So, he sang a crazily jubilant song which said: I know that everything looks bleak, but I put my faith in God. God’s gonna turn things around. Someday we shall overcome. There will be peace, with justice. We sew in tears now, but we shall come rejoicing one day, bringing in the sheaves. Thanks be to God! This is the Christmas good news, personal and political: We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.