“A Word for 2010”

John 1:1-14

Rev. Rhonda Abbott Blevins

Happy New Year! Today we mark the first Sunday of 2010, and the first Sunday of a new decade! An exciting day, right? OK, I have to admit, today’s not really an exciting day at all. The holidays are over. The presents have been opened, the visits with family complete, the very thought of another turkey sandwich made from holiday leftovers leaves us nauseous. At my house, we took down the decorations on New Year’s Day, much to my toddler’s protest, “No wanna clean up!” “Yeah, kid I no wanna clean up either, but people will talk if we leave our tree up until next Christmas.”

There’s something very anticlimactic about the first days of January. We’re often left with a cloud of ambivalence, left with the question, “Now what?”

It reminds me of when my son was born. Before his birth we were busy with all kinds of preparations, painting and decorating the nursery, organizing sleepers and diapers and where do you keep socks the size of a thumb nail? Like any new mom, I wanted to make sure everything was “just so.” Then came the excitement of the birth, the rush to the hospital, the anxiety of a premature birth, the days in the hospital nursing a four pound baby to health. When the doctors cleared our baby to come home after two weeks in the neonatal intensive care unit, we had the thrill of baby’s first car ride. I rode in the back seat with the baby while my husband drove 10-miles-per-hour all the way home. We carried this tiny little human into our home, set him down in his carrier on the floor, and stood there looking at him. “Now what?” we wondered. Little did we know it had only just begun!

As Christians, the days after Christmas prompt us to ask the same question. The Christ-child has been born, the carols have been sung, the manger given back to the animals, the baby Jesus sleeps in his car seat as Mary and Joseph wonder, “Now what?” “Now what?” we wonder along with them. “What was all that about anyway?” [1]

That’s where our scripture lesson comes in. John helps us answer that question. “That life,” John explains, “that little life we’ve been celebrating? That life is the light of all people. That light shines through our darkness. Don’t you get it?” the apostle begs us through the ages. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us! That’s what!”

The other part of the good news is that Jesus opened the door for you and me to become sons and daughters of God as well. Listen to verse 12: “But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.” The life and ministry of Jesus Christ is basically summed up in that one statement: Jesus gave you and me the power to become the very child of God.

Barbara Brown Taylor says it this way, “Jesus is not alone in this word-made-flesh business. He has brothers and sisters able to do the works that he does and more. Almost everyone has a word that he or she has a gift for bringing to life.” [2]

Think about that for a moment:

· Think about that person you know who has the knack for bringing to life the word, “generosity.”

· Think about that person you know who has the knack for bringing to life the word, “compassion.”

· Think about that person you know who has the knack for bringing to life the word, “integrity.”

“Until someone acts on these words,” Taylor suggests, “they remain abstract concepts—very good ideas that few people have ever seen. The moment someone acts on them, the words become flesh.”

So my question for you on this, the first Sunday of a new year and a new decade is this, “What word in you wants to become flesh?” What word in you is ready to live and breathe and have life in this New Year—in this new decade?

I want to give you a hint as you think about this, don’t think about this as a way to correct a weakness. That’s the stuff of New Year’s resolutions that often fizzle out before the first light of February. Think about this as harnessing your strength . . . that God-given quality in you that comes so naturally that you don’t even realize how special it is. What is your most natural gift?

· Is it really easy for you to make friends? What a gift! Harness that gift and become a friend to someone who needs companionship!

· Is it really natural for you to do little things in service to others? Harness that gift—the world needs those who can offer acts of kindness!

· Is it second nature for you to care about those marginalized by society? Harness that gift—and work for a world in which justice reigns!

Here’s another way to think about this challenge from scripture today: Frederick Buechner said that our true vocation, that deepest calling from God, is where our deep passion meets the world’s deep need. The world has innumerable needs. We can’t meet them all. We may have lots of passions. The challenge is connect our passion with the world’s need.

We have to fight the tendency to become complacent. The ruts we find ourselves in become very comfortable, but our habits can also imprison us and lead us to a kind of emotional death.

In one of my favorite movies, The Shawshank Redemption, there’s a powerful scene in which two prisoners have a deep conversation about the future. Red (played by Morgan Freeman) tells his good friend Andy (played by Tim Robbins), “I don’t think I could make it on the outside, Andy. I been in here most of my life. I’m an institutional man now,” he confesses to Andy. In stark contrast, Andy tells Red about his dreams of owning a small hotel and charter fishing boat off the coast of Mexico. As Andy talks about his dream you can see the hope emanating from him. Red thinks that kind of hopeful thinking is bad for Andy’s psyche. “I don’t think you should be doing this to yourself, Andy. Mexico’s way down there and you’re in here and that’s the way it is.”

Andy replies, “Yeah, right. That’s the way it is. It’s down there and I’m in here. I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living or get busy dying.”

One of the silver screen’s most compelling lines: “Get busy living or get busy dying.”

Prison is a powerful metaphor for the habits and routines that can eventually control us. Several years ago I had a dream in which, like Andy and Red, I was a prisoner. As I walked the halls of the prison, I happened upon a room where other prisoners were being executed. I knew that if I continued to stay in that prison, I would die as well. Later on in the dream, I stood in the prison yard. The gate was wide open—I had the freedom to walk out, but the gate was closing slowly. I stood there in the prison yard with a choice. I could stay or I could leave, and in the dream I stood there unable to decide simply because I was terrified of the unknown outside that gate. Because of my crippling fear, I stood there imprisoned, frozen, watching the gate to freedom close in front of me.

“I don’t think I could make it on the outside, Andy.”

That dream opened my eyes to how fear was holding me hostage and keeping me from the freedom God had in store for me. Fear can hold us captive and keep us from living into our full potential. Fear often prevents us from being the men and women that God is calling us to become.

For me, my calling was to become a pastor. My prison was my denomination that prevented me from such a thing because of my gender. That dream showed me the folly of my fear, and I eventually walked through that prison gate into the freedom that eventually led me here to be your pastor. God gave me the courage to live into the calling God placed inside me.

“But to all who receive him, to those who believe in his name, he gives the power to become the children of God!”

So child of God, what are you afraid of? What Word in you is dying to get out this year? Open the gate to the freedom of living into God’s deeper calling for you.

May you find the courage to let that Word inside of you become flesh. Amen.

[1] Stephen Bauman, “John 1:(1-9) 10-18: Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word: Year C Volume 1, David L. Bartlett & Barbara Brown Taylor, eds., Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, KY, 2009, p. 190.

[2] Barbara Brown Taylor, “John 1:(1-9) 10-18: Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word: Year C Volume 1, David L. Bartlett & Barbara Brown Taylor, eds., Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, KY, 2009, p. 191.