Where We Belong - Where the Wild Things Are

Isaiah 40: 1-11 & Mark 1:1-8

Last Sunday, Vicar Anne welcomed all to a new year… and today in Mark, we start at the very beginning. The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ. We listen to the ancient prophets calling from Isaiah and Malachi… here is the messenger, the forerunner, John the baptizer (who looks so much like Elijah), that previous wild voice of God in the wilderness. 

Do you remember Elijah? Elijah… didn’t exactly die after his many years of being God’s voice on earth but was carried up to heaven in a flaming chariot, so the people began to imagine that Elijah would return before the Messiah came. And here is John, another character in the wilderness, out on a vision quest, surviving on what the wilderness provides, coming back to speak God’s words to the community with clarity. Here is John to pave the way for the One who was coming soon.

 

Things are hard in the wilderness… there is isolation, frustration, loneliness…

We know something about that in this season of waiting when we’re all… waiting.
Waiting for a vaccine, waiting to see our loved ones, waiting to gather with others again.

This year, this Advent, we’re not able to meet God in our usual spaces – sanctuaries, volunteer roles, usual patterns of gathering and serving others. 

It’s a wilderness time when God’s presence is de-centralized, where God has spread out to all the places we are…

 

Things are hard in the wilderness, things also may become more clear.
Wilderness can be a revealing place.
Many ancient and diverse people went to the wilderness to learn their names, deepen identity, to gain spiritual grounding and insights.

 

Maybe some of you remember the children’s book by Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are. Max has gotten into all kinds of mischief and is finally sent to his room without any supper. His room becomes a forest and then he sails away in his own little boat to the place where the wild things are. They have yellow eyes and terrible teeth and claws, but actually, Max is able to tell them to be still. They say that Max is the king of the wild things and they have a wild rumpus. Then… Max begins to smell supper and looks just a little bit lonely and sad… and “wanted to be home where someone loved him best of all.” So he returns back to his room where his supper is waiting for him and it is still hot.

 

That is the picture that Isaiah creates for us today – a beautiful picture of coming home to the One who loves you best of all.

True… in this time, we’re not able to meet God in our usual spaces – 

Yet out here, where we are… God is present and this is the God who loves you best of all.

 

Advent is a season of great expectations… and maybe we’ve been trying to tamp down our expectations this year… 

But, we need great expectations when we’re wandering in the wilderness.

 

So here is John the baptizer, forerunner of Jesus, one of those amazing people who pave the way for others, saying “I am not the one you’re waiting for but I know who is.”
And this Jesus, who is Emmanuel—God with us—even in this unusual December, in this month we cannot predict, when we cannot rely on our usual plans and patterns… this Jesus is coming soon in ways we cannot expect.

 

How glorious God is… however good and loving we think God is… God is even more loving…

And in this month, God invites us to cultivate relationship.

 

Again and again and again, God invites us to turn around (not just in the sense of turning from bad stuff we’re involved in…)

But to turn around toward God is who constantly calling each one, everyone home.

This month, we’ll come back to this theme repeatedly - Where we belong – 

And this theme is about coming home to God, coming home to who we are… who God has truly made us to be, a daily turning, receiving God’s daily embrace.

 

Even when the whole world is moving or has moved on in a different direction, Jesus invites our turning to the God who is past, present and future…

 

In Advent, we wait for the second coming of Jesus…
but isn’t Christ always near, ready to be born within and among us?
God has met us in song and prayer, in candlelight and community, in family and gatherings, year after year.

So, we can expect the second or third or billioneth coming of Christ… among us…this year… even if the context is different.

This year, God will meet us in our homes.
God will meet us in each beginning, each thing that we do in a new way because we’ve never lived with these circumstances before… God will gather us like lambs, carry us in her bosom, be strong and tender, be faithfully present, reveal glory.

 

God’s coming is good news.

No need to tamp down expectations here in the wilderness because here, we’ll begin to smell God’s delicious cooking, wafting our way…  

after a little time in the wilderness where the wild things are, we might just realize that in God, we are finally home where we are loved best of all.