"The Morning Light!"

Text: Romans 13:11-14
Theme: “The Morning Light!”
The 1st Sunday of Advent
November 28, 2010
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
The Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

+In the Name of Jesus+

Sing a song of gladness and cheer, for the time of Christmas is here!
Look around about you and see what a world of wonder this world can be!
Sing a Christmas carol!
Sing a Christmas carol!
Sing a Christmas carol – like the children do.
And enjoy the beauty, all the joy and beauty
That Merry Christmas can bring to you!
(from the overture to the motion picture Scrooge)

Happy new year to the church! The time of Christmas is here! Just for the record, there are three seasons in the overall Time of Christmas. First, we have Advent; that runs for four weeks. It’s a season of reflection, of repentance (which is turning back to God), and eager expectation for the coming of Christ. Advent means coming! “Hark, the glad sound! The Savior comes, the Savior promised long; let every heart prepare a throne and every voice a song!” is how one hymn puts it. After that, we will observe the season of Christmas itself which goes on for twelve days. “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a partridge in a pear tree”; you get the idea. Then, on January 6th, Lord willing, the the third and final season in the overall time of Christmas begins with the Epiphany of the Lord. We recall the arrival of the Magi. “We three kings of Orient are bearing gifts; we traverse afar – field and fountain, moor and mountain, following yonder star.” They were not kings; they were not from the orient, and there were likely more than three of them, but that’s for another sermon.

The time of Christmas – with Advent, the twelve day festival of Christmas itself, and Epiphany -- does seem as though life is being injected with steroids. Almost everything is amped up to warp speed. Schedules are packed and so are the malls. The fragile seams of our existence – economic or otherwise -- come close to bursting. Will we make it to and through another Christmas?

There are those who, if truth be told, dread the holiday season. They have very deep, very personal, and reasonable reasons for feeling that way. Existential despair can sink its talons in deeper at Christmas. A sickening realism can invade life. While the world around sings carols, the song in some folks’ hearts goes like this:

Turn out the lights the party’s over.
They say that all good things must end.
Call it a night, the party’s over –
And tomorrow starts the same old thing again.

That was Willie Nelson.

But contrast Willie with old Fezziwig, the boyhood boss of Ebenezer Scrooge. In the motion picture Scrooge – with Scrooge played by Albert Finney – old Fezziwig sings:

Of all the days in all the year that I’m familiar with,
There’s only one that’s really fun: December the Twenty Fifth!
Ask anyone called Robinson, or Brown, or Jones, or Smith,
There favourite day and they will say: December the Twenty Fifth!

At times we’re glad to see the back of all our kin and kith,
But there’s a date we celebrate: December the Twenty Fifth!
At times our friends may seem to be devoid of wit and pith,
But all of us our humorless: December the Twenty Fifth!

If there’s a day in history that more than any myth,
Beyond a doubt one day stands out: December the Twenty Fifth
I don’t hear any arguments, so may I say forthwith,
I wish that every day could be December the Twenty Fifth!

December the Twenty Fifth, me dears!
December the Twenty Fifth!
The dearest day in all the year: December the Twenty Fifth!

Add the violin, and you have a sweet song! But who is telling it like it is in your life as you head in to Christmas– Willie or Fezziwig?

As you can see, our chancel is now bathed in yet more light – light from the Lord’s table, from the Advent wreath, from the Christmas tree. Put it all together, and you have a sign that points to the Light of the world – even Jesus Christ our Lord. St. John says that “In Him (Jesus Christ) is life, and that life is the light of all.” Years before the arrival of Christ on the world stage, King David wrote, in the thirty sixth psalm: “In Your light we see light.”

Having taken a good, long look at the Scripture readings scheduled for this holy season, the theme of light presented itself powerfully to me. Today’s epistle suggests a kind of morning light. Next Sunday, the Second Sunday of Advent, we’ll look at light in the middle of the day. On December 12th, the Third Sunday of Advent, we’ll consider the evening light. On December 19th, the Fourth Sunday in Advent, we’ll gather for the traditional and lovely service of lessons and carols where our focus will be on the light of life! Then, on Christmas Eve, we will celebrate what C.S. Lewis described as the “grand miracle” of light.

Start with the morning light. We all know it’s coming, but there are times when we wish it would wait awhile longer so we might sleep more. Others are used to being “up before the sun and gone with the wind,” as it is said. The season of Advent can be described as a wake up call for the soul, for the spirit. “It is now the moment,” writes the apostle Paul, “to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near.”

What kind of day will it be as the morning lights shine? In their famous song, Oh What a Beautiful Morning, lyricists Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein write:

There's a bright golden haze on the meadow,
There's a bright golden haze on the meadow,
The corn is as high as an elephant's eye,
An' it looks like its climbin' clear up to the sky.

Oh what a beautiful morning,
Oh what a beautiful day,
I've got a wonderful feeling,
Everything's going my way.

Some mornings are like that. Others aren't. On many days, we almost can sense whether things are going to go our way or not. On any given day, we can wake up to predict, prognosticate, and prophecy about how the new day will play itself out. Whatever the condition of our soul may be, the apostle’s call is to set aside, to cast off, anything that deepens the darkness of our souls. He lists the darkness deepeners: dishonorable living, for example, and reveling, drunkenness, debauchery, licentiousness, quarreling, and jealousy. He says to not make “provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” The flesh, our flesh, will always have its needs – like air, food, and water among other things. But it also has its desires – and we run into trouble when the gratification of those desires becomes the all-encompassing, all-consuming reason for our existence. All of that desire that’s run amok and all of those darkness deepeners we’ve mentioned are like old, worn-out, dirty, tattered clothing that ought to be tossed and not recycled. Instead of even thinking of wearing that, he says to “Put on the armour of light” or “Put on Jesus Christ.” Advent, therefore, is a time of spiritual grooming. Like the morning light, it reminds the soul and the spirit to wake up, get up, clean up, and suit up!

A few years back, the poet Sharon Olds told a story that her mother had related to her about when Sharon was only six months old. They had gotten up one morning to go the doctor. Here’s how Sharon describes what happened on that day:

By the time I was six months old, she (my mother) knew something was wrong with me. I got looks on my face she had not seen on any child in the family, or the extended family, or the neighborhood. My mother took me in to the pediatrician with the kind hands, a doctor with a name like a suit size for a wheel: Hub Long. My mom did not tell him what she thought in truth, that I was possessed. It was just these strange looks on my face – he held me, and conversed with me, chatting as one does with a baby, and my mother said, “She’s doing it now! Look! She’s doing it now!” And the doctor said, “What your daughter has is called…a sense…of humor.” “Ohhh,” she said, and took me back to the house where that sense would be tested and found to be incurable.

Friends in Christ, we have a very busy season in front of us. Hopefully, it will be a most meaningful and joyful one too. In God’s light we can see light – in our souls, in our understanding, and even at the end of the tunnel. With the morning light, we can wake up, get up, clean up, and suit up with Christ, the Light of the world. Having a sense of humor – even an incurable one – isn’t too bad either!

Amen.