It Begins in the Wilderness

Gospel Text

Mark 1:1-8

Sermon Text

It begins in the wilderness. And what did you expect? Last week Advent came to us in the middle of things. Or, more pointedly, at the very end of things — at the end of Jesus. The sky growing dark. But now we’re in Mark chapter 1. Now, we’re in the wilderness.

A pastor I used to work with would say:

It’s funny. Seems you can tell the good news without a baby Jesus, but apparently you can’t tell it without John the Baptist. Because not all four of our gospels have a birth story about Jesus, but they do all have this: The wild man in the wilderness telling people to get ready, to let God change their hearts.

It begins in the wilderness. And what did you expect? Have you ever had Christmas in the wilderness? Here’s one way you can do it, in our very town. There is a simple hike off of Mt Rose Hwy. You head from town up the hwy toward the lake, and you turn left on Callahan Road.

In a little ways you get to Galena Creek Trailhead, and if you take that hike, some of it next to the golf course, on your right, but then you outpace the golf course which always make me feel good like — then, it starts to feel like some wilderness, and you’re following the creek. And then there’s this moment where, in a clearing, there’s a pine tree with a bunch of Christmas ornaments on it. I think the first time I saw it I was like, “O come on, who’s out here doing this to the trees?”

But, really the more I’ve seen it, I kind of don’t mind it so much. Some of the ornaments are personal ones, and interesting. Also, it’s kind of like a rock cairn, those stacks, they let you know as you’re going — Hey, folks have been here.

And for me it’s two things in our desert waiting. In our dry creek-bed waiting:
1. It’s suddenly Christmas in the wilderness. Like a surprising gift.
2. And it’s a connection to others in the wilderness. O, I’m not alone! I was happy to leave the golf course behind. That was maybe too much connection. But just as you’re getting into the wild, it can be a respite to know — Oh yes, I don’t walk this way alone.

It begins in the wilderness. And even there, Advent is whispering to us— there are gifts! There is one another. In Scripture, the place of the wilderness is where a reset occurs, a challenge (like a temptation) or a place or a space where our idea of the “normal way of things” has broken down, or reached it’s end, and it’s time to begin again.

Wilderness can be an in-between place. On the way to the new. It’s not easy. It’s not always desirable. But it’s not always a setback either. Like a preparation, it is cleaning the slate, it is clearing the deck. Writers and naturalists like Henry Thoreau know this, saying: “We need the tonic of wildness.” Or Gary Snyder, writing just on the other side of the Sierras, up by Nevada City says: “The wild-often dismissed as savage and chaotic by “civilized” thinkers, is actually impartially, relentlessly, and beautifully formal and free. Its expression-the richness of life, life on the globe including us, the rainstorms, windstorms, and calm spring mornings- Its expression is the real world, to which we belong.”

And what did you expect?

We belong, in part, to this wilderness, on the way to the new. And we belong, together. Consider today the good news of Isaiah 40: “Comfort, O Comfort my people. Speak Tenderly to Jerusalem. Her penalty is paid.”

This is God saying: it’s time to whisper to any wandering heart, call the wanderer, call them in to the warmth of home. Comfort, speak tenderly, here’s hot cocoa, take off those wet boots, get by this fire. You belong here.

Isaiah says, Take Heart! If you are suffering, there is a HOME from the wilderness. We are found and we are called home. So you can already tell, the relationship between wilderness and Home, between self and world … it is a tangle, it’s complicated. But being drawn between these places, spaces, and states, and existing there—it’s true.

Take, for instance, the Israelites wandering in the wilderness, after being freed from slavery in Egypt. It is a long time and it takes trust. God is feeding them, but they don’t know the way, they don’t have the map, they are not in control. They wander that wilderness long enough that the generation that came out of Egypt, adults when they were freed, they all die. Even Moses, you remember.

There’s the peculiarity. No one makes it out of the wilderness alive. The desert is undefeated. And we will come to the end of ourselves. Even Jesus. Last week, the first Sunday in Advent; Our Beginning is Jesus’ end, the giving of his life. Not even Jesus makes it out of this world alive, and yet, for him, death is not the last word.

We don’t make it out alive, and yet there is a voice calling in our wilderness.

This Advent, can we hear it? Can we feel the other side of death? That’s the context for Isaiah 40: Hey, a battle has been won, a war is over, and returning is our king with the spoils of that war. For society it is the end of wilderness time, because this kingdom is made whole again! The agents and advocates returning, a royal highway is prepared. That’s a way made through every valley and mountain, so that crowds can gather along a parade route, cheering because it’s victory day!

And the crowds are shouting: good tidings! Isaiah says, we are to shout to one another HERE IS YOUR GOD!, pointing to the way that’s been made.

See, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. God has the reward with him, of fighting the good fight. Of going through death, and what reward, what treasure does God bring to showcase on the highway? And, what did you expect?! God is a shepherd with a flock, “He will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep.”

For God in Christ the treasure…what is won…is you and me.

The whole reset, the strife, the battle for life and death … it is so that God can carry us home from the wilderness. Carry YOU home from YOUR wilderness this Advent. The little lambs of the flock are returned, Comfort, Comfort my people. I gather them in my arms.

It was our prayer on Monday night, with Pat McDuffie in her last hours, in the wilderness of a hospital room; but tangled, because the wilderness had a voice calling someone home, and we knew we weren’t alone — I feel like you all were with us, family in the wilderness, her family gathered around, all saying: it’s ok, you can go home to God, God comes to gather you in God’s arms. You are the treasure, Patsy. And even now it’s that you are the treasure. You are gathered in the arms of Mercy. Here is your God!

This Advent, as the nights grow darker, the days shorter, and we try to focus on the reset of this time in the midst of Christmas-mania. May you and I be heralds of glad tidings, may we speak tenderly to each other and to a wilderness world, saying, “This God of comfort is not far away from you, but is all about finding you in the wild and gathering you up and bringing you home!”

So, be at peace, abide with your shepherd, turn around. Those longing for justice and light are lambs, seeing a new day in a new kingdom.

AMEN