Today's sermon was centred on Isaiah 40:1 - 11 (Lectionary OT reading), and as a way in we did a little bit of Biblical studies type stuff noting the generally accepted hypothesis that there at least two and probably three books combined end-to-end to make up what we know as Isaiah.

Recognising that Deutero-Isaiah and Trito-Isaiah are exilic/post-exilic whereas as Proto-Isaiah was penned around 200 years earlier, and pre-exilic, was key to our approach.

We tried to imagine ourselves into a place of 'exile' - a literal or metaphorical place or state of being that felt dark, hopeless, unending... and then to imagine that someone handed us a book to read.  Great, we might think, sacrcastically, just what I need - how to pray harder, or sin less, or believe better, or, or... but then we opened it up and there it was, page 1, line 1

Comfort my people

The role of the prophet(ess) here is denounce the sorrow, sadness, regret, loss, grief, exile as the "wrong thing" sorrow, sadness, regret, loss, grief, exile, etc. and instead to speak a word of hope... God wants to embrace these broken-hearted people...

Ending with the image of the shepherd, the rough semi-outcast peasant worker, scooping up the frightened lost lamb and carrying it safely home in his arms, this is a passage of surprising tenderness and hope.

Shout it from the roof tops: "Comfort" this is Good News indeed

"I once knew a man who danced with a women, who danced with the Prince of Wales" or so the saying goes... an expression of the six degrees of separation type thing that almost certainly predates the 'six degrees' expression.

Anyhow, true story: I have someone in my congregation whose Father recalls hearing a sermon preached by Howell Lewis, whose hymn is BPW 146... so I have a tenuous link with this hymn which, it seems, expresses something of the gentle spread of the good news as "new people are learning to pray"

The light of the morning is breaking,
The shadows are passing away;
The nations of earth are awaking,
New peoples are learning to pray.
Let wrong, O Redeemer, be righted,
In knowing and doing Thy will;
And gather, as brothers united,
All men to Thy cross on the hill.

Thy love is the bond of creation,
Thy love is the peace of mankind:
Make safe with Thy love every nation
In concord of heart and of mind.
Thy pity alone can deliver
The earth from her sorrows, dear Lord:
Her pride and her hardness forgive her,
Thy blood for her ransom was poured.

Thy throne, O Redeemer, be founded
In radiance of wisdom and love;
Thy name through the wide world be sounded
Till earth be as heaven above.
Though hills and high mountains should tremble,
Though all that is seen melt away,
Thy voice shall in triumph assemble
Thy loved ones at dawning of day.

Howell E Lewis (1860-1953) © Piers Morgan

The tune, Crugybar, is not everso well known, beign a Welsh folk tune.  However I did find this video of some young clarinetists playing Vaughn Williams' fantastia upon it...

PS almost certain it's not that Piers Morgan!!

It's not too late to join in with this blogified advent calendar which is really rather wonderful... each day a short reflection and prayer relating to a group of poeple who might feel excluded in or by church.  They are already proving really thoughtful and important...

Dec 1 - children

Dec 2 - single people

Dec 3 - blind people

Dec 4 - people who are homeless

Dec 5 - people who use foodbanks

Dec - people with dementia

Well worth a look see....

Often I find that a word or theme recurs during the extended liturgical seasons of Lent and Advent.  This year there have been two, it seems... "backwards" and "simplify"

BACKWARDS

"Walking Backwards to Christmas" by Stephen Cottrell is an Advent book that travels backwards through the story, with some slightly lumpy smoothing of the Luke/Matthew differences, imagining the scene through real and "invented" characters - so far the most powerful (with a strong language alert) is that of "Rachel" at the slaughter of the innocents... not something we often ponder this side of tinselmas Christmas.

Similarly, Jostein Gaarder's "Christmas Mystery" is a narraive advent calendar that travels backwards from 20th century Scandinavia to 1st century Bethlehem via a 'magic advent calendar'.  I am enjoying this book which is new to me, though a much loved treaure of many others.

Then yesterday, I was at meeting where the speaker observed, as many have done before, that it is only by looking backwards we  see God's action in our lives or in history.

Telling it backwards, seeing it backwards, imaginatively travelling backwards... it seems to be an Advent 2014 theme.

SIMPLIFY

Explicity, and specifically from the Alternativity movement comes the call to 'simplify' our Christmas festivities... less bells and whistles, less fuss, less self, less money, less stress... whatever it may be.

This year I have simplified what I am offering to my fellow Gatherers... no 'angle' on the Advent candles, just adopting the Christian Aid liturgy, no gimmics, no giveaways, just straightforward services.  Our morning carol service on Advent 4 will be, essentially, the Christian Aid "lessons and carols" with a few tweaks to add in offertory and intercessions!!

Family gifts this year are, to all intents and purposes "shoe boxes" - 'small parcel' size boxes which I will fill with small gifts purchased locally and avoiding the lure of Amazon (so far so good on my Amzaon free Advent, not even a digital download :) )  Church fundraising calendars, charity chocolate bars, little "aha" gifts... I will spend as much, I am sure, but it will simpler, gentler and hopefully still bring some happiness to the recipients.

I wonder which words are featuring in your Advent preparations?

Now, all this talk of walking backwards stirs a little levity in my soul...

Sometimes word changes in old hymns/songs/carols to modernise language are helpful, making clearer the intent and removing obsolete idiom.  Sometimes they manage to lose, damage or even destroy something of the poetry/mystery/meaning the original writer captured/expressed.

BPW 145 begins thus:

Of the Father's heart begotten

When the worlds had yet to be

He is Alpha and Omega

He the source, the ending he,

Of the things that are, that have been,

And the future years shall see:

Evermore and evermore

The 'traditional words' version I learned years ago, and which is in BHB begins:

Of the Father's love begotten

Ere the worlds began to be...

And another even older version has:

Of the Father's heart begotten

Ere the world from chaos rose

He is alpha and omegea

He the source and he the close

Of whatever is or has been

or the future years disclose

Saeculorum secoulis

For me, somehow "ere the worlds began to be"  is richers than "when the worlds had yet to be"... something about 'ere' an archaic word that does, simply mean "before' echoes better the mystery of the eternal Christ who is beyond/outside time and space.

I am intrigued by the plural "worlds" in the majority of versions of this hymn, which has a clear 'universal' referent rather than "world" which preusmably means earth.  The hints of John 1 and John 3 are there for those who will see... in love God created all that is, in love for the cosmos, God entered its finitude to redeem it.

A beautiful hymn worth singing - in whichever version you favour!