Christmas Homily: Ards 2017: Year of the Family

Christmas Homily: Ards 2017: Year of the Family

Emmanuel that is the title He gives Himself…

God with us…

Down the dark and longing ages the prophet’s flame touched words are heard,

“A virgin will conceive and bear a Son and his name shall be Emmanuel”…

They were not understood but they were repeated, renewed in each generation’s heartfelt yearning…and so the sacred words come down to us…

They shine an inner light upon that yearning that arises from that deeply gnawing sense we all have of separation… of being alone… of isolation…

Separated from our God, sin sundered from each other, separated by death… we long for completeness, for perfection, for peace… for life eternal,

for God with us…

We look for its fulfilment… so often searching in the wrong places… We give ourselves over to short term solutions, thinking that our hungers are more important than asking why we are hungry at all and, if we are then what are we truly hungry for? We think our desires are more important than those of others, our needs more pressing than yours…and so finding in our overwhelming desires a fire that scorches and destroys when all the time we were really looking for a light that illumines and enlightens…

It is enough to make us despair…

Or it would be…

Were it not for the prophet’s Spirit whispered promise…

Emmanuel: Our God with us…

the fulfilment of all our hopes and dreams with us…

Can it really be possible?

We wonder…

Could the God of gods, the light from light truly want to be with us?

With us in our mess?

With us in our sin?

With us in our brokenness?

No! Impossible, we think,

At least not until I make myself perfect, or at least a little better,

God would not come to my home, to my heart, to my family… I mean look at us…

Look at me…

“If you really knew me…” we say

 and the fall silent before the mirror of our own soul and its sin soiled surface

No, we think… He could not want to be with me, and in our twisted pride we close our doors to him, just as surely as the innkeeper did on that night,

as the Pharisees would later,

as Pilate finally will with the washing of his hands…

But look at the name He is announced under…

God with us… Emmanuel

Not God with us if…

Not God with us… when

Not God with us…but

You see, where true love exists there are no ifs, buts, or whens;

no conditions no limits no ultimatums

There is only with…

The Lover with the Beloved

Each allowing the other to be who they are.

The One present to the other in open compassion and peace.

That is love

That alone

And to prove this He comes in the most simple and poor way possible.

He descends directly into the mess, into the heart of the mess,

Into a divided world

Into conquered nation

Into a persecuted people

Into a displaced tribe

Into a dung and straw filled stable

Into a topsy turvy family barely ready for a birth

Into the pure heart of a young girl

Love descends.

Love itself descends and becomes one with the mess

Becomes one with us.

Becomes one with me.

Becomes one with you.

And we touch pure, divine unconditional love

No waiting for us to be perfect here…

If God was to wait for us to be perfect there would never have been a Christmas!

No He comes to the mess and in coming to it begins to heal it there and then.

Right there in the midst of it all.

He comes.

The star hangs silent and almost unnoticed over a town overrun with chaos

The angels travel to the simplest and most unclean to deliver the message

of peace!

(no shepherds allowed in the temple! No farmers before the altar with their muddy sandals and earthy hands.)

Emmanuel: Our God with us…

He comes in stillness

He comes in peace

He comes in vulnerability

He comes in the middle of the night

He comes in the deep midwinter

He comes to be loved

He comes to love as only a baby loves

Without judgement and always in the perfect

present moment, forgetting what has just been before

and open to Love now.

Emmanuel: Our God with us…

One with us…

And in that shining moment of Bethlehem we are made part of His family again

The one great family of creation restored as sons and daughters of the Most High

There is no one without a family ever again

No one without a place here at the manger

No one for whom the babe would not have come

Or did not come…

He came for you

He came for me, broken, sinful me…

And He came so that in the Love that is God the broken would be made whole, the sin forgiven and the new beginning of blessing begun in my life and in yours too…

This is what we celebrate tonight…

Every Christmas light you see reminds us of the light of the stable and the star,

every tree in every window the evergreen welcome of Christ in His Love,

every gift exchanged a shadow of the greatest gift ever given…

this is why we gather here and in all the churches of the world tonight and it is why we are sent from here with this message, this commission to tell the whole world

Our God is Emmanuel

Our God is with us!

Hear it!

You have a commission… You cannot call yourself a Christian and absolve yourself from it! Wherever you are, wherever you go you have a message to proclaim, if not by your words then more importantly by your life!

In your home

In your place of work

In your relationships

You must be Christmas!

You must be the reminder to all that God is with us!

You must become a Christmas tolling bell announcing the Word made Flesh,

the birth of the Saviour…

No one should meet you, friend or stranger and not meet the Good News of God in the mess, God with us…

No one should meet you, should meet me

without knowing they have met another call to the manger,

a call to come home to the family of God,

a call to the embrace of Love;

No one should meet you, should meet me

without knowing that in some way they have met the Christ who comes,

the babe of Bethlehem, the God who is with us…

the God who is love.

The God who sees in us only and always

His beloved sons and daughters

His family.

We have called Him Lord and Master and rightly, for so He is…

We have called Him Prince of Peace, and Wonderful Counsellor and Everlasting Father, and so He is…

But He has called Himself Emmanuel…

God with us…

And that is what we celebrate this Christmas night.

May the Lord give you His Peace this Christmas Night: The Father, the Son and + the Holy Spirit.

Amen/

The Wild Nativity

The Wild Nativity.

We have our prophecies too
you know,
we tell our own tales,
and so we knew
to gather there
that night,
ambassadors of our
varied kinds all.
Before old Joseph
came back
with supplies from the inn.
We were there,
hidden in the hay,
up amongst the old beams,
resting by the manger
or drawn there
by the new star
that rose that night
pure and shining
like a snowflake
in its light.
We were there.
We had felt the
old pull of Eden
in our furred and feathered hearts
and felt his long forgotten nearness
once again who walked with us
once in evening light.
Old rivalries forgotten,
or at least put aside tonight,
we sat peacefully
in storied rank
half hidden in the shadows,
lost in awe at her,
settled
so still
in the straw,
her eyes closed
as though present
to a mystery
within.
We were there
waiting for Him
with her.
Let us prepare
His place we said...
Wren moved first,
to pluck her own breast
scattering the softest down
amongst the rough straw
and sparrows followed
weaving moss and herbs
as mattress
as Owl, and old Crow
and Hawk directed.
"I will keep him warm",
said Robin,
reddening his breast
while fanning flame alight.
"We will sing to him
when at last He comes"
said the little ones,
four footed and furred
and long tailed too,
piping in their tiny voices
choiring high as mouse
and vole, rabbit
and hedgehog all
assembled there,
followed by fox's clear tenor
and Badger's earthy baritone
to sing their
benediction of
wild welcome.
And then he came.
How? As sun shines sudden through a cloud breaking blindingly!
How? As the first rays of dawn mark that moment when night becomes a new day.
How? As a scenting nose is suddenly aware of a change in the air.
He came.
More than that we will not say.
Ours alone was that privilege to see and we will guard it down the ages...
And Mary looked upon us with love
and thanked us all
and in her smile and words
we heard old Eve laugh
at last again.
And then there was noise,
and people,
so many people,
and we withdrew
as we always do
to the shadows
again.
But not before He smiled at us
a smile of long recognition
graced and grateful
both.
After the shepherds left,
and their piping drumming din
went off amongst the crowds.
After Bethlehem finally became still.
After old Joseph nodded off
to his Angeled dreams.
We were there
and came forth again
from the shadows
to dwell with them,
our new Adam and Eve,
and heard then
our Gospel
preached to us,
who are already
of His kingdom
and always were.
We made our covenant
with Him then,
to be the first apostles
of His love
and in
our being blessed
and shared with you
to remind you
of the innocence
you lost
and He renews
if you would but follow
our
wild way to
Eden's light
again.
We have been
forgotten now
as shepherds, kings
and crowds
followed,
but not by Him,
who from his mother's arms
smiled past them all at us
hiding in the shadows
there.
And we would later
meet Him
in the desert
and the garden,
there
we will be with Him
again,
for we have
our prophecies too
you know,
and tell our tales
too,
whispering
to each other
across the woods
and hills,
on this night
each year
as you toll your bells
and sing,
we look to the skies
and
remember;
we
were
there.

Christmas Blessings to you and yours this Holy Night +

(Pic is of The Christmas Star by Lynn Bywaters)

On the Edge of Waiting: A Meditation Poem for Christmas Eve, Eve.

On the Edge of Waiting.
(A Meditation Poem for Christmas Eve, Eve)

Shhh...
Come away a moment,
my friend.
Come away
from the lights,
and the crowds,
and the shops,
and the noise,
and the pressure,
and the worrries,
and the old wounds that
winter us
before our time.
Come and sit with me here.
Rest.
Just for a moment.
Let me share with you once again
what we forget in our festive
frenzy:
He is coming…
Down the long ages of despair
He comes as Hope.
Down the rough road of doubt
He comes as Faith.
Down the broken byways
of the
human heart
He comes as Love.
He is coming…
Sit with me on the edge of waiting…
Sit in sacred stillness…
Breathe the deep breath of
blessing.
You do not have to do anything.
He is coming…
Whether you are ready or not
Aware or not,
Able or not,
Present or not,
Believing or not,
He is coming…
As the sun rises,
as the moon shines,
as the tides turn,
as the stars dance,
He is coming…
So do not worry.
Let the tyranny of
tension
fall from you…
You never needed to carry it.
Let the false face of
righteous readiness to defend,
dissolve.
You never needed to wear it.
How could you ever be ready
for this?
For the first proclamation of the
Kingdom to be heard in a baby’s
cry.
Nothing is asked of you
but
to be here and now
who you are.
Truly.
Fully.
Broken?
Yes.
Weak?
Yes.
Called?
Oh yes.
He is coming…
And He is calling you to come to Him.
As He always does.
As He always will.
So, how will you greet Him,
the One who is coming?
The One who calls you,
to His crib.
(Yes, you.)
Will you prepare a place for Him?
Will you open the cave of your heart to Him?
Will you place Him in the sanctuary of your soul?
Will you lay Him upon the rough straw of your life?
Will you swaddle Him with your silence?
Will you offer Him the gentle warmth of animal breath?
Will you offer Him your love?
Or not.
He is coming…
Do not miss the moment
Of Mystery’s
mangered birth
by succumbing to
Bethlehem busyness.
No.
Become as still as a shepherd watching the flock of slumbering sheep.
Become as still as a sage watching the long dance of the stars.
Become as still as Joseph hearing Angels on the edge of dreams.
Become as still as she who is the stillpoint of love’s longing, filled with light,
and whose silence
brought forth the
Word of Love.
Be still and you will know
He is coming…
Always…
In stillness,
on the edge of waiting…
He is coming for you…
He is coming to you…
Always.
He is coming in Love.

(I wrote this last year and just discovered it has been shared over 1000 times on FB! As it seems to be something we all need to hear I'm posting it again. May its words continue to bless all who read it... Happy Christmas Eve, Eve to all)
Brother Richard

O Emmanuel: A meditation on the seventh of the Great O Antiphons of Advent.

O Emmanuel!

You who are God with us,

Come and deliver your people!

All holy one

who dwells higher

than the Cherubim,

adored by the living fire of the

Seraphim in love

so exultant it enflames all

it touches,

you who hide behind

the cloud and thunder of Sinai,

lest we would die

in awe,

descend now

and reveal at last

your face to us

our Saviour!

O Emmanuel!

Name by which

we would never

have named you,

so awesome is your mystery;

and yet, this name you choose

and place upon your

prophet who speaks it as sign

through lips of flame.

Descending into our nature

so to raise it on high;

our God above,

beyond,

before

you are,

yet now revealed as

with us

in our every moment,

as in your incarnation

eternity weds time

and heals the long broken

human heart

consecrating the cosmic 

temple anew.

O Emmanuel!

Love incarnate

and light from light!

You fill all things,

and all things 

have their being in you,

yet you choose us

for your family

and come to dwell in us

through the mystery 

of a mother’s love!

For nine moons

at play in that sacred pool,

ever unrippled 

and undisturbed,

you hallow

the waters of the womb 

again

and in its sacred darkness 

dance,

making of the one who builds you

from her own blood

and feeds you on her own milk

the first tabernacle from

which all of us 

will feed!

O Emmanuel!

Hear us on this seventh

and most sacred night,

as we complete 

the circle of 

our sacred invocations,

closing at last the wreath 

of evergreen time,

and gather once again

at star-rise to call you

from the heavens

and down the winding roads

of our long hoping

to be born in us again!

O hear our song

sung from the heart

of humbled humanity

that we, who have in you

our very God with us,

may learn the wisdom from

your prophet promised

and thrice holy mother,

to bow our heads

and enter Bethlehem’s barn

and there be with the One

who in love’s divine mystery

is always and ever

with us.

“O Emmanuel, our king and our lawgiver,

the hope of the nations and their Saviour:

Come and save us, O Lord our God!”

O King of the Nations, O Rex Gentium: A meditation on the sixth of the Great O Antiphons of Advent

O King of the Nations!

Long desired one we call to you!

Come from

your Royal Throne

and reign over us!

You who are the beginning

and the end of all;

the first principle

and the fount of all that is!

Come, we pray,

and restore the

divine order of this cosmos,

long thrown into chaos

by the discordant note

of our sin.

O King of the Nations!

Of old known by so many names

and in so many places sought!

Desired in the hearts

of all peoples, of all times

and

templed in the souls 

of all those ancient elders,

men and women of

justice,

peace,

and truth.

Tear down, then

the veils of separation

and reveal your holy name

to all,

as you did to Moses,

that from the many nations

there may be formed

one peaceful people,

one flock,

beneath the loving gaze of

the Good Shepherd.

O King of the Nations!

Come and be our cornerstone!

Take our lost

and tumbling efforts

and re-found, re-form,

our crumbling clay

in your divine matrix

that humbled,

we may stand tall again

and find our place

within your temple

as living stones

once more!

O King of the Nations!

Hear our sacred invocation

as we sing the royal hymn of the Lady,

she who is your Queen and Mother both!

Let us follow her 

in magnifying your power

in its paradox of grace!

For you,

O Conquering Messiah,

in your stabled birth

will teach us the true path

of kingship,

and bestow upon our nature

a royal dignity

never to be taken away!

So then,

may we become, again,

as once we were,

the highest gift

and twice blessed

in our being

by following your

descending

path to the lowest point

of emptiness

and there,

between the

breathing of the beasts

and the beating of a Mother’s

heart,

beneath the star-stilled sky,

and

only there,

come at last

to hear the

Angels

exult

in true royalty

revealed

as Love.

“O King of the Nationsand their desire,

the cornerstone making both one:

Come and save the human race,

which you fashioned from clay.”

O Rising Sun, O Oriens: A meditation on the fifth of the Great O Antiphons of Advent

O Rising Sun!

On the day of the deepest dark

we call you!

Come to us O promised light!

Gazing upon the eastern edge

of the world

we thrill,

as from our long benighted being

the first dayspring spark is cast,

and a red dawn heralds

a conqueror’s coming!

O Rising Sun!

You who are light from light,

scatter upon us

the uncreated light by which our dull eyes

may even now behold

the dawn of your presence!

Illume us as lanterns,

kindle us as fires,

breathe your flame upon us as beacons

in a world so cold

and a winter of the heart so dark

we oft forget the dawn that has come,

is come,

will come again,

needing our annual remembering

to rekindle our rebirth in you

O Son!

O Rising Sun!

We long for your dawn

down the dark and ancient ways of ancestry

Feeling in our old yearning

the gathering of ghostly generations

who followed their deepest knowing,

that map,

long inscribed upon the centre

of our being

but written in a sacred script

unknown to eyes lost to Eden’s light.

For they,

So desperate for the

warming of a presence

they remembered

but did not know

wrought stone,

and marked ways,

and offered song,

and told story,

and gathered green,

and even spent

blood,

to charm back an earthly sun

while truly seeking

for the Divine Son

who would warm

the winter of our heart

and make of Himself

the sacrifice that brings the light back

for an eternal day  

O Rising Sun!

We call you by our evening invocation!

Kindling our vesper candles and vigil lights,

wrapping the wreath of time

in flames of rose and purple,

we sing now the soul song of

the Lady of the Light.

She whose heart blessed beacon

shone so bright in love,

it drew you from

the realms of everlasting day

to that sealed chamber in which,

with quickening touch,

you, the dayspring and the morning star

both

bestowed your spark of glory

and found your home,

issuing forth

as Word and Light

to bestow the blessing

of a dawn from our Midwinter night,

that re-orients us to righteousness,

and reveals the Light beyond all night

Bethlehem born and blazing

as the true and victorious

Son.

"O Rising Sun!

Splendour of light eternal and sun of righteousness:

Come and enlighten those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death!"

Our Lady of the Solstice

Lady of the Solstice

At the moment
of
the
deepest dark
and,
at
the sharp point
of the
longest night,
at such distance from
dawn
that we groan
beneath
the burden of
being,
and touch within
ourselves
only
the winds of winter
and the
wild longing
where
light
is only a memory
long lost
and left behind in
summer sun;
then we,
suddenly,
and just for
the merest of moments,
are hushed
into silence,
as the turning
of the
ancient
wheels of wonder
stop,
and sun and stars
all,
still their divinely
directed dance
and take their
yearly yearned for
deep remembering
rest,
like lovers suddenly
still,
when struck
by desire's reverie;
or dancers,
pulsing with passion,
awaiting the next
beat
of beauty's music
to liberate life within.
They,
our elder siblings
of the sky,
recall in
their
sacred stillness
that moment
when
once,
just once,
their fiery song,
sung since
first
divine kindling,
was
paused,
hushed,
stilled,
stopped;
just
once,
long ago,
so as
to
listen to
a new note
joined to
the
great hymn of gratitude
that all
offer
simply by their very being.
For in that
moment
of their listening
was revealed
she who is
our true solstice.

The Woman,
that moment of
perfect stillness
between
divine in-breathing
and creation's
exhalation of excelsis.
So they watched,
as she who is the
stillpoint
of
the dance of story,
and the sanctuary
where
myth becomes flesh,
then,
before angelic emissary,
dropped the pebble of her
yes,
in its utter simplicity,
longed for through the countless
ages of agony,
into the pool of our pain.

Behold the Solstice of the Lord…
Be it done unto me according to His Word…

Looking deep they
saw its
ripples now run to the
edges of existence
trembling them with
the promise
of a new
Spring.

And the Story became flesh…
And dwelt amongst us…

This young girl,
this Lady of light.
who is our solstice.
She,
the perfect place
of stillness,
so attuned
to the coming of the Light
that in her
all
creation stills,
the old cycle of sin
is broken
and,
even the deep dark
of despair
must yield
to glow of dawn.

She,
the light that glows before
the rising Sun,
heralded by Robin
and Wren
and fluting Blackbird,
She, like that blessed moment
when Sun and Moon
both
hang in the deep blue together
and bow as they pass
gentling our hearts
and
drawing us from dreams
to welcome
the advent of the One
who
IS
Love's Light
and eternal Word both,
spoken now into time’s renewed turning
by the Yes of one who
holds
within her heart
the perfect emptiness of Love.

Treasuring in
the holy dark of
her womb the hearth
where Spring's spark is
kindled
and brightens with beauty
as a
first place of
promised Easter exhalation
the cave of
rebirth;
in which
eternity and time
are married,
and infinity will wed itself
forever
to clay's embrace.

Here, in this
sacred solstice place,
Eve's aching
is healed,
and
here,
Adam's sin
undone,
as from the dry root
of the
sundering tree
a new shoot rises
at the word of
one
whose whole being
is Yes
whose whole being
is
Love,

And so,
yearly
we sit,
rooting ourselves
once again
in Mother Earth's embrace,
and while looking ever upwards
we find the still point
of the skies
and yet
inwardly gaze
into
the light of story
long-kindled
against the cold of winter,
and so become
re-minded,
re-hearted,
re-souled,
by she who is our solstice,
whose self-forgetting
Yes
brought to us
the turning of the light
and blessed us
all
like barren trees
brought to beauty
by a sudden
anointing
of
new snow.