This is the Sunday of Advent that we light the pink candle, because this Sunday of Advent stands out with the theme of joy. Our readings and propers wasted no time getting to the joy theme. The Introit shouts out: Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. And then our Old Testament reading from Zephaniah: 14 Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! The cause of this singing and celebrating is the Lord’s deliverance of His people. 15 The Lord has taken away the judgments against you; he has cleared away your enemies. The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall never again fear evil.
Our Epistle reading from Philippians says so much in one sentence: 4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. And the reason for rejoicing is because the Lord is at hand. The Lord is not far off, but near and present. Whatever may bring sorrow is only temporary because in a permanent way God joined himself to the world he created in the birth of Jesus.
And by this birth none of the old things remain, even death is transformed by this birth of Jesus. One of our Easter hymns says it well: “Weeping be gone, sorrow be silent, death put asunder and Easter is bright. Cherubim sing: “O grave be open!” Clothe us in wonder and adorn us in light.
In the time when John the Baptist sat in prison, the Lord was at hand in the form of the miracles of healing Jesus performed. In our time the Lord is at hand through the miracles of salvation that are worked through the church. We who are dead to sin are brought near to God with clean hearts. That is a miracle that the Lord works right in our midst, that helps us to know without doubt that the kingdom of God is here. As we see right before our eyes how the Lord saves our brothers sisters here and elsewhere we have joy.
This joy comes in a time when the prince of this world scowls fierce as he will. We are in a time when the days are short, and at least in our part of the world, the cold winds howl. The backdrop of joy in the liturgical setting of this Sunday includes the trying situation in our gospel lesson where the greatest prophet born of woman, John the Baptist is imprisoned in a dungeon.
Not because he committed a crime, but because the world rejected the light of Christ that he preached about. Remember the 1st chapter of John verses 9 and 10 “The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.” Just as the scripture warned, John and many others who follow Jesus are persecuted for righteousness sake. And somewhere in the context of this persecution is joy. The joy that says: Rejoice in the Lord always, again I say rejoice.
Sometimes when you are told to be happy and there is nothing apparent to be happy about it rings hollow. How can we rejoice when we face so much suffering? In times of distress we wonder what is there to be so joyful about? Sometimes those who have been the most severely neglected and abused in early years of life have a hard time following Jesus and rejoicing in God’s promises, because it feels like the good news of the kingdom has not applied to them.
John the Baptist was born to point to Jesus, born to be a prophet, yet in the dungeon he sits, not many to preach to isolated and alone in a cell- a far cry from the crowds of people that flocked to him in the desert and in the wilderness.
For all those who have been brought low and humbled and have cried out in desperation too many times, John asks the question you wish you could ask, the question of, is this what the nearness of God looks like, is this what rejoicing is about?
John did not have the cross and resurrection in clear sight as we have, so we wouldn’t quite ask the same question, but listen again to his question “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”
Jesus, who are you? Who are you for me? What can I expect? The darkness of our hearts looks for a sign and feels the despair of life in our fallen world.
Jesus answers by telling John’s disciples: to look to his actions. Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them. 23 And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”
Jesus was pointing the people to look to his actions to see that the Lord is at hand. The works of healing Jesus performed helped illustrate the coming of the Messiah. These miracles were signs of the joy of God’s kingdom coming right to before the people of Israel, right in their midst.
Today, whenever we feel short on joy, the Lord provides the joy. After giving the signs of the Messiah’s reign now present Jesus says: “And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.” Blessed is the one who is not scandalized, embarrassed, or turned off by Jesus. Blessed is the one who faces persecution with courage and faith.
John was not offended by Jesus, as in John did not say or do anything to distance himself from Jesus for his safety or ease of transport in this fallen world.
There is joy following this example of John, to say that I am not ashamed of the gospel, it is the power of God unto salvation. There is joy is saying, I will not leave you, ‘Lord to whom shall we go, you have the words of eternal life.’
When we surrender all our claims for comfort in this world and look to Jesus for our comfort there is great joy, because the comfort of Jesus cannot be taken away from us. That is how St. Paul was able to say: rejoice in the Lord always, again I say rejoice. Paul could rejoice because he considered himself dead to the world and he knew that his life was in Christ. His life was in a Savior who came to our world to save us and will not let Satan snatch any of us away.
We are all invited to place out trust in Jesus, and we are blessed by God when we do this. Like John we can expect that our place in the world is none other than to find hardship and persecution. Anyone can find appeal in the easy parts of being a Christian without ever clashing against the values of our culture. But true joy is following Jesus in good and bad alike.
Zephaniah describes in detail how the joy comes from the Lord and not us:
16 On that day it shall be said to Jerusalem: “Fear not, O Zion; let not your hands grow weak. 17 The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.
What will our Savior do for us? He will rejoice over us. He will see us as the lost sheep who are in need of rescue, and when we have been saved he will rejoice over us.
God is at peace with us because of the cross. Salvation is near to us, Jesus speaks peace to us because we are made righteous and holy before the Father.