Walking the Lighted Path      First Sunday of Advent      November 27, 2022

    A Sermon preached at Covenant Presbyterian Church, Scranton, PA,
    based on Isaiah 2. 1-5; Romans 13. 11-13; and Matthew 24. 36-44 

“To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.”[i]

A quote from the poet, Wendell Berry,

from a poem called, ironically, “To Know the Dark.”

I have the quote because I read the poem.

I read the poem because I have a book.

I have the book because I have a friend.

I have this friend because God introduced us.

God introduced us so we might support one another.

We support one another by learning together.

Between lectures while learning together

in a Seminary chapel I bought the book

that contained the poem that yielded the quote:

“To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.”

How nicely the quote pairs with the summons of Isaiah:

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”[ii]

The first Advent Candle is ablaze over yonder,

it’s little light shining to overcome the darkness—

its singular glow a reminder

of the Light of the World

sent by God out of love for us all.

Our world’s need for that overcoming Light

is evidenced by bombs raining down

in the attempt to plunge a country into darkness.

Our nation’s need for divine illumination

is communicated in the all to frequent report

of gunfire bringing death to people enjoying life.

Our own Soul’s need for the Lord’s Light

is revealed by all that leads to heavy hearts:

disappointment, depression, disillusionment, despair.

So we hear the summons and respond

to the choice shared by wisdom birthed by experience:

"Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

“To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.”

“To walk in the light,” “to go in the dark with a light,”

these are words picturing a pilgrimage.

Those who make a pilgrimage are not the same at the end

as they were in the beginning or any place along the way.

Isaiah had a vision of people proposing a pilgrimage.

It wasn’t a Sunday afternoon ride in the country.

The envisioned voyage was a passage with a purpose:

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

to the house of the God of Jacob,

that he may teach us his ways

and that we may walk in his paths.”[iii]

Isaiah’s vision is still very much a dream

because the idea of one world “under God,”

seems an improbable, if not impossible fantasy

in our fractious time of deep divisions,

when people were urged to keep the peace

by posting signs at the entrance to holiday feasts, reading:

“Leave your politics on the porch!”

What unbelief dismisses as a dangerous delusion

faith embraces as an awesome aspiration

as humble hearts discover the choice Isaiah offered

to the house of Jacob long ago

is the spiritual GPS direction we desperately need today.

Embedded in the invitation

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

is the prophet’s assessment that the people

were not walking in the light of the Lord.

Implanted in the appeal to his people

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

is the prophet’s hopeful promise

that one day, with hearts and minds awakened,

God’s faithful will choose for themselves

to learn God’s ways and live them by walking his paths.

That same choice is always ours to make.

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

One of the Psalms of Ascent, the pilgrim songs sung

by those on their way to worship on God’s holy hill,

has been heard as a response to Isaiah’s summons:

“I was glad when they said to me,

‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’”[iv]

When I say those words, I don’t hear my own voice.

I hear the smoke-deepened alto of Mickey Oswald,

or the Jersey accented speech of Laura Ingersoll,

or the sisterly duet of Miss Taylor and Mrs. Stiedel,

all of whom took turns using Psalm 122, verse 1, as a

Call to Worship when the primary grade Sunday School

classes gathered to model what the adults were doing

at the other end of the building in the big sanctuary.

“I was glad when they said to me,

‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’”

The gladness portrayed in that phrase is a signal to us

that choosing to learn the ways of God

and walk in his paths is not an onerous obligation.

It is a blessed opportunity. Pilgrimage is a privilege!

Reflecting on the opening words of Psalm 122

as a guide for our Advent journey, Carol Wade writes:

“Our yearly pilgrimage gives us once again an

opportunity to reconsider the way we are living our lives.

Through pilgrimage, praise, and purpose, the Psalmist

reminds us that we are always waiting in hope,

always called to be the light of the world,

and to work on behalf of God’s reign of justice and peace.

We are forever engaged in an act of new creation.”[v]

Note well, the pilgrimage is one we do not make alone.

Both of Isaiah’s invitations, and the one heard in the Psalm

are addressed, not to individuals, but to the community:

“Come, let us go!

That same communal invitation pops up again in the

words the Apostle Paul wrote to the Romans.

And Once again, I am tickled how the Scripture is echoed

by the quote from Wendell Berry:

“To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.”

Paul writes:

“Let us lay aside the works of darkness

and put on the armor of light;

let us live honorably as in the day.”[vi]

Paul uses one of his favorite metaphors to speak

of the same choice Isaiah put before his people.

The metaphor Paul employs is changing clothes.

When one wakes up in the morning,

one lays aside the pajamas or nightgown

that have clothed the body during darkness

and put on the clothes to be worn through the day.

Cynthia Campbell explains it for us:

“As Paul paints the picture,

it is still dark outside when his spiritual alarm clock

goes off; the day is “near” but not quite here.

Perhaps it is that mysterious moment

when the darkness of night begins to give way to shadows,

and there is just enough light to know

that morning is just around the corner.

This is a time of anticipation,

and Paul urges his audience to action.

It is time to get up and get dressed.”[vii]

Paul’s selection of an outfit for the day is very special.

Again we turn to Dr. Campbell for an explanation:

“The clothing Paul wants us to put on is Jesus Christ:

his life, his way of being are the garments

that we are to put on to meet the future.

What concerns Paul here is that we adopt a new

and more honorable way of life.

Put aside partying and drunkenness—

things that dull the senses

or draw attention away from what is really going on.

Put aside quarrelling and jealousy—

things that destroy community and injure relationships…

That new day that God is bringing is a time

when God and humanity will be reconciled;

when peace, justice, and integrity will be

the hallmarks of human society.

What Paul wants is for the Christians to start living now

as though this new day has already begun.”[viii]

“Let us lay aside the works of darkness

and put on the armor of light;

let us live honorably as in the day.”

The alternative is stark, and is captured

by the last line of one of Wendell Berry’s Sabbath Poems:

“When people make dark the light within them,

the world darkens.”[ix]

A few years back on a Tuesday afternoon in November

I drove over the river and through the woods to my

Alma Mater to sit in the five-story atrium of

Princeton Seminary’s new library.

The occasion was a lecture by columnist and author

David Brooks.

He began his talk with a couple of stories,

one of which concerned a hot summer afternoon

when he returned to his home after a busy

but productive day.

When he got out of the car,

he walked around the side of the house

and saw his children happily playing ball

on a lovely day in a beautiful yard.

Then he went into the house,

a welcoming space, a haven, a home,

a place that on that day seemed so perfect

that it caused him to pause and give thanks for it all.

It was, he said,

one of those moments when you are aware of grace,

when you are aware of something so wonderful

that you in no way deserve or have earned.

It was, he said,

one of those times when you find yourself deciding

to live a life worthy of that gift.

One of the reasons he told that story

was to awaken us all to be on the alert

to recognize such moments in our own lives

and choose to live worthily of them too.[x]

In that book of poems I bought while my friend and I

attended a lecture series at another divinity school

is another poem that speaks of that same idea

of choosing to be worthy of our blessings.

The poem is called: “Prayer After Eating:”

I have taken in the light

that quickened eye and leaf.

May my brain be bright with praise

of what I eat, in the brief blaze

of motion and of thought.

May I be worthy of my meat.”[xi]

“Let us lay aside the works of darkness

and put on the armor of light;

let us live honorably as in the day.”

The time to respond to Paul’s spiritual advice

is always now,

as the Gospel reading from Matthew makes clear.

“About that day and hour no one knows,

neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son,

but only the Father.

Keep awake therefore,

for you do not know on what day the Lord is coming.”

Jesus, as Matthew presents him to us

has his own way of saying

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord!”

Contemplating it all, a pastor from Wisconsin

finds a reason for relief in the midst of

the second coming talk of Jesus in our gospel text.

The relief he finds comes with the recognition that

“uncertainty is a condition of even the best biblical faith.”[xii]

If Jesus doesn’t know, and the angels don’t either,

Mark Yurs says, “It is a relief to know Christ

does not expect us to know everything.”

And yet, Jesus has his own way of inviting us, like Paul to

“lay aside the works of darkness

and put on the armor of light;”

and to “live honorably as in the day.”

My Wisconsin colleague puts it this way:

“We are not expected to know everything,

but we are expected to do something.

The Jesus of the verses before us calls persons

to a life of work in the spirit of wakefulness.

Work in this sense means activity here and now.

Biblical faith as Jesus envisions it is not

so concerned with otherworldly matters

that it neglects this world’s affairs.

Matthew’s Jesus has an eye on what is to come

and believes something decisive is going to happen

in the future, but he keeps attention focused

on the present day and the needs of the hour.

We find this in the manner in which he directs people

to the field, the mill, the daily grind,

the ordinary places of human endeavor where life is lived.

This region of the mundane is where faithfulness happens

and it is not to be neglected.”[xiii]

“Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord…”

in the shop and behind the counter,

in the kitchen and on the street corner,

at our desk through our keyboard strokes,

and as we participate in acts of kindness and charity.

“Let us then lay aside the works of darkness

and put on the armor of light;

let us live honorably as in the day…”

while doing the laundry and raking the yard,

when little eyes are watching and tender ears listen,

when we’re in the stands at the game

and when we gather with family and friends

to give and receive gifts

and feast around a holiday table

“To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.”

Know the light,

wear the light,

share the light,

walk in the light,

wherever you are

in whatever you do

and in all that you say.

Amen.

[i] Wendell Berry, “To Know the Dark,” New Collected Poems, (Berkeley, CA, Counterpoint Press ©2012), p. 121
[ii] Isaiah 2. 5, NRSV
[iii] Isaiah 2. 3b-e
[iv] Psalm 122. 1
[v] Carol L. Wade, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 1, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), p. 13
[vi] Romans 13. 12c-13a
[vii] Cynthia L. Campbell, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 1, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), p. 16
[viii] ibid.
[ix][ix][ix] Wendell Berry, “2007 Sabbath Poems, VI,” Leavings, Poems, (Berkely, CA, Counterpoint, 2010), p. 93
[x] My recollections of a November 2016 Lecture by David Brooks at Princeton Theological Seminary.
[xi] ibid., Berry, p. 169
[xii] Mark E. Yurs, Feasting on the Word, Year A, Vol. 1, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), p. 23
[xiii] ibid., pp. 23, 25