A sermon based on John 5:1-9. Acts 16:9-15, and Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5.

I was at home when the news alert came across my phone. There had been—

No. I have to start earlier.

I want to be profound. Aren’t chronic pain sufferers profound? Doesn’t the daily presence of the thing we’re all trying to avoid every moment of our lives cause them to see the world differently?

Jesus has proclaimed the year of the Lord’s favor, a jubilee. In a jubilee year, everyone is set free. The land is given a rest from constant tilling and the people are released from all debts. It’s a reset, an equalization, a loosening of what binds us. Just as Lazarus is freed from his graveclothes after Jesus calls for him to come out, in a year of jubilee, we are freed from all that has held us in death.

On the day my friends were commissioned, I roasted pumpkin seeds.

A letter.

Through all the fog of this moment, and through all the storms of emotion that may lay ahead, I know I’ll hold onto that thought: she is home.

What do you do when someone is taken from you mid-conversation? What do you do when there is still work to do, when there was still a role for her to play, when you were waiting on a visit that will never happen, for a meal you’ll never share, for conversations that will never happen, for love with nowhere to go?

I’m not sure that I’ve let myself fell the full impact of that moment even now, more than sixteen Sundays down the road.

We believe that the God who calls us God’s own people is the same God who cast a spiderweb of galaxies out into space and taught spiders how to weave here on earth, and somehow, we believe that God loves us.

This is how God works. God works in the lowly. God doesn’t seek out kings. God seeks out people who are willing to share God’s dreams.

I don't mean to portray Mary as naive. I think Mary is exactly right. These cries for justice are fundamental parts of the biblical story and we can't ignore them. We can't just shake our head and say, “Oh, those kids. They'll learn one day.”

When I think about people who prepared the way for me, I think about my first grade Sunday School teacher, Mrs. Johnson, may she rest in peace.

Light is what I think about the most as I approach Advent. I think about how out four Advent candles build up light each week, even as the nights stretch out around us. That’s what we do as Christians: we hold on and we trust and we testify to others that even the darkness night will end and the sun will rise.

Have I ever told y’all the best question I ever got asked when I was working at the planetarium?

You are enough, just as you are. Rest in the comfort of this knowledge. Carry it with you as a light as you go throughout your days this week. You are enough.

hat means of grace open each of us up? What movement of the Spirit has God made each of us for? What oil do we need to fill our lamps?