What Is Hope?
Eastern Parkway United Methodist Church
A warm welcome to each worshiper today. We celebrate you and offer you our friendship and love. We are a congregation of people who seek to grow spiritually, to become more like Christ in His compassion and acceptance of everyone while growing more aware of what it really means to be Christians today.
As a Reconciling Congregation, EPUMC affirms the sacred worth of persons of all sexual orientations and gender identities and welcomes them into full participation in the fellowship, membership, ministries, and leadership of the congregation.
943 Palmer Avenue, Schenectady, NY 12309 / 518-374-4306 epumc943@gmail.com / www.easternparkway.org
Order of Worship
November 27, 2022
10:00 a.m.
*You are invited to rise in body or spirit.
Prelude Wachet Auf Johann Sebastian Bach
Greeting and Announcements
Mission Statement:
We are a faith community striving to be, to nurture, and to send forth disciples of Jesus Christ.
Lighting of the Advent Wreath:
Reader 1: O God, we light the first candle of Advent.
Reader 2: We kindle it with hope. We long for you to come to our world, to break through and reign with compassion, justice, and peace.
Reader 1: The prophet Isaiah also cried to God to tear open heaven and come down. He called God’s people to do right. Isaiah called them to be refashioned like clay by God, the potter. This Advent, we call out to God.
People: Mighty God, creator of the world, break through all that keeps us from you. We ask for your mercy and reform us in your image. This Advent, visit us with your justice, love, and peace. Amen.
Call to Worship:
I was glad when they said to me,
let us go to the house of the Lord!
In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house
shall be established as the highest of the mountains.
Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord!
Laura Jaquith Bartlett
*Hymn O Come, O Come, Emmanuel #211, v 1, 3, 6
Prayer of Confession:
God, we are ready now.
We want peace now.
We long to receive the Prince of Peace
in our world today.
But don’t delay too long, Holy One,
for soon we’ll be busy with parties,
and decorating, and baking, and shopping.
Our lives are crammed so full,
we find it hard to calendar you in;
we find it hard to locate the time
to welcome the Light of the World.
We need your help, O God.
Teach us to set aside our party wardrobes,
and clothe ourselves in Jesus Christ.
Guide us into true readiness,
even though we do not know the date and time,
when true peace will reign.
Wake us up;
shake off the cobwebs of our complacency;
and take us with you
on the path up your holy mountain.
Plant your peace within us,
so that each day, each moment,
we may be ready for the harvest of your love. Amen.
Assurance:
The light of God’s love shines brightly!
The invitation is given:
Come, walk in the light. Amen.
Scripture Reading Isaiah 2:1-5
Isaiah 2:1-5 NRSV
The word that Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. In days to come the mountain of the LORD's house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it. Many peoples shall come and say, “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.” For out of Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall arbitrate for many peoples; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the LORD!
Sermon What Is Hope?
Happy New Year!
While it’s true that we have another month of 2022 to go, the first Sunday of Advent kicks off the church year. We just finished Year C in the Revised Common Lectionary, this guide worship leaders use to read and preach from. We’re now beginning Year A. Most of our Lectionary-appointed Gospel stories this year will come from Matthew.
We have plenty of time to get into his Gospel. For today, though, I adored the words the lectionary appointed from Isaiah, and the image that goes along with it: God’s bringing us to the world’s biggest mountain and instructing us all to climb it. Oh boy. I don’t know, God, I’m pretty out of shape. I get winded if I make too many trips up and down the stairs. I know it’s on a lot of people’s bucket lists, but I never imagined scaling Everest.
Yet, sticking with that specific image, of the literal highest peak in the world: surely you’ve seen those pictures of scores of people lined up to see the Everest summit. There’s something inherent to human nature that makes us curious about what we might experience from the highest height. This mystical connection to the Divine, this idea that the cord running from the Holy to us is the shortest once we reach the top. I also imagine the perspective you’d get from the highest peak in the world: imagine how much more you could see from there, and how small and temporary everything else must look from God’s eyes.
In this season of Advent, which we begin today, God is readying a mountain even higher than Everest, and instructing us all to get ready to climb it. Think of the next four weeks as your time to train. I’m not going to lie, my legs aren’t taking me up the top of a mountain. These are sea level legs. But could my faith get me there? Could my spiritual discipline get me there? Can my relationship with Jesus handle the labor? Can yours?
While we wrap our minds and hearts around the meaning of these ideas, we also have four key words that follow us through this Advent journey: hope, peace, joy, and love. The word traditionally coupled with Advent I is “hope”.
So...what is hope? The dictionary gave me two different definitions:
1: “A feeling of expectation and a desire for a certain thing to happen.”
2: “A feeling of trust.”
These are big ideas. What do we expect to happen? What do we desire? And whom do we trust? All of these ideas are tied up into hope.
Poet Emily Dickinson once said this about hope:
“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -
And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -
I’ve heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb - of me.
Dickinson gives us a lot to chew on there. Hope flies. It sings. It’s sweet. It’s warm. It contradicts most of what we experience in the world. And you rest your expectations in it without it needing anything in return from you.
Hope is a small fragment of the colossal mystery of God.
If God is putting us to the task of scaling the highest mountain in the world, and bringing the rest of the global population up there with us, then we’re going to need a ton of very powerful motivation. Nothing less will get me to take that on. That for which you hope is the only thing you’d climb that mountain for. It’s what you expect to see at the top.
What do you want to see at the summit of God’s mountain? What gives you hope?
For me, my hope is coming from a project I’ve been working on with two UNYUMC clergy gal pals of mine, Emily and Jess. A few months ago, God put the smallest kernel of an idea in my mind: talk theology on a podcast. I quickly decided the only true way I could fulfill that calling would be to create a podcast of my own, to fill a void left in this world. There’s something God wants me to say that hasn’t been said, and there’s friendships to be made in this world that have never been attempted. I asked Emily and Jess to team up with me, and help me launch and run this project, this inherently feminist, interfaith, intercultural, sociopolitical, edgy, ceiling-breaking podcast that we’ve titled “The Dangerous Liberal Lady Preachers.” I got the name for the idea from something a disgruntled commenter wrote on my YouTube back in the heyday of the pandemic, when I was posting sermon videos there every week. Emily and Jess have climbed the mountain of God with me for years, since we all met in seminary, and I can’t say we’ve ever seen the summit, but we’ve certainly seen the garbage that the other climbers carelessly dump on our path as they make their way up. Learning to jump over garbage without falling is what being a “lady preacher” is all about. In a Church built by and for men, we play by their rules. We get a steeper path, and harsher winds. White, cishetero men approaching this mountain get handed the strongest ropes and the toughest boots, while the rest of us claw our way up holding a piece of dental floss and wearing bunny slippers. Emily, Jess, and I have spent years waxing philosophical about how unfair and crushing the climb can be. But when we teamed up to make this podcast, we started to realize that the system may be rigged against us, but that doesn’t stop us from being one another’s sherpas. We can make the climb easier for one another. So far we’ve interviewed three different clergy friends as guests on our podcast, and we’re recording a fourth interview this afternoon. And this work has filled us with hope for the future of Jesus’ Mountain. The Climb—the work of following Jesus and being his Church in the world—doesn't have to be what it has been. It’s our choice. We’re the ones carving a path forward for one another. And if the summit has become inaccessible for so many left on the sidelines of our history—the BIPOC, the LGBT, women, the poor, the disabled—then we can fix that, together. This project gives me hope that I will see that summit. And I’ve seen glimpses of what’s up there from the loving words we’ve exchanged while recording our episodes. You’ll get to hear all about it when we launch in January.
What gives you hope? What makes you believe that the world could be a kinder, gentler, more just place? And what will that world look like, once we actually get to the summit and see it? Will we see it in this life, or are we really describing heaven?
What I’ve been describing is the Kin-dom of God. Creation restored to God’s vision, made possible through Jesus. Advent is a season where what seemed impossible before inches closer and closer to earth. That which we hope for: a future without worry, without burden, one shaped by equality and love—is within reach. We see a glorious glimpse of it at the manger scene on Christmas Eve. In the meantime, invest in spiritual mountain training: prayer, inward searching, time at church, and time with supportive friends and family who are sherpas for you. In order to fulfill our hopes, we have a lot of work to do.
Amen.
*Hymn Children, Go Where I Send Thee
Front Porch Rockers
Offering
Offertory Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus Anna Laura Page, arr.
Chancel Choir with Rebecca Oliver, violin
*Doxology See projection Tune at #229
*Prayer of dedication
Pastoral Prayer and Lord’s Prayer
Lord Jesus,
You were deprived of a home for much of your life: you were born in a stable, you were a refugee in Egypt, you lived with nowhere to lay your head, you hosted your last supper in someone else’s house, you were buried in someone else’s tomb, you understand what it is to have nowhere that feels safe, nowhere to put down roots.
We pray for those who have been displaced by wars, crime, land grabs, unemployment, and poverty, addiction, health problems, bad relationships, heartbreak, and hopelessness.
Where are you?
You told us that you were with the poor, and the downtrodden.
You have called us to be their answer to prayer.
Can we live up to that radical Gospel?
During Advent, we prepare our hearts to be the only home you have ever had. Give us courage and love to invite those who feel they have nowhere to go into our homes, our communities, and our churches. Help us to be the hope you promised.
Our Father, Mother, Creator God who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us, not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory forever. Amen.
*Hymn Prepare Ye the Way #207
Benediction
Postlude Angels We Have Heard on High John Leavitt, arr.
Staff
Natalie Bowerman Pastor
Betsy Lehmann Music Director
Joe White Custodian
Cassandra Brown Nursery Attendant
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