Luke 1: 57-80
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What's in a Name?
A story told about a recent convert to the Christian faith who was asked by one of his unbelieving friends about Jesus. The friend said to him: “I hear you have become a Christian.” “Yes,” said the convert. “Then you must know a great deal about Christ,” said the friend. “Tell me, what country was he born in?” “I don’t know,” replied the convert. “Well then, what was his age when he died?” asked the friend. “I don’t know,” replied the convert. “Well, can you tell me how many sermons he preached? Or how he was born, or how he did miracles, or how he was raised from the dead?” asked the friend “I don’t know,” responded the convert. “You certainly know very little for a man who claims to be a Christian,” said the friend. “You are right,” replied the convert, “I am ashamed of how little I know — but this much I do know. “Three years ago I was a drunkard. I was in debt. My family was falling to pieces. My wife and children would dread my return home each evening. I was desperate. I gave my heart to God. Now I have given up booze, we are out of debt, and my wife and I are in love once more. All this Christ has done for me. This much I know...
Illustrated Resources from the Archives
Close to Home: Into the Ways of Peace
Bryan Stevenson talks about being nurtured by his family, but also by a community of women who had fought for justice. One time, Rosa Parks came to town and Bryan was invited to be there. He was invited by Ms Johnnie Carr, a child-hood friend of Rosa Parks and one of the primary organizers of the Montgomery bus boycott. So, of course he went. He sat on the porch with Rosa Parks and Johnnie Carr and they talked and talked. He remembered that they weren’t talking about any of the extraordinary things they had done in the past. They were talking about the things they still wanted to do. He said there was a hopefulness in their conversation and he just sat there, soaking it in. And then Rosa Parks turned and asked Bryan about his work. Bryan gave her his pitch, “Well, we’re trying to end the death penalty. We’re trying to help people on death row. We’re trying to challenge conditions of confinement. We’re trying to help the mentally ill. We’re trying to help children. We’re trying to help the poor.” He said that Rosa Parks leaned back smiling. 'Ooooh, honey, all that's going to make you tired, tired, tired.' Everyone laughed. Bryan looked down a little embarrassed and then Ms. Carr leaned forward and put her finger in his face and talked to him just like his grandmother used to. She said, “That's why you've got to be brave, brave, brave.”...John the Baptist
New York University recently honored seven students it expelled 60 years ago for an act that NYU today calls "courageous." In the 1920's, 30's and 40's, many college athletic departments had a "gentlemen's agreement" that, if a game was scheduled between two schools and one of them objected to black athletes participating, the opposing team would keep the black players off the roster. Many larger, prestigious northern universities - including Harvard, Rutgers, the University of Michigan and NYU - complied so as not to embarrass their mostly southern opponents. In November 1940, NYU was scheduled to play football against the University of Missouri. Leonard Bates, NYU's star black fullback, would not be allowed to play. Seven students, appalled at their school's complicity in such discrimination, began circulating petitions, wore buttons and picketed the university administration, chanting "Bates must play!" The protests increased when other black basketball and track stars were forced out of athletic events. NYU resisted. Not only did Leonard Bates not play, but the student leaders - known on campus as the "Bates Seven" - were suspended for "circulating a petition without permission." One of the seven, Evelyn Maisel, a senior, was not able to graduate. After World War II, many universities, including NYU, began dropping the gentlemen's agreement as pressure from students and politicians mounted. But the NYU protests in 1940 and 1941 were the largest protests against the gentlemen's agreements. The stand of the "Bates Seven" was one of the first sparks of our nation's civil rights movement that would blaze two decades later. At the NYU dinner for the "Bates Seen" this spring, Naomi Rothschild, now 80, said that this was the first positive acknowledgment she has received for her college activism: "When it happened, I got no support from the school, no support from my family. For all these years I felt slightly guilty that maybe I had done the wrong thing. Now maybe I see that [we] didn't do anything wrong."...God's Plan for Us
Since the age of ten Lauren was obsessed with food. When she became a teenager, conscious of her weight but unable to manage her eating, her life became a cycle of gorging herself and then forcing herself to vomit. Her distraught parents finally did the only thing they could - they had her admitted to a hospital. Lauren was angry that they had done this to her; she was angry at her friends who couldn't believe that she was doing this to herself while, at the same time, constantly complaining about their own weight. She refused to admit her problem. When the nurse settled her in her room, the teenager found she had a roommate. The girl in the next bed, coughing uncontrollably, looked tired and drawn, with dark circles under her eyes. Suddenly, when she saw Lauren, a bright smile came over her face: "Hi. I'm Julie and I'm ten years old. What's your name?" "I'm Lauren. I'm fifteen." The nurse inserted Lauren's IV and soon she was asleep. She awoke sometime later to cartoons playing on the television and Julie's giggling. Julie's side of her room was a sea of stuffed animals and photos. It looked like she had been in this room for a long time. "You want to play 'Crazy Eights'?" Julie asked, in her unusually chipper voice. Lauren got up and pulled a chair up to Julie's bed...Birth of John the Baptist
Once upon a time, there was this parish director of music, a young woman just out of musical school. She found a children’s choir which everyone loved, an adult choir which no one liked because they sang too long, a scola cantorum which sang Gregorian chant, which some people liked a lot, and a teenage choir that “jammed for Jesus,” which the young people liked totally, and they were by their own admission the only ones that counted. She was also going on for her master’s degree and had a boy friend, who was a baseball pitcher without a future because he played for the Cubs. The pastor was delighted with the young woman’s talent and work ethic. After her first year he recommended to the financial council that she receive a fifty percent raise because, as he said, “She works harder than any priest I know.” We’re not considering a raise, they said. She’s only a kid. Let’s not give her a raise till she asks for one. If we do pay her more, she’ll be back in two years for more. More likely she will be out of here, said the pastor. This is a case of commutative justice said the pastor, who was kind of old and remembered these words from his social ethics courses. They still said no. He gave her the raise. Finance committee complained to the bishop who said that if she didn’t get a raise he’d hire her for the Cathedral. That was that.Home Life
A century ago no egg from an emperor penguin had yet been studied. The scientists were eager to examine one, but they were too hard to acquire. During the blackness of night, the female lays an egg in mid-winter on a slender beach below great black cliffs on the Antarctic coast. The male penguin immediately puts the egg between his feet and a warm pouch located on his lower stomach. He thus incubates the egg throughout the long, cold, dark Antarctic winter. The chick will hatch in the spring if all goes well. The temperatures reach 70 degrees below zero, blizzards blow against his back constantly, yet the emperor will not budge. When in 1903 a few hardy souls from Captain Scott's expedition arrived to collect these specimens, they were surprised to gather false eggs. The maternal instinct (paternal instinct too) is so strong that if emperor penguins lose their eggs, they'll grab up and hold in their pouch a dirty piece of ice, or a rock, anything. Their driving ambition during that long savage winter is to protect a precious chick. Are there lessons to be learned from nature? Yes indeed! One reason God created emperor penguins was perhaps to show us the importance of protecting and raising our young. The birth of John the Baptist described in the book of Luke is really a focus on the parents too...About the "Birdies"
Throughout our lives we are blessed with spiritual experiences, some of which are very sacred and confidential, and others, although sacred, are meant to be shared. Last summer my family had a spiritual experience that had a lasting and profound impact on us, one we feel must be shared. It's a message of love. It's a message of regaining perspective, and restoring proper balance and renewing priorities. In humility, I pray that I might, in relating this story, give you a gift my little son, Brian gave our family one summer day last year.Head of Household?
("Today we tend to use the word 'hysterical' to describe something extremely humorous, as in, 'Comedian Robin Williams was hysterically funny last night on the Late Show'. Of course, the term is not limited to expressions of the comical. Webster's dictionary also defines the word 'hysterical' as 'an uncontrollable emotional outburst as from fear'...")Birth of John the Baptist (B)(2012)
("An Episcopal priest tells a story about the first time he got a message. It was a gift from his wife, who thought it would be a nice thing to help him relax and get ready for the holiday season, which was just about to begin. He was a bit nervous. It was a new experience, and as he says, he grew up in a neighborhood in New Jersey where guys don't get massages...")How Hard Did the Baby Cry?
I met a friend on a street with a cast on his arm. I joked and asked, “What happened, Dave? You fall off your bike?” He didn’t smile. He lost his brother a month ago. He told me he slammed the wall in anger one night. How hard does a prophet cry? A father turns on the ballgame, feels a shiver of pride as the flag flaps in the wind and the strains of the national anthem fill the room. But at his feet lies the morning paper with news of bombings in Iraq. On top the TV the framed portrait of his daughter in uniform sends a shiver of panic to his gut. How deep does a prophet weep?...Preparing the Way
In the book, My Favorite Christmas, by Amy Hammond Hagberg (Integrity House, 2006), Jimmy Carter tells a story about one of his favorite Christmases. In 1991 he and his family helped to build a home for Curtiss Jackson, a man who worked for Rosalyn’s grandfather. Jackson had eight brothers and six sisters. After retiring he got a job at a saw mill to provide for his sick wife, Martha. They were living on fifteen dollars a month. Then Curtiss had an accident with a chain saw and severed his right leg above the knee. When he could finally walk again he got a job at a nursing home doing yard work. Jimmy Carter’s mother had been a nurse at the home and Carter and Jackson became friends. When Jackson’s mother became ill, Jimmy Carter visited the shack where they lived. It had no heat except for a small wood stove and you could see through the walls in several places. The roof leaked and on a clear night you could see stars through the ceiling. Jimmy and Rosalyn rallied some friends from their church and made plans to build the Jackson’s a home....
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Repent and Behold
In his book Plain Christianity, J.B. Phillips tells the story of an exciting evening at a youth center in London. There had been dancing, speeches and cheer and singing, "For he's a jolly good fellow." At the end of the evening, Phillips suggested that the group have some worship. One young person spoke up bluntly, "You know we haven't any idea what you really mean by worship." "Haven't you?" he responded, "Well, it's like three cheers for God."...