Dec 02 | “The Spirit is loose,” (Sermon, December 2nd)

“After Jesus had left that place, he passed along the Sea of Galilee, and he went up the mountain, where he sat down. Great crowds came to him, bringing with them the lame, the maimed, the blind, the mute, and many others. They put them at his feet, and he cured them, so that the crowd was amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the maimed whole, the lame walking, and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel.

Then Jesus called his disciples to him and said, ‘I have compassion for the crowd, because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat; and I do not want to send them away hungry, for they might faint on the way.’ The disciples said to him, ‘Where are we to get enough bread in the desert to feed so great a crowd?’ Jesus asked them, ‘How many loaves have you?’ They said, ‘Seven, and a few small fish.’ Then ordering the crowd to sit down on the ground, he took the seven loaves and the fish; and after giving thanks he broke them and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all of them ate and were filled; and they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Those who had eaten were four thousand men, besides women and children. After sending away the crowds, he got into the boat and went to the region of Magadan.”

Matthew 15: 29-39

 

If you’ve been following what I call the Media Outrage Machine, you’ll know that there’s been a kerfuffle over Starbucks recently.

This controversy (which really deserves the most exaggerated of air quotes) concerned a perception that Starbucks’ unadorned red cups (featuring no seasonal designs like snowmen or ornaments or stars) represented yet another assault in the non-existent “War on Christmas.”

I thought it was a hoax at first. It sounded exactly like the kind of thing someone cooked up to get people self-righteously buying coffee to stick it to the perpetually offended. I thought this because I have seen too many potshots taken at my conservative brothers and sisters in Christ, and also there was absolutely no way to support a claim like that. I’d been in Starbucks. Everywhere you look there are signs of Christmas, including Advent calendars and “Christmas blend” coffee.

So I was terribly depressed when I finally traced the story to its source: an angry video posted by Christian Youtube personality Joshua [Fewer-stine] Feuerstein. The video of him standing outside a Starbucks using “politically correct” as a slur and berating this corporation for hating Jesus went viral.

Feuerstein also advised that customers tell Starbucks employees that their names are “Merry Christmas,” so employees will be forced to write the phrase on the cups and to call it out when the drinks are ready to be picked up.

“That’s right, Starbucks,” Feuerstein gloats into the camera, “I tricked you.”

The first time I heard that it made me laugh out loud, because it reminded me of a hilarious moment in one of my favourite TV comedies, American Dad. American Dad is a cartoon about Stan Smith, a CIA operative living with his family in suburban Virginia. In one episode an ex-KGB operative who was once a bitter rival of Stan’s moves in across the street and continues his war against consumerist America by showing up at Stan’s door one morning and asking menacingly, “Did you notice your showerhead was on the pulse setting this morning? That was a mere appetizer at the banquet of my revenge!”

Now I’m not going to waste too much outrage on this. For one thing, the internet has already done that for me. I’m becoming convinced that a lot of folks have such bad self-esteem that, to feel better about themselves, they will loudly and gleefully point out the flaws of anyone else, even complete jerkstores.

(By the way that’s an insult from my Millennial arsenal you can add to your collection).

In my research on the absolute tidal wave of vitriol the video generated on both sides of the issue, I discovered a thoughtful article featuring two intriguing quotes.

One was offered by Jim Chern, director of the Newman Catholic Centre at Montclair State University. He said, “If we’re worried about the war on Christmas, what does Christmas really mean to us?”

What indeed?

The other quote made me laugh until I cried – not because of the content, but because of who said it.

Here it is. Quote: “Starbucks has become a place of sanctuary during the holidays. We’re embracing the simplicity and the quietness of it. [It being the minimalist design of the red cup]. It’s a more open way to usher in the holiday.” End quote.

What a fascinating little piece of theology. The seeds of Advent, a time of contemplation, reflection, and quiet, are really sprouting here – or maybe it’s the beans of Advent brewing?

Who would say something like this? It sounds like something a theology professor or student, relaxing at the campus Starbucks location might say. Or maybe a priest or parishioner of a church located close to a Starbucks?

Nope.

That little piece of Advent wisdom is from Jeffrey Fields. He’s the Starbucks vice president of design and content.

This guy understands Advent better than the most (allegedly) devout among us.

This is what we’re talking about when we say that the Spirit of God is loose in the world.

It surprises me, but Matthew the Evangelist would not have batted an eye. Our passage today is only one in a series that explores this very topic.

We need context here. Some time ago I preached on Jesus’ encounter with a Canaanite woman in the same Gospel. Remember, Canaanites were ancient enemies of the Jews. They were the heathen hordes that in the biblical accounts were flushed violently out of the Promised Land by the invading Israelites – problematic stories, to be sure. Jesus at first refuses to help her with that stinging comment about throwing food to the dogs, but her wit makes him change his mind.

That passage is what immediately precedes this one.

We see that Jesus has gone on to heal many Gentiles, and, like the Canaanite woman who calls Jesus “Son of David,” they recognize him for who he is, giving praise to the God of Israel.

As they do, Jesus tells the disciples that he has compassion for them, because he knows they are hungry. He feeds 4,000 of them and they leave seven baskets of leftovers. Like the twelve baskets left over by the earlier crowd, seven is a significant number. Seven represented the Gentile nations.

There is enough for all of these heathens, these unbelievers. And they are the ones who recognize the incarnate one walking among them as the Holy One of Israel. They thank Israel’s God for his presence.

The elders of Jesus’ tradition, of course, scold him for breaking the laws of his faith.

Now I often cut the elders some slack. They were defending a faith that had been under fire for about as long as it had existed – under fire from countless invading empires which always had different attitudes toward other faiths, and under fire from the Roman Empire, which only tolerated their differences as long as it suited them.

I cut those elders a little more slack than my angry Christians brothers and sisters, because I do believe that threats to the Christian faith in North America are far less prevalent and aggressive than War on Christmas alarmists seem to think, especially in the United States. But the fact remains that many of us feel like our faith is under threat. Some of us, myself included, cling rigidly to Advent specifically to drown out the chaos of this season, which begins earlier every year and focusses so much on consumerism, and invite stillness into our lives. As our children at St. Philip’s learn in Godly Play, it takes time to enter the Mystery of Christmas, and if you don’t take the time you might walk right through it and not even know it’s there.

But, as one frightened child learned long ago, “All things are possible with God.”

The Spirit of God is brooding over the tempestuous waters of creation. In my imagination (what I might better call my prayerscape), she has always made a sound like pigeons in the eaves at dusk – a low, placid, maternal murmur that fills me with awe.

The Gentiles knew the work of God when they saw it.

The Starbucks juggernaut, for all its faults and worldliness, knows the longing of the human soul for quiet in this time, and decided to offer up its own work for the purposes of that longing.

This is the truth we celebrate in this season of Advent: the incarnation of the divine within our fragile, broken, and yearning fleshly bodies, not where we think it is going to be, but in the most unlikely and irreverent of places.

This is the truth that changes the world.

It happened long ago…and it is still happening today.

Amen, amen. Come, Lord Jesus.