Choosing Life
December 17, 2006
What a great job the choir is doing with this Cantata. It’s a lot of work – on top of the music they are preparing for Christmas, and it is a wonderful gift to all of us to have them lift up the Advent/Christmas season with this musical proclamation of the Gospel.
In a sense, this Cantata serves the very same purpose for us, that the Infancy narratives serve for Luke’s Gospel. As I have made clear in the Adult Forum Bible studies, the infancy narratives in both Matthew and Luke, provide a critical link – a transition from the Old Testament promises, to the fulfillment that is proclaimed by the Gospels in the coming of Jesus.
In Luke’s Gospel, for example, the connection is made through the lengthy parallel stories of John the Baptist and Jesus. John the Baptist is not only the quintessential Old Testament prophet, an Elijah-like figure, but he also is born under circumstances amazingly similar to the birth of Abraham and Sarah’s son, Isaac. John’s role is clear – to point the way toward Jesus, who is greater than John – indeed, he is the Messiah, the Son of God.
The first portion of Luke’s Gospel is the Advent section of the Cantata and helps the reader prepare for the big event – the arrival of the Messiah, the birth of Jesus. It sets up the expectations for the beginning of God’s reign. Even our lesson today – which occurs after the Birth of Jesus, is actually part of this Advent message. The actual ministry of Jesus does not begin until Chapter 4 and if Luke had not added on the infancy narratives of Chapters 1 and 2, the gospel could have just as easily begun at Chapter 3, with the preaching of John the Baptist – Prepare the way of the Lord!
I could go into all of this a lot more, but suffice it to say, that for John, a decisive moment was occurring and people had to make some choices. Repentance meant to change the direction of your life in those areas that required change. The crowd hears John and asks the appropriate question – what should we do? And John’s response is very concrete and practical – it deals with honesty, caring about those in need, work ethics, use of power – topics that make as much sense today as they did in his day.
John’s preaching makes us realize that most of life is lived exactly where we are sitting right now – the time in between the expectations and hopes of Advent and the fulfillment of Christmas. God is constantly coming into the midst of our lives with a Word that challenges us and encourages us to make choices that will make life better – for everyone.
Of course we make choices every day – all day. Sometimes the choices are almost sub-conscious or unconscious choices, but every choice, whether deliberate or unintentional, have consequences. So John’s message is one of living intentionally – thinking about the choices we make and making wise choices consistent with God’s earthly presence.
My brother Bob sent me an email the other day with an essay about choosing. It involved a fellow named Michael who was always Mr. Positive – to the point where you had to wonder if it was real. He’s the kind of guy who when you would ask him how he was doing, he would say, “If I were any better, I would be twins.” If a fellow worker were having a bad day, he would tell the person to look on the positive side of things, and so on.
Finally, a friend went up to Michael and said, “I don’t get it. You can’t be positive all the time. How do you do it? Michael said, “Each morning when I wake up, I tell myself you can choose to be in a good mood or you can choose to be in a bad mood. I choose to be in a good mood. When something bad happens, I can choose to be a victim .. . or I can choose to learn from it. I choose to learn from it. When a person complains to me, I can choose to accept their complaining, or point out the positive side of life. I choose the positive side of life.
“Yeh, right,” the friends said, “It’s not that easy.”
Yes it is, said Michael, life is all about choices. Every situation is a choice. You choose how you react to situations. You choose how people affect your mood.
The friend took all of it in and over the next several years remembered that conversation as he made a choice about life rather than just reacting to it. Then he heard the Michael had been involved in a serious accident – fell 60 feet from a communications tower. He saw Michael about six months after the accident. He had been through 18 hours of surgery, two weeks in intensive care and was released with rods placed in his back. When he saw Michael, he asked him how he was doing. “
If I were any better, I’d be twins, ya wanna see my scars?” He asked about the accident and Michael said the first thing he thought about was his soon to be born daughter. Then, he said, as I lay on the ground I realized I could choose to live or to die – I chose to live.
“Weren’t you scared?”
“The paramedics were great, they kept saying I would be fine.” But when they wheeled me into the hospital and I saw the expressions on the doctors and nurses, I got really scared. In their eyes I read, ‘He’s a dead man.’ They started firing questions at me and one nurse said, “are you allergic to anything?” And I said, “Yes” and they all stopped working to hear my reply – And I said, “gravity.” Over their laughter I said, look, I am choosing to live. Operate on me as if I were alive, not dead.” And they did.
From the petty decisions about what and how many gifts to buy, to the life changing decisions about medical treatment and paths to follow in life – choices are the key. John the Baptist knew that too and called people to make choices in their lives that honored God’s purposes – to align their lives with the Messiah to whom John pointed.
Our cantata will move into the second portion – the Christmas portion that tells us that God fulfills God’s promise to come among us and to guide us. And each day, by the way we live, the way we love, the way we care, the way we share, the way we speak, the way we listen, we make our choices to follow or not to follow Jesus – the light and the life of the world.
Amen.