Advent 3: Isaiah 35:1-10, James 5:7-10 and Matthew 11:2-11
In 1980, the sitcom Hi-de-Hi! appeared on the BBC.
After the customary “ping, ping, ping” of the xylophone, Gladys Pugh - played by the late Ruth Madoc - says: ‘Hello campers; rise and shine. It’s a beautiful Maplin morning and we’ve got lots of Maplins’ fun in store for you today’.
Set in a fictional holiday camp, there is an atmosphere of forced amusement and fun. It’s expected that the ‘first laugh of the day’ will be at breakfast, with sports, laughter, games and entertainment filling every minute thereafter.
Underneath that performed jollity, the entertainers are mainly out of work actors or faded stars and former champions; people out of pace and looking for something more.
We have reached the third Sunday of Advent - known as Gaudete Sunday, a Sunday of rejoicing. As the liturgical “ping, ping, ping” introduces us to gladness, abundance, blessing and joy, perhaps we have arrived with a sense of unpreparedness, dread, tiredness or overwhelm.
Gladys Pugh’s ‘Hi-de-hi’ demands an Advent type response of rise and shine; wake up be alert. Yet, when we read the newspapers, see the evidence of our own senses, the beautiful mornings are shot through with discontent; the fun or laughter in store is combined with tears.
And yet, and yet, our readings today allow us to be honest about that reality and tension; they draw us from despair to longing; they renew in our flesh and bones something of the mystery of God’s.
The one who gives us permission to long for joy when we don’t always feel it is John the Baptist. In him, we see questioning and patience in our waiting; and the conviction to trust the promise that God will come.
For today, the forerunner sends his disciples to ask Jesus a question: ‘Are you the one?’ And he waits, in prison, for an answer.
When he lept in his mother’s womb, Elizabeth felt joy, connection and recognition that the child her younger cousin carried was indeed ‘the one who is to come’.
In the wilderness, he was the one who prepared the way by preaching a message of repentance. His dress and diet were strange and other - yet he was compelling, inviting others to turn back to God’s ways of justice and love.
Now we find him imprisoned: his seeking after truth and courageous unmasking of abused power had confined him to the loneliness of a cell He challenged a faithless and unfaithful king; he faces death as a result of a flirtatious whim and vain promises.
Has it all been for nothing? Or are the stories he’s hearing true? His boldness has given way to uncertainty, his clarity becomes a need for reassurance. So he openly, honestly, bravely turns his despair into longing; he asks that poignant question: ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’
He asks. He waits. Might his patience give way to gladness; might joyful news strengthen his heart?
Jesus’ response isn’t a simple yes of self-identification. He points to what can be seen, known, talked about, witnessed to. He sends the disciples back to John saying - tell him your stories, for those stories reveal who Jesus is.
The truth of Jesus emerges in these encounters: in fear and shadows, in whispers and speech, in movement and song. Listen to that, and be glad; may that news strengthen your hearts. As John waits, as we wait, God comes near; the promise of Isaiah is fulfilled.
We aren’t told how John received the news and stories. Perhaps his joy renewed as relief broke in? Perhaps he saw life beyond his own death as God in Jesus raises up, restores and brings hope.
We receive those stories today - trusting that Jesus is indeed the one who was to come, who came and will come again. In his words, we find encouragement and a depth of joy that goes beyond the first joke of the day.
You are blessed, he says, if you don’t take offence at me: even when things are harder or more complicated than we’d imagine, he invites us to stay rather than run, to ask questions rather than quit; to wait patiently for the dawn when it is still dark.
For God is present in both the joy and the pain. There is something sacred about what we are gifted on this gaudate Sunday. We can trust our responses to the world - grief, rage, shock, despair - because those things reveal what needs to change.
Our experience sharpens our longings and refines our actions - if every second we exist is a gift, is something sacred, we can dare to feel deeply because God is in it; God feels it too. As James wrote, we can allow for patience in sorrow and joy in abundance; we can ask questions and choose to act in a way that sets others free.
Perhaps in a way John understood real joy. It is not sentimentality or superficiality: it’s not the rise and shine of Maplins’ fun. It is the depth of assurance that God will come to save us; that God’s activity is beyond his own circumstances; that life extends beyond the grave and finds completion in God. He has gone ahead of us - knowing that his hope was not in vain, despair to joy.
Prayer for this Sunday from Christian Aid:
Every second we exist is a gift,
Gone in a whisper, it will not come again…
So God of us all, we come to you and ask
That you help us unwrap it,
and teach us to share it,
and call us to cherish it -
this precious life we’ve been given.
There are gifts we can offer each other;
time, forgiveness, consideration…
things we cannot purchase,
but which are priceless.
And there are the lessons
we desperately need to learn -
about love that does what it says,
about concern that changes our behaviour,
about this life that we’ve been given that
explodes in beauty when we understand
how to give it up.
Every second we exist is a gift.
Gone in a whisper, it will not come again…
When poverty robs our sisters and brothers,
when unfettered power proclaims some lives
are more important than others,
when the prophetic voice of those struggling
under the chaos our over-consumption has
caused, is drowned out, call us to listen,
to learn, to change.
Every second we exist is a gift.
Gone in a whisper, it will not come again.
Your creative, joy-filled love gave us life.
May we share it with the same joy and generosity.
