It is a lot easier to believe something is to good to be true, than it is to believe that something good can happen out of nowhere. Goodness is easier believed earned, than it is believed given in mercy.
So too it was for Zecharia. When he received the news that his wife was expecting a child. And not just any child, but the child later known as John the Baptist. And not just at any age, but at the age when you would not expect such a thing. He was hesitant in believing.
The hesitance of Zecharia is not described in today’s Gospel Reading because in today’s reading, Zecharia has come to ease with it. And not only that: In today’s Reading he gives praise.
At first – in a Reading prior to the one we listened to today – he had said to himself that it was too good to be true. But something changed.
This change is the reason we have Advent. We need some time to prepare ourselves for miracles. Without time, we might just disregard miracles as something too good to be true. But with time – with preparations – miracles may be regarded as what they are: Miracles.
Jesus needed John the Baptist as well. Needed someone to indicate that something completely different was about to happen.
Something good was about to happen. An unexpected, unearned, undeserved goodness was about to appear before creation. God was about to reconcile himself with all living.
‘Advent’. The word derives from the latin word ‘adventus’ which means arrival. During ‘advent’ we are awaiting the arrival of the Messiah. This is why it is called ‘advent’.
Another word that derives from the same latin word is ‘event’. With an ‘event’ we are expecting something to come as well. But there is an important difference.
Whereas ‘advent’ awaits something miraculous – and require one kind of preparation – and ‘event’ requires a whole other kind of preparation, often more earthbound and materialistic.
What kind of preparation does ‘advent’ require? Well, it requires that we change in the same way as Zecharia. It requires that we broaden our perspective and consider not only earthbound matters, but spiritual matters as well. It requires that we dare look up and believe.
In this time of advent are we then doing all that? Or are we inclined to prepare ourselves in the way we most often prepare for something? Or said in another way: Do we prepare for Christmas through ‘advent’, or do we prepare Christmas as an ‘event’?
This is an interesting question to consider? First, I want to say that we for sure are preparing for Christmas through ‘advent’. Christ-mas is not all without Christ just yet.
Second though, it is interesting how a lot of things around Christmas solely emphasizes Christmas as an ‘event’ and therefore prepares for it without any spiritual matter – without Christ – being relevant.
And not only that: A lot of the traditions around Christmas that used to have Christ in it, has lost its original purpose.
The Christmas Tree is not an evergreen anymore symbolizing eternity; it is made of plastic. Well, plastic might seem to last for an eternity as well, but anyway.
Also, to me a tree should have a star on top. The star of Betlehem. Maybe an angel instead symbolizing Gabriel’s visit to Mary, Joseph, and the Shepherds.
But today a lot of other options are available: A bow symbolizing… I do not know. A snowflake symbolizing… I do not know. A Christmas ball symbolizing… I do not know.
It is not that I am complaining. After all, as I said earlier, our celebration of the arrival of the Messiah – Christmas – still has a lot of ‘advent’ to it, and not just a lot of ‘event’ to it.
But it is funny to track all of this and see how our traditions change, how our necessary spiritual preparations change, how advent change.
‘Adventus’. The latin word has another well-known word derived from it, and that is the Danish word for fairytale: ‘Eventyr’. ‘Eventyr’ derives from ‘Adventus’ as well.
And it makes sense. In a fairytale something arrives. Something wondrous. Something surprising. And it changes the setting, making a hero embark on a journey to not only restore something, but to create a new reality. Often a reality where the hero gets the princess and half the kingdom.
Again, I will not complain about our use of the word ‘advent’, but maybe it is worth the while reflecting a little upon the fact of the word not only being connected to ‘event’, but to the Danish word for fairytale as well.
Because some similarities between faith and fairytales exist: First, a lot of fairytales are spiritual. Second, fairytales – just as faith – has to do with supernatural events, beings and what not.
As the ending of my sermon today, I would like to give you an example of just that. May that example help us prepare for Christmas. Not without Christ, but in the way that eventually also prepared Zecharia to give praise.
The example is written by Hans Christian Andersen and is called “The Loveliest Rose in the World”:
Once there reigned a Queen, in whose garden were found the most glorious flowers at all seasons and from all the lands in the world. But care and sorrow dwelt in her garden as the Queen lay upon a sick-bed.
“There is still one thing that can save her,” said the wisest of them. “Bring her the loveliest rose in the world.”
And young and old came from every side with roses. The poets sang of the roses from the coffin of Romeo and Juliet and from Walborg’s grave. But they were not the right sort.
“I know where it blooms,” said a happy mother. “On the blooming cheeks of my sweet child.”
“Lovely is that rose; but there is still a lovlier,” said the wise man.
“Yes, a far lovelier one,” said one of the women. “I have seen it on a mother who was carrying her sick child as she prayed in anguish.”
“Holy and wonderful in its might is the white rose of grief; but ut us bit gte ibe we seek,” said the wise man.
“No, the loveliest rose of the world I saw at the alter of the Lord,” said the good old Bishop.
“That rose is blessed,” said the wise man. “But it is not it.”
Then there came into the room a child, the Queen’s little son. “Mother!” Cried the little boy, “only hear what I have read.” And the child sat by the bed-side, and read from the book of Him who suffered death on the Cross.
And a roseate hue spread over the cheeks of the Queen. From these words sprang the loveliest rose.
“I see it!” She said: “He who beholds this, the loveliest rose on earth, shall never die.”
The end.
Amen.