Mtr Taylor Devine
Dear Friend,
The story of Zechariah and his silence while Elizabeth is pregnant with baby John the Baptist catches me off-guard each Christmas. It somehow feels even more ancient and legendary than the rest of the Christmas story. The kind of fulfillment narrative Elizabeth and Zechariah are living feels more like Abraham and his descendants (as many as the stars), or like Moses and his burning bush, or like Ruth and Naomi finding home again. God is speaking directly through all these lives. In Jesus' story we hear this, too, but it feels different because—in some way—we know Jesus, and we know the fullness of humanity and divinity that he holds.
In a reflection on today's Gospel reading, author Kathleen Norris writes about the scandal: “what then will this child become? The child was named by God, and things do not go easy for those who are so touched by God’s hand.”
Unlike the coming of Jesus, Immanuel, God with us, John is a just a person, not a God-man, and the story seems to invite us to look at ourselves, just people, as well. I routinely pray for God to be near, or for me to notice God’s nearness but Kathleen Norris reminds us that God does not leave us the same, and this transformation is hard! It flings open doors we didn't know existed, and calls us to continual growth in love and service of God.
I have two resources for you to consider if this John the Baptist story in the midst of Jesus’ story has you curious.
One is a pattern of prayer that reckons with our humanness. I might meditate on the ways John’s story and ours show these virtues. John the Baptist, though larger than life, was doing this:
Remember Christian Soul
That today and every day you have
God to glorify.
Jesus to imitate.
Salvation to work out with fear and trembling. A body to use rightly.
Sins to repent.
Virtues to acquire.
Hell to avoid.
Heaven to gain.
Eternity to hold in mind.
Time to profit by.
Neighbors to serve.
The world to enjoy.
Creation to use rightly.
Slights to endure patiently.
Kindnesses to offer willingly.
Justice to strive for.
Temptations to overcome.
Death perhaps to suffer.
In all things, God’s love to sustain you.
The second is a recording of a sermon preached by David Zahl, a lay theologian and author in Charlottesville, VA at a conference last year. It’s titled “Captives are for Rescuing” and I’ve listened to it several times (which is unusual for me).
In this season we praise God whose son so desired to redeem and rescue the world that he dwelled among us and lived among us so that he could take up all that we are—in all of our humanness—and make it whole.
In Christ,
—Mtr Taylor