Second Sunday After Christmas

January 4, 2009

The Very Rev. Peter Swarr

The city of Granada, Spain, nestled in the majestic Sierra Nevadas mountains is a strikingly beautiful city. Granada is modern yet ancient with nearby settlements that predate the travels of the Wise Men narrated in Matthew’s Gospel and even predate the writings of Jeremiah from hundreds of years before Christ. Granada is home to world renowned poetry gatherings, incredible food, an ancient university, and the breathtaking Alhambra palace.

Visiting Granada and its famed palace and gardens is a fantastic experience. The Alhambra is a gem of ancient Islamic and Christian architecture surrounded by some of the most exquisite gardens in all of Europe. From the moment you step on to the 35 acre campus the smell of roses and oranges fills your nostrils while the sound of fountains and flowing water never ceases to caress your ears. The Alhambra is magnificent, an example of the beauty which humanity is capable of creating to delight the senses and calm the soul.

For the Muslim kings who built this magnificent palace, water, and lush gardens were incredibly important. The Moorish kings who conquered much of Spain in 711 AD came from Saharan Africa, a land of parched deserts, a land where water signified one important thing: life. Water surrounds and fills the Alhambra as a reminder to those kings, and to modern visitors, that water is a gift, water is something that nurtures life, water is something to be celebrated and cherished.

The importance of water, the source and foundation of human, animal and floral life, is not simply seen in Muslim architecture in Spain, it also fill Hebrew Scripture and the Bible as a whole. Think of Israel’s wandering in the desert and how God provided fresh, sweet water through Moses. Think of the Old Testament’s description of the Holy Land, a land flowing with streams, rivers and springs, a fertile land flowing with milk and honey. Think of the 23^rd Psalm which speaks of the Shepherd God who leads his beloved people beside still waters. Think of the passage of John’s Gospel where Jesus calls himself living water which gushes up to eternal life. Water is a gift, water is a source of life, water is something which humanity needs in order to live, in order to thrive.

Our reading from Jeremiah this morning reminds us of the importance of water, of the gift which it is to humanity. Jeremiah is writing to a people in exile, a people who have been displaced by war from their promised homeland to a foreign country. As Jeremiah speaks comforting words promising new life and new hope, Jeremiah uses the image of water. In two different verses Jeremiah tells the exiled and powerless people of Israel that in restoring Israel God shall cause them to “walk by brooks of water” and that “their life shall become like a watered garden…they shall never languish again.” Jeremiah and the people of Israel know that water is essential to life, it is essential to hope, it is essential to a future.  

God through Jeremiah offers this life, this water, as a gift to the dispossessed and powerless people of Israel. It was a gift which Israel could never earn, never take by force. God’s “announcement describes the returning company [of Israel] primarily as a community of the weak, not an army of the strong.”[1] The gift of life, of water, of hope, is something which is given by God, not something taken by force.

This idea of the free gift of God of life, of water stands in stark contrast with human history. Time and again force has surrounded water, it has surrounded humanity’s striving for life and security. The Alhambra itself, while an image and reminder of the blessing of water is also a walled citadel which was the site of numerous battles. Sadly, throughout the south of Spain one finds town after town which were build as citadels in the 700 year war between Christians and Muslims striving to control the water and fertile lands of Spain. Water, while a free gift, an image of God’s grace and providence, has been distorted into a commodity which humans have fought for, a thing for which humans have killed. Similarly the Holy Land itself, a land flowing with water, with milk and honey, is a land which has been marred by violence and strife as humans fight and kill to obtain what God offers as a free gift. Such violence fills the history of the Old Testament, it fills the history of Roman occupied Palestine, it fills today’s newspapers as Israel bombs and attacks the Gaza Strip in a futile effort to bring peace, to bring security, to bring the Biblical image of water, through force and not through the gracious gift of God. Humans have the unfortunate penchant for trying to take by force that which God offers to us so freely, so abundantly.

It is the abundant gift of God, freely offered, the abundant offer of a life which flourishes and grows like a well-watered garden which stands behind all of our readings today. It was this freely offered gift to a dejected and dispossessed Israel which filled Jeremiah and those who heard his words with joy and hope. It is this free offer of life, of Biblical water, which fills Ephesians which states that God “has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing.” For Ephesians the blessings which Jeremiah spoke of, the blessing of life, of hope, of a well-watered land, are found in fullness in the person of Jesus Christ who came to a hurting and war-torn humanity as a gentle and powerless infant. In this weak Child, God demonstrated yet again that life, true life, true blessings come not through force but through the free gift of God who pours blessings upon humanity as rains freely water the parched earth.

It is this knowledge, this belief, that it is the free gift of a gracious God which brings life and meaning, which filled the Wise Men in our Gospel today. It is their understanding that God offers new life, not armies, not power, not force. It is these mysterious traveler’ ability to trust and receive  from God which makes them so wise. Their wisdom lies in understanding that joy-filled, meaningful life, just like water, is not something we earn or take by force, but instead something which comes to us as a free gift. Their wisdom was in understanding and believing that in seeking God, God would bless them. Their wisdom lay in trusting that God would guard them, that God would guide them to the Christ-child, to the very source of living water which gives life to all that would seek Him.

My friends, in this final Sunday of the Christmas season, in this final Sunday of celebrating the in-breaking of God into human history as one of us, may we be filled with the wisdom of the Wise Men. May we see that it is only through receiving God’s grace that we find true freedom, true life, true meaning. It is only in opening our hands in hope that the abundant life of God is poured upon us, not in striving, not in warring, but instead in trusting and receiving. The gift of life, just like the gift of water, is a gift, it is freely given. 

As the nations furiously rage, as corporations strive and struggle, as so many of us find ourselves in dusty and dry places, may we remember that true life is a gift which we receive, not something we earn. May we remember that the abundant life of God, which flowers and thrives like a well-watered garden, is not something which we are meant to horde, not something we are meant to protect with tall towers and our might. Instead, just as God so freely gave himself for us as the Christ Child, just as God so freely watered the people of Israel with a land and with hope, we are meant to open ourselves to others. As people marked by Christ, filled with him through the Eucharist, washed by him in the living waters of Baptism, we are called to open ourselves unto God and unto each other.

My dear friends, as we find ourselves in the midst of trying times, in the midst of dry and dusty places, I pray that we might be refreshed by the free gift of Jesus Christ. May we open our hearts and souls to his life-giving presence. May we be nourished by the gift which is God’s presence within this world, within us. May we take this living water, freely offered, freely given into the dry and desolate world offering others a glimpse of the life which God desires for humanity. May we be signs of the grace of God. In place of guarding and hiding this living water may we share it with all. Instead of hoarding that which was given to us so freely, may we, like the saints before, be streams of living water, streams which nourish and refresh. As we go forth from this holy place, as we pass the baptismal font in the narthex, may we carry this free gift to all. May we, like Jeremiah, like the Ephesians, and like the Wise Men open ourselves to the gracious gift of living water which God has given to us.