Maurice A. Fetty

Finding the boundary of doing something and not trying to do it all is a difficult line to find — especially in a culture that admires accomplishment, time management, and overworking for a cause or passion. The verses from this week’s lectionary tell us to operate a little differently, though. Instead of reaching for the next level of achievement, enjoy the view from where you are. 

Advent in Cycle A means Isaiah, Romans, and Matthew. Isaiah is so rich and musical. His imagery is the source of so many hymns. This week’s passage uses the images of the world coming alive again to sing about the revival of God’s people, and the restoration of their true identity.

Isaiah 35:1-10
Leslie B. Flynn told the story of an orphaned boy who was living with his grandmother. Their house caught fire, and the grandmother, trying to get upstairs to rescue the boy, perished in the flames. The boy’s cries for help were finally answered by a man who climbed an iron drainpipe and came back down with the boy hanging tightly to his neck.

Contents
“Are We There Yet?” by C. David McKirachan
“Mary — A Child Prodigy?” by Frank Ramirez


Are We There Yet?
by C. David McKirachan
James 5:7-10

Did you ever wonder where they get the kids for the TV ads, you know the ones that are always smiling, and sitting next to parents on the couch, or at the table? Maybe your kids are like that. Maybe there are kids like that somewhere. But mine… well let’s say they were more likely to be involved in other activities.

John the Baptist asked Jesus, through his own followers, if he really was the “expected one.” Jesus’ reply was to tell John about what he had been up to. Jesus was healing people left and right of all kinds of irreversible ailments. Even raising people back to life! To top it all off, the poor were hearing the good news. Then Jesus said “if that makes you happy then I’m your guy.”

There wasn't much that Adrian was good at, except swimming. He learned to swim when he was little more than a baby, and he loved it. When he was seven he joined a swimming club. It was there that he first met Mr Stevens, the swimming coach.

When a woman is pregnant, we often say she is "expecting." That is a good term for it, because she's expecting or anticipating that a baby will be born at some appointed time in the future, and along with that baby will come a whole wealth of other expectations. There will be expectations about who the baby will look like, and what that baby will be like. There will be expectations about the baby's future -- the kind of life he or she will live; the kind of person the child will become. As V. S. Naipaul once said, "One isn't born one's self.