Showing items filed under “The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin”

Thy God Reigneth

For Epiphany (Jan. 6), the Episcopal daily office lectionary gives us for Morning Prayer in odd-numbered years Isaiah 52:7-10. It is an inspired choice.
    How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace, that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation, that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!
    Here the prophet Isaiah speaks to Israel in hard, alienating times. The reason Israel is in hard times is because of God himself: God has exiled Israel for its unfaithfulness, its moral corruption, its abandonment of the law, its failure to walk before the Lord in the ways of holiness. But God still loves Israel, and the time has come for reconciliation.
    So there is a messenger coming with good tidings of “peace” and of “salvation,” news that God is going to effect peace between himself and his people and is going to save his people from oppression and alienation and bring them home. The news is beautiful, and for that very reason the messenger is beautiful, even down to his feet—although surely his feet are blistered and dirty! The news makes everything beautiful even before what it announces comes to pass.
    The most important line is this: Thy God reigneth!
    A problem many of us have is that we spiritualize the reign of God. We think, although God does reign over my heart, he doesn’t reign over the United States (or the republic of Texas, or whatever). This is not true and it shrinks the impact of the good tidings that the messenger brings. God reigns over everything! He is the king over kings, he rules nations; in the end, not only individuals come to his throne for judgment but nations do also. This means, for instance, that America is a real thing with an eternal destiny for good or for ill. (Likewise, Texas, Dallas, and Texarkana.) The good news includes the news that good government is coming: government that will protect us, government that will provide true judgment, government that will serve our true identity.
    On Epiphany, God’s light shines forth not only upon Israel, upon Zion, but upon all nations, all humanity, every person. The light shows that the king has indeed come. Thy God reigneth! Jesus is the king of the universe, the governor over all governors, the law-giver over all lawgivers, the judge of every judge. He will save us from wrong that we do and wrong that is done to us, from all that is hard and alienating. He will judge decisively between right and wrong. And he will give us our true identity as a people, an identity to which history has given the name “Christian.”
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    On the Web. Sunday, January 24, I will be teaching a class for the church of the Annunciation in Lewisville, Tex., on friendship. This will be online. More info to come.

 

Posted by The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin with

MAGA

Have you seen the MAGA hats, the T-shirts? I first saw one at a Zoomish staff meeting, but since have seen them elsewhere. They say: “Make Advent Great Again.”
    You thought this was going to be political? It isn’t, but it is; keep reading.
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    The informal catechism I received when I became an Episcopalian (this was when our president had a four-letter name, just before the six-letter president) said that you could tell Episcopalians by their not saying Merry Christmas until it was really Christmas. This was one of three distinguishing marks of the True Faith. (The other two? Saying URR for “err” and SETH for “saith.”) The local vicar expressed the irony in a satisfying way. Christmas lasts twelve days, beginning (not ending!) on December 25. So he left the church’s outdoor creche in place through January 6. Invariably, he told us in a sermon, some well-meaning Baptist woman would call him around New Years to let him know he had forgotten to put his Christmas decorations away.
    I took it in. Our family created a new tradition: we would pig out on Christmas carols on Thanksgiving Day, which is before Advent, and then fast from singing them until December 25. We also would shop for our Christmas tree on the last weekend before Christmas (which did save some dough, which was a good thing, provided the tree-mongers hadn’t already closed shop).
    Susan had the view that not only could the tree and all the decorations stay up until the Epiphany (January 6), but they could remain all the way to the feast of the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, which comes forty days after Christmas (i.e., February 2). With seriousness she would admonish us: we have to get the tree down by February 2.
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    Society, however, does not stand still. When the four-letter-guy was president, to say “merry Christmas” was still a social norm of sorts. In the decades since, we have become more aware of alternative holidays. People started feeling that to say Merry Christmas was an imposition, even an aggression, something offensive. So while the duly-catechized Episcopalian was keeping Advent and holding off Christmas, society was packing off Christmas to the cellar.
    I changed. No longer did I demur during Advent if someone said “Merry Christmas” to me. No longer did I say, “Yes, I’m looking forward to it also.” I became an enthusiastic merry-Christmas-er to all and sundry, all through Advent.
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    Unquestionably, Advent has diminished. But to make Advent great again, methinks, is not to try, ever more frantically, to hold Christmas at bay. No, greatness lies in a different direction.
    Which is: to remember that Advent points, not primarily to the birth of Jesus, but to his kingship. As the creed puts it, Jesus will come again to judge the quick and the dead. Advent is about the arrival of the true king. This we need to recapture: the true political meaning of Jesus as a king whose reign, when he returns, will extend over all the world. At that time he will judge universally, both individuals and also nations.
    There is nothing greater than to have in your heart a longing for his coming, for his reign to be universally manifest. Come, Lord Jesus! With such a longing, Advent will indeed be great again.

Posted by The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin with

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The Rev. Canon Victor Lee Austin. Ph.D., is the Theologian-in-Residence for the diocese and is the author of several books including, "Friendship: The Heart of Being Human" and "A Post-Covid Catechesis.: 

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