Hope: God's Promise at the Margins

Biblical hope is defiant and stubborn, believing God isn't finished with our story yet. Elizabeth and Mary, both marginalized women, became vessels of God's promise during Israel's darkest times. Elizabeth, elderly and childless, conceived John the Baptist after decades of shame. Mary, young and poor, accepted the call to bear Jesus despite the risks. God consistently chooses the powerless to demonstrate His hope. We can live out this hope today through encouraging speech, generous actions, and intentionally reaching out to overlooked people in our communities.

Transcript

All right, folks, if you have your Bibles, I'm going to invite you to open them up to the book of Isaiah. It is a prophetic book. It's about in the middle of your Bible. It's in the Old Testament. Isaiah is a prophet.

We're going to start in chapter nine. We're going to read just a couple of verses, verses one and two, and then we're going to read verses six and seven. If you don't have a Bible, you can follow along on the screen. But here is God's word for us. This day says this.

Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past, he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naftali. But in the future, he will honor Galilee of the nations by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan. The people walking in darkness have seen a great light on those living in the land of deep darkness, a light has dawned. Verse 6.

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given. And the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called a wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of peace, of the greatness of his government and peace, there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

So, church, I know that everybody knows today is the beginning of what we call the Christmas season, right? Well, for people outside the church, they call it Christmas season. For us inside the church, we call it Advent. And as we've talked about Advent every single year, this is a season of waiting, a season of longing and preparing. We look backward to the birth of Jesus, the son of God, so long ago in the manger in Bethlehem.

And yet we also look forward to the eventual return of Christ and Advent. If you don't know this, it always begins with hope. Every week in Advent, there is a theme and hope, which is this week's theme. It's not supposed to be just a sentimental word that we've turned it into. Hope is not a Hallmark card.

Hope is not a vague feeling that things might get better someday. Hope is defiant, hope is resistant. Hope is a stubborn, stubborn belief that God is not finished with us or our story yet. The scripture that we started out with this morning sounds beautiful, doesn't it? The prophet Isaiah declared, the people walking in darkness, they get to see this great light.

He spoke of a new king that would inherit the throne of David. And this king was going to be a wonderful counselor. Mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of peace. Would you describe our government with those words today? No.

But the amazing thing to know about the prophecy of Isaiah is that those words were not supposed to be spoken just for simple comfort. They weren't spoken in the midst of a beautiful season of life for the people of Israel. They were spoken in crisis. Judah was under the threat of regime change and occupation by their sworn enemies. The Jewish people in this time were afraid.

And Isaiah dared to proclaim that God's light would break through the shadows of darkness. As we have talked about a lot this year in church, God's hope does not arise in places of power, but instead God chooses to reach into the places of despair. And the Advent story, the incarnation of God among God's people, it's just stronger proof that God seeks to lift up those who've been powerless. And so that's where we find ourselves in Scripture this morning. We don't find ourselves in the throne room of Nebuchadnezzar or the halls of Caesar or the courts of kings, but today we find ourselves in the margins of society.

So let's sit in the Isaiah text for a minute. God's people were living under the looming shadow of the Assyrian empire, the great empire of the day. Armies threatened their borders. Leaders were corrupt. The poor were being exploited.

Those without power were being taken advantage of. Fear was everywhere. And into that fear, Isaiah spoke of a child who would be born, a ruler who would bring peace, a savior who would embody God's promise, a deliverer. Isaiah didn't say things are bad, but hopefully someday they'll get better. There was no Pollyanna ish cover up of the feeling of the time.

He didn't want to hide the fact that there would still be hard times to come. He instead said, God is doing something new here and now. God is sending light into darkness. Even though we can't see it in this moment, even though it feels really awful, even though everything that we know is shifting and changing. And I'm fearful God is acting on our behalf.

God is working to save us. And in spite of the warnings of the prophets, in spite of the hope that Isaiah tried to instill in his people, the Jewish people still up in exile, they were taken from their homes and their way of life. They were taken from everything they knew. And they were dispersed throughout an empire that they didn't speak the language of, they didn't know the rituals of. And although things looked terribly bleak for The Israelite people.

God never abandoned them.

And as believers in a Christ that loves us, we know that God doesn't abandon us today in the moments where it looks tough in our lives. And we can trust this because this is who God has promised us that he is. This is who God has proved himself to be over and over and over again. Right in the midst of slavery in Egypt, God sent a deliverer and Moses to save his people, to make a way in the 40 years in the wilderness. God never left the people that he cared for so deeply.

He carried them out of Egypt and into the promised land under the control of empire after empire. God used the prophets to speak life and hope into his people. Even in some of the darkest times in their history, God continually offered hope for God's people. Even in the toughest moments, even when they couldn't see that God was working, even when we still to this day can't see what God is doing, God still offers hope. And hope is not simple optimism.

It is a defiance against the state of despair. It's standing strong in the face of the unknown. Optimism says things like, I think things are going to work out. Yeah, I hope things work out. But hope says, even if everything in my life falls apart, I believe that God is still faithful.

Optimism, friends, is a mood. Hope for us has to be a decision.

And here we are. Centuries after Isaiah wrote these words, the same defiant hope broke into the lives of two women. Elizabeth, Mary. Let's read again the story of Elizabeth found in Luke, chapter one. This is Luke 1, verses 5 through 25 says this.

In the time of Herod, king of Judah. Sorry, Judea. There was a priest named Zechariah who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah. And his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord's commands and decrees blamelessly.

But they were childless because Elizabeth was unable to conceive and they were both very old. Once, when Zechariah's division was on duty and he was serving as priests before God, he was chosen by Lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord to burn incense. And when the time for the burning of the incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside. Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and he was gripped with fear.

But the angel said to him, do not be afraid, Zechariah. Your Prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you were to call him John. He will be a joy and a delight to you. And many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord.

He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born. He will bring back many of the people of Israel to their Lord, their God. And he will go on before the Lord in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the parents toward their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. Zechariah asked the angel, how can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.

The angel said to him, I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time. Meanwhile, the people were waiting on Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple. When he came out, he could not speak to them.

They realized that he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them, but remained unable to speak. When his time of service was completed, he returned home. After this, his wife Elizabeth became pregnant and for five months remained in seclusion. The Lord has done this for me, she said. In these days, he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people.

Listen, I think Zechariah does a really good job of not speaking directly to how old his wife is, right?

I. He says, I am very old, and she is also well along in years.

Elizabeth, according to scripture, was not just elderly, but scripture describes her as very old. Zechariah, on the other hand, was like, ah, she's matronly, well seasoned, right? Like, as kind as you can be. But Elizabeth has lived her whole adult life being silenced by the shame of barrenness. Now, I think not having children is something that is a choice for many people nowadays.

And it's also something that can be very painful to talk about. For those of you who've not been able to have children, hear me when I say this. There is no shame in that at all.

But in this time and in the culture of Elizabeth, childlessness was not just a private sorrow, something that you regretted, but it became a very public Shame whispers followed her everywhere she went. Pitying glances reminded her of what she lacked. And the silence of unanswered prayers pressed down on her year after year. Luke tells us she was very old, a phrase that underscores not only just her age, but also the impossibility of hope by human standards. And her husband, Zechariah was a priest, and he carried his own burden, too, right?

He would have been seen as troubled by God, somebody who might have been considered a sinner for his wife's perceived inability to conceive a child. When he entered the temple to burn incense, the angel Gabriel appeared to him and announced that their prayers, the years of their begging God to take them out of this shame, had been heard and that in months to come, Elizabeth was going to have son. Their prayers would be answered. The hope that they've been begging for now, all of a sudden, is light in their life.

But even in the midst of this miraculous moment, Zechariah struggled to believe right, asking how such a thing could be possible. If we were sitting here in church today and an angel. Poof. Just showed up right here next to our Advent candles, I think we would all believe. But Zechariah, who is a priest of the Lord, struggles because not only is this angel something that shouldn't be there, but you're giving me a message that I've known for decades hasn't happened.

I have given up my hope.

His doubt left him mute until the moment his son was born.

But Elizabeth, the woman who had endured shame and silence for decades, becomes a vessel of God's promise.

When she conceived, Elizabeth hid herself for five months, not out of fear, but of awe. She declared, the Lord has done this for me. In these days, he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people.

Her voice, once silenced by this shame, now rang as a testimony to God's faithfulness.

God had met her in her tears and replaced them with a hope that was alive. And as we all know, because we get the benefit of history to see what has happened, we have the stories told in scripture. We know that Elizabeth's son is John. Not just John, not just any John. He's John the Baptist, right?

And it's in those modifiers that make a difference. John the Baptist was the one who would prepare the way for the Christ, the Messiah, the very son of the living God. Elizabeth's womb, once considered barren and closed, became the place where God's plan of redemption took root.

Elizabeth's life shows us that hope is not reserved for the powerful. Or the celebrities or the celebrated. But it comes explicitly to those who have been marginalized, those who have been overlooked, those who are considered by community around them dismissed, those who felt shame can now experience hope because God proves that he will never leave any of us, nor forsake us. And we see that continue on in God's story of hope, not just through close relative Mary. In Luke, chapter one, going on in 26 through 38, we hear God's story continue.

It says, in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent an angel, the angel Gabriel, to Nazareth, a town. Sorry, a town in Galilee. There we go to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, greetings, you who are highly favored.

The Lord is with you. Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, do not be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you were to call him Jesus.

He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever. His kingdom will never end. How will this be, Mary asked the angel. Since I am a virgin, the angel answered, the Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.

So the Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth, your relative, is going to have a child in her old age. And she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.

I am the Lord's servant, mary answered. May your word to me be fulfilled. Then the angel left her.

Mary was young, very young. It was clear that she was poor, she was unmarried. And much like even in our own time in Mary's culture, pregnancy outside of marriage was scandalous, dangerous, and even punishable. Scripture tells us that she was from a town called Nazareth, a town of little reputation. It was a tiny little place that had no real claim to fame.

It's kind of a lot like the equivalent of maybe slap out. Oklahoma. You ever been there? You have? I've never been there, but I heard it's a real place.

I don't know. I have no reason to go. But what's important for us to recognize here is that by every single cultural measure, Mary would have been considered insignificant. She was a woman very Young woman, probably a child.

She was poor.

She was pledged to be married to a man named Joseph. That's all we know. He was a carpenter. He wasn't wealthy.

But she was God's chosen. It was to her that the angel Gabriel was sent carrying the most astonishing announcement in human history.

She would give birth to the Son of God. She would become what we call the Theotokos. It's a Greek word that means the bearer of God.

Gabriel greeted her with the words, greetings, you who are highly favored. The Lord is with you. And it says that Mary's response to that was. She was troubled, right? Not because she doubted God's power, but because she could not imagine why she would be highly favored or chosen in any way.

But in the midst of her doubt, Gabriel reassured her. Don't be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. Mary's question is a great response. How can this be?

I am a virgin. And that question wasn't a disbelief, but it was an honest wonder. Both she and Elizabeth were thinking in human terms, and they didn't understand what it meant to think in God's terms. Gabriel explained that the Holy Spirit would overshadow her and she would be the bearer of God's Son. The child inside of her would be holy, the Son of God.

To confirm God's power, she pointed to Elizabeth's pregnancy as proof. This elderly woman, your relative, who has never had a baby, is in this moment bearing a child with you. It was proof.

And then Mary responds again. It's one of the most profound acts of faith in all of Scripture, in my opinion. She said, I am the Lord's servant. May your word to me be fulfilled. And in that moment, she surrendered her reputation, her security, her future.

She gave it all up for God's plan. She became the vessel through whom the Word would become flesh. As we read about in John, Mary's story, just like Elizabeth before her, shows us that God's hope comes through the marginalized. It comes through those who the world overlooks. And this young, unmarried virgin's.

Yes, that she gives to God and opened the way for Christ to enter into our world. Mary's trust in God's promise reminds us that hope is not found in strength or status, but in humble trust and in courageous obedience. Neither of these women fit the world's definition of power. No one would have expected an old woman to be the bearer of God's way. Bringer Right.

Nobody would have expected a young virgin of no consequence to be the bearer of God's son.

But God chose them both. Elizabeth became the mother of John the Baptist, the forerunner of Jesus. Mary carried Jesus, the savior of the world, God's one and only son. Do you see what God is doing? God begins salvation not with kings or emperors, but with women whose voices were often ignored.

God's saving desire for all of humanity began with those that the world had forgotten.

Elizabeth, whose womb was once empty, was filled. Mary's life, once ordinary, became extraordinary. Hope was born on the periphery of a world that didn't value the periphery and church. That's the scandal of Advent. God doesn't begin with the powerful.

God begins literally with the powerless. God doesn't begin at the center. God begins in the margins. And yet we still live in a world where hope feels scarce, doesn't it? Economic anxiety weighs on families.

World change seems to be threatening our personal freedoms. Political and religious division tears communities apart. Violence fills our headlines. Despair seems stronger than the light of God. But God's promise of hope still arises among the overlooked.

And Advent is a perfect reminder that God's hope still breaks into the margins even today. I truly believe that if Jesus was born again today, the hope that he brings would be a voice that cries out from refugee camps, from homeless shelters, from ICE detention centers. That's where God meets us. If Jesus was born today, his birth wouldn't be announced from the halls of Congress or the towering, gleaming glass buildings on Wall Street. The hope of God would be announced in the places that we least expect, among the poor, the sick, the displaced, those who have been silenced.

And if hope is born there in the margins, then that hope must be carried to other places in creation by us. If we can still see the light of God's hope made manifest in Christ Jesus, then our job of lovers and believers in that Christian must be to make him known to every corner of the world.

I recently heard a story of a single woman here in Tulsa. She was without work. She struggled with mental health issues, and she was addicted to drugs. And because of the hardships that she faced, she eventually lost everything she had and she became homeless. And when you're homeless, you're desperate.

And out of her desperation. One cold night here in Tulsa during COVID and a winter storm, she ended up walking over to a local hotel that worked in partnership with the City Lights foundation here in Tulsa. The City Lights foundation had received some grant money, and they also got some donations that helped them to help those who had been unhoused to receive a hotel room. And for the first time in years, she was able to sleep in A room where she could lock the door in a bed that was clean, with privacy of her own for the first time in two years. For the next two weeks, she was finally able to get a deep sleep.

What she didn't know when she checked into the hotel is that she had Covid. And every day for those two weeks, someone brought her something to eat, and they checked on her. She began not only to get physically better, but in this place of safety, her mind began to be healed. She began to get treatment for her addictions. And it was through the grace of God that she, in that moment, had wandered into the right place at the exact right time.

And it was on that one cold night in the snow in midtown Tulsa that she met the people who would change her life forever.

So those who work at the City Lights foundation eventually helped this woman not just get out of homelessness for those two weeks, but they eventually got her into an apartment, and she began to get the resources that she needed to begin to straighten out her life. This woman not only was able to get off the streets through the City Lights foundation, but now she volunteers and financially supports the program that helped change her life and give her new hope.

That is what hope does.

Hope brings us defiance against despair. Hope shouldn't be something that we wait for. It's something we have to live out. Living in hope should be our response to the hope that God has given each of us in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. So this beautiful story of Advent.

It's a really great story, Matt. I love it so much. I just. I remember being in church, hearing this all growing up. My parents talked about it every Christmas.

It's a great story. But what does it mean for us to have hope today? What does it mean for us to have hope in the midst of a world that seeks to destroy our hope? Right. Because someday, that's.

That's just what it feels like.

It means that we are called to carry hope out of these doors and into our communities. We are called to serve the poor. We are called to forgive those who have wronged us. We are called to listen to those who've been silenced. We are called to not be separated by disagreement or be divided by things that are ungodly.

We are called to embody God's promise in the margins of our own lives.

Hope is not something that we can afford to wait on. Hope has to be something that we live in. And it can't be passive. Hope for us has to be active, which means that hope is embodied in our choices. In our actions and in our daily lives.

So, church, here's a couple things that we can do to live out hope every day. We have got to be people who practice hopeful speech. Each of us are going to have to replace the words of cynicism or complaint with words of encouragement and blessing. Speaking hope into daily conversations reshapes both us and those who hear us speak. You probably have heard this before, but our words carry weight, right?

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. Lies. There's a lie from the devil. Words hurt. Our words carry weight.

And we should be the people who speak the same words that Jesus spoke. Even in the midst of things that we disagree with, even in the midst of things we don't like, we have to be people that speak like Jesus. We also have to be people who act with hopeful generosity. Each of us here are called to give. That means not just finances.

That means we have to be willing to give our time, our resources, and our attention. And we have to give in ways that anticipate God's abundance rather than the fear of us running out. Even small acts of generosity become signs of hope in a world in need, Right?

And lastly, I want to encourage you over the coming weeks to seek hope in the margins. Each of us has to intentionally notice and engage with people who have been overlooked. This means people that are on the edge of society, like the elderly, the lonely, the lost, the homeless, and those who struggle. Embodying living hope means showing others that God is present, even in the places where others only see despair. Doing things like this keeps our hope from simply being an abstract thought.

Acting out of our hope makes the gift of hope a lived practice woven into our speech, our actions, and even into our relationships. So, church this week and always. Let us be those who are the bearers of hope. May each one of us defy despair with acts of love. May each of us embody God's saving desire by showing up where the world least expects it.

Sometimes, Not only through Christ do people get to see great light. Sometimes the only light people see is the Christ in us.

Friends, we have to embody the light of Christ in our world today. So as we leave this place this morning, be people who shine. Let's pray.