“A Sermon for Advent” by Muriel S. Lipp

November 30, 2014

The First Sunday of Advent

I was moved to stand here today mostly by the Isaiah Scripture, particularly that phrase, “Thou art the Potter—I am the clay.”  Since it’s the first Sunday in Advent, I wondered how that thought portrayed  the birth of Jesus.  We know that Isaiah predicted the birth of The Messiah several times, saying, “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son ,” and once he even confessed his own doubts:  “Shall a woman bear a child without pain?…Who has heard of anything like this?”  Like Isaiah, those are my thoughts too, but since am the clay, I’m not yet fully formed.

The Cloud of Unknowing.  Beat on that cloud, he says, through contemplation, meditation, and prayer.   Thomas Keating calls  this centering prayer.  Not easy.  We are so used to thinking–and this is not thinking.  How can I do this?  we say.  I am not a monk or a nun.  Well, we can do it through silence.  Or rather, it is done for us within us, or as Paul says, “Wait.  Just wait.”

Amen.