Vessels of God's Grace

The priests and Levites, caretakers of religious tradition, came to John the Baptizer and asked: “Who are you?” He had two answers. Both very important. First he said, “I am not God.” Then he said, “I am a voice.” A voice helping to bring God into the world. Or more accurately, a voice helping other people prepare themselves to receive God. God was coming into the world with or without John’s help. In fact, even though this passage comes from the very beginning of John’s Gospel, John and Jesus are both already adults. Jesus is in the world, but as John says to the people around him: “Among you stands one whom you do not know.” John, as a voice, spoke with the fervor and intensity of God’s own desire, God’s desire to be known. Through John’s voice the people around him recognized God’s presence with them; they came to know that God stood among them.

The Old Testament reading from Isaiah is one of the so-called servant songs, lyrical poetic passages, spoken by the prophet as a servant of the Lord God. I was particularly struck this week by these lines: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my whole being shall exult in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” I can just picture the prophet, the servant of the Lord, this human being, not God, but radiant with the Spirit of God. Somehow clothed with a richness, a depth of peace and joy, beyond human fabrication. Communicating God’s righteousness, holiness into the world. People nearby couldn’t help but notice. I don’t know exactly how, or what it may have really looked like, but when someone’s whole being exults in God, other people can see it and they recognize God is a part of their world.

There’s a phrase in the Book of Common Prayer that I end up saying quite often, but may not be too familiar to you. As you may know, there’s a portion of the Great Thanksgiving as we begin the Eucharistic Prayer called the Proper Preface. And it is just that. It is a preface to the Eucharistic Prayer that is proper for the particular day or occasion being celebrated. Later this morning after we have the conversation about lifting up our hearts, I’ll say the proper preface for Advent. There is another proper preface appointed for various saints’ days. You never hear it on Sunday, because the seasonal celebration of Sundays always trumps the lesser feast days of saints. But we typically celebrate saints’ days in the Wednesday service. This is one of the proper prefaces appointed for the celebration of a saint. It is right, and a good and joyful thing, we say, to give thanks for the saints, “chosen vessels of God’s grace and the lights of the world in their generations.”

Vessels of God’s grace. A saint is a vessel of God’s grace. The description seems particularly apt for John the Baptist and for the servant in Isaiah. Vessels of God’s grace. Saints are vessels of God’s grace. But remember that the church is the communion of saints. At baptism each of us was “sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism and marked as Christ’s own [saint] forever.” Today’s Gospel reading began with John the Baptist being asked, “Who are you?” What if the priests and Levites came to you and asked, “Who are you?” What would you answer? As a saint, a member of the communion of saints, you might answer, “I am a vessel of God’s grace.” I am a vessel of God’s grace.

When was the last time you used the word vessel in casual conversation? Engineers and chemists speak of vessels more often that the rest of us, I suppose. And maybe people who quote Scripture a lot. When I think of vessels I think first of earthen vessels or potter’s vessels—allusions from Scripture. Those vessels are things like a jar or vase. Or, as I consider vessels, I think of sailing vessels, or any ship that travels the sea or outer space. Vessels. I am a vessel of God’s grace.

A vessel is a container. And containers are very important things. If you want to serve guests water when you welcome them to your table, you need a container. You cannot have water at the table without a container, a vessel of some kind. Without a bowl or a pitcher or a glass, water would just go everywhere and be useless to quench the throats of people who are thirsty. Water might be in the room spilled on the floor, or be present in humidity, or available at the kitchen tap, but you have to have a vessel to hold it for water to be really present, to be really useful, to be something that you can offer to the thirsty. Even for yourself, if you want to have water always present with you, no matter where you journey or what you undertake, you need a container to hold and carry it in.

Ships, sailing vessels are containers, too. Vessels that contain all sorts of life and cargo in their hold. Containers that provide safety and transport. Ships, as containers, are the only way for human life to exist amid the vast reaches of the sea or space.

Vessels of God’s grace. Saints are vessels of God’s grace. Saints are people who contain God’s grace, who hold God’s grace so it can exist within the world, so that God’s grace can be visible, safe and available for others.

John the Baptist was a vessel for God’s grace. He was not God. He was not the Messiah. But he was a vessel of God’s grace. He was a container brimful with the spirit of God, spilling over with words that quenched the thirst of people around him who were spiritually parched. He was a vessel of God’s grace, who made God’s grace real and available in the lives of people around him.

Next week, our focus will be on Mary, the other great figure of Advent. A vessel of God’s grace.

And the servant of the Lord in Isaiah. “The Lord has anointed me…” to be the vessel of good news for the poor, to be the vessel of freedom for the captive… the Lord has anointed me to be the container that holds and preserves the Lord’s favor so that it can be shared with God’s people so that they and all who see them will know that they are a people blessed by God.

Who are you? This Advent, 2008, as Christmas approaches, who are you? Can you answer, “I am a vessel of God’s grace”?

All it really takes to be a vessel of God’s grace is a willingness, a desire, to be filled by the grace and spirit of God. All it really takes is a prayer desiring that God’s own spirit will come upon you and within you. A prayer that this Christmastide we will not just find the manger somewhere in our world, but will be a manger that holds and contains God’s life.

God’s spirit, of course, is among us, around us everywhere, like the air we breathe. God’s grace is available always to us here in the Word spoken and the Bread broken. God is present in the world with or without our participation. But for God’s grace to be recognizable, real, accessible, in the world, it sure helps to have human vessels who hold that grace, human beings who glow with righteousness, who speak repentance and comfort, who offer good news to the poor. People just like you and I are the vessels that contain, hold, preserve, transport and share God’s grace in the world.

And all it really takes to be a vessel of God’s grace is a willingness, a desire, a prayer to be filled. For a while I thought that if I were to be vessel of God’s grace, I needed first to fix the cracks… that I was a leaky vessel and I needed to fix all the cracks in my faith before I could contain God’s grace. Or, this being Advent, I thought I needed to empty out all the unholy clutter in my life to “prepare room” before God’s grace could fill me. Those things are definitely worth considering, but they are not the most important things needed to be a vessel of God’s grace. The miraculous thing about God’s grace is that it can be held by a vessel that is leaky or even quite a bit cluttered. Unlike a water pitcher or a space ship, we do not have to be perfect containers in order to be filled with the grace and glory of God.

We just have to be willing. So pray. Pray that you may be a vessel of God’s grace. Pray that God’s grace will fill you brimful. Pray that you may be a container to hold and pour God’s grace into the world. Some of the earliest pictures we have of Christians show a posture for prayer standing with hands extended palms upward… waiting to hold something, reaching out to take something in. Whether or not you are comfortable physically adopting that posture for prayer, at least imagine it. Pray that God will fill your arms, fill your whole body with grace.

And, on a lighter note, you also might also imagine another posture—the gestures that go with the children’s song. “I am a teapot… here is my handle… here is my spout.” Imagine yourself pouring God’s grace into the lives of all the people you know and meet.

Or, as you pray to be filled by God’s grace, consider the image of light in addition to water. A lot of you know the hymn “Breathe on me breath of God.” Listen to verse three. It is a prayer. “Breathe on me, Breath of God, till I am wholly thine, till all this earthly part of me glows with thy fire divine.” Breathe on me, fill me with your grace, let me be a vessel filled with your light, glowing with divine fire in the world.

Who are you, the priests and Levites ask. Pray that we may all be vessels of God’s grace.