“There’s no place like home,” said Dorothy in the classic Wizard of Oz. This mantra paved the way for Dorothy to return home. Dorothy recognized that all she hoped for was within reach of whatever space she occupied as long as she remained true to herself.
In Alice in Wonderland, Alice finds a door in a tree. Alice was preparing for adulthood. In preparation for adulthood, Alice confronted the bizarre and often unpredictable world lying outside the only world she knows. There’s something safe about a world found only in our imagination. Most of all, we’re in charge of the unpredictable.
Alice learns that adults need rules to live by. We learn them as children by watching the adults in our lives, often without questioning why. Of course, this leads to confusion when we observe inconsistency between the words we hear and what we see. We also discover that we don’t all see the world through the same lens.
Like Alice, most of us struggle with how to respond when asked who we are. The process is complicated by constant change, both within and around us.
In the first act of Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, Polonius, chief minister to King Claudius, offers advice to his son, Laertes, who is preparing to leave for college. “This, above all, to thine own self be true,” he says.
Parents and mentors often reuse much of this father’s advice. For example, he reminds his son to be careful before speaking out and to avoid lending or borrowing money from friends.
The problem is the source of the advice. Polonius often does things that illustrate an inherent dishonesty in his advice. The father wears the t-shirt, declaring himself a good person, but lives out a less authentic identity.
Nevertheless, many parents borrow his words as their children prepare for adulthood and search for their own place in the world. His story makes me wonder how my children accepted my advice as they prepared to strike out on their own.
Speaking of preparations, I’m thrilled with the Christmas decorations adorning many of the houses I pass by each night. I’m grateful that so many other people’s Christmas preparations add interest to my dark drive home each evening and remind me to see the joy in the midst of cold temperatures and slippery roads.
Also, on the topic of preparations, God promised a messenger would prepare the way for the Messiah through the Prophet Malachi. God also warned us to be prepared and expect big changes in ourselves.
During the time of Malachi, the people questioned God’s claim that humility and honesty paid off. The opposite seemed to be the reality. The arrogant’s boasting amplified the lack of justice and accountability. God’s claim that honesty and being true to ourselves weren’t the truth people were experiencing.
But God knew better.
Luke tells us that an elderly Priest named Zechariah is visited by an angel while he is burning incense in the inner temple. After questioning the validity of what the angel told him, Zechariah is unable to speak. God’s message through the angel sounded impossible, and he simply wasn’t prepared to believe what he was told to expect.
Our text for this week begins with Zechariah’s declaration after his extended silence. Zechariah’s voice was restored after he confirmed that his and Elizabeth’s son would be named John. It appears that during his months of silence, Zechariah concluded that the angel’s prophecy could be trusted. As foretold in ancient prophecy, his son would be a messenger preparing the way for the coming Messiah.
God is merciful and tender and will cause the bright dawn of salvation to rise and shine on all who live in the dark shadow of death, guiding our steps into the path of peace.
Luke 1:68-79
What does it mean for Zechariah’s son to “prepare the way?” A little later in Luke, after John becomes an adult, we discover that his call for repentance turns our attention to rule-following. But John wasn’t a conservative. He was more of a progressive. John told the people that it wasn’t enough to declare their goodness. They needed to live out their faith by bearing the fruits of goodness. Ideas like sharing your clothing and your food. Be honest and fair in your business, and not cheat others.
Were the people confused about what it meant to be faithful to God? Apparently, they identified as followers. They owned the logo, but they were focused on the entitlements of claiming faithfulness rather than living a life that reflected faithfulness.
Spiritually, they were children, but it was time for them to grow up. Rules are important, but they can seem downright silly when blindly followed.
Perhaps home is the place where we don’t need to sport a team logo for others to realize we’re authentic. I remember my mentor from seminary, Dr. Jim Perkinson, walking with the graduates. The school had to loan him a robe to wear over his jeans, t-shirt, and sandals. Pomp and circumstance weren’t his thing. He focused on living out the spirit of John’s call to faithfulness.
Sometimes, I think we need a different word for faithfulness. How about honesty? I like this word. We need to be honest with ourselves about our own preparations.
Preparations imply a process that begins with raw materials and a vision. Preparations aren’t perfection. Perhaps there is a plan, but a plan sure to change.
It’s as though we’re God’s Christmas decorations, along with the snow and all of creation. Some of us are twinkling, while others are always on until we run out of energy and crash. None of us are perfected. Instead, we’re all preparing for that day when we return home and meet the One we celebrate at Christmas.
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Pastor Tommy
Parts of our series are inspired by the Reverend Dawn Darwin Weak. Daring to Connect: Advent as Adventure. Danvers, MA: Chalice Press, 2024.
“‘To Thine Own Self Be True’, Meaning & Context.” © No Sweat Shakespeare, 2022. Retrieved from: link