Advent Lutheran Church

"Fire and Soap (Advent 2 Midweek)"

Advent is an interesting time, because it asks us to prepare for both the beginning and the end…It asks us to prepare for the Christ child who was born in Bethlehem and for Christ the King who will come again in glory. 

            It asks us to look back and look forward to “The Day God comes to Set things Right…”

We might reflect on how all of this “Setting Right” by God is working from that first Christmas until now and into our future.  God has had to remove "mountains" in the minds and hearts of people, to fill in "valleys" for those who had eyes but could not see, who had ears but could not hear.  This God will never condone our sinful actions, but will also never give up on us, because ours is a God of covenant.  And we, too, long for “the promised land” that is honest and just; where people care for each other and the earth. where war is no more, and where little children never suffer.

            There is something to love in the strange and inscrutable writings of the Hebrew Bible.  These prophets were masters of the image; and were disarming in their use of both male and female imagery.  Think of the mother hen gathering chicks, or a female eagle, or Lady Wisdom in the streets, yes, the Old Testament prophets did not forget the ladies…

            In our reading tonight from the prophet Malachi, there are two distinct images:  the refiner’s fire and fuller’s soap.  Both are cleansing elements, and when this reading supports last Sunday’s reading about John’s proclamation of a “baptism of repentance for forgiveness of sins” we can see the connections in how we should Prepare!  But when looked at on their own, they also reflect something of our relationship with God.

            A refiner’s fire is a blazing hot, “blast furnace” fire.  Another word for the refining process is “smelting.”  There is a wildness about the words and about the process, where metal is melted in a white-hot heat, such that every impurity is seared away, and the burning hotness itself cautions those who participate to beware.  This kind of purity requires risk; danger, even, to attain.  And the only way the refiner knows the metal is pure enough, is by seeing his own reflection in the molten liquid.  Does God administer this painful process to “burn away” our impurities?  Does God require this kind of fiery reconstruction to see himself in us? Is this the way we relate to God’s power?

            Or, are you in a place where you need to hear about a God who is a god of soapsuds and squeaky cleanness?  Perhaps a fuller’s soap is harsh, but it has nowhere near the potential for destruction that fire has!  In fact, those who laundered in ancient times were predominantly the women - Mothers who washed the clothes of their families in public; who gathered with others in the community to prepare the garments to present fresh and clean to those they loved.  Not much danger in this process.  A much “friendlier” image.  Hard work, yes.  Death and power and destruction, no.

            So as we reflect tonight, we recall another prophet’s words, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through the fire you shall not be burned and the flame shall not consume you” (Isaiah 43:2).   And then Malachi reminds us that it is God himself who brings us through the fire and the water in order to make us clean.  Thus, we prepare our hearts and our homes and our lives without fear, for whenever and however God will come.

            Some will be frantic and wild in their Christmas preparations – awaiting the moment when they can look into the face of the molten metal around them and say “Ah!  Now I can see my reflection.”While others will work industriously, sometimes even in concert with others, to set things in order and for a new day and a new year and a fresh, clean start.  

            The poet Theodore Roethke once wrote “deep in their roots, all flowers keep the light.”  I believe that deep in our hearts, all of us keep the Christ who was, who is, and who is to come, the Light of the World.  So however you need to prepare for God’s coming, rest in the fact that the highway home is straight and clear – the precious metal of our lives is pure, and our garments are white as snow.  Because this season, like all seasons of human existence, begins and ends in God.  Amen. 

Resource:  Frederick Gaiser in Word and World – Winter 1999