‘Rejoice again! I say rejoice!’: (Sermon for Advent 3, 14th December 2025)

preached by Mother Lucie Spiers, Assistant Curate. Isaiah 35:1-6, 10, James 5:7-10, Matthew 11:2-11

I wonder how often you have been asked an unexpected question- something unanticipated,

unusual, or outside an expected conversational script. And we can be affected emotionally by

these questions, ranging from feeling excited and interested (if you enjoy spontaneity) to

uncomfortable and anxious (if you prefer predictability).

In the Bible, there are many surprising, unexpected questions throughout the Old and New

Testaments. ‘Where are you?’ God asks Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. ‘Who told you that

you were naked?’ ‘Do you want to get well?’ Jesus asks the paralysed man. He asks the disciples.

‘Who do you say I am?’ He asks the crowd ‘Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?’ These

unexpected questions interrupt complacency, reveal inner truth, and invite repentance and faith, a

shift from knowledge to transformation.

One of those unexpected questions arises in today’s Gospel. We focus once again on John the

Baptist, a man sent from God - the last prophet in an Old Testament line stretching back to

Zephaniah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Isaiah. John, who crowns one age and ushers in another,

brings a host of prophetic witnesses and serves as a bridge between the old covenant and the

new – a transitional figure between two ages. He testifies to the divine light, bears witness to it,

and reveals its presence where people least expect to find it – in Jesus. 

But now we find him in prison, where he has been for several months. He had cried out to prepare

the way of the Lord, in which God would fulfil his promises to his people. There was an

expectation that once the Messiah appeared, this would happen swiftly.

But following his baptism, Jesus has been journeying from village to village, welcoming prostitutes,

eating with tax collectors, and forming disciples for mission and community amid mounting

hostility. Meanwhile, John faces execution, not exoneration or escape.

Jesus is not the kind of messiah that John or anyone else had expected. He had brought healing

to many who had come out to see him but, it would seem, judgment to none - not even to those

who had unlawfully confined the Baptist in a prison. So John sends his followers to ask the

unexpected question, ‘Are you the one to come, or shall we look for another?’ 

And Jesus responds: 'Go and tell John what you hear and see. The blind receive their sight, the

lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up. The poor have good

news preached to them, and blessed is the one who is not offended by me.' This message

references the prophet Isaiah, a paraphrase of our first reading today, and John would have

known the prophet Isaiah by heart.

When Jesus gave this reply to John, he must have expected John to understand immediately what

he meant. He was signalling that the messianic era had truly begun. The time of God’s liberation is

here. Yet it remains unconfirmed unless one has eyes to see and ears to hear. For it is true that

Jesus healed the sick, gave sight to the blind, and made the deaf hear, among the crowds who

swarmed to see him. But it was not everyone.

As we reflect on a year marked by ongoing conflict, worsening humanitarian crises, economic

recession, immigration, and political division, we may also begin to doubt. We fear that things are

not happening as they should; they may be changing, but often not for the better. Are we tempted

to look away from Christ and towards someone or something else?

We must remember that the signs of the kingdom remain hidden, just as they were in Jesus’ time.

That is partly why Jesus said, ‘And blessed is the one who is not offended by me’. Because they

did not expect a Messiah to be so humble, so obscure, and ultimately rejected. They expected

power, victory, and triumph. Yet the signs were present then - as they are now. 

When we welcome all, excluding none, when we show compassion and ensure justice for the

weakest and most vulnerable, it becomes a sign - it may be hidden, but it is a tangible sign - that

the kingdom of God is breaking through. All these tiny signs enacted by the Body of Christ point to

the glory that will come when the Lord takes his power to himself. What remains unchanged is the

narrative and the meaning of Jesus’ birth. God is with us.

The coming Christ will bring joy to all. A joy rooted in the grace the Spirit offers us through our

participation in God's life and work as we proclaim God's faithfulness. Our creator and redeemer,

with us in disappointment and difficulty, in sorrow and joy. Today of all days, joy!  

Whatever trials we face, suffer, or grieve - these may still weigh on our shoulders on Christmas

morning and appear with the first light of the New Year. Yet we have been promised that His

peace and light will come, even in the midst of our troubles, even when faced with unexpected

questions.

For each of us by our baptism and our place together in the body of Christ has been sent to

witness to the light. In our longing for God, we gather to worship with our voices, minds and

hearts. This matters in the here and now because each of us individually matters to God. Joy is

the happiness we find in God’s love for us and in living a life of love.

And at times, we can be aware of God's love for us, and our souls fill with joy. However, we will

not always experience such a gift of consolation, and rejoicing will require us to stand firm on the

foundations of our faith. We must know and be assured of a steady faith in God's loving presence

and hold the conviction that nothing can separate us from that love. Such joy will help us to wait

patiently and positively upon the Lord. Rejoicing in Him now - trusting to Him all that the future

holds. As James reminds us in our Epistle reading, ‘You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for

the coming of the Lord is at hand’.

As we approach the darkest day of the year, we will witness the dawn of the brightest day of the

sacred. In winter, we will see spring - the promised dawn of a new beginning - and with it, the

extraordinary joyful mystery in which that itself is rooted - the word-made-flesh God’s own life as

gift - and love. We have been exalted by this gift, and no words can describe it.

So rejoice,

‘Rejoice again! I say rejoice!’