This is an adapted form of the sermon I preached on the Third Sunday of Advent, December 17, 2023. The reading I preached on was Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11. You can watch a video of the sermon here.

Several times in the past few weeks, it’s seemed appropriate to me to pray the Serenity Prayer with someone. It just seemed like a prayer I needed to pray with them in the moment. Some of you probably know the prayer. It goes something like this:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.

Written by Reinhold Niebuhr, it’s become very important to Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12-step programs. I think it’s helpful to people who feel overwhelmed by what’s around them. We discover that there are so many things we don’t have control over, and we ask for serenity, or peace, to accept them. Yet we do have control over a few things, and we ask for courage to change them. And crucially, we ask for wisdom so we can discern which is which.

I’m not sure why I’ve been praying that with people so much lately. Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’ve just got that prayer on my mind. Or maybe it’s this season, or maybe it’s something else. Whatever it is, it’s come up so much that I thought maybe it would be helpful to preach with it in mind today.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.

In today’s first reading from Isaiah, we find these words:

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me;

Anointing with oil was something that was often done to great leaders – prophets, kings, and so forth. Anointing was a way to show that they had an important and great job to do. Listen to what this anointed one was sent to do:

The Lord has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,

to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim liberty to the captives 

and release to the prisoners,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor,

to comfort all who mourn,

to give them a garland instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,

the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.

Christians have usually interpreted this passage to refer to Jesus, that Jesus was the one anointed to do all this. In fact, the Hebrew and Greek words for “anointed one” are Messiah and Christ. So one way to read this passage is that Isaiah was prophesying the coming of Jesus.

But Isaiah was also talking about us. But it’s not just about the past. This passage has a huge meaning for us today as well. Because Jesus now lives in us. We are the body of Jesus in the world. So what Jesus did when he walked this earth two thousand years ago is what we do now. This means that the Spirit of the Lord is upon us! God has anointed us! We are the ones who are now called out to bring good news to the oppressed. To bind up the brokenhearted. To proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners. To comfort and provide for those who mourn.

And oh boy, there is a lot of need out there. There are so many people who are oppressed, so many brokenhearted, so many captive in various ways, so many mourning. We look out among all of it, and what do we do?

I’m reminded of the story of the Star Thrower by Loren Eiseley. Remember that story? It goes something like this.

Once upon a time, a man was walking along the shore. As he looked down the beach, he saw a girl reaching down to the sand, picking up something and very gently throwing it into the ocean. As he got closer, he called out, “Good morning! What are you doing?” The girl paused, looked up and replied “Throwing starfish into the ocean.”

The man asked, “Why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?”

The girl said, “The sun is up and the tide is going out. And if I don’t throw them in they’ll die.”

“But young lady, don’t you realize that there are miles and miles of beach and starfish all along it. You can’t possibly make a difference!”

The girl listened politely. Then bent down, picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea, past the breaking waves. She said, “It made a difference for that one!”

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Every one of you is called to be the light of Christ in the world, the hope of Christmas. Every one of you is called to bear that light to someone. To bring good news to someone, bind up someone, proclaim liberty to someone, and to comfort someone. But you’re not called to do that for everyone. You cannot save all the starfish. You cannot feed all the hungry. And sometimes there’s just nothing you can do. You cannot change someone who doesn’t want to change. And when you sit with a loved one in a hospital room, and want so much to set them free from their illness, what can you do?

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.

But even then, there is something, one thing, you can do. You can pray. You can tell God, “these people are oppressed.” You can tell God, “this person before me is brokenhearted.” You can tell God, “These folks are imprisoned.” You can tell God, “This person is mourning.” Perhaps using Isaiah’s own words, you can tell God how bad things are, how sad it makes you. This is a prayer of lament. And these are important prayers. It’s okay to tell God, “This really stinks!”

The serenity prayer encourages us to be honest with God, and with ourselves. “I have to accept that I can’t change this, God, but I’m not happy about it.” Imagine the girl in the Star Thrower saying to God, “I will throw back this one, God, but there are so many others! It breaks my heart!” That’s lament. And believe it or not, lament can actually lead to a deeper peace, a deeper serenity.

Lament is a kind of Advent prayer, a prayer of waiting and longing for things to get better. But as we know, Advent leads to Christmas. And we can pray a Christmas prayer as well. Christmas is all about God’s presence here in this world, and we can pray for that. A prayer that God would be with the people who are oppressed, brokenhearted, captive, or mourning. That God would dwell with them, and give them peace. Imagine the girl saying to God, “I will throw back this one, God, but there are so many others! Be with them, God, give them your peace and your comfort as they wait.” That’s a prayer of presence.

You are just one person. And together, you are just one congregation. You cannot fix the world. But you can make a difference where you are.

May God grant you the serenity to accept the things you cannot change. May God grant you the courage to change the things you can. May God grant you the wisdom to know the difference.

Image by Antonio López from Pixabay