Lamentations 3:55-57
“In the Time of Herod…We Long For God To Break In”
Preached Sunday, November 30, 2025
Today marks the first Sunday of Advent and the beginning of a new worship and sermon series that will carry us through Christmas. It is called:
“What do you fear? Insisting on hope this Advent.”
The sermon series focuses on the narrative in the Gospel of Luke that starts with the words “In the time of Herod…” Our Scripture translation was a little more wordy today: “In the days of King Herod of Judea…” It has long been said that Luke was the more historical of the Gospel writers and he wanted to cement the story of Jesus’s birth in the historical narrative. This opening sentence, however, conveys more than just the year in which these events took place. It also lets us know what kind of world Jesus was born into. It is the important backdrop for everything that is about to happen.
Saying “In the time of Herod…” would be synonymous with saying
“In a time of rampant oppression,”
“In a time of economic disparity,”
“In a time of uncertainty,”
“In a time of instability.”
It sounds like it might be a time not too unlike our own.
If this story had happened “In the time of 2025…” what background knowledge would that give for our stories and lives…
“In a time of stark political divides,”
“In a time of a widening gap between socio-economic classes,”
“In a time of mass deportations,”
“In a time of covid & post-covid,”
“In a time of war and broken peace treaties,”
“In a time of, in a time of, in a time of….” I will let you fill in the blank.
And yet, and yet. In the time of Herod…the angels of God repeatedly say, “Do not fear.” In a time when there was so much to fear, the most repeated phrase in the Christmas narrative is, “Do not fear.”
I believe, in our world, in our times, God is repeating that same phrase to us here and now, today, and across our lives. “Do not fear.” And so this Advent we will explore where we can release fear and hold tightly to hope, peace, love, and joy - the promises of God.
Therefore we are invited this Advent to gently and tenderly examine our fears - the larger fears of our world and the fears of our personal lives, for so often they are deeply intertwined. As we hear the echoes of the angels saying, “Do not fear,” I do not want you to imagine a deep booming voice issuing a command from the heavens to tell us to instantly banish all fear. It is not a scolding command that fills you with shame and doesn’t actually work to make fear just go away. Instead imagine it whispering softly in your ear, in the voice of a loving Divine parent, coming to comfort a child who just had a bad dream. “What are you afraid of? Do not fear. I am here with you.”
It is in the comforting Divine embrace that we are called to release our fears, acknowledging what they are in order to make room instead for hope.
We may never in this life let go of our fears completely. And fear can be lived with in a healthy way, acting as a safeguard and a teacher. But fear cannot be allowed to run our lives and shrink our hearts. I sometimes think of fear as a protective measure for our hearts - for my heart. If I expect the worst, if I don’t dare to hope, then our cruel and harsh world will hurt me less when it eventually disappoints me.
The Rev. Sarah Speed wrote about this in a poem called, “In the Time of Herod.” The beginning of the poem reads:
“I didn’t live during Herod’s time—that brutal, murderous king, God save his soul.
But even hundreds of years later, I know the prayers of his people.
I know the prayers of the mothers and the children under his rule.
I know the prayers of the young men under his angry arm.
I know their prayers, because anyone who has ever lived in this soft world for more than two days
knows how to pray for a miracle.
We rub our hands together.
We fold weary shoulders in,
a cage of bone to protect our bleeding hearts.”
I know that posture, shoulders folded in, a weary weight upon them, constructing a cage around my heart in the hope of protecting it ...but also closing it off to the miracles that God is working in this world…
The poem concludes:
“And when all of that is said and done, we whisper to our creator,
God, break through the yelling and the fear. Break through the violence and the oppression.
Get past the Herods of this world, and come be here.
Like every bleeding heart before, we pray for a miracle.”
Enter Zechariah, praying for a miracle.
Zechariah was living in this world in the time of Herod. As a priest and as a Jewish man, I believe he would have been praying for an end to the oppression of his people. And on a personal scale, as a man, as an individual, he was praying for a child.
He was praying for a miracle - miracles.
The sermon series focuses on the narrative in the Gospel of Luke that starts with the words “In the time of Herod…” Our Scripture translation was a little more wordy today: “In the days of King Herod of Judea…” It has long been said that Luke was the more historical of the Gospel writers and he wanted to cement the story of Jesus’s birth in the historical narrative. This opening sentence, however, conveys more than just the year in which these events took place. It also lets us know what kind of world Jesus was born into. It is the important backdrop for everything that is about to happen.
Saying “In the time of Herod…” would be synonymous with saying
“In a time of rampant oppression,”
“In a time of economic disparity,”
“In a time of uncertainty,”
“In a time of instability.”
It sounds like it might be a time not too unlike our own.
If this story had happened “In the time of 2025…” what background knowledge would that give for our stories and lives…
“In a time of stark political divides,”
“In a time of a widening gap between socio-economic classes,”
“In a time of mass deportations,”
“In a time of covid & post-covid,”
“In a time of war and broken peace treaties,”
“In a time of, in a time of, in a time of….” I will let you fill in the blank.
And yet, and yet. In the time of Herod…the angels of God repeatedly say, “Do not fear.” In a time when there was so much to fear, the most repeated phrase in the Christmas narrative is, “Do not fear.”
I believe, in our world, in our times, God is repeating that same phrase to us here and now, today, and across our lives. “Do not fear.” And so this Advent we will explore where we can release fear and hold tightly to hope, peace, love, and joy - the promises of God.
Therefore we are invited this Advent to gently and tenderly examine our fears - the larger fears of our world and the fears of our personal lives, for so often they are deeply intertwined. As we hear the echoes of the angels saying, “Do not fear,” I do not want you to imagine a deep booming voice issuing a command from the heavens to tell us to instantly banish all fear. It is not a scolding command that fills you with shame and doesn’t actually work to make fear just go away. Instead imagine it whispering softly in your ear, in the voice of a loving Divine parent, coming to comfort a child who just had a bad dream. “What are you afraid of? Do not fear. I am here with you.”
It is in the comforting Divine embrace that we are called to release our fears, acknowledging what they are in order to make room instead for hope.
We may never in this life let go of our fears completely. And fear can be lived with in a healthy way, acting as a safeguard and a teacher. But fear cannot be allowed to run our lives and shrink our hearts. I sometimes think of fear as a protective measure for our hearts - for my heart. If I expect the worst, if I don’t dare to hope, then our cruel and harsh world will hurt me less when it eventually disappoints me.
The Rev. Sarah Speed wrote about this in a poem called, “In the Time of Herod.” The beginning of the poem reads:
“I didn’t live during Herod’s time—that brutal, murderous king, God save his soul.
But even hundreds of years later, I know the prayers of his people.
I know the prayers of the mothers and the children under his rule.
I know the prayers of the young men under his angry arm.
I know their prayers, because anyone who has ever lived in this soft world for more than two days
knows how to pray for a miracle.
We rub our hands together.
We fold weary shoulders in,
a cage of bone to protect our bleeding hearts.”
I know that posture, shoulders folded in, a weary weight upon them, constructing a cage around my heart in the hope of protecting it ...but also closing it off to the miracles that God is working in this world…
The poem concludes:
“And when all of that is said and done, we whisper to our creator,
God, break through the yelling and the fear. Break through the violence and the oppression.
Get past the Herods of this world, and come be here.
Like every bleeding heart before, we pray for a miracle.”
Enter Zechariah, praying for a miracle.
Zechariah was living in this world in the time of Herod. As a priest and as a Jewish man, I believe he would have been praying for an end to the oppression of his people. And on a personal scale, as a man, as an individual, he was praying for a child.
He was praying for a miracle - miracles.
My question is, was he praying for a miracle that he really believed would happen? Was he praying for a miracle with hope in his heart for Divine intervention? Was he praying with the assurance that God was listening to his prayers? Or was he praying the prayers he had prayed for many years, going through the routine of saying them but devoid of the hope they would be answered, let alone heard.
Let’s pause here and ask these questions of ourselves. Are you praying for any miracles? Are you praying with hope? Have you stopped praying for the miracle at all? Have you stopped praying?
In John 14:27 we have this famous line from Scripture, “Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”
Do not let your hearts be troubled. That word which we translate as troubled is Zechariah’s reaction to the angel appearing before him. Started, disturbed, agitated.
Do not be afraid. That word, translated as afraid, implies a shrinking of the heart. And yes, since we are entering Christmas time, think of the Grinch who’s heart was two sizes too small. The translation and understanding of this word as “afraid” tells us what we all know because we have experienced it ourselves - in our lives or the lives of people we know - fear shrinks the heart. It can shrink our hearts’ capacities for love. Fear holds our hearts back from loving and treating others as God would have us love and treat them. Fear shrinks our hearts and doesn’t leave room for God breaking into our world and lives with loving action. Fear obliterates our hearts’ desire for hope. It erases even the hope that our prayers are heard at all.
And that’s what I want to focus on today - not on the miracles themselves but on the prayers being heard.
For the miracles we pray for, we know they may or may not happen. More often than not, our world has taught us that they won’t happen, to not even hope for them…and I also think that makes us not even look for them and we miss the small miracles that happen right in front of our eyes.
And yet we know…we know that the healing that we so desperately pray for doesn’t always come in this life but in the soul being healed before the presence of God. We know the child that is so longingly prayed for doesn’t always come. We know that the peace we want to descend on our world may be a long, long way off.
We don’t always get what we want. We don’t always get what we pray for, what we hope for. The mountains don’t move, God doesn’t appear before us as an angel, clear before our eyes. Our prayers aren’t answered in flashing neon lights. And perhaps it causes us to begin to think,
God isn’t listening to me. God doesn’t even hear my prayers.
But what the angel says to Zechariah is, “for your prayer has been heard.”
The same sentiment comes to us from our Lamentations reading this morning. That passage of Scripture is written from the perspective of an oppressed person under Babylonian rule, crying out in personal pain to God.
“I called on your name, O Lord…you heard my plea”
“You came near when I called on you;
you said, ‘Do not fear!’”
Friends, I don’t want to diminish what it means for God to hear our prayers. I feel so often it has been diminished, brushed off, not seen as the absolute miracle that it is.
I said our prayers aren’t always answered in the way we would want or the way we would hope - we don’t get our big miracles in flashing lights. The healing that the doctors can’t explain. The life-changing news. Whatever it may be…
But. And.
God hears our prayers every time we pray.
God draws near to us when we call out to God.
The God of the universe hears each and every prayer that you pray.
The God who is the Creator of All Things…draws near to YOU.
The God of Love loves you intimately and dearly and listens to every single prayer you say.
This is a miracle.
Our God comes to you like that loving parent who comes to the child’s side when they’ve had a bad dream. God tucks your hair behind your ear, kisses your forehead, and whispers in your ear, softly and surely, “Do not be afraid. I’m here with you…”
And so…
In the time of Herod. In our time. Don’t let fear shrink your heart. Keep on praying with hope and don’t lose sight of the miracle that is God hearing each and every prayer you lift up and drawing near to you.
May it be so. Amen.
Let’s pause here and ask these questions of ourselves. Are you praying for any miracles? Are you praying with hope? Have you stopped praying for the miracle at all? Have you stopped praying?
In John 14:27 we have this famous line from Scripture, “Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”
Do not let your hearts be troubled. That word which we translate as troubled is Zechariah’s reaction to the angel appearing before him. Started, disturbed, agitated.
Do not be afraid. That word, translated as afraid, implies a shrinking of the heart. And yes, since we are entering Christmas time, think of the Grinch who’s heart was two sizes too small. The translation and understanding of this word as “afraid” tells us what we all know because we have experienced it ourselves - in our lives or the lives of people we know - fear shrinks the heart. It can shrink our hearts’ capacities for love. Fear holds our hearts back from loving and treating others as God would have us love and treat them. Fear shrinks our hearts and doesn’t leave room for God breaking into our world and lives with loving action. Fear obliterates our hearts’ desire for hope. It erases even the hope that our prayers are heard at all.
And that’s what I want to focus on today - not on the miracles themselves but on the prayers being heard.
For the miracles we pray for, we know they may or may not happen. More often than not, our world has taught us that they won’t happen, to not even hope for them…and I also think that makes us not even look for them and we miss the small miracles that happen right in front of our eyes.
And yet we know…we know that the healing that we so desperately pray for doesn’t always come in this life but in the soul being healed before the presence of God. We know the child that is so longingly prayed for doesn’t always come. We know that the peace we want to descend on our world may be a long, long way off.
We don’t always get what we want. We don’t always get what we pray for, what we hope for. The mountains don’t move, God doesn’t appear before us as an angel, clear before our eyes. Our prayers aren’t answered in flashing neon lights. And perhaps it causes us to begin to think,
God isn’t listening to me. God doesn’t even hear my prayers.
But what the angel says to Zechariah is, “for your prayer has been heard.”
The same sentiment comes to us from our Lamentations reading this morning. That passage of Scripture is written from the perspective of an oppressed person under Babylonian rule, crying out in personal pain to God.
“I called on your name, O Lord…you heard my plea”
“You came near when I called on you;
you said, ‘Do not fear!’”
Friends, I don’t want to diminish what it means for God to hear our prayers. I feel so often it has been diminished, brushed off, not seen as the absolute miracle that it is.
I said our prayers aren’t always answered in the way we would want or the way we would hope - we don’t get our big miracles in flashing lights. The healing that the doctors can’t explain. The life-changing news. Whatever it may be…
But. And.
God hears our prayers every time we pray.
God draws near to us when we call out to God.
The God of the universe hears each and every prayer that you pray.
The God who is the Creator of All Things…draws near to YOU.
The God of Love loves you intimately and dearly and listens to every single prayer you say.
This is a miracle.
Our God comes to you like that loving parent who comes to the child’s side when they’ve had a bad dream. God tucks your hair behind your ear, kisses your forehead, and whispers in your ear, softly and surely, “Do not be afraid. I’m here with you…”
And so…
In the time of Herod. In our time. Don’t let fear shrink your heart. Keep on praying with hope and don’t lose sight of the miracle that is God hearing each and every prayer you lift up and drawing near to you.
May it be so. Amen.
