“What kind of leaders do you want?”

Summary

“Make America great again.”  We have heard this phrase over and over again for the last year.  Who wouldn’t like to see America be great?  But what are we hoping for when we want “greatness”?  Power?  Wealth?  Security?  Privilege?   And what would we hope for if we said “Make Goshen great again”?  Or if we said “Make the Mennonite Church great again”?  Or “Make Berkey Avenue great again”?  Most of the time we want to return to some mythic, unhistorical, memorable but fictional past.

In this season of Advent—when we are talking about “the hope and fears of all the years,” about expectations and desires—we have heard in the Scripture just read (Psalm 72, Isaiah 11, and Matthew 3) an alternative, subversive picture about how to make Israel, or Jerusalem, or America, or Goshen great.