Christmas Eve, 2011
Luke 2:1-20
This is an odd time of year. There is such an intense build up to Christmas – the stores marketing all the things we need to buy in order to prove our love to people, the pressure from our families to spend more time with them or from our kids to get them this or that, the barrage of holiday gatherings and events. Sometimes it feels like the world is screaming for our attention from so many directions that it’s easy to miss the miracle that we celebrate tonight.
I found myself more frustrated by the world’s hijacking of Christmas than usual this year. The newspaper has been my particular area of anguish lately. First it was the Macy’s ads that caught my eye – the ones telling us to “Believe” – but as far as I can tell, even Macy’s isn’t sure what we should believe in beyond spending money. Then the Bloomingdales’ full-page ads that assault us with their “Nifty Gifty” ideas, none of which cost less than $50. But it isn’t just the ads and the buying frenzy that give me heartburn. In the Kids’ Post this week there was an article summarizing the many holidays that are celebrated this time of year, including an Indian holiday called Diwali, Hanukkah, the Winter Solstice, Christmas and Kwanzaa (in that order). What bothered me wasn’t the inclusion of these other winter holidays, or even their seeming priority, but the way the Post characterized Christmas. I quote: “This important holiday in Christianity is now a major commercial holiday, too, with gifts and shopping and lots of Christmas lights. About 1,700 years ago, the Christian church chose to celebrate the birth of Jesus on December 25, which at the time was the date of the winter solstice. As those celebrations were focused on light, the tradition carried over to Christmas.” The birth of Jesus is mentioned in passing but only after gifts and shopping. And while Hanukkah rated a mention of the miracle of the oil lamps, in the Christmas blurb there is no shout-out to the miracle of Jesus’ birth or to the incarnation of God in that baby. It’s just a birthday celebration for Jesus with lots of shopping involved. Fabulous.
It’s a hard time of year to be still enough to let the Christmas story wash over us. To sink into the mystery and let it speak to us, wherever we find ourselves. And so tonight I offer you the Christmas gift of a journey with the shepherds. Let’s join them as they hear the glorious story of Christmas. And even better, maybe we can join in their response and turn the world’s celebration of Christmas upside down.
“In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.”
So here are the shepherds, out in the fields, minding their own business. Shepherds in Jesus’ time, as you might imagine, were dirty and smelly and poor. They were nobodies with nothing jobs, living outside polite society. When we meet them they aren’t up to much. Just trying hard to stay awake and protect their ovine charges from wolves and whatever other nasty things might come after them in the darkness.
Now imagine yourself out in the “fields” of your life, wherever that might be. Imagine yourself with whatever or whomever the “sheep” in your life are, the things or people that you spend your time with. Just like the shepherds, that’s where our stories so often begin. We are doing whatever it is we do; sometimes life is going along well and sometimes it is messy.
“Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.”
Wherever your “fields” and whatever your “sheep,” can you imagine just being in the midst of your normal, mundane life, and suddenly something like this happens? The shepherds weren’t just surprised or confused or a little anxious about the appearance of the holy messenger before them – they were terrified, petrified, or as Linus puts it so beautifully in the Charlie Brown Christmas Special, they were “sore afraid.” Who among us would judge them for that? It would be a pretty shocking thing to have an angel appear before you unexpectedly. There’s no hint that the shepherds were particularly religious people or that they were seeking a God experience. And yet God jolts unexpectedly into their unassuming and anonymous lives, and sometimes into ours, and unsettles everything.
“But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid.” (Angels are always saying that, it seems, always reassuring people that they aren’t out of their minds.) And then the angel continued: “For see – I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!’”
God surrounds the shepherds them right where they are, smack dab in the mud and the muck. Ours isn’t a God-up-there, but a God-with-us. Suddenly these shepherds who must have felt so discounted by the religious people and practices of their time are literally surrounded by God, filled with God, shining with God’s glory. Just like for the shepherds, however less than ideal our circumstances may be, however far from home we find ourselves, however little our lives reflect the Christmas cards we send, our God comes among us right where we are.
“When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.’ So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger.”
These shepherds may not have been included in the ranks of the proper religious people; they may not have been able to recite scripture or have been familiar with any of the prophecies surrounding Jesus’ birth. But they immediately recognized the messengers as being from God. And they didn’t stop there, content with their spiritual encounter. They recognized the message as something requiring action from them. They didn’t sit and wonder endlessly about what the angels’ visit meant, or diddle and waffle about what to do next. They sensed God calling them and so they moved - and with haste, no less. Presumably they left behind the sheep in those fields as they ran toward Bethlehem, sensing somehow that what they were about to witness was worth more than their livelihood. We hear this story so often that it sounds more romantic and clean to us than it must have felt to the participants in the story. This baby with nowhere but a manger to lay its head, this seemingly ordinary and common child, was somehow the Savior of the world. I wonder if there are times and places where God might be coming among us and we don’t realize it? Or maybe we even sense it but we’re afraid to act?
“When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them.”
The shepherds knew immediately that the story of their encounter with God was news was worth spreading. But what unlikely evangelists these shepherds were! These rough, worn, exhausted nobodies were the first to hear, the first to see, the first to tell of the birth of God-with-us. Over and over again, God surprises us by choosing the lowest of the low to spread the good news. The world around us may focus on the influential, the good-looking, and the wealthy. But not God. God jumps into the thick of humanity and emerges from the very bottom of the heap.
“The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.”
It’s interesting to imagine those shepherds heading straight back to their sheep, back to their grueling jobs and sleepless nights, back to their lives of being looked down upon by the rest of the world. In a way, nothing has changed – God didn’t lift them out of their messy lives into lives of contentment and ease. And yet somehow everything changed for them. They are filled with a whole new sense of purpose and joy; so completely brimming over that they can’t keep to themselves all they’ve experienced. The change for the shepherds, and very often for us, isn’t in where we find ourselves or in what is happening around us but in ourselves.
Tonight we finally encounter the mystery we have been preparing for throughout Advent. Wherever we are, in whatever particular field we may be living right now, the good news and mystery of Christmas is that God has come among us – thoroughly and finally and forever. Christmas isn’t just a birthday party for Jesus; it isn’t just the marking of an event in history. Tonight we remember what has already been accomplished by God in Jesus and the promise of its completion. An entirely new creation was born on Christmas Day. Even if it doesn’t always feel like it, the crater between God and humankind has been bridged. Whatever our fears may be, no matter how ordinary or how unlovable we may think we are, God includes us in His embrace; we are part of the Christmas mystery. Amen.
Luke 2:1-20
This is an odd time of year. There is such an intense build up to Christmas – the stores marketing all the things we need to buy in order to prove our love to people, the pressure from our families to spend more time with them or from our kids to get them this or that, the barrage of holiday gatherings and events. Sometimes it feels like the world is screaming for our attention from so many directions that it’s easy to miss the miracle that we celebrate tonight.
I found myself more frustrated by the world’s hijacking of Christmas than usual this year. The newspaper has been my particular area of anguish lately. First it was the Macy’s ads that caught my eye – the ones telling us to “Believe” – but as far as I can tell, even Macy’s isn’t sure what we should believe in beyond spending money. Then the Bloomingdales’ full-page ads that assault us with their “Nifty Gifty” ideas, none of which cost less than $50. But it isn’t just the ads and the buying frenzy that give me heartburn. In the Kids’ Post this week there was an article summarizing the many holidays that are celebrated this time of year, including an Indian holiday called Diwali, Hanukkah, the Winter Solstice, Christmas and Kwanzaa (in that order). What bothered me wasn’t the inclusion of these other winter holidays, or even their seeming priority, but the way the Post characterized Christmas. I quote: “This important holiday in Christianity is now a major commercial holiday, too, with gifts and shopping and lots of Christmas lights. About 1,700 years ago, the Christian church chose to celebrate the birth of Jesus on December 25, which at the time was the date of the winter solstice. As those celebrations were focused on light, the tradition carried over to Christmas.” The birth of Jesus is mentioned in passing but only after gifts and shopping. And while Hanukkah rated a mention of the miracle of the oil lamps, in the Christmas blurb there is no shout-out to the miracle of Jesus’ birth or to the incarnation of God in that baby. It’s just a birthday celebration for Jesus with lots of shopping involved. Fabulous.
It’s a hard time of year to be still enough to let the Christmas story wash over us. To sink into the mystery and let it speak to us, wherever we find ourselves. And so tonight I offer you the Christmas gift of a journey with the shepherds. Let’s join them as they hear the glorious story of Christmas. And even better, maybe we can join in their response and turn the world’s celebration of Christmas upside down.
“In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.”
So here are the shepherds, out in the fields, minding their own business. Shepherds in Jesus’ time, as you might imagine, were dirty and smelly and poor. They were nobodies with nothing jobs, living outside polite society. When we meet them they aren’t up to much. Just trying hard to stay awake and protect their ovine charges from wolves and whatever other nasty things might come after them in the darkness.
Now imagine yourself out in the “fields” of your life, wherever that might be. Imagine yourself with whatever or whomever the “sheep” in your life are, the things or people that you spend your time with. Just like the shepherds, that’s where our stories so often begin. We are doing whatever it is we do; sometimes life is going along well and sometimes it is messy.
“Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.”
Wherever your “fields” and whatever your “sheep,” can you imagine just being in the midst of your normal, mundane life, and suddenly something like this happens? The shepherds weren’t just surprised or confused or a little anxious about the appearance of the holy messenger before them – they were terrified, petrified, or as Linus puts it so beautifully in the Charlie Brown Christmas Special, they were “sore afraid.” Who among us would judge them for that? It would be a pretty shocking thing to have an angel appear before you unexpectedly. There’s no hint that the shepherds were particularly religious people or that they were seeking a God experience. And yet God jolts unexpectedly into their unassuming and anonymous lives, and sometimes into ours, and unsettles everything.
“But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid.” (Angels are always saying that, it seems, always reassuring people that they aren’t out of their minds.) And then the angel continued: “For see – I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.’ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!’”
God surrounds the shepherds them right where they are, smack dab in the mud and the muck. Ours isn’t a God-up-there, but a God-with-us. Suddenly these shepherds who must have felt so discounted by the religious people and practices of their time are literally surrounded by God, filled with God, shining with God’s glory. Just like for the shepherds, however less than ideal our circumstances may be, however far from home we find ourselves, however little our lives reflect the Christmas cards we send, our God comes among us right where we are.
“When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.’ So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger.”
These shepherds may not have been included in the ranks of the proper religious people; they may not have been able to recite scripture or have been familiar with any of the prophecies surrounding Jesus’ birth. But they immediately recognized the messengers as being from God. And they didn’t stop there, content with their spiritual encounter. They recognized the message as something requiring action from them. They didn’t sit and wonder endlessly about what the angels’ visit meant, or diddle and waffle about what to do next. They sensed God calling them and so they moved - and with haste, no less. Presumably they left behind the sheep in those fields as they ran toward Bethlehem, sensing somehow that what they were about to witness was worth more than their livelihood. We hear this story so often that it sounds more romantic and clean to us than it must have felt to the participants in the story. This baby with nowhere but a manger to lay its head, this seemingly ordinary and common child, was somehow the Savior of the world. I wonder if there are times and places where God might be coming among us and we don’t realize it? Or maybe we even sense it but we’re afraid to act?
“When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them.”
The shepherds knew immediately that the story of their encounter with God was news was worth spreading. But what unlikely evangelists these shepherds were! These rough, worn, exhausted nobodies were the first to hear, the first to see, the first to tell of the birth of God-with-us. Over and over again, God surprises us by choosing the lowest of the low to spread the good news. The world around us may focus on the influential, the good-looking, and the wealthy. But not God. God jumps into the thick of humanity and emerges from the very bottom of the heap.
“The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.”
It’s interesting to imagine those shepherds heading straight back to their sheep, back to their grueling jobs and sleepless nights, back to their lives of being looked down upon by the rest of the world. In a way, nothing has changed – God didn’t lift them out of their messy lives into lives of contentment and ease. And yet somehow everything changed for them. They are filled with a whole new sense of purpose and joy; so completely brimming over that they can’t keep to themselves all they’ve experienced. The change for the shepherds, and very often for us, isn’t in where we find ourselves or in what is happening around us but in ourselves.
Tonight we finally encounter the mystery we have been preparing for throughout Advent. Wherever we are, in whatever particular field we may be living right now, the good news and mystery of Christmas is that God has come among us – thoroughly and finally and forever. Christmas isn’t just a birthday party for Jesus; it isn’t just the marking of an event in history. Tonight we remember what has already been accomplished by God in Jesus and the promise of its completion. An entirely new creation was born on Christmas Day. Even if it doesn’t always feel like it, the crater between God and humankind has been bridged. Whatever our fears may be, no matter how ordinary or how unlovable we may think we are, God includes us in His embrace; we are part of the Christmas mystery. Amen.
Just received your Christmas card. Great to keep up with you through these annual letters. I went to type in your web address and typed in: http://reverendelizabeth.blogpsot.com/
ReplyDeleteAnd thought Oh my! Amazing what flipping two letters can do. Huge hug to you and your family!