"Christmas Meditation" - Chirstmas 1C

 

Saint Luke 2:21-52

The world has moved on from Christmas.  

Even though the song tells us quite correctly that there are twelve days the world gives the celebration 24 to 48 hours at best.

The rest is all prelude with Christmas music being played non-stop on one Chicago radio station since {And I’m not making this up} November 1st.  

Throngs shopped at the Christkindl market which the time Lowell and I visited before Christmas was crowded with smiling faces eating, and buying, and drinking but last Wednesday as we walked through to go to the theatre was filled only with workers dismantling the place.

It is enough to make you want to sigh.  

Some sigh in sadness that Christmas is over. Other’s sigh in relief. 

You can always tell the difference between the two groups by the way they talk about their Christmas celebrations.  If they say, “We’re having people over this Christmas!” that’s good.  If they say, “We’re having people over this Christmas” not so much.  

When either group goes home, and the dishes are done and put away there may also be a sigh of contentment or relief.

Airline passengers may be sighing that they finally are where they want to be.  

But in the church, we continue to celebrate. {Check under your tree for the eight milking madens which should have arrived today! What you are going to do with them I’ll never know except to put them with the menagerie that is already there.} 

Christmas goes on because the story of Jesus only begins with a baby lying in a manger.  We love that image, but Saint Matthew reminds us in a seldom read passage that this very same child grew, became strong, and had the favour of God upon him.

Jesus grew up and became a man whom the favour of God rested. 

It is an image we gloss over.  It is an image we sometimes forget but Jesus grew up, grew strong, and taught us the important things about God’s presence and love.  

Jesus doesn’t remain weak and helpless he grows.  

That is the only way we can know for sure that what St. John in his gospel tells us that the Word, the eternal Word of God – God from God, Light of Light, the One who set the stars in the courses at creation and flung the planets into being – God has “become flesh.”  Or, as Dr. Eugene Peterson paraphrased it in The Message. “The Word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood.”1

This is regentrification at his very best!  Why would God choose to do this?  We may sigh as we wonder why God would do this.  Why would God bother?

In 1957 J.B. Phillips, writer and Bible translator, wrote a short story entitled “The Visited Planet.”  

Phillips imagined a tour of the universe by two angels, one as old as creation, and the other newly formed amidst the host of heaven.  

The older angel showed off wonder upon wonder, the birthing fields of stars, nebulae thousands of light years across, distances and depths beyond imagining.  

At length, as the attention of the young angel began to flag, they entered a back lot of the Milky Way, the galaxy that includes our sun.

As the two of them drew close to our star, and its circling planets, the senior angel pointed to a small and rather insignificant sphere turning very slowly on its axis.  It looked dull as a dirty tennis ball to the little angel whose mind was filled with the size and glory of all he had seen previously.

“I want you to watch that one particularly,” said the senior angel, pointing with his finger.

“Well, it looks very small and rather dirty to me,” said the little angel.  “What’s special about that one?”

“That,” replied the senior solemnly, “is the Visited Planet.”

“Visited?” said the little one.  “You don’t mean visited by...”

“Indeed, I do.  That ball, which I have no doubt looks to you small and insignificant and perhaps not over-clean, has been visited by our young Prince of Glory.”  And at these words he bowed his head reverently.

“But how?” queried the younger one.  “Do you mean that our great and glorious Prince, with all these wonders and splendours of His Creation, and millions more that I ‘m sure I haven’t seen yet, went down in Person to this fifth-rate little ball?  Why should He do a thing like that?”

“It isn’t for us,” said his senior a little stiffly, “to question His ‘whys,’ except that I must point out to you that He is not impressed by size and numbers as you seem to be.  But that He really went I know, and all of us in Heaven who know anything know that.  As to why He became one of them...how else do you suppose He could visit them?”

The little angel’s face wrinkled in disgust.

“Do you mean to tell me,” he said, “that He stooped so low as to become one of those creeping, crawling creatures of that floating ball?”

“I do, and I don’t think He would like you to call them ‘creeping crawling creatures’ in that tone of voice.  For, strange as it may seem to us, He loves them."

Phillips concluded his story with these words: “The little angel looked blank.  Such a thought was almost beyond his comprehension.”2

It is almost beyond ours too.  That God would not only visit us but move into our neighbourhood to stay with us.

While such thoughts may be beyond our comprehension for the present all we need to do is open our hearts and minds and accept that the visit did occur and all because God loves us.  

It’s amazing I know but it’s the story of Christmas and it does not end with a sigh. 

As the carols fade and the decorations come down you may sigh and wonder if it was all true but stick with the story, watch that child grow, listen to his words, and see what he did and it just may be enough for you to keep Christmas in your hearts all through the coming year knowing that you are loved and remembering as you sigh in either joy, or sorrow, or just plain exhaustion:

Love came down at Christmas,

Love all lovely, love divine.

Love was born at Christmas.

Star and angels gave the sign.

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1. St. John 1:14.  (MESSAGE) [MESSAGE=Eugene H. Peterson, The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language, with Topical Concordance (NavPress, 2005).]

2. J B. Phillips, “The Visited Planet,” Sermon Central, December 14, 2009, https://www.sermoncentral.com/sermon-illustrations/74708/the-visited-planet-by-sermon-central.

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Sermon preached at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Saint Luke

1 January 2023

(82) January 1, 2023: The Name of Jesus | Saint Luke Chicago - YouTube

"John's Christmas Card" - Advent 3C

Saint Matthew 11:2–11

Seasoned preachers should know better.  Pastors who have been in the business for years and have large, tall steeple churches in the centre of town should know not to challenge members – especially young members - of their congregation.

So, it came as a surprise that one of my favourite preachers, Dr. James D. Howell, whom you have heard me refer to often, one Sunday in Advent inadvertently laid down a dare to a member of his church in Charlotte, North Carolina when he said in a sermon that he had never seen a John the Baptist Christmas Card and he doubted that he ever would.

When he arrived back in his office after the 11 o’clock worship the drawing at the top of this postwas waiting for him on his desk.

Yes, the good pastor was holding in his hand the first ever John the Baptist Christmas Card.  Look again and you will see that the person who drew it was really paying attention.

Not only is “Repent Ye!” written in bold letters across the top but the card has everything.  John’s hair is a mess.  He is dressed in the obligatory leather belt - referred to as a girdle in the picture, and camel’s hair raiment and, for good measure, there is a plate of locust and wild honey at his feet.  The picture is clearly labelled as being located in the wilderness of Judea but there is one more thing.  Let’s take a closer look. 

To the artist those squiggly lines emanating from John’s arm pits may signify that even though he spent a great deal of time in the river Jordan what he really needed was a good, solid bath.

This is the picture that Matthew, Mark and Luke drew of John.  He is full of bluster and bravado but that is not the picture before us today of a prisoner behind bars.

John made two mistakes.  He let the adulation of the crowd get to him and he got ahead of the story.

We heard last week that John could draw a crowd.  As Dr. Fred B. Craddock reminds us:

His preaching was extraordinary; it’s just riveting.  Crowds came from everywhere ... they came from the towns and from Jerusalem.  Plows were left in the furrows, bread was left in the oven, shops were left unattended, school was let out early because the crowds were moving out into the desert to hear this extraordinary preacher.

I’m sure that many people who went were just curious, curious about the way he looked and the way he talked.

He was not beautiful candle burning softly in the sanctuary. He was a prairie fire, the very fire of God scorching the earth.  He was no diplomat trying to make yes sound like no and no sound like yes to please everybody.  He just said, “The judge is coming and I am here to serve subpoenas.”1

 And still the people came.

Having the crowds come and listen while you preach judgement, brimstone, and hell-fire can be pretty heady stuff.  If you hear yourself saying that the time is coming when “the ax is lying at the root of the trees; {and} every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire”2 you may be tempted to take matters into your own hands.

When you hear yourself talking about a time when one whose “winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire”3 you just may come to believe it and think that it will be in your power to usher in that moment.

I think the crowd’s adulation may have caused John to get ahead of the story.  

I think the crowds are what caused John to overplay his hand and wind up in the clink.  

I think they emboldened him to speak out about sin and judgement wherever he found it, even if he found it in the king’s palace.  

I think what landed John in jail was when, as they say in the south, “he stopped preaching and got to meddling.”  

Make no mistake about it.  Herod was chaff.  He was the chaff who set the standard for chaff. His was the kind of chaff that is rarely seen in history.  Except in our recent history where we seem to have some leaders and former office holders, and election deniers with chaff to spare.  

Herod deserved to be called out but it may not have been the best of ideas for John, just in from the wilderness and more than a little unkept, to  call King Herod’s adulterous affair into question. Gossiping about it to neighbours and friends was one thing but shouting it out loud on the street corners was another.

Herod didn’t take kindly to John’s scandalizing his private life so he had him jailed and sentenced to death.

Prison can make real the saying that Pastor Baumann referred to in his wonderful sermon last Sunday when he quoted Dante’s sign over the gates of hell: “Abandon all hope  all ye who enter here.”  

John sat in his prison cell staring at the four walls that kept him from freedom. He was cut off from his friends. He was disconnected from his community and stranded in a limited world, a world filled with uncertainty. He remembered the days in the wilderness when every word he spoke exuded certainty and assurance.

John has heard of the miracles, but they are doing him no good. He's in prison. There are no miracles coming his way.  Locked behind prison doors John had to be wondering: What  happened to the fire? What happened to the judgement? What happened to the vision?  Maybe this isn’t the guy we have been looking for after all.4

This isn’t the unquenchable fire John was looking for it wasn’t even quenchable fire. Thus the obvious question for John: “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”5

Jesus doesn’t give John’s followers a direct answer but rather tells them to look at what he is doing.  “Go and tell John what you see and hear -—that blind men are recovering their sight, cripples are walking, lepers being healed, the deaf hearing, the dead being brought to life and the good news is being given to those in need. And happy is the man who never loses faith in me.”6

That is a coded message that John’s captors would never understand but John and John’s followers would know by heart.  And in that message Jesus is telling John is that he may be emphasizing the wrong prophets.  

Jesus is reminding him that while some prophets were about destruction others were about restoration.  While some prophets were about retaliation others were about reconciliation.  While some prophets were about division others were about bringing people together.  

I think Jesus learned what prophets to look for at his mother’s knee.  

You don’t think that Mary only sang that beautiful song only once, do you?  Something that magnificent stays with you. She may have sung it full voice while working around the house.  Or, softly to her husband Joseph as they rested after a long day as she stroked his hair.  No doubt she sang it to her beautiful boy, her son, in those moments we all struggle with growing up. 

Jesus learned the will of God for him, for us all, listening to his mother sing about a time when God will have mercy on those who fear him throughout all generations.

Jesus learned from his mother about a time when the hungry will be filled with good things while the rich will be sent away empty handed.

Jesus learned from his mother about a time when God would bare “his arm and {show} his strength, scattered the bluffing braggarts.”  When God would knock “tyrants off their high horses,” and pull “victims out of the mud.”7

That was the message Jesus was sending to John. When Jesus told John’s followers that they should   “Go back and tell John what’s going on: “The blind see, The lame walk, Lepers are cleansed, The deaf hear, The dead are raised, The wretched of the earth learn that God is on their side”8 he was talking about what he had learned from his Mother.

That is our Advent belief.  The belief that “even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.”  

We have no idea if John could see this hope shining through the bars of his prison or whether he went to his death still wondering if Jesus was really the one who was long-expected.  It doesn’t really matter because his faithfulness drew his praise from the only one that mattered. Jesus, who called him the greatest of all prophets because John offered the people hope for the time when all of God’s children “will live again in freedom.  When the ransomed of the Lord will come with singing. They will walk behind the ploughshare, they will put away the sword. The chain will be broken, and all men will have their reward.”9

For some it is easy to hold on to this hope but for others not so much. So we stand with Dr. Mike Lindvall, pastor emeritus of the Brick Presbyterian Church and wonder.

Does it work, Jesus’ way?  Does it work, his way of love and compassion?  Does it work, his way non-coercion and kindness?  Does it work, his way of service and sacrifice?  In the short run, sometimes.  In the long run (maybe the very long run) always.  That’s the promise of the gospel.10

In a recent article, author David French summed it up best when he said.  “The community of the closed fist ultimately creates a community of the open hand. We were not created to be despised, to be hounded, and to be hectored into righteousness. Instead, our souls long for actual love and true fellowship.”11

That is what the Christ of Christmas offers us.  That’s what John needed to hear about as he sat in his prison cell. Dr. John Buchanan, Fourth Church’s pastor emeritus,  paraphrased it this way.

Remember, John, as you sit there, in that cell—- cold, hungry, thirsty, waiting for your inevitable execution - remember the promise that came to our people at the darkest, most frightening moment in their lives, the worst moment in our history, when a cruel and powerful enemy was about to attack and kill and defeat and imprison and exile. Remember: They shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God. . . .Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are of a fearful heart, "Be strong, do not fear!"12

 It’s the promise of all of scripture.  God could not have said it any stronger? God could not have given directions any better.  God could not have given us a map more clear. 

When the baby whose birth we are getting ready to celebrate, grew up and became the man we kno as Jesus, he taught us that there is another way “it shall be called the Holy Way and it shall be for God’s people; no travelers, not even fools, shall go astray.”13

Christ is calling us: “Be strong!  Do not fear! Follow me! Down this road! Follow me and I promise that no travelers, not even fools, will go astray.”

That is the conclusion John the Baptist’s question leads us to.  “Are you really the one we are waiting for, or shall we keep on looking?”14  No need, to keep looking.  Christ is the one.  

We have John the Baptist to thank for this reminder and for that, I’ve come to believe, he really does deserve his own Christmas card.  

Don’t you think?

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 1.  Fred B. Craddock, “Have You Heard John Preach?,” in Craddock Stories, ed. Richard F. Ward and Mike Graves (Nashville, TN: Chalice Press, 2001), pp. 109-115.

2.  St. Matthew 3:10.  (NRSV) [NRSV=The New Revised Standard Version]

3. St. Matthew 3:12.  (NRSV)

4. Mary Donovan Taylor, Matthew 1:2-11. The Christian Century. December 6, 1995, p. 1173.

5. St. Matthew 11:3b. (NIV) [NIV=The New International Version]

6. St. Matthew 11:4-6.  (PHILLIPS) [PHILLIPS=J. B. Phillips, in The New Testament in Modern English (London: HarperCollins, 2000).

7. Saint Luke 1:46-55.  (MESSAGE)   [MESSAGE=Eugene H. Peterson, The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language (NavPress, 2005).]

8. St. Matthew 11:4-6.  (MESSAGE)

9. Alain Boublil, Jean-Marc Natel, and Herbert Kretzmen, “Finale Lyrics Les Miserables,” LyricsFreak, January 26, 2011, https://www.lyricsfreak.com/l/les+miserables/finale_20606960.html.

10.  Michael L. Lindvall, “Shall We Wait for Another” Sermon preached at the Brick Presbyterian Church, in  New York.December 13, 2013),  http://www.brickchurch.org/Customized/uploads/BrickChurch/Worship/Sermons/PDFs/2013/12152013.pdf

11.  David French et al., “How Fundamentalism Fails,” The Dispatch, November 27, 2022, https://thedispatch.com/newsletter/frenchpress/how-fundamentalism-fails/.

12. John Buchanan, “Fear Not” Sermons from Fourth Church, Chicago, IL, December 16, 2001), http://www.fourthchurch.org/sermons/2001/121601.html

13. Isaiah 35:8b. (NRSV)

14. St. Matthew 11:3.  (TLB) [TLB=The Living Bible. (Carol Stream, IL:Tyndale House Publishers Inc., 1971)

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Sermon preached at The Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Luke

11 December 2022

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeJiDrjcoY4

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