|
|
Whose Celebration is it Anyway? III:
“For Unto Us a Child is Born”
Matthew 1:18-25
A sermon preached by the Rev. Douglas M. Donley
We are at the third in a series of sermons asking, “Whose
Celebration is it Anyway?” It’s an
important question for us to consider as the images flood us at this time of
the year.
On the first Sunday in Advent, we
looked at the ancient traditions that had saviors born on December 25th. Some of them closely resembled Jesus. There’s no magic to the date of December 25th
at least from a Biblical perspective.
Jim Ross reminded me that the only reference to the time of year was the
fact that there were shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night when
Jesus was born. Shepherds would usually
do this only during lambing season which is in the Spring. We have Easter in the spring and there’s only
so much we can handle at one time. Maybe
the winter is the best time for Christmas.
On the second Sunday in Advent, we
looked at the tradition of St. Nicholas and the derivation of gift-giving. We were encouraged to recapture the desires
of that ancient saint to help out the poor.
What a great way to celebrate the birth of Jesus who called us to sell
all we have and give to the poor, and who never called us to receive anything
except salvation which is somehow tied up with our commitment to making the world
better for those less fortunate than ourselves.
Next Sunday, we’ll look at the
Winter Solstice and see what the apex of darkness and light has to do with the
revelation of God. More about that next
week.
This Sunday, why not look at the
birth narratives in Matthew and Luke’s gospels?
There’s a novel idea for a
Christian church.
Most nativity scenes morph these two
stories together, but they are really quite different. In Matthew, we have a
very short birth story, where Jesus is prophesied as Emmanuel—God with us. In Matthew, the magi show up and find Jesus
in a house. There are no shepherds, no annunciation, no Magnificat, no
Quirinius—governor of
In Luke’s gospel, we have the story
of the conception of both Jesus and John the Baptist. Mary and Elizabeth offer
each other support and God is smuggled into the world in a stable and wrapped
in swaddling clothes with shepherds and their herds watching nearby. There is
no Herod, no magi, no flight to
Both books have genealogies,
tracing Jesus oddly through Joseph’s family, back to Abraham (Matthew) or Adam
(Luke). Matthew adds four women to his genealogy (Ruth, Rahab, Tamar and
Bathsheba). All four were women on the outside and considered less than pure
blood. They were foreigners, women
shunned by their families, ignored or abused by those they trusted. And all four claimed their power in spite of
their patriarchal and even misogynist upbringings.
The writers told the parts of the
stories important to them, maybe even pulled together other stories. Both
writers used the birth of Jesus to set the stage for the telling of the story
of his life.
There’s something inherently hopeful about the birth of a child. Aside from the circumstances of the birth, and there are plenty of those circumstances in this case, there is something that pushes us to ask about possibilities, about new life, about new opportunities.
Anyone who has been in a maternity
ward knows this. Whether you are
awaiting a biologic or adoptive child, you know that there is a miracle taking
place. You also know that your world
will be turned upside down. It will
never look the same again.
I think the biblical writers needed
the birth narratives in order to sustain the movement. We need something of hope, not only in the
world to come, but in this world as well.
We need to remember that we are partners with God in the creative
process of this fragile world of ours. And
every year we need to remember the possibilities that lie before us.
Let’s look a bit at the birth
narratives and see what we find there.
We know that Jesus was born in what many might call unusual
circumstances. His conception was at
best immaculate, and at worst the result of violence.
Was Isaiah referring to a virgin
bringing forth a child or a young woman?
The Hebrew seems to point to a
young woman, not necessarily a virgin.
Joseph follows the Deuteronomic formula
of an honor-divorce, when he discovers Mary’s pregnancy. Who was he protecting? .
When the Holy Spirit came upon
Mary, was this a symbolic act of inspiration, or was it an immaculate
conception?
If Jesus did have a biological
father in heaven only, then what is up with the genealogies?
We don’t know. What we do know is that it was a
nontraditional conception that caused concern amongst the holy family. In Matthew’s Gospel, Joseph is tempted to
divorce her quietly so as to not bring shame upon him, not her but him. Thank God he changed his mind. The presence of the four women in Matthew’s
genealogy ought to point us to the fact that Jesus came from a long tradition
of people who broke with the status quo and were even illegitimate in the eyes
of the world. Jesus continued a long
line of subversives who saw things in a new way.
In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus and his
cousin John the Baptist are both conceived in unusual circumstances. Thank God, Mary and Elizabeth had each other
to commiserate with as they faced the obvious scrutiny of their families and
friends.
When Jesus was finally born,
Joseph’s family shunned him. Think about
it, if you are traveling to your hometown where your relatives live and you’re
wife’s about to have a baby, why would you seek out a hotel? The only explanation could be that Joseph and
Mary’s family shunned them. That’s why
they looked for a hotel. When the hotel
was filled, that’s when they took refuge in a stable.
Plenty of us have trouble with
Christmas because it paints a Norman Rockwell picture of family
togetherness. Everyone is happy and the
egg nog flows as Christmas carols are sung around the piano.
But what if your house seems a lot
more like Norman Bates than Rockwell?
What if there has been a recent
loss in the family?
What if there is no room for your
kind of family at the table?
Jesus came into the world in a
family just like that one. What a
subversive and hopeful message. We need
these birth narratives, if for no other reason than to show us that God is with
us in our struggles and challenges.
It can be a struggle to make it
through the holiday season.
It can be a challenge to keep up
the façade of everything going so well.
Sometimes, the holidays are great
times to celebrate family.
For others it can be a bit of a
charade. Is it any wonder that holiday
time coincides with the resurgence of mental health issues?
It can be down right exhausting to
make it through the holiday season. How
do you make it through? It helps to
remember the stories. It helps to not
shy away from the challenge that the holidays bring to many people. It helps to have a methodical Advent that
really prepares us for Christmas. It
helps to be with a church family that tries its doggone best to model the
unconditional love of God.
Whose celebration is it? Maybe it’s the celebration for all of those
misfit families. Because that’s how God
came. That’s to whom God came at Christmas.
For unto us a child is born. Unto us.
Unto a world and a people
challenged and struggling.
Unto us, a people that are trying
to find our way.
Unto us, a family that doesn’t
quite feel the Christmas spirit.
Unto us, even when we are feeling
lost and alone.
Unto us, who are burning with
questions in our hearts.
Unto us, who wonder whether this is
all there is.
Unto us, who long for something better.
Unto us, ravaged by war.
Unto us, facing foreclosure.
Unto us, in the midst of court
proceedings.
Unto us, the joyful and the
sorrowful.
Unto us the content and the lonely.
Unto us, the shepherds and the
magi.
Unto us, who long for and await the
revelation of God and the new opportunities that it may accompany.
Whose celebration is it
anyway? It may well be ours, if we
recognize the wonder and the possibility that may occur because of that baby’s
birth on that first Christmas.
We need the birth narratives to
ground us in the fact that God is with us.
We need the birth narratives to
remember that we each have the possibility to have a fresh start.
We celebrate that fresh start each Christmas
and even have New Year’s resolutions around the corner to keep us on our toes.
We need the birth narratives to
remind us that God can get smuggled in to even the most hopeless places and the
most desperate and clueless families.
And God can work miracles in all of us.
For unto us a child is born. And the government shall be upon his
shoulders—hallelujah. And his name shall
be called wonderful counselor the prince of peace.
For unto all of us, we have a new
possibility.
A new opportunity.
A new starting point to our
participation in the story.
We can start anew on Christmas,
too.
That’s what we are waiting
for.
For unto us misfits who long for
something better, a child is born. It’s
the start of something new. Thank God.