Christmas Message (2008)

Christmas Eve, December 24, 2008
References: Rev. Ed Bacon, Christmas Eve 2006 and Sr. Joan Chittester

The wonderful Christmas stories are being read in many churches this night. The first two chapters of Matthew and Luke are the basis of our Christmas narrative. Each of these gospels presents a very different story. In Matthew, Joseph is the main character. Mary does not speak nor does she receive any revelation. There is no story of the birth itself, no stable, no manger, no angels or shepherds, all of these are in Luke. Tonight, however, I want to talk with you not about these details but about the meaning that lies beneath the stories. Beneath the story of the baby born in Bethlehem, beneath the story of the shepherds, the magi, the angels, the virgin mother, the no-room-in-the-inn—beneath all of these wondrous stories is this deep, deep life truth which tells us that the journey from fear and anxiety to joy and peace always goes through compassion and generosity for others. For the angels this night say that this news is to be good news for all people not just for me and mine, but for our brothers and sisters in Zimbabwe, in South America, in homes here in America where parents have lost their jobs recently or have been without income for a long time. The baby born in Bethlehem is not only about peace in my heart and peace in my life. The Christmas story is about peace for all people—the people in Iraq and Afghanistan, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in Sudan, (add other war zones) and in Jerusalem.

Odetta, the great folk singer that recently died, sang:

There’s fighting in the city where baby Jesus grew.
All in all the Prince of Peace we send a prayer to you.
Walking through Jerusalem I see the signs of war
Calling on the Prince of Peace to walk the streets once more.
Walking in Jerusalem just like the prince of Peace.
Praying for Jerusalem. May all the fighting cease.
O Jerusalem, O Jerusalem
Sweet little baby born in a stable
O Jerus’lem in the morning.

My friends, the message of Christmas is that you and I are given the vision of God, the one God who always in every age wants to become embodied anew—not in the daylight but in the deepest darkness of night. God wants to be born in you and me tonight—in the people who have heard the message of the angels that the one God is not just for our tribe but for everyone. We are the ones who have heard the angels say, “Fear not. Receive this love which will not only make you loving and lovely but will, if you say yes to it, work through everything you do in your life to make the whole world loving and lovely as well.” (Fr. Bacon)

There’s something very different about Christmas this year because of the economic recession. Suddenly, from one end of society to another, people are faced with an unusual vulnerability. For some, the fall down the economic ladder has been severe, for others, less dramatic. With less money available many people have had to find a new way to do Christmas, one that doesn’t depend on things. Maybe this Christmas will be one in which we learn again to focus on love rather than things. As Sister Joan Chittester says, “The parties will be smaller – and more intimate. The gifts will be more useful – and less disposable….In fact, it may actually become a “feast” again, rather than simply a shopper’s holiday.”

So let’s celebrate the feast where the central ingredient is the message that God will always seek human beings to be the bearers of the divine power, God’s power, that makes possible compassionate, inclusive, justice-seeking, peacemaking, forgiving, healing and reconciling love. The message is about a way to bring love and peace not just to me, not just to you, not just to our kind, not just to our religion, but to bring peace to all people, all nations, and the entire world. When you and I love like that, Christmas comes again not just for our families, not just for our hearts, not just for our church, not just for our religion but for the whole world.
So as we participate in this holy celebration, may your Christmas be—as Sister Joan says—“made merry by the gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh, of generosity and serenity and spirit, that this year will surely bring.” May joy and peace go with you tonight and continue throughout the year to come. Merry Christmas!

Blessings and Joy

Sermon for Advent 3B, 12-14-08
Scripture: Psalm 126, 1 Thessalonians 5:16-22, Luke 1:45-56

I hope all of you will be with us tonight at Vespers when we will be reading many of the Advent and Christmas scriptures. Rather than repeating those scripture, this morning I have chosen to go with an alternate Gospel lesson, the Magnificat or Mary’s Song. I love this scripture. It comes after Mary has gone to visit her cousin Elizabeth who is pregnant with John the Baptist. Have you ever thought about how long it must have taken Mary to walk the 85 miles from her home in Nazareth to Elizabeth and Zechariah’s place in Judea near Jerusalem? (And then back again.) Elizabeth is overjoyed at seeing Mary and she shouts out, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” She continues to bless her as her baby jumped in her womb. “And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” (In Luke 1: 41-45)

No wonder Mary stayed for three months with Elizabeth. Remember she is a pregnant teenager, between ages 12 and 14 most sources say, without a husband. Can you imagine what Mary might have been concerned about in terms of a scandal with her being an unwed mother? Who would ever believe her that she had never been with a man? That God was the Father of her baby? Her humility and faithfulness made her assent when the angel asked her to carry the son of God. She responded,, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” (1:38a) All good and well, but what will her parents say? How will Joseph, her fiancé, respond? Will he reject her? In the gospel of Luke, Joseph is only mentioned in the beginning, Gabriel comes “to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David.” And as she arrives at Zechariah’s house, Elizabeth begins joyously blessing her. What a relief! We are told that Mary stays with Elizabeth three months and then returns home. I believe she stays because she needs her older cousins’ reassurance and affirmation. We all need someone who affirms us in difficult times. Other than Elizabeth, at this point, Mary only has the memory of an angel’s visit.
The next voice in Luke is Mary’s proclaiming what has been called one of the most revolutionary speeches in the entire Bible, also one filled with great joy. She starts off with saying that her soul magnifies the Lord and her Spirit rejoices in God because God has chosen her in spite of her heretofore lowly position in life and from then on generations now and to come will call her blessed.

She than expands this thought to say that:

You have put down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of the lowest status.
You have filled the hungry with good things,
but the rich you have sent away empty

Mary’s song is good news for the homeless on the streets of our nation’s Capitol, the hungry and oppressed in Zimbabwe; the refugees from Congo and Sudan; for the street children in Calcutta, for the AIDS orphans in Africa, to just name a few of our suffering poor. These words would be painful and shocking for those who wield power, the leaders of the Empire then and now, who live affluent lives while either perpetuating, or permitting, grave injustices to happen to vulnerable people.

The words can be so mesmerizing until we don’t really listen to how radical they are. The words turn things upside down. Instead of God being impressed with money, power, status, the poor and the vulnerable are lifted up. During this season of love personified, I have continued to preach about having compassion and doing unto others as Jesus has commanded us. I hope that our hearts have been turned upside down also and that we will not be focusing so much on material things for our friends and relatives that already have so much, but instead focus on meeting all with kindness and compassion and sharing with others who are in need. The Good News of Christmas is news that must be shared, celebrated, and then lived!

In today’s Psalm we are told how the people rejoiced as God restored their fortunes. I love the words, “May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy. Those who go out weeping bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy. (126:3-6) This reversal of fortune is raised up in the Magnificat. We are also told in Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, to rejoice always, give thanks in all circumstances for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. The joy that Jesus talked about in his final days was this joy that comes from deep inside. It’s joy that takes into account all the sufferings and cruelty of the world and still can say Yes to God, yes to being partners in bringing light to the dark places. It’s a reminder of triumph, that kind of triumph that Jesus talked about in John 16:33 …in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But be of good cheer; I have conquered or overcome the world.” This promise of Jesus always makes me think of our sisters and brothers in Zimbabwe, those that pray and shout for joy despite how bad things are all around them. That joy and faithfulness I believe is one of the greatest things we can learn from our Ukama partnership.

For me blessings and joy go together. When I feel joy I feel blessed and I want to bless others, even God. One of my favourite blessings is in Psalm 103: Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless God’s holy name. Yes, it is good for us to give blessings to God as well as letting God bless us. Elizabeth, who had waited so long for a child, was already filled by joy at her own pregnancy when Mary appeared at her door. No wonder she was so quick to bless Mary. Elizabeth seems to have been the only person that knew Mary was pregnant with the Messiah. She seems to have been the first person to publicly confirm what the angel told Mary. Luke says after the child leaps in Elizabeth’s womb that she was filled with the Holy Spirit. All of this was quite mind boggling to Elizabeth. She says, “and why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me?” It’s pretty amazing when we realize that God has come to us, that God has chosen us. When I was getting ready to do volunteer work and live in community in Washington, DC, one of my friends gave me a bookmark with a quotation from John 15:16: “You did not choose me but I chose you.” I saw that quote almost daily right up to the point of deciding to go to seminary and become an ordained minister. I often would marvel about being chosen. If any of you were like me, always picked last for team sports, you know how wonderful it feels when you are chosen, It was wonderful and amazing to me that Jesus would choose me to become a minister..

It is equally amazing to feel that you have been blessed. There’s a wonderful blessing benediction that goes like this: “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious unto you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.” One of the favorite expressions I often heard from my mother was “Bless your heart, Barbie. I’m so glad to see you.” It meant a lot to me, so much that on the first anniversary of my mother’s death, I sat at her grave and wrote a poem with that title. You may have noticed that I quite often sign my emails and letters with “Blessings” or “Bless you”. It’s not an unconscious, random sign-off. I really want to affirm you and let you know that you are special to God and to me. Just as God came to Mary, God comes to ordinary people to let them know they are special. God comes to us in those people that bless you in your life, whether or not the word blessing is used. I also believe that God comes through us when we bless each other. It is in God’s coming to us through Jesus, the Christ child, that we are blessed and filled with joy in this wonderful season of Love. Thanks be to God for coming and living amongst us. Amen.

Prepare Ye the Way: for Peace

Sermon for Advent 2B, 2008
Scripture: Isaiah 40:1-11, Psalm 85, Mark 1:1-8

Welcome to the second Sunday of Advent, the Sunday of Peace. In a time when there is so much violence and conflict: wars, abuse, terrorist attacks and so forth, the world is certainly a place in need of Peace. Isaiah foretold a time when there would be such a peace—that a child would lead all natural enemies such as the wolf and the lamb, the calf and the lion to lie down together. The prophet in Isaiah 2 says that God shall judge the nations and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore (Isa 2:4) and in our reading today he is talking about comforting his people and then we hear, “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,” (Isa. 40:3), the same refrain that opens the Gospel of Mark. Both Isaiah and Mark continue with “prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” (Mark:1:3 and Isa 40:3.) Mark goes on then to introduce John the Baptist as the person who will prepare the way for the Christ.

Have you ever seen a Christmas card with a picture of John the Baptist? His image just doesn’t sell in the sentimental world of angel choirs, Christmas cookies, loving families, shepherds in the field and wise men bearing gifts. Instead we have an odd looking fellow who has been living in solitude in the wilderness of Judea. He fed on honey and wild locust and dressed in garments of camel hair with a leather belt around his waist. He studied the Scriptures, and we are told he especially was drawn to the prophetic ministry of Elijah, after whom he modeled his own ministry. Some of the other gospels, particularly Luke, goes into much more detail on his preaching. What is consistent is John’s announcing that Jesus is coming: “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” (1:7-8) As I read to you this morning, that’s about all that Mark says about John, other than he baptized Jesus in the Jordan.

Each Sunday of Advent we prepare a little more for that wonderful birth of Jesus. Even though Jesus and John were cousins, born only three months apart, possibly playing together as children, in their adulthood it is John that prepares the way for Jesus. Each of us is important in preparing the way for Jesus to be born into our hearts and into the world. Last week we focused on the importance of hope, coming out of the darkness to prepare for the Christ child. This week I want to focus on Peace.

World peace seems pretty slim, then and now; according to one resource ‘in almost 3600 years of recorded history, the world has known only 292 years of peace (less than 8%). During this period there have been 14,351 wars, large and small, in which 3.64 billion people have been killed. There have also been in excess of 8000 peace treaties that were made and broken.1 Pretty gloomy isn’t it!

In spite of this history of the lack of peace, I will remain hopeful that we will move to more sustained periods of peace in the world. However, today I want us to look more towards inner peace, a peace that strengthens us from the inside-out—the kind of peace that we can feel even though we are struggling with both inside and outside problems. Maybe some of you are in a wilderness place where you feel lost, alone, without that comfort of Isaiah 40. Maybe you are completely overwhelmed. Yet I am here to proclaim that it’s still possible to be peaceful inside. The peace that Jesus brings is not the absence of problems or trouble. The peace that Jesus brings is a new way of looking at God and knowing God is always with us.

Let’s go back to John the Baptist. John calls us to repent, kind of an old fashioned word that we don’t use much today, but it means to STOP where we are, to turn around and examine where we have just been and consider if a change is in order. Repentance is not merely feeling sorry and giving things up. It is a complete turn around in one life. It is turning from something disastrous to something wonderful. One of my resources said it’s like turning from a dead end to an open highway, or like turning from a stagnant puddle to a bubbling spring. So I urge each of you to ask the Holy Spirit if there is anything in your life that is not pleasing to God. Is there anything that dishonors God, anything that has become more important to us than God? Is there anything we need to repent of, anything that God wants us to do that we are not doing? I think that John was asking us to turn away from everything Jesus spoke against, anything that creates barriers between human beings. We need to turn away from everything that oppresses others or ourselves. We need to turn away from anything that does not reflect justice, compassion or peace. Maybe before you go to bed tonight or if you are a morning person, get up early enough tomorrow to spend some quiet time listening and talking to God.

There’s actually been research done at Duke University on what can help us have peace of mind. I want to briefly share the eight things they came up with:

1. The absence of suspicion and resentment. Nursing a grudge was found to be a major factor in unhappiness.
2. Not living in the past. An unwholesome preoccupation with old mistakes and failures leads to depression.
3. Not wasting time and energy fighting conditions you cannot change. Cooperate with life, instead of trying to run away from it.
4. Forcing yourself to stay involved with the living world. Resist the temptation to withdraw and become reclusive during periods of emotional stress.
5. Refusing to indulge in self-pity when life hands you a raw deal. Accept the fact that nobody gets through life without some sorrow and misfortune.
6. Cultivating the old-fashioned virtues—love, humor, compassion and loyalty.
7. Not expecting too much of yourself. When there is too wide a gap between self-expectation and your ability to meet the goals you have set, feelings of inadequacy are inevitable.
8. Finding something bigger than yourself to believe in.

Believing in something bigger than ourselves is why most of us are here on Sunday morning. The Peace that comes through the birth of baby Jesus brings us a new way of looking at God, and gives us the assurance to know that God is with us always and all ways. The next step is for us to bring light into the world by the life we lead. My prayer is that we can all become the signs of hope and peace in the darkness that surrounds so many. May our lives reflect the Love that is God. God with us, Emmanuel. And peace on earth, goodwill to all. AMEN.