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...Hear the Word |
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Merry Christmas! As you can see, our tree is still up—not because we just haven’t gotten around to putting it away. The poinsettias and the greens continue to proclaim the birth of our Lord and Savior. Of course, you know, it’s still Christmas. Because ours is not a holiday observance—but a festive celebration of God’s entering the world! Surely all those who filled our Sanctuary Friday haven’t forgotten—have they? Christmas—Christ’s mass. Not yule-tide. Christmastide. The happy holiday may have been finished up with the turning of the day at a glance calendar, but not Christmas. Christians feast and celebrate for 12 days, through the 5th of January. And so, we continue our celebration. The question is…do we know what it is we are celebrating? Once a group put on a nightly Christmas pageant in a city park. Each evening, they would tell again the marvelous story of a couple from Nazareth, traveling to Bethlehem for the census. She, heavy with child. There, they find the city filled for with travelers, and they can find no one who will give them room, save for a cattle stall. A child, born in a barn, laid in a manger. Each evening, they would prepare for the night’s drama, set the stage, and then go to change into their costumes. Several nights in a row, when the players would return to begin the pageant, they would discover that someone had taken the baby doll from the manger before the pageant began. After several nights of this, one of the actors came up with a solution. They would simply tie the baby down into the manger! So with cables and padlocks, they securely fastened the baby Jesus into the cattle trough. There would be no more removing the baby from its resting place. The show could go on. As I heard about this rather curious series of events, it occurred to me. Sometimes….sometimes Christians become so engaged with the baby on the bed of straw, we metaphorically do what the actors in the park do…we tie Jesus down to the manger to make sure that he doesn’t escape from the beautiful picture we create in our imagination. A tiny baby, wrapped in swaddling clothes, and lying among the animals in a primitive barn. While visiting with my prayer group this past Monday about this very issue, one of the group said—“you know, when I think of it, when I celebrate my own birthday, I don’t celebrate my infancy—I celebrate who I have become, I celebrate who I am.” As I thought of what this woman said, I realized, as we celebrate the birth of other heroes, we don’t remember them as babies….we don’t focus our observance solely around their lives as an infant, we remember what they accomplished. What they did. We remember their words and how they taught and inspired us. Think of George Washington’s birthday, Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. We celebrate the men and their great work and words! Why do we so want to keep the observance of Christ’s birth centered upon a helpless infant lying in a manger? Why do we, like the actors, work so hard to keep the baby in the manger? Could it be that the baby demands nothing of us? Has no comment on how we live our lives? With a baby, there’s no hard teachings to understand, or worse, to apply. But try as we might, this son of God does not remain an infant for long. He grows in mind and spirit Scripture tells us. He’s baptized and takes his place as God’s missionary to the planet. He faces temptation head on, and then returns to Galilee. There, he goes to the Synagogue, and begins to teach. He unrolls the Scroll, to words the prophet Isaiah had spoken to his ancestors hundreds of years before. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, and has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. To proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind. To let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” He rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and then he said a most astonishing thing. He said, “it’s true. Today. This Scripture is fulfilled as you hear it.” At first the congregation is amazed and said, “is this Joseph’s son?” Of course they couldn’t have known then that Joseph was simply the foster parent. Then Jesus went on to preach a little. And the room became quiet, and uncomfortable. Just a few words…about prophets not being sent to their own hometowns. And something about what Jesus said, or the way he said it made them furious, so furious that they drove him out of the synagogue, and out of town, and drove him to the brow of a hill and the edge of a cliff. They were going to throw him off of it! Can you imagine? So angry they wanted to kill him? His own hometown synagogue? It’s safer to keep Jesus as an infant. Before he starts to preaching. Before he starts eating with sinners. Before he starts offering the kingdom of God to just about any raggedy old Samaritan he might meet in the street. Better tie this one down to the manger. The truth is, folks throughout his life tried to tie Jesus down. They tried to tie Jesus down by demanding he ignore pain and suffering until after the Sabbath. They tried to tie Jesus down by demanding he follow Jewish practices rather than show compassion and mercy. They tried to tie Jesus down when he reached across racial and gender lines to bring hope and healing. The would try to tie him down as he cast out demons. Try to tie him down when large crowds began to seek him out and call out for his healing touch. They tied to tie him down with trick questions from the law. Of course, they would finally try to tie Jesus down on a cross when their fears reached a fever and they knew not what else to do to contain him. We know, all their efforts were futile. Jesus would not, could not be tied down. Not even in death! But the really good news I have today, from the biblical witness this Christmas is that not only did Jesus refuse to be tied down. . .he also frees us from the things that tie us down. Those who put their trust and faith in the Lord born that night in a cattle stall, will not be tied down. Not depression, not failure, nor addiction, divorce, poverty, or bankruptcy can tie us down! Not hatred, not jealousy, not poverty or wealth, not illness or grief. Even the grave loses its power over us. We will not be tied down! Not now, not ever, not so long as we know that Jesus, sets us free! Night before last I got to hear Casey Ross sing for the first time, and my, what a blessing that was in my life. And he sang one of my favorite Christmas hymns, “I wonder as I wander out under the sky.” Most of us all know the words: “I wonder as I wander out under the sky, How Jesus, the Savior, did come for to die. For poor, ornery people like you and like I, I wonder as I wander, out under the sky.”
No one knows who wrote the song. It was discovered by composer John Niles as he wandered through the Appalachian Mountains in search of the origins of folk songs. On a cold December day in North Carolina, as he watched the poor people go about their chores, he heard the sound of a quiet, solitary voice that belonged to a little girl sitting alone on a bench. She was singing a song Niles had never heard before. When she finished, Niles asked her about the song. She told him that her mother had taught it to her, like her grandmother had taught it to her mother before her. The carol is not the creation of a famous composer, or poet, but simply the product of poor, hard-working country folk. And that’s no coincidence, I think. Poor people who gave us a song that does not simply sentimentalize the baby in a manger laid in the hay. But instead, offers the world this lovely gift that reminds us all why this baby was born—for what purpose. “That Jesus the Savior did come for to die. For poor ornery sinners like you and like I.”
Thanks for dropping by: Guest # |
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