Bless Me Less!

Sermon-4 Epiphany Year A-Jan. 30, 2011
The Cloud of Unknowing, "O God, our great companion, lead us ever more deeply into the mystery of your life and ours, that we may be faithful interpreters of that Life to each other, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
5When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. 2Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying:
3“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. 5“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. 6“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. 7“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. 8“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. 9“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. 10“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Ok, I like to start this way so that long after you have forgotten the sermon, you’ll remember your Bible. The name for the verses from Matthew today is _____________ (the Beatitudes). It is the most famous part of Jesus’ most famous sermon, the Sermon on the _________ (Mount). You’re going to be hearing from the Sermon on the Mount the next 4 weeks. This is the longest of the 5 sermons that Jesus has in the gospel of Matthew. Scholars believe that Matthew has grouped Jesus’ words into 5 sermons because it reminds the Jewish people of the 5 books of _________(Moses). In other words, Jesus is supposed to be the new Moses. That’s how Matthew portrays Jesus.
So this is the first words of Jesus’ first sermon. Ok, why are they called “the beatitudes”? (and despite Robert Schuller they are not the “Be” attitudes). Because Beatitude is the Latin word for blessing. How many Beatitudes does Matthew have in his gospel? Nine. Ok, The Beatitudes are the first part of the first sermon in the gospel of Matthew. The Sermon on the Mount is chapters 5-7. It is the first of 5 sermons by Jesus in Matthew. The word Beatitude comes from the Latin word for blessed, and there are 9 of them.
There’s a big argument as to whether they are in two sets of four or 3 sets of 3 but that’s enough facts for today. Let me tell you what I think the Beatitudes are about: they are about turning the world upside down. The Sermon on the Mount is a sermon of challenge. It’s not Jesus changing Moses’ Law, but interpreting it in a new and exciting way.
Think about it, when do you say that you are blessed? When something happens to you that is good, wonderful, propitious-right? How often do you say, “I was mugged last night-what a blessing!” or “someone just stole my identity and all my credit card numbers-I am sooooo blessed!”. We don’t say that. Sometimes we might say that someone died, and that it was a blessing-because they were suffering so much. But in the beatitudes Jesus is trying to teach his disciples (and the crowds who were eavesdropping) that to follow him was to live a different kind of life-to have different values, different goals, different dreams. Remember what season we’re in? Epiphany. “a sudden realization: a sudden intuitive leap of understanding, especially through an ordinary but striking occurrence.”
People listening to Jesus’ teaching expected him to praise those who were well, rich, and comfortable. He didn’t. They expected him to pronounce a blessing on the happy, contented, and strong. He wouldn’t. Jesus chose the poorest, the emptiest, the saddest, the people hurting the most-and said, these are the people most open to God-these are the ones who will be filled. Does that make sense? Of course not. Does it strike you as odd who Jesus doesn’t choose as “Blessed” (from Alyce MacKenzie): “Blessed are the self-reliant (not the poor in spirit), the cheerful (not those who mourn), the bold (not the meek), the proactive and the ambitious (not those who hunger and thirst for righteousness), those who demand to be treated fairly (not the merciful), those with a single, driving ambition (not the pure in heart), those who stand up for themselves (not the peacemakers), those who have a high quality of life (not the persecuted), and those who have a good reputation (not those who are reviled and slandered).”
Jesus told his disciples when we have lost what was most important to us, that’s when God steps in-that’s when we feel God’s touch, that’s when we hear God’s voice. Until then, we are spending so much time thinking that we are in control of our lives, that we have very little room for God. Jesus wants people to see blessing as their inner life being filled by God, not when their outer life is going the way they want.
In 1976 I was visiting Dachau, the first Nazi concentration camp ever built, a few miles outside Munich. A German Lutheran pastor showed us around. He had been a political prisoner there in World War II, and in those days former inmates were stoill being asked to be guides. As he showed our group around he said, “in here we were stripped of every possible form of human self-respect. All we had left was divine dignity.” That’s the beatitudes. When there is nothing left, that’s when God’s blessing is most powerful.
The first four blessings, 1)poor in spirit, 2) those who mourn, 3) the powerless (the meek) 4) and those who are desperate for justice –those are who Jesus is blessing here. Those are the ones most open to Christ, most available to the voice, the touch.
As Alyce MacKenzie, a Methodist preaching professor (noted above-who I seem to quote every week) writes: “This blessedness is not a state of passive resignation to present hardships. It is a positive gift he gives to those who follow him with faith despite present adversities (New Century Bible Commentary: Gospel of Matthew, 110)….
When the things that bring us strength and hope are taken away, Jesus says, that’s when we are most open to the power and blessing of God.
Look at the next 4 beatitudes. Here is Jesus teaching what his followers -those who are poor in spirit, grieving, powerless, desperate for justice are like - are like: 7“Blessed are the merciful, …. 8“Blessed are the pure in heart, …. 9“Blessed are the peacemakers, …. 10“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake,
First Jesus talks about those who have lost so much, then he describes as blessed those who respond out of that emptiness-AND seem to do all the wrong things-the merciful, those devoted to God, the peacemakers, the persecuted. I don’t want to be in the first group-nor in the second. It’s just too hard. What happens to the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, the persecuted? They get run over. They are forgotten. People make fun of them. They are ridiculed. Look at the 9th beatitude: “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Who are people reviling? Who are the persecuted? Those who minister out of their blessing.
That is what happens to the blessed. First you lose those few things that keep us going, then when we try to act decently and kindly, we are reviled. Sound appealing? How many really want to be blessed like this?
This is the opening words of the most popular sermon Jesus ever gave. They are very hard, very demanding-and very revolutionary. This is not the feel good Jesus. This is the Jesus who is opening up the 5 books of Moses and reinterpreting them in new ways. His teaching in the Sermon on the Mount is going to be about how God’s kingdom is so very different that the human kingdom. This is his opening shot-it’s going to continue for 4 more weeks.
A woman was walking along the street one night and came upon a man walking around under the streetlight , staring intently at the ground. She asked him what he was doing, and he replied that he was looking for his car keys. She offered her help and started looking. After about 15 minutes of intense searching she asked, “Are you sure you dropped them here?” “Oh No,” he answered, “I dropped them near my car”, he replied, and pointed to the other side of the street. “Well, why are we looking over here”? she responded, barely able to hide her exasperation. “Well, because there’s no light over there!” he answered.
Jesus brought the light to where the lost were. Matthew wrote down these words to his generation of Christians who were scared, empty, and discouraged. They felt helpless and powerless in the face of persecution, they often felt that God had left them-and Jesus’ words of blessing gave strength to weak knees and drooping arms. It didn’t lift them all the way up-but it did let them know that when they were most alone, most empty, most powerless, most discouraged, that God was coming in to their lives. Regardless of what was happening in the circumstances of their lives, Jesus was teaching them, God would be filling them with a divine dignity. It is not easy hearing who is blessed-or WHEN we are blessed-unless you are feeling poor in spirit, powerless, broken hearted, and persecuted. Then, more than anything else in the would, you will want to hear that God is coming into your life.

A Sudden Realization

Sermon-3 Epiphany Year A-Jan. 23, 2011
The Cloud of Unknowing, "O God, our great companion, lead us ever more deeply into the mystery of your life and ours, that we may be faithful interpreters of that Life to each other, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

, "Follow me, and I will make you fish for people." Immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.
Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.

Do you ever listen to this reading and think, “I could never do that”? Drop everything and run to Jesus? Every time I’ve ever done this reading in a Bible study this is the pattern of conversation:“oh, those fishermen, they had so much faith! I could never leave everything and (fill in the blank-be a missionary, go door to door, be a professional Christian”). That’s the fist response. Then someone asks me, “do you really think they responded that quickly (like I would know).” Then someone says, “I don’t think snap decisions like that are a good idea (and then they will tell some terrible story about someone who made an snap decision and wound up losing all their money to a Nigerian con man). And the Bible study kind of goes downhill from there-about whether these fishermen really were right to act so impulsively.
This is the season of Epiphany, the season of : “a sudden realization: a sudden intuitive leap of understanding, especially through an ordinary but striking occurrence.”
This is the season when one day we’re walking along and we realize something new-even though we’ve seen it a million times before. One of my favorite stories is about Anna Power Scheffer. She grew up here, attended church here almost every Sunday until she became an adult. One day she was back visiting and she said, “you know, I have been here for hundreds of your sermons-but I never listened to one. I listened to the one today- you know what, it wasn’t bad!”
This is from Alyce MacKenzie, a professor of preaching in Texas:
“In all four gospels, people made what looks like a snap decision to become disciples of Jesus. But things look a little different when we look at their decisions in the flow of that particular gospel's story. Then it looks like the snap decision may have been one step in an ongoing process. It seems likely that the disciples had been thinking about Jesus for a while and about what the impact of following him might be.
Each gospel has a different definition of what it means to be a disciple, to follow Jesus. In John it means to believe. In Luke, to be a disciple means to have compassion on the poor and the sick. In Mark, to be a disciple means to be willing to suffer,
[And in each of the gospels the story right before the call, and right after always explain what it means to be a disciple]
And in Matthew, to be a disciple of Jesus means to be willing to follow his teaching and to do God's will. The call of the first disciples in Matthew comes right after Jesus' brief teaching about the purpose of his ministry (Mt. 4:12-17) and right before the Sermon on the Mount. So the disciples make (what sounds like) a "snap" decision to spend their lives as salt and light for the world by living by Jesus' teachings. These teachings fulfill, the heart of the Law: to love God with one's whole being and one's neighbor as oneself. ….The life of the disciple, which begins with what may look like a sudden decision, becomes a series of recommitments to that decision, day in and day out, every day of our lives.”
We don’t just make one time only snap decisions to follow Jesus, to become fishers of people. We usually have to make the decision every day. What may look like a snap decision to someone else, has usually been building up in us for a long time. You want your life to mean something. You want your life to matter. You want to be part of something bigger than just you. You want to make a commitment that draws every part of you. No one ever became a Christian because they wanted to remain exactly the same. Amen.

A Sudden Realization

Sermon-1 Epiphany Year A-Jan. 9, 2011
The Cloud of Unknowing, "O God, our great companion, lead us ever more deeply into the mystery of your life and ours, that we may be faithful interpreters of that Life to each other, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Matthew 3:13-17
13Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. 14John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” 15But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. 16And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. 17And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

You’ve heard this story before, right? Jesus goes out to John in the wilderness , baptizing people in the river Jordan, and he asks to be baptized. You’re familiar with it, right? So, what’s your favorite part? It’s a very short gospel reading-some of you have heard it dozens of times-which part do you like the best? Which part of this short episode speaks loudest to you?
We’re in the season of Epiphany. Here’s a definition of Epiphany that I like: ? a sudden realization: a sudden intuitive leap of understanding, especially through an ordinary but striking occurrence. A sudden realization. The season starts with the coming of the wise men on January 6th. And every year the first Sunday in Epiphany we hear the story of the baptism of Jesus. Then for the next several weeks we will hear about other epiphanies, other sudden realizations. Every week in the gospels. And every year this season ends with the great epiphany of Jesus being transformed on the mountaintop. That’s all I want to tell you about this season for now. But I have much to say about baptism.
Tertullian the early Christian theologian wrote about baptism in the 2nd century: "When we are going to enter the water," he says, "we solemnly profess that we disown the devil, his pomp, and his angels. Hereupon we are thrice immersed, making a somewhat ampler pledge than the Lord has appointed in the Gospel. Then, when we are taken up, we taste first a mixture of milk and honey. And from that day we refrain from the daily bath for a whole week.” Did you know that early Christians were always baptized naked? They would go under the water and when they came up they were then dressed in a white robe symbolizing purity. “It was a sign that they had literally put on Christ like a garment. They wore those robes for a long period as a reminder of who they were and what they had done.” That would increase attendance on baptism Sundays, wouldn’t it?
You may think that the baptism of Jesus story is pretty harmless, but in the first century Christians were very embarrassed by this story. Why would Jesus, the Son of God, their savior, need his sins washed away? It was one of the “scandals” of Christianity. The baptism of Jesus was terribly embarrassing to the church. These days it is usually an opportunity for a party. The Rev. Dr. Bill J. Leonard the dean of the Wake Forest University School of Divinity, tells this story about baptism in the Baptist church: …in 1807, a Kentucky slave woman named Winnie was disciplined by the Forks of Elkhorn Baptist Church, where she was a member, for saying that "she once thought it her duty to serve her mistress and her master, but since the Lord had converted her [since her baptism] she had never believed that any Christian [could keep] Negroes or slaves." And she got into more trouble with the church for saying that "there were thousands of white people wallowing in hell for their treatment of Negroes--and she did not care if there was many more.”
So when you (again) hear today the story of Jesus being baptized, what’s your favorite part? Does the story have the power to move you? To free you? Make you think? If you don’t feel scandalized or intrigued by the story, do you feel any interest in it at all? How about scared? Listen to this story from The Scott Black Johnston, senior pastor of Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York
“Early Christian icons, devotional pictures of this scene at the Jordan River, depict Jesus submerged up to his neck in the water. John stands nearby, gently touching the Messiah's head. Above, a lone dove glides down a ray of heaven-sent light, while on shore, angels wait with ready towels for God's beloved Son to emerge. My friend with the water collection, Stan, once pointed out to me that these icons usually include a curious figure. There in the water along with Jesus you can often find a small elderly man carrying a jug. He is the river god, the spirit of the Jordan [River], the sometime enemy of humankind. This aqueous [water] sprite reminds viewers that water is not always so friendly. It destroyed the earth in Noah's time. It threatened to swamp the disciples' boat in a storm. It nearly drowns both Peter and Paul. In one Eastern icon (Ohrid, Yugoslavia, c.1300), Jesus raises his foot to squash this river god. And that's not the only adversary that the Messiah will find in the depths. The waters of the Jordan in these icons are frequented by dragons and great sea serpents. In these icons, when Jesus goes into the river, he goes to do battle against the powers of evil.
So when you hear the story of Jesus being baptized do you imagine him fighting the river spirits? The dragons and sea serpents of the Jordan? Do you see Jesus, gentle Jesus, going to war? Setting prisoners free? Rescuing people from hell?
I tell you all this because when you hear a story a lot it’s hard to stay focused, to stay interested. But you know what I hear when this story is told? When Jesus comes up out of the water “the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. 17And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”
When I hear the story of Jesus baptism, I hear a story of approval and acceptance-I hear a story of love. I think of that every time we have a baptism here. The first baptism was a story of God loving his son so much that he couldn’t NOT say it. He didn’t tell the people to follow Jesus, or to bow down to him, or throw money at him-or even to give him a party. All he said was, “I love you so much, and I am so proud of you.” And I think to myself, this is what every person, no matter how old, whatever the circumstances, this is what every person wants and needs to hear-from God, from the church. When our new life begins with God, that’s what we need to hear-not promises, not threats, not warnings, not enticements-we need to hear what every child craves to hear from a loving parent-I love you, you’re mine, I am so proud of you.
Fr. Henri Nouwen was a famous Catholic writer, speaker, teacher, when he decided in his 60s to leave that life behind, and to share his life with mentally handicapped people at the L'Arche community of Daybreak in Toronto, Canada. He wrote this in a sermon many years ago: “I would like to speak to you about the spiritual life as the life of the beloved. As a member of a community of people with mental disabilities, I have learned a lot from people with disabilities about what it means to be the beloved. Let me start by telling you that many of the people that I live with hear voices that tell them that they are no good, that they are a problem, that they are a burden, that they are a failure. They hear a voice that keeps saying, "If you want to be loved, you had better prove that you are worth loving. You must show it." But what I would like to say is that the spiritual life is a life in which you gradually learn to listen to a voice that says something else, that says, "You are the beloved and on you my favor rests."You are the beloved and on you my favor rests. Jesus heard that voice. He heard that voice when He came out of the Jordan River. I want you to hear that voice, too. It is a very important voice that says, "You are my beloved son; you are my beloved daughter. I love you with an everlasting love. I have molded you together in the depths of the earth. I have knitted you in your mother's womb. I've written your name in the palm of my hand, and I hold you safe in the shade of my embrace. I hold you. You belong to Me and I belong to you. You are safe where I am. Don't be afraid. Trust that you are the beloved. That is who you truly are."
I want you to hear that voice. It is not a very loud voice because it is an intimate voice. It comes from a very deep place. It is soft and gentle. I want you to gradually hear that voice. We both have to hear that voice and to claim for ourselves that that voice speaks the truth, our truth. It tells us who we are. That is where the spiritual life starts -- by claiming the voice that calls us the beloved.
This is the Epiphany season, a season when we hear stories of sudden realizations: sudden intuitive leaps of understanding, especially through an ordinary but striking occurrence. This is the season when we talk about the light bulb coming on, and we can see something ordinary in a new way. Today we talk about the baptism of Jesus, a story you may have heard a 1000 times. But today, see if there is an epiphany for you, any kind of realization. What do you hear when you hear the story now? What speaks to you loudest? Maybe God is trying to let you know in some mysterious, intimate way, how much he loves you and approves of you. Maybe today you can make an intuitive leap and hear a voice claiming you as his beloved. Perhaps when we hear the old familiar story of baptism we will hear God not just speaking to Jesus-but also speaking to us. Amen.

The Whole Christmas Story

Sermon-1st Sunday after Christmas Dec. 26, 2010

Lord Jesus!. Oh, make your word a swift word, passing from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the life. Oh Lord, hearken, and do so for your blessed Son’s sake, in whose sweet name we pray. — George Herbert, 1593-1633

Years ago I was talking with a woman from another church and she told me that at THEIR church, they were going to have a Living Nativity outside their building, and they were going to tell the WHOLE story of Christmas (by that I am pretty sure she meant angels, shepherds AND wise men) not just a donkey and a cow with the Holy Family. But because I am such a smart aleck, I said, “oh, the WHOLE story? So you’re going to have the slaughter of the Bethlehem children and Joseph, Mary and Jesus having to escape into Egypt? Needless to say, I was not asked to attend the performance.
This gospel is read every year on the Sunday after Christmas, but we either have Lessons and Carols that day or because most people don’t go to church the Sunday after Christmas, very seldom is this story heard: Are you starting to understand why? It is filled with evil kings, the massacre of children, references to Israel’s past of inconsolable sorrow. And the story ends with the holy family having to go into exile into Egypt. The Christmas story that we think of as beautiful is actually filled with evil, sadness, pain, escape, deception, slaughter, and illegal immigration. You don’t see too many of these scenes on people’s front yards at Christmas, do you? Can you imagine if we told this story every year on Christmas eve? “ one commentator once compared the second chapter of Matthew 2 to “an obnoxious and most unwelcome guest at your Christmas party--the kind of person who talks too loudly and who spills eggnog all over your nice Persian rug.”

When we hear THE WHOLE CHRISTMAS STORY it is unsettling, to say the least.

So, I’m going to give you a little more history than you’re used to because it may be a while before you’ll hear it again and it may help you to understand it a little more fully.
Remember the story about the Wise Men? How Herod told them to let him know where this new king would be born so he could worship them, too? But they were warned in a dream and returned home by a different way-avoiding Herod. That’s usually where our knowledge stops. But after that (verses 12), Herod does find out that the “new king” will be born in Bethlehem, so to make sure he “gets” Jesus, he kills every boy under the age of two in the town of Bethlehem. Usually the number given is about 120, but I don’t know why. Before that happens Joseph, Jesus’ father, is warned in a dream that Herod is coming and takes the family and escapes to Egypt. They stay there for 2 years until Joseph has another dream that it’s safe to return to Galilee (Herod is dead and one of his few living sons is now on the throne). Maybe you’ve heard all of this before. (Let’s see a show of hands). Let me give you some more background.
Herod, the king mentioned in this story was a tyrant. He had 10 wives and dozens of children. He killed many members of his own family (wives, in-laws, and especially several of his sons fearing that they might try to take over his kingdom). The word for pig in Latin and the word for son are only 1 letter apart. Caesar Augustus, the Roman emperor at the time of Herod, once punned that it would be safer to be one of Herod’s pigs, than one of his sons (Jews can’t eat pork, get it?). When Herod finally died after ruling for 37 years, they held a national day of celebration and a festival-he was so hated.
The idea that Herod could order the death of all the male children in a little village is not preposterous. He was very capable of doing such an atrocity (Danielle-“she’s evil”).
Rachel in the quote from Jeremiah ‘A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.’[So Rachel] She became a symbol for Israel, in other words, of inconsolable sorrow. How can anyone console you when so much that seems to happen to you is unfair and full of sadness? So, when the Babylonians carried off Israel into exile centuries later, Jeremiah wrote that it was like old Rachel was still crying out from her grave.”
And one more thing-Rachel was buried just outside of Bethlehem. So when Matthew quotes Jeremiah in today’s gospel, he is using a code word for Israel and its inconsolable sorrow-and connecting Rachel and her sorrow to Bethlehem. Even today, if you visit Bethlehem, there are long lines into the tomb where Rachel is buried
Are you starting to understand why people never hear this gospel story? It is filled with a lot of bad stuff. This is THE WHOLE CHRISTMAS STORY: evil, sadness, pain, escape, deception, slaughter, and illegal immigration. You don’t see too many of these scenes on people’s front yards at Christmas, do you? Can you imagine if we told this story every year on Christmas eve? Christmas is supposed to be beautiful and sweet, but the truth is that the Christmas story wasn’t like that.
“In an episode of the TV series “M*A*S*H” back in the 1980s, two doctors and a nurse desperately try to keep a fatally wounded soldier from dying on Christmas Day lest the man's wife and children back home forever after have to associate Christmas with their loved one's death. When the man expires just before midnight anyway despite their best efforts, Dr. Pierce moves the clock hands forward twenty minutes and then puts “December 26” on the death certificate. "No child should have to connect Christmas to death" he says in defense of his unethical faking of a medical record.”

But death is a part of Christmas. And so is new life. And fear, and joy, and awe, and terror. This story is that God breaks into the world that is-not the world we want it to be. God breaks into the world and it is messy and scary and real. The Christmas story is God breaking into the world. It’s not that everything was, or will be, beautiful-it’s that God is with Mary and Joseph, and he will be with us. That’s the truth. Part of the good news is that the story isn’t beautiful-it’s real, and part of the story is that bad things happen to innocent people-and yet, God continues to be a part of Joseph and Mary’s lives. It is a story of challenge. And it is a story of faith. And that, is really The WHOLE CHRISTMAS STORY

Why Did He Come?

Sermon-Christmas Eve Dec. 24, 2010
Lord Jesu!. Oh, make your word a swift word, passing from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the life. Oh Lord, hearken, and do so for your blessed Son’s sake, in whose sweet name we pray. — George Herbert, 1593-1633
Lord Jesu! Teach thou me, that I may teach them: Sanctify and enable all my powers; that in their full strength they may deliver thy message reverently , readily, faithfully, and fruitfully. Oh, make thy word a swift word, passing from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the life and conversation: that as the rain returns not empty, so neither may they word, but accomplish that for which it is given. Oh Lord, hear, Oh Lord, forgive! Oh Lord, hearken, and do so for thy blessed Son’s sake, in whose sweet name we pray. — George Herbert, 1593-1633
Fred Craddock, one of my favorite preachers, “tells the story of a preacher who loved to preach on big subjects and large issues every Sunday. From time to time some of his parishioners would complain of his big sermon topics and say they wanted something that helped them closer to home, helped them to get through the week but the pastor said they needed to learn to think beyond their petty concerns. So one week the pastor had to go to a denominational meeting in a large city and got one of his church members to go with him. When they reached the city, the pastor asked his church member to find a map so they could make their way to the meeting place. The church member reached over in the back seat and pulled up a globe of the world.”
So here is a sermon about petty concerns that is closer to home.
In central and west Africa there is the country of Cameroon. They have a traditional Christmas carol that they sing where the choir repeatedly asks, "Why did he come?"
"Why did he come?"
A few days ago there was an interview on National Public Radio with Mark Goldsmith. Six years ago he got involved with a not-for-profit program that encourages New York civic leaders to volunteer in city schools. He told them to put him in a tough school. He thought they would put him in east New York or South Bronx, really tough areas. Instead they asked him if he would go to jail. He was a 68 year old New York retired cosmetics executive. So they sent him to Rikers Island, the jail complex where most New York lawbreakers are sent. So many teenagers are incarcerated there that New York operates a public school there. 60% of those released from Rikers return. Again and again and again. “Goldsmith found out he had more in common with the inmates than he expected. He himself had once been a poor student and a college dropout. He knew what it was like to be an aimless young man with no clue how to get by.” It didn’t matter that he was old, Caucasian, and a businessman. The young men in jail had never ever met a successful human being in their lives. Goldsmith said, “They do not know a single person who can help them when they get out - not one.” So Goldsmith started an organization called “Getting Out and Staying Out”. Over the last 6 years they have placed 1500 young men in jobs. It is hard to imagine a 74 year old retired white cosmetics executive having anything in common with a 17 year old Latino gangbanger. And yet. Can you imagine how hard it is for these two to find anything in common, much less to learn from each other?
But Marc Goldsmith knew what it was to be one of these young men, aimless, clueless, with no hope, and never having known anyone who had achieved ANYTHING. And so he went there.
“Why did he come?”
Every year at Christmas I ring bells for the Salvation Army in front of Walmart for a 2 hour shift. I talk to folks, I see people I know, and a lot of people come up and thank me and bless me for what I am doing. But the best ones, every year, are the people who come up to the bucket and stuff in a wad of cash and say to me, “last year Salvation Army saved me.”
“Why did he come?”
The Christmas story makes no sense, none at all-which is why, I suppose, that we try to make a terrible, desperate story so beautiful and sweet. It is why, I suppose, why we tell the story of Santa Claus, a man who flies through the air in a reindeer drawn sleigh once a year carrying gifts for every child in the world. I guess we figure if we tell one fantastic story, why not tell another.
Mary was an unmarried teen age girl in a 3rd world country 2000 years ago. And she claimed that her child was the Son of God. It makes no sense (except that we’ve all known parents who believed their child was God). She was forced to travel about 70 miles on a donkey when she was 9 months pregnant. There was no hospital, no house, no designated space for a child to be born. So her child was birthed in a barn. 40% of all children in that era died before they were one, and this child looked like a good candidate. Can you imagine anyone farther away from who you are, your experience, than a child born to an unwed mother in 1st century Israel? Can you picture anyone you can relate to less than Jesus than us?
"Why did he come?"
One of my favorite stories was the one told by the character Leo on The West Wing several years ago. A man falls into a very deep hole and cannot get out. He yells and yells but no one hears him. Finally his best friend comes along and jumps down into the hole with him. “WHY DID YOU DO THAT?” yells the first man at his friend! Now we’re both stuck down here!” The friend says, “Yeah, I know, but I’ve been in this hole myself, and I know the way out.”
The Christmas story is an extraordinary one, that God would come as one of us into the world. That God would come as an infant in a barn in Bethlehem-a town of about 100 adults, in a 3rd world country, in the first century. That the same power that created the universe would come as the most powerless being there is. It makes no sense.
"Why did he come?"
The essence of hope, is when someone who is like me, can show me another possible future-I may not take it. It may take me a long time to understand it. It may make no sense to me, and I may not trust it, but someone like me showing me the way out, gives me hope. The Christmas story is about God coming as one of us, and showing us another way. It is unbelievable. But my experience with hope is that it is always hard to believe at the time.
Why did Jesus come? Because we needed him. Because we needed to believe that there was a purpose to our lives. Because we needed to believe that there was a loving God that cared about each of us. Why did Jesus come? He came to show us the way out.