Sermon
She already owns a latest generation Kindle with Wi-Fi and 6" display, and she's got an Invicta women's Angel diamond stainless steel chronographic watch. He has the new Kodak Zi8 pocket video camera, a Vizio 22-Inch full HD LED LCD TV, and a Diamondback Response Sport Mountain Bike with 26-inch wheels.
Perhaps they both have a new, stylish Wi-Fi Detector Shirt. This is interactive T-shirt features glowing bars on the front that dynamically change and glow as the surrounding Wi-Fi signal strength fluctuates when they walk down the street, or a corridor in the mall.
Finally they are getting the attention that they so richly deserve, as others bow to them as their reverential Wi-Fi gods. Geeky guys and gals alike swoon in their presence.
One of the classic Christmas dilemmas is trying to figure out what to get the person who has "everything." These are the people who have supposedly been there, done that, bought the T-shirt, punched the ticket and seen it all. You figure whatever you're going to put under the tree is going to be a real yawner for them, so you bail out and go with the gift card -- impersonal, but never awkward.
The truth is, though, that even in a culture as
prosperous as ours, nobody has everything. We'll never have everything, or read
everything, or watch every movie or TV show ever made, so perhaps whatever
you've put under the tree for that sophisticated person in your life is going
to be just fine. Even the most prolific readers, film aficionados and couch
potatoes can't skim, see or surf all that's out there. None of us has a chance
of seeing everything that exists, even with the Internet. Not to put a damper
on an otherwise bright holiday season, but every one of us will die having
missed almost everything.
The good news, though, is that even if we miss almost everything, we can still catch the most important things that we should never miss -- like the real meaning and value of Christmas. Whether lifelong churchgoer, holiday visitor or downright atheist, most people already believe they have a pretty good idea of what shouldn't be missed at Christmas.
For many people, for example, the one thing you don't want to miss at Christmas is family. Getting the extended family together, remembering times and loved ones past, sharing a meal around the table, opening presents under the tree -- that's what Christmas is all about. In our increasingly nomadic culture, where extended families stretch all over the country and even the world, family is certainly a good thing that many don't want to miss.
Ask a kid what is most important about Christmas, and those presents are likely the things they don't want to miss. What would Christmas be without presents? Sure, the tree is nice and all, but come on!
For many others, even those who aren't Christians,
it's the "feeling" of Christmas that really matters.
Lots of folks who have never set foot in a church still set up a tree, put
together a shopping list, maybe even sing a few carols. Christmas is especially
popular in
But this holy night, I wish to humbly offer another "don't-miss-this" proposition for us. It is an offer that many of us are missing in this world where jobs are scarce, where violence and terrorism light up our TV screens, where disease and death are at the forefront in the minds of many of us.
Read Luke’s Gospel and one important phrase seems to jump out more than the others, even if you've read it many times before: "Do not be afraid."
Luke uses this phrase three times in the first two chapters, each time spoken by the angel Gabriel. It functions as a kind of thesis statement for the story of the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus that will follow: It's because of the newborn King that we need no longer be afraid.
So even though we don't want to miss out on family,
or presents or the "feeling" of Christmas, perhaps the
most important thing not to miss this Christmas is the opportunity we all have to live our lives
unafraid.
According to a recent Gallup Poll, one of the biggest fears affecting
American’s lives and views is a fear of so-called “big government.” In a poll
conducted at the end of November and beginning of December, 64% of those polled
responded that they were more afraid of “big government” and its potential to
erode their rights and opportunities than they were of either “big business,”
or ‘big labor.” This is only one percentage point less than the highest ever
recorded in a similar poll by the
Casting aside any political of philosophical debate we may have about
this topic, we must reflect, this evening anyway, upon the relative threats of
big government caused by the U.S. Federal government in comparison with those
caused by the Roman Imperial government in first century Palestine.
“In those days a decree went out from Emperor
Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first
registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of
Yet into this situation, into this turmoil that would cause many Americans (had they been there) to march en masse with misspelled and grammatically incorrect signs against this perceived tyranny, God comes into the world to save it. In the form of a small, defenseless baby born to an inconsequential young girl in a backwater of the backwaters of the Roman Empire, God and all of God’s grace, mercy, peace, power and might enter the world. Gabriel comes to Mary and says:
Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his
ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ (1:30-33).
This announcement alone ought to tell us that we are not to fear governments and what they can and cannot do to us.
So what other things do we fear? What other bugaboos haunt our collective conscience on this Christmas Eve?
Back in August, a Reuters/Ipsos poll published found that 47 percent of Americans believed that the worst economic woes were and perhaps are yet to surface.[2] Among us, there are always those with pessimistic outlooks who fully believe that the worst is yet to come. Such folks are by nature quite pessimistic and enjoy passing their grim outlooks along to others. The standard cultural portrayal of such people includes the cartoon long hair dressed in a long robe and standing on a street corner holding a sign that says “THE END IS NEAR.” But nowadays such folks also appear regularly on TV in the guise of “commentators,” have an electronic presence on the internet, and sometimes even send out letters via old fashioned snail mail.
We must all learn to keep out distance from such types, as they attempt to spread the chaos which has a hold upon their own hearts and minds. Each of us, after all, has enough to worry us on our own.
Look at Zechariah and Elizabeth, the parents of John the Baptist for example. Clearly, for them, devout Jews of the first century, the time for them to assure their progeny and therefore their eternal existence through their physical offspring had passed. They were old. Their end was near, and it would be final.
One day, while serving at the
The angel says to the old man, "Do not be afraid because your prayers have been answered" (Luke 1:13). They were going to be answered in a personal sense because Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth were going to have a son who would become John the Baptist, but also answered in the larger sense that God was going to do something about the plight of his people, who had lived under the specter of fear and oppression for generations. The end seemed near. The worst seemed yet to be coming. But, it was not.
Perhaps all of our fears, when taken together, can be summed up as a fear of uncertainty. We are such dangerously controlling creatures at time. And although the free will that causes us to have such controlling tendencies was bestowed upon us by our Creator, we tend to use it in the wrong ways. This, of course, is why we needed God’s Son to come into the world.
A few years ago, while downsizing, my mom gave me a whole Christmas village. You know what I’m talking about: Tidy, Tudor-style houses, shops and outbuildings -- some illuminated from within, their rooftops dusted with artificial snow. Little Dickensian figures of Christmas carolers congregating outside, under miniature gas lamps, songbooks in hand. Over There were not just one, but two a little, upturned mirrors, upon which teeny ice skaters glided across the surface.
It was a wonderful, appealing little world. I found myself spending a lot of time tending to it, adjusting it, imagining the lives of the little people in it. I controlled it. I was their god!
Unfortunately, there was one glaring problem with it. It was not real. The imaginary people who dwelt in that quaint little Christmas village -- spread out there in the little side room of the parsonage -- didn't need to be saved. Their world was already perfect, complete and whole. It was also static, controlled, and limited. The world of those little villagers was nothing like ours. Like it, our world includes many wonderful things; but unlike it ours also includes which also includes the pink slip, the flashing police lights, the estranged family member, the intensive-care unit, addictions and other mental illnesses infirmities, and spiritual unbalance.
Jesus entered this world, not that world.
Here in this world, on a long ago night – probably in mid Spring, not early winter, an angel announced the Good News. Shepherds, who were the poorest of the poor, were watching over their flocks when Gabriel appeared and, as the King James Bible says, they were "sore afraid." [so afraid it hurt, I guess – smirk]
"Do not be afraid," says the angel a third time, "for see -- I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people" (Luke 2:10). And notice the angel song: “Glory to God in heaven and on earth peace.” Peace. Not despair, not fear. It is good news for all the people -- not just for 1%.
Jesus would grow up to preach that the
Yes, The kingdom will be fully realized in that second Advent, when Jesus claims the throne once and for all. But, this is the grounds for our hope on this Christmas Eve -- that no matter what happens in the present, in Christ, God promises to set the world right once and for all.
In the meantime we hear the angel’s voice: "Do not be afraid." Money will come and go, yet still God is with us. Our health may fail, yet still God is with us. Our lives may be broken by sin and our past mistakes. But still God is with us.
That is the good news for all of us. This is the thing which none of us need miss out on: Our failures are not final, our infirmities are not ultimately fatal, and our death will not be the last word.
All the books ever written, all the movies ever made, never will amount to the can't-miss truth of this story. You get this good news, and nothing else really matters.
Let's not miss out on the opportunity to be unafraid! Think of it as the perfect gift for those who think they have it all figured out, who believe they have everything! Amen.
[1]
“In
[2] “Americans fear worst economic woes: Poll,” Press TV website, August 11, 2011, retrieved December 24, 2011 from http://www.presstv.ir/detail/193372.html.