Community Presbyterian Church
Deerfield Beach, Florida, December 20, 2009
The Fourth Sunday of Advent
Scripture: Micah 5:2-5a; Canticle (Luke 1:46-55, paraphrase); Galatians 4:4-7; Luke 1:39-55.
Is Christmas
the wrong time of the year? Do you and I celebrate the
birth of the Savior Jesus Christ on the actual DATE of that
birth?
I hope it won’t disillusion anyone here this morning if I say, almost certainly NOT! Why? –Well, among other things, the Christmas story according to the Gospel of Luke, chapter two, tells us that the shepherds who heard the angels were “abiding in the FIELDS” (King James Version) --that is, they were spending the nights with their FLOCKS, camping there in the outdoors. This suggests a date during LAMBING season--that is SPRINGTIME, when the ewes were giving birth. Although fairly early we Christians in the West settled on December 25 as the date for Christmas, no one really KNOWS for sure the actual date when the Messiah, our Lord, was bon to Mary.
But let me ASSURE you, I’d NEVER suggest that you and I CHANGE Christmas to another time of year! For in a sense God DID come into the WINTERTIME of the ancient Mediterranean world. A December observance of winter is highly appropriate in our part of the world. Although this certainly doesn’t hold true for Australians or New Zealanders or those who live in the parts of Africa and Asia that are BELOW the equator, for those of us who live in the NORTHERN hemisphere, it’s powerfully SYMBOLIC to celebrate Christmas at the darkest and the coldest time of year! Nineteenth-century English poet Christina Rossetti puts it so well in her poem that became one of our most beloved of Christmas carols. And even though her description of the WEATHER at the time of the Baby Jesus’ birth is surely FAR from historical, the WORDS strike a clear note in our hearts:
Yes, friends, Christmas—the wrong time of year? NO! Even though December 25th almost surely wasn’t the date, how fitting to celebrate that birth NOW! In our Second Lesson today, from Galatians, chapter 4, we see that God was PREPARING the ancient Mediterranean world for the coming of God’s Son, the Savior. LISTEN! – “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, . . . so that we might receive adoption as children.”
Now you and I may think it ODD that the Savior of the world was born 2,000 years ago, and to a relatively obscure people, the Jews, who were ruled and often humiliated by the all-conquering Romans and, earlier and later, other powers. And we may wonder that Mary and Joseph, who themselves were unimportant by most standards of HUMAN judgment were the chosen parents for the Messiah. But God’s thoughts aren’t YOUR and MY thoughts! And God is the wise Author of all time and all history! The great 18th-century composer J.S. Bach wrote one of his finest cantatas when he was only 22 years old: a work that he created to be sung at funerals. He entitled that work, Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit – that is “God’s Time is the Best Time of All!”
In our Sunday Bible study of Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, that we concluded last Sunday, I noted that Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, in their rock opera Jesus Christ, Superstar, have the doubting and soon-to-fall Judas Iscariot, at one point sing this question to our Lord:
That’s a GOOD QUESTION! WHY, as I asked earlier, if Jesus is the Savior of the world, did he come to the JEWS, an obscure tribe of people, often occupied by the great world powers? Why didn’t God choose the GREEKS, with all their WISDOM and their PHILOSOPHY and their ART? Or the ancient EGYPTIANS, with their architectural skills and agricultural knowledge? Or the BABYLONIANS or the ROMANS or the ancient PERSIANS, with their military might? And why in 4 B.C., the REAL year that most scholars say Christ was born?
It’s true that had the Savior of the world appeared today, in the 21st century, satellite communication could instantly have spread the good news. (Why my son can do things with his cell phone every day that I don’t even begin to understand—and would have a terribly hard time to learn, I’m sure!) But, friends, at least as far as the ANCIENT, MEDITERRANEAN world is concerned, 4 B.C.E. was the BEST POSSIBLE TIME. And it REALLY wasn’t so backward at all! If the Messiah Jesus Christ had come BEFORE 4 B.C.E., or if he’d come after 180 C.E., the Gospel would have had a hard time spreading! You see, by 4 B.C. that whole part of the world enjoyed:
Yes, friends, it was a MAXIMUM time for the spread of the new faith of Jesus Christ! God’s time IS the best time of all! But what does this have to do with YOU AND ME? With us who, in all honesty, sometimes wonder where God is, and if God dwells in a totally different time zone from that which you and I know? How IMPATIENT you and I can become with God! You know what I mean: The little child who just can’t WAIT for Christmas Eve to arrive, and, with it, SANTA CLAUS! That driver in the line right behind us on Hillsboro Boulevard, who, the very moment the light changes to green, HONKS LOUDLY, as if you and I can’t even SEE it!
And, more seriously, when life hits us IN THE FACE. And we await with dread and apprehension, a DIAGNOSIS. Or we await a CURE. We await a pain-free moment. We wait at the side of a gravely ill loved one, for a sign of recovery, or, at times, a sign of death to come—and the relief that even it can bring on occasion! We ask, at such times, in all honesty, “Is God REALLY in charge?”
Or think of those people stranded in airports, perhaps at this very moment, in Richmond, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and points north. Or of those sitting in their CARS on the shut-down interstates, their vehicles stranded in the blizzard, awaiting help. Of your relatives and friends in the north, who you hope to get through those crowded airports and skies, down here, to spend Christmas with you. How IMPATIENT they (and we) can become!
Christmas, the wrong time of year? Is God’s schedule ever totally off base? -- NO! OF COURSE NOT! You and I, like the world before Jesus, each in our own way, await the ‘fullness of time,” when God will come and fill us again with the shining presence. Be assured, that the great Scheduler is ALL-WISE—and that NO wait is in vain!
George Macdonald, the Scottish divine, whose writings powerfully influenced the much later, and much more famous, LAY theologian C.S. Lewis, gave us THIS beautiful, little Christmas poem, that tells of the world before Christ:
Friends, how WONDERFUL that our loving God IS in charge! How GLORIOUS that Christmas, whatever form it may take, according to our individual needs and longing—yes, how GLORIOUS that Christmas is NEVER at the wrong time of year!
Prayers:
Eternal God, through long generations you prepared a way in our world for the coming of your Son. We praise you for choosing the Virgin Mary as the means by which He entered human life, and experienced it—joys and sorrows, frustrations and delights-- as WE know it.
Gracious God: send peace on earth, in this season when we sing so much about peace; and put down greed, pride, and anger that turn people against people and nation against nation. Speed the day when all wars will end, and every human being worship you through Christ our Lord.
Merciful God: you bear the hurt of the world. Look with compassion on those who are sick. Cheer them by your word, and bring health as a sign that, in your coming kingdom will be no more pain or crying.
Finally, God of all space and time; in these holidays when families are reunited and loved ones are gathering to celebrate the birth of your Son, receive our thanks for those whom we cherish who are not with us in this season; protect those who must travel—and particularly those who, this very day, may be stranded in airports or on highways, because of the weather. Bless those who must remain in distant places—and we remember before you servicemen and servicewomen who will spend Christmas in locations where they may be in danger, and for ALL people who live under threat.
Especially, O God, during these holy days, make us thankful for those who, having rejoiced with us in the past, now have entered heaven into more perfect joy, in praises celestial; in the light of your full presence. Keep us united with them in the fellowship of all saints, until we, too, join them in the radiance of your glory; through Jesus Christ, our Lord. AMEN.
I hope it won’t disillusion anyone here this morning if I say, almost certainly NOT! Why? –Well, among other things, the Christmas story according to the Gospel of Luke, chapter two, tells us that the shepherds who heard the angels were “abiding in the FIELDS” (King James Version) --that is, they were spending the nights with their FLOCKS, camping there in the outdoors. This suggests a date during LAMBING season--that is SPRINGTIME, when the ewes were giving birth. Although fairly early we Christians in the West settled on December 25 as the date for Christmas, no one really KNOWS for sure the actual date when the Messiah, our Lord, was bon to Mary.
But let me ASSURE you, I’d NEVER suggest that you and I CHANGE Christmas to another time of year! For in a sense God DID come into the WINTERTIME of the ancient Mediterranean world. A December observance of winter is highly appropriate in our part of the world. Although this certainly doesn’t hold true for Australians or New Zealanders or those who live in the parts of Africa and Asia that are BELOW the equator, for those of us who live in the NORTHERN hemisphere, it’s powerfully SYMBOLIC to celebrate Christmas at the darkest and the coldest time of year! Nineteenth-century English poet Christina Rossetti puts it so well in her poem that became one of our most beloved of Christmas carols. And even though her description of the WEATHER at the time of the Baby Jesus’ birth is surely FAR from historical, the WORDS strike a clear note in our hearts:
In the bleak midwinter,
Frosty wind made moan.
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow.
In the bleak midwinter,
Long ago.
Our God, heav’n cannot hold Him,
Nor earth sustain;
Heav’n and earth shall flee away
When He comes to reign:
In the bleak midwinter
A stable-place sufficed
The Lord God incarnate,
Jesus Christ.
Angels and archangels
May have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim
Thronged the air;
But His mother only,
In her maiden bliss,
Worshiped the beloved
With a kiss.
What can I give Him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd,
I would bring a lamb;
If I were a wise man,
I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give Him:
Give my heart.
Frosty wind made moan.
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow.
In the bleak midwinter,
Long ago.
Our God, heav’n cannot hold Him,
Nor earth sustain;
Heav’n and earth shall flee away
When He comes to reign:
In the bleak midwinter
A stable-place sufficed
The Lord God incarnate,
Jesus Christ.
Angels and archangels
May have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim
Thronged the air;
But His mother only,
In her maiden bliss,
Worshiped the beloved
With a kiss.
What can I give Him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd,
I would bring a lamb;
If I were a wise man,
I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give Him:
Give my heart.
Yes, friends, Christmas—the wrong time of year? NO! Even though December 25th almost surely wasn’t the date, how fitting to celebrate that birth NOW! In our Second Lesson today, from Galatians, chapter 4, we see that God was PREPARING the ancient Mediterranean world for the coming of God’s Son, the Savior. LISTEN! – “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, . . . so that we might receive adoption as children.”
Now you and I may think it ODD that the Savior of the world was born 2,000 years ago, and to a relatively obscure people, the Jews, who were ruled and often humiliated by the all-conquering Romans and, earlier and later, other powers. And we may wonder that Mary and Joseph, who themselves were unimportant by most standards of HUMAN judgment were the chosen parents for the Messiah. But God’s thoughts aren’t YOUR and MY thoughts! And God is the wise Author of all time and all history! The great 18th-century composer J.S. Bach wrote one of his finest cantatas when he was only 22 years old: a work that he created to be sung at funerals. He entitled that work, Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit – that is “God’s Time is the Best Time of All!”
In our Sunday Bible study of Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, that we concluded last Sunday, I noted that Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, in their rock opera Jesus Christ, Superstar, have the doubting and soon-to-fall Judas Iscariot, at one point sing this question to our Lord:
Every time I look at you
I don't understand
Why you let the things you did
Get so out of hand
You'd have managed better
If you'd had it planned
Now why'd you choose such a backward time
And such a strange land?
If you'd come today
You could have reached the whole nation
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication
Don't get me wrong . . . .
I only want to know.
I don't understand
Why you let the things you did
Get so out of hand
You'd have managed better
If you'd had it planned
Now why'd you choose such a backward time
And such a strange land?
If you'd come today
You could have reached the whole nation
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication
Don't get me wrong . . . .
I only want to know.
That’s a GOOD QUESTION! WHY, as I asked earlier, if Jesus is the Savior of the world, did he come to the JEWS, an obscure tribe of people, often occupied by the great world powers? Why didn’t God choose the GREEKS, with all their WISDOM and their PHILOSOPHY and their ART? Or the ancient EGYPTIANS, with their architectural skills and agricultural knowledge? Or the BABYLONIANS or the ROMANS or the ancient PERSIANS, with their military might? And why in 4 B.C., the REAL year that most scholars say Christ was born?
It’s true that had the Savior of the world appeared today, in the 21st century, satellite communication could instantly have spread the good news. (Why my son can do things with his cell phone every day that I don’t even begin to understand—and would have a terribly hard time to learn, I’m sure!) But, friends, at least as far as the ANCIENT, MEDITERRANEAN world is concerned, 4 B.C.E. was the BEST POSSIBLE TIME. And it REALLY wasn’t so backward at all! If the Messiah Jesus Christ had come BEFORE 4 B.C.E., or if he’d come after 180 C.E., the Gospel would have had a hard time spreading! You see, by 4 B.C. that whole part of the world enjoyed:
- A Common Peace, the so-called Pax Romana, ushered in by the Emperor Octavian—Caesar Augustus-- in 27 B.C.E. It would last through the reign of Marcus Aurelius, in 180 C.E. Under such stable conditions the Gospel could advance without much hindrance.
- A Common Transportation System. “All roads lead to Rome” was the slogan. The ancient Romans were unsurpassed in the quality of their paved highways, such as the Appian Way. Not only on land but at sea, in well-built, Roman vessels, Christian missionaries such as Paul could travel afar with the good news.
- A Common Government, for Rome ruled EVERWHERE. And the Romans didn’t mind their subject nations’ maintaining their individual languages, customs, religions, cultures They DID ask that people of a conquered province add to the list of gods and goddesses whom they worshipped, the emperor himself. And annually, on the Emperor’s birthday, everyone was expected to burn a pinch of incense before his statue, to acknowledge his divinity. Devout Jews, and, later, Christians, refused—and could suffer the consequences!
- A Common Language--Koiné Greek—the everyday speech of people in ALL those lands, a legacy from the famous general Alexander the Great. Thus the New Testament, WRITTEN in this Greek, could be read by practically everyone.
- FINALLY, as I pointed out to you a few Sundays ago, the ancient Roman world knew a Common LONGING. People were growing dissatisfied with the OLD religions, with their FICKLE gods and goddesses, and longing for something DEEPER and more SATISFYING! And even in Judaism, to many folks God seemed to be mainly a harsh Rule-giver, who expected everyone to obey every elaboration on the Torah (the Law) handed down by the rabbis!
Yes, friends, it was a MAXIMUM time for the spread of the new faith of Jesus Christ! God’s time IS the best time of all! But what does this have to do with YOU AND ME? With us who, in all honesty, sometimes wonder where God is, and if God dwells in a totally different time zone from that which you and I know? How IMPATIENT you and I can become with God! You know what I mean: The little child who just can’t WAIT for Christmas Eve to arrive, and, with it, SANTA CLAUS! That driver in the line right behind us on Hillsboro Boulevard, who, the very moment the light changes to green, HONKS LOUDLY, as if you and I can’t even SEE it!
And, more seriously, when life hits us IN THE FACE. And we await with dread and apprehension, a DIAGNOSIS. Or we await a CURE. We await a pain-free moment. We wait at the side of a gravely ill loved one, for a sign of recovery, or, at times, a sign of death to come—and the relief that even it can bring on occasion! We ask, at such times, in all honesty, “Is God REALLY in charge?”
Or think of those people stranded in airports, perhaps at this very moment, in Richmond, Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and points north. Or of those sitting in their CARS on the shut-down interstates, their vehicles stranded in the blizzard, awaiting help. Of your relatives and friends in the north, who you hope to get through those crowded airports and skies, down here, to spend Christmas with you. How IMPATIENT they (and we) can become!
Christmas, the wrong time of year? Is God’s schedule ever totally off base? -- NO! OF COURSE NOT! You and I, like the world before Jesus, each in our own way, await the ‘fullness of time,” when God will come and fill us again with the shining presence. Be assured, that the great Scheduler is ALL-WISE—and that NO wait is in vain!
George Macdonald, the Scottish divine, whose writings powerfully influenced the much later, and much more famous, LAY theologian C.S. Lewis, gave us THIS beautiful, little Christmas poem, that tells of the world before Christ:
They all were looking for king
To slay their foes and lift them high;
Thou cam’st, a little baby thing
That made a woman cry. . .
My how or why thou wilt not heed,
But come down thine own secret stair,
That thou mayst answer all my need—
Yea, every bygone prayer.
To slay their foes and lift them high;
Thou cam’st, a little baby thing
That made a woman cry. . .
My how or why thou wilt not heed,
But come down thine own secret stair,
That thou mayst answer all my need—
Yea, every bygone prayer.
Friends, how WONDERFUL that our loving God IS in charge! How GLORIOUS that Christmas, whatever form it may take, according to our individual needs and longing—yes, how GLORIOUS that Christmas is NEVER at the wrong time of year!
Prayers:
Eternal God, through long generations you prepared a way in our world for the coming of your Son. We praise you for choosing the Virgin Mary as the means by which He entered human life, and experienced it—joys and sorrows, frustrations and delights-- as WE know it.
Gracious God: send peace on earth, in this season when we sing so much about peace; and put down greed, pride, and anger that turn people against people and nation against nation. Speed the day when all wars will end, and every human being worship you through Christ our Lord.
Merciful God: you bear the hurt of the world. Look with compassion on those who are sick. Cheer them by your word, and bring health as a sign that, in your coming kingdom will be no more pain or crying.
Finally, God of all space and time; in these holidays when families are reunited and loved ones are gathering to celebrate the birth of your Son, receive our thanks for those whom we cherish who are not with us in this season; protect those who must travel—and particularly those who, this very day, may be stranded in airports or on highways, because of the weather. Bless those who must remain in distant places—and we remember before you servicemen and servicewomen who will spend Christmas in locations where they may be in danger, and for ALL people who live under threat.
Especially, O God, during these holy days, make us thankful for those who, having rejoiced with us in the past, now have entered heaven into more perfect joy, in praises celestial; in the light of your full presence. Keep us united with them in the fellowship of all saints, until we, too, join them in the radiance of your glory; through Jesus Christ, our Lord. AMEN.