01 January 2012 “What’s up with this?” Galatians 3:23-25; 4:4-7

01 January 2012 “What’s up with this?” Galatians 3:23-25; 4:4-7

It may be the best question to ask this first Sunday of the New Year. What’s up with this? Was Jesus really born for us to treat him this way?
How far have we gone from worship to silly human distraction?
David Davis of Nassau Presbyterian Church in Princeton, NJ tells the story of a Christmas pageant with significant issues. Mrs. Smith, the pageant director, was only in her first year as the volunteer in charge, and if David is honest, it would probably be her last.

As David tells it, “Nightmare” might be too strong a word to ever use for a Christmas pageant, but that years might qualify. After all, the term “perfect Christmas pageant” is an oxymoron. Christmas pageants are going to have rough edges. However, on this particular evening, as the pageant played on, Mrs. Smith was just a bit taken aback by the sharpness of those edges.

Mary had been sick all morning and the bucket next to the manger was for her. Joseph was thirteen now and decided about ten days ago that he wasn’t going to enjoy this pageant at all. When the animals arrived behind the shepherds, any hope of heavenly peace vanished. They took over the whole chancel and elevated “lowing” to a new, loud, hip-hop, rap sounding art form.

Right near the end, just before everyone was to sing “Joy to the World the Lord is come” and “He rules the world with truth and grace, and makes the nations prove the glories of his righteousness,” the narrator, Jerod, literally fought his way to center stage for his last line. He stepped on and over sheep and cows. Mary was reaching for the bucket, and Joseph had rolled his eyes so many times they just about fell out of his head.

So Jerod had to shout over the barnyard noise. Finally, in desperation, he put his folder down and stretched out his arms and with no little amount of exasperation, yelled, “Christ was born for this?”

Mrs. Smith, now fully exhausted, said to no one in particular, “it was an exclamation point, not a question mark.”

However, some years it does feel more like a question mark, doesn’t’ it? Christ was born for this? Some years the pageantry of life seems to not be like a chancel drama, but a pageant of life itself.

That is how William Muehl once described it. “This rich pageant of life is often fouled up,” “Fouled up by our rigid moralism, and the cross is hidden beneath the flimsy fabric of our simple piety . . . Our flesh drives and afflicts us from birth to death.”

You and I, we find ourselves stepping on and over so much as we make our way across life’s stage. Every year in this family of faith, somebody heads to Bethlehem by way of the grave, because death has an unceasing part to play. Every year, for some it is Christmas carols and tears as the earthiness of the flesh has torn at relationships, or the brutality of disease has torn at the flesh. Christ was born for this?

This year, like every year, we come face to face with flesh not just torn but destroyed. There are places in our world destroyed by war, torn by economic distress or natural disaster and nations proving something other than the “glories of his righteousness.” Yet we sing “peace on earth and good will to all,” not just once or twice, but over and over again.
It was not too long ago that Jesus made the cover of both Time and Newsweek. When such an appearance happens to be around Christmas, we can expect some conversation about the birth narratives found in the gospels of Luke and Mark. The headlines tell the story, “Behind the First Noel: How the story of Christ’s birth came to be” and “The Birth of Jesus: from Mary to the manger, how the Gospels mix faith and history to tell the Christmas story and make the case for Christ.”

Writers in both magazines engaged scholarly opinions to raise critical issues surrounding the Virgin Birth, and the importance of Bethlehem, and the questions of numbers in terms of the Magi, and whether or not the star was Haley’s Comet.

When turning to the question of why this all makes a difference, both magazines looked to the message of the angel in Luke: “For to you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
“A simple, joyous proclamation of salvation,” one writer concluded. “On earth peace, good will toward all,” cited the other writer, calling it “a promise whose fulfillment is worth our prayers not only in this season, but always.” One concludes with a simple proclamation of salvation; the other a sweeping prayer for peace. As important as both may be we still find ourselves asking, Christ was born for this?

The reader of Time and Newsweek ought to be turning pages looking for more, looking for what is missing, looking for why this nativity of Christ would have anything to do with you or me.

Perhaps what they fail to consider is that Christ came that you and I might be justified by faith. “In Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith,” the scriptures tell us. “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

That is what is missing. If you “belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise.” These words come to us from the Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Galatians. It is his approach to the birth of Jesus. “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children.” No angels; no shepherds; no Magi; no star. You and I, we are adopted as children of God. Christ was born for this!

We can remember growing up and as recently as this past Christmas Eve standing in our sanctuary to sing “Silent Night.” The candlelight would spread, and some would sing with tears streaming down their cheeks. The pew might even shake a bit. We might even say that was the night we learned it was safe to cry in church.

But we learned something far greater about faith and God’s promise. “We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.” That is God’s promise, hear and now, in the very earthiness of life. Such fullness of time belongs to God in those moments when in that exact earthiness of our lives, we come face to face with the promise of God. “We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.” The nativity of the Christ Child enters into our own mundane lives and there are additional truths that become self-evident.

God has promised us; “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Phil 4:13)

“I am persuaded that neither life nor death, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor death, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom 8:38-39)

“I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Mt 28:20)

“My peace I leave with you, not as the world gives, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” (Jn 14:27)

“Come unto me all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Mt 11:28)

“I am the bread of life, whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”(Jn 6:35)
“This is my body broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” (Lk 22:19)

Somewhere this rich pageant of life is unfolding. Somewhere a child of God is moving to center stage, stepping on and over more than an abundance of life’s joys and challenges clawing at her feet. Few will pay attention and she will have to shout over the world’s noise. But for her, it is the fullness of time, with a heart stretched out to God, she will proclaim, not with a question mark, but with an exclamation point: “Christ was born for this!”

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever more. Amen

Additional sources:
“Lectionary Homiletics,” Volume XVII, Number 1, 45-47.

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