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Christmas Eve , 12/24/2016
Sermon on Luke 2:1-20, by Beth A. Schlegel
I’m going to say the first part of a carol, and you answer with the next part.
Hark the herald angels sing – glory to the newborn King.
Good
Joy to the World ---- the Lord is come.
Great!
I wish I had a million dollars to give you as a prize, but I do have something of far greater value:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and his Son, our Savior Jesus Christ.
…
Have you ever had to pick teams for a game? You know, like kickball or volleyball or baseball or basketball?
I remember the times in school when the biggest or the strongest or the fastest were picked first. I always felt sorry for the others – the unathletic, the weak, the uncoordinated—who always knew nobody wanted them on their team, but they had to be picked ----last.
I was reminded of this while paying attention to the people president-elect Trump has been interviewing and picking for his cabinet posts. All of them are in varying ways high profile people in their fields, the top of the pyramid, important people, accomplished people, people who will now be on Trump’s team. This is not criticism, just observation. It is the way we do things as human beings – to accomplish our goals, we seek out the best resources, the best people who will help us to succeed.
For this reason, it is all the more astonishing that God turns the pyramid completely upside down.
Look who God chooses to accomplish his purposes – an old married couple who cannot have children to be the parents of millions of descendants, a small shepherd boy to slay a giant and who as an adult became a murderer, adulterer, and king of God’s people.
God made a tiny army of only 300 men to conquer an opposing army of 10,000;
and 1 single prophet to outshine 450 false prophets.
God chose peasants to carry his message to the people and a prostitute to rescue his servants.
And tonight, we see how God chose a lowly girl to be mother to his Son and a simple carpenter to be the guardian; God chose poor shepherds to be the first outside the family to see the humble Savior, lying in a cow’s feed trough.
Not a single one of these people who helped God to accomplish the purpose of God’s love was at the pinnacle of the human pyramid – they were at the bottom.
Including the very One who would save God’s people from their sins – Jesus.
It is hard to imagine a more insignificant birth than this Jewish boy in an urban back alley stable.
Wouldn’t it be more believable if this birth had taken place in a palace, the baby having royal parentage and being surrounded by the finest attendants, protected from the “real world”?
Wouldn’t it be more believable if this Jesus had been laid in an ivory cradle with a flashing LED sign saying in capital letters – the Savior of the world?
I don’t know. Maybe.
But if that had been the case, would the stinky, dirty shepherds have been left in to see him?
Would you and I with our lack of fame and fortune have been given access to this king?
I doubt it. He would have been only for those with VIP clearance, the high and mighty, the people at the top of the pyramid along with him.
We would be left wondering if the salvation he brings is really for us – if we qualify for it.
I think I might have assumed it wasn’t for me, given my awful track record, and not even bothered paying attention.
…
The truth is, God does not settle for that. God does not settle for my disinterest because does not settle for catering only to the top of the pyramid.
God’s heart – God’s love for the people created from his own passion for life – demands something else.
It demands that all people have access to the Source of mercy, forgiveness, and life beyond death.
It demands that all people have access to the Way to his own heart.
We girls know that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.
But we cannot cook and bake our way into God’s heart.
In fact, we don’t have to work at all for that.
The way to God’s heart is through Jesus.
We can be thankful that God’s ways are different from human ways.
We can be thankful that God turns the pyramid upside down so that the love he has for all people is shown first to the poor and humble – beginning with his own Son in human flesh, coming to us as a baby.
With the shepherds, we get to peer into that manger to see our Savior as approachable as our best friend.
It is astonishing that God chose to come into our world in vulnerability – as the kind of guy who would be picked last for the team.
Yet that is exactly who Jesus is.
And look how he continues God’s pattern of choosing the least to accomplish the most – when choosing his team, Jesus chose fishermen, a tax fraud, a skeptic, a few nobodies, a woman, a soldier, and a fixer.
Would you choose the likes of them for your team? I wouldn’t.
But Jesus did.
And even more than that, he made himself the most vulnerable of all – vulnerable to torture, suffering, crucifixion, death and burial.
All so that we in our human vulnerability might know that the salvation Jesus brings in human flesh and blood is indeed for us.
…
Not only our humanity, but the world we live in makes us vulnerable, doesn’t it?
We are overwhelmed by the increasing presence of violence in our lives – ISIS against Christians, drug and gang shootings in our streets, racial tensions and conflict with law enforcement, spouse against spouse and parent against children.
Even our entertainment is violent.
We are vulnerable to the forces of hatred and anger that give rise to violence.
We are plagued by threats to our freedom, our health, and even our identity.
We are overwhelmed by the costs of daily life, the pressures of work or unemployment, the anxiety of raising children, the impact of disabilities and the challenges of aging.
We falter in the perplexities of life and death, meaning and purpose, who we are and who we are to be.
We are vulnerable to the lie that all the answers and solutions can be found within ourselves;
And then are shattered to discover we are powerless.
..
The Christmas story is good news for the vulnerable.
For to you is born – in all vulnerability – a Savior, whose name is Jesus.
He is the Way to the Father’s heart full of love for you.
Jesus calls you over to the manger he fills with his infant body – and to the cross that he fills with his dying body – and to the tomb that is empty because he lives – no longer vulnerable.
Jesus picks you and me for his team – simple and flawed as we are – because the love of God demands that we share in the purpose for which we were created: namely, to love God and others and to be loved by God and others.
O come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord.
In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen