All in the family room

Isaiah 9:2-7; Luke 2:1-20

Tonight is all about the birth of a child, God incarnated, God-with-skin-on, named Jesus. But his is not the first important birth in the history of the Israelite people. There was Isaac the son of Abraham and Sarah, first son in the line that led to King David. There was Samuel, Hannah’s son, who grew up to be the prophet who anointed David the shepherd boy. And there was John, the long-awaited son of Zechariah and Elizabeth, who grew up to be John the Witness who baptized lots of people in the Jordan River.

The song in Isaiah 9 is a reference to two important figures in Israel’s history: King Hezekiah and King Josiah. The song is not a birth narrative but celebrates the reigns of these two men. Originally written for the crowning of Hezekiah after a long war, it was later used in reference to Josiah for his faithful leadership. For Christians, it affirms the authority of Jesus, although he was, and is, a very different kind of king.

… Some churches have plays that tell the story of Jesus’ birth, with children acting out all the parts. Sometimes the adults participate in the storytelling. Here’s one pastor’s recollection of performing a Christmas play.

Timothy Adkins-Jones recalled the time he and his church produced Langston Hughes’ Black Nativity. He and his wife played Joseph and Mary, frantically looking for a place for the baby to be born. His wife was 8 months pregnant at the time and it was the source of hilarity for years.

The idea of Mary and Joseph searching for a room is based on a misunderstanding of a Hebrew word. It was the guestroom that was full, not the inn. And a careful reading tells us that Mary and Joseph had been in town for a while. Verse 6 says, “while they were there, the time came …” They had family in town, a lot of family, since King David had lots of children. They had been in town long enough to have housing arranged, to meet with the midwife, and to have the swaddling and other supplies on hand.

So imagine that Mary gave birth with the midwife and maybe an assistant on hand. There were probably one or two older female aunties and maybe even Mary’s mother in town as well. After the baby is born, he is placed in a manger full of fresh hay. The manger might have been be a hole in the floor, or a movable wooden trough. In today’s world, he might have been settled in a dresser drawer or a laundry basket. Perhaps the animals are inside the house for the night, so they are also present. This precious child, as welcome as all children are, is put to bed surrounded by his family.

And yet, he is not just any child. He is so special that the angels tell the shepherds about him, and send them to see the baby. The shepherds report on the angel encounter, and everyone praises God. They will all give witness to the birth of this child.

… Whether Mary and Joseph spent hours knocking on inn doors looking for a place for Mary to give birth, or they were in a crowded and loving family home isn’t important in the long run. What is important is that our God cares enough about us to make sure we know the true story … that God is always present with us. Sometimes we can even see God in the presence of love or grace offered through another person, a gift from God directly to us.

It happens that this year, there will be no big Christmas celebrations in Bethlehem, Israel. The city is in Palestine, within the walled-off region of the West Bank. It is dangerous to go there with the Israel-Gaza war and its echoing conflicts popping up in Palestine. But the church has not abandoned the opportunity to give witness to the birth of the baby.

You may have seen the image on social media. At the center is a baby Jesus from a traditional nativity scene. He has a keffiyeh, a Palestinian scarf, across his body, just as he might look every year in Palestine. But this year, he is surrounded by rubble, as if a bomb fell near him. The pastors of the Lutheran Church in Bethlehem want to remind us that Jesus is present all the time, everywhere. He is still and always Yeshua and Emmanuel.

… As the shepherds left town after seeing the baby, they glorified and praised God. It has long been my practice to have the sending hymn on Christmas Eve be Go tell it on the mountain because this is what we should do, too. We should be so happy that Christ has been born that we don’t hesitate to share this good news with everyone.

So I ask you … How will you be an angel or a shepherd, telling this good news to someone who needs to hear it? Amen

 

 

 

With thanks to Timothy Adkins-Jones:

https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/christmas-eve-nativity-of-our-lord/commentary-on-luke-21-14-15-20-24

Mary’s dream

 2023 12 24a Sermon

Luke 1:46b-55; Luke 1:26-38

Today, I have lots of questions, with few answers. Maybe you, too, have wondered about these things.

Once upon a time, about 50 years ago, a pastor said to the Bible study group I was in, “In Jesus’ time, all girls wanted to be the mother of the Messiah.” In all my studying over the years, I have never seen anything in scripture or commentaries about that, but we can suppose it’s true. Especially when times were challenging, we know that hopes were high for the messiah to come. And 2,000 years ago, Judea was an occupied country, a province of Rome, with soldiers constantly on the watch for mischief by the locals.

It was a superstitious age, when people believed in spirits, in ghosts, in angels. So, most angels began their conversations with humans like this: Don’t be afraid! I am an angel, sent by God with a message for you. Then they usually tell the person they have a special job for the person to do. The angel encounter with Mary fits this pattern.

Gabriel tells Mary she will be the mother of a boy she is to name Yeshua, which means God saves: ye- for God, shua for saves. This boy will be great, he will be called the son of the Most High, he will inherit the throne of King David, and reign over the house of his ancestors forever.

Mary is puzzled, since as a young woman, she has no husband. Gabriel assures her it will be by God’s power that this happens. The Spirit of God will overshadow her. I imagine this looks like a heavenly dove gathering Mary under her wings and making Mary feel safe while she breathes in God’s Spirit. – At least, that’s what I am thinking today.

To prove that this is real, not just the dream of a young Judean girl, Gabriel then shares some news. Go check with your old auntie Elizabeth. She thought she would be childless until she died, but she is now 6 months pregnant!

Mary agrees to participate in this miraculous event. The author of Luke doesn’t tell us how Mary broke the news to Joseph, her fiancé. Though, the author of Matthew tells us there was some trouble that required the appearance of an angel to resolve. Luke tells us that Mary went to spend time with Elizabeth during the older woman’s third trimester.

Having been a pregnant woman with friends who were also pregnant, I know the conversations they had. But then, these two have the added feature of divine action, which added elements I can only dream of to their time together.

As Luke tells the story, Elizabeth greets Mary by telling her that baby John leapt in her womb when she and baby/ fetus Jesus arrived. And that Mary sang a song, which is our psalm today. The traditional beginning is: My soul magnifies the Lord, so we have called this the Magnificat. We get to sing one version of it later in the service.

My practical, somewhat skeptical and seminary-trained mind wants to know if Mary actually wrote this on the spot, if she developed it as she travelled to visit Elizabeth, if she wrote it over time, or if Luke wrote it for her, decades later.

I also have wondered – assuming she wrote something like it – how the boy Jesus would have heard it. How would it have influenced him as he grew up?

… Pregnant women – at least those who want to be pregnant – are excited to be having a baby. Being pregnant changes our lives. We focus on what we need to do to have a healthy pregnancy, what we will need when the baby arrives, whether it’s a girl or a boy, and we pray that the baby will be whole and healthy.

We wonder what they will grow up to be. We hope they will follow in our footsteps, or we hope that they don’t follow in our footsteps. We hope they will change something in the world, make the world a little better for those who follow.

But we never imagine they will be the messiah!

… Until he was about 5 years old, Mary would have been Jesus’ main influence. Once he was old enough to learn something about his father Joseph’s craft, he would have spent more time in the workshop or at the jobsite. And he would have learned the Torah and its meaning. There are legends, but no scripture stories, about Jesus’ childhood in any of the canonical Gospels, other than the Luke story about him in the temple when he was 12.

Did he have special knowledge, extra information about the Hebrew Scriptures, as the Son of God? Or did his childhood as the son of a skilled laborer in a poor community, combined with his mother’s song and teaching, give him a different point of view than the traditional priestly interpretation?

When we look at the song itself, how much of it did Jesus do? Certainly, he left the toppling of thrones to others, but his teaching and living definitely fulfilled all the merciful, uplifting stuff in the rest of the song. And it has influenced people ever since it became known to the world. 

… In my studying this week, I was intrigued by a story. There was a small town with a monastery which had once been a thriving community. But over time, there were fewer monks living there. They found it hard to get along with each other, and the abbot was worried they would need to close the monastery.

One day, the abbot had a conversation with the local rabbi, telling the him about the problems they were having. The rabbi said he had no answers, but he could tell the abbot that the messiah was among them. The abbot reported this conversation to the monks, and before long, they were all getting along much better. They were kind and forgiving with one another. The monastery was thriving so well that young men were asking to join.

… The messiah came to Judea, born of a young woman and a young man, with the help of God’s Holy Spirit. His teaching changed how people saw each other, perhaps because of a song his mother wrote.

Let’s pay attention to this song and look for the messiah to come among us at an unexpected time. Amen