Sermon

Christmas Eve

Scripture Text:

Isaiah 9:2-7

Sermon:

Last week, I got a call from a reporter at the Chicago Tribune because she saw that we were advertising a worship service called “Blue Christmas.” There were several churches offering Blue Christmas services and she wanted to do an article about them. Some people call it: “The Longest Night” service, some call it a Christmas Healing Service. But it’s the same idea: Christmas isn’t easy for everybody, and as the Church, we want to offer a place for all people in this holy season, whether they’re very merry or not so merry or just not merry at all.

A friend of St. Benedict told me recently that Christmas for her family is very hard because over the years during the holidays they’ve lost her mother, her father, and her nephew, and her mother and her nephew the same year. There are several families in this church who are celebrating their first Christmas without someone they love. And I’m sure there are those of you who are celebrating the second, third, seventeenth, or fiftieth Christmas without someone who you love, and that you still feel that empty chair and that empty place in your heart every year at this time.

The reporter asked me: “Pastor, isn’t Christmas supposed to be ‘happy’ for Christians? Isn’t it a time of joy and celebration?” Well, yes, it is. It is about celebration: candles, lights, music, exchanging gifts, baking and cooking, decorating, welcoming a new baby, and welcoming God to earth. But that’s not the whole story… and that’s important because Jesus’ life on earth was a life that made room for all of our human stories: happy and not-so-happy, normal and not-so-normal.

He was born to a mother and father. He was a kid who Luke tells us showed off his the teachers at the Temple. He walked, ate, wore clothes, and used the bathroom just like any other human being. He had friends, he ate great meals, he went to weddings, he got baptized. But he also fought with his parents, he was bullied, he was ignored, he was lonely, he lost his temper, he got arrested, he was beaten and abused, and he died a violent and very real death. He lived a fully human life. That’s what Christmas is about.

Even Jesus’ parents didn’t exactly have a merry Christmas that first year. Their son was born, that was joyful! And their son was God, come down to earth to be closer to all of humankind and to bring us salvation and grace! That was joyful. But the Christmas story has a lot of hardship as well as joy. You thought going through O’Hare at Christmas time was a nightmare? Mary and Joseph had to travel 70 miles on foot, they couldn’t find a hotel or beds to sleep in, so they spend the night in a stable, which was probably more like a cave than a barn. Their families were far away, and King Herod was out to get them: it was not a Christmas they would get all nostalgic about years later.

It’s ok for Christmas not to be perfect, or entirely merry, or a day of unadulterated joy and bliss. Although, of course, it’s also ok if it is! But I want you to know that there’s room with the Holy Family for you if you’re carrying some heaviness in your heart, if you’re mad at God, or if you’re not sure how you feel about Christmas at all. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph can take it. They’ve been there. There’s room at the manger for heavy hearts, there’s room for anger, there’s room for doubt, there’s room for grief and disappointment. There’s room for the families of the firemen in Chicago who died in a burning warehouse this week, trying to save any homeless people who might have been trying to take shelter inside. There’s room for the family of a student at Bolingbrook High School who took his own life this past month. There’s room for people whose homes have been lost to floods, earthquakes, or the terrible rains we’ve heard about in southern California, for people who aren’t sure what or if they’ll be able to eat today, for people who live in such desperate poverty that we can’t even imagine it. There’s room for people who face violence every day, whether in their own homes, or in the streets and villages of their country. There’s room for soldiers, for refugees, and for victims of torture.

We heard words tonight from the prophet, Isaiah, that don’t sound very Christmas-y: For all the boots of the trampling warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire. Those words are for those people who live with war and long for peace. And the birth of Jesus promises them that. The story of Christmas is about joy and baked goods and blinking lights (it IS!), and it’s about war and loss and loneliness.

And so here we are, on Christmas night, gathered around the manger with all the people of God – and we are all welcome here. There is a place for all of us, no matter where we have been or what we have been through or what we’re not sure about. God has made a place for us in the birth of Christ.

Isaiah says, a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light, Isaiah said. We find our way to the Light, but the journey shouldn’t stop there. The journey doesn’t stop at the manger – now that God has welcomed us here, where can that light, called Christ, lead us? How can that Light change us? We can also be instruments of the Light of Christ in a world of where there is so much darkness. May the light and joy of Christmas and the birth of Jesus give us an extra jolt of love and hope to go out into the world and share love and hope with others, especially those who need it more than we do.

Merry Christmas to you, and hope, peace, and Light in the darkness. Amen.

Uploaded on December 25, 2010 in by RevHeidi

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