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Things earthly and heavenly gathered into one: A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2025

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December 24, 2025
Christmas Eve
2025

On Christmas Eve, I always feel the chasm between the way things are and the way they ought to be especially acutely. There’s the beauty and brightness of our church, our worship, and our music; the joy of our celebration, our happy faces, excited children. And then outside, there’s the darkness of night, the realities of a world, suffering people, breaking hearts, hunger, homelessness, violence and evil.

Those differences have always been present, but in the past decade or so, I’ve been feeling that disjuncture more acutely, and it seems that gap between the world’s suffering and our celebration grows ever wider.

We live in tumultuous, chaotic times, as we watch our society collapsing, behavioral norms vanishing, as we witness the attacks on civility, on science, and learning, as institutions we held dear are under attack. We are fearful, anxious, and we know that others around us are even more frightened as families are ripped apart and immigrants deported. We avert our attention from the news because we can’t bear knowing all the details, whether it’s suffering in Gaza, war in Ukraine, or attacks on our healthcare system that put all our lives in danger.

This chaos has even come to Christianity as it is experienced and practiced in the United States. The rise of Christian nationalism has transformed the figure of Christ from the Prince of Peace to a Warrior, as it rejects his message of love of neighbor and enemy, and his embrace of the outcast, the vulnerable, and the foreigner.

It may be that you are tuning me out right now, because you came here to get away from all of that, to have a little peace and quiet, to sing familiar carols, to be reassured of well, normalcy, in these strange and unsettling times. We want to keep the barbarians, or our deepest fears, outside the gates, and activate security systems in our homes and our psyches to keep the chaos at bay.

But there are similar contradictions at the heart of the Christmas story, at the heart of the Christian faith. Think about Luke’s story of the birth of Jesus. On the one hand, he places his narrative squarely in the context of the Roman Empire: “In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.” We see the reach of empire—a capricious, violent ruler demanding that the population be counted, why, so imperial domination could extend its way to the furthest reaches of the population. Rome, the eternal city, the city to which all roads led, the greatest power the world had ever seen.

On the other hand, and the contrast couldn’t be greater, another city is mentioned, the city of David, Bethlehem,  a tiny village far from the centers of power. But with the mention of David, an allusion to a long-ago monarchy that was conquered, a subject people, and a far away history.

And the people: the emperor, the governor, men in power, men of power, and Joseph, a powerless nobody, Mary, a pregnant, vulnerable teen. Their places: palaces, sumptuous furnishings and meals, many attendants; the other, Joseph and his family at a manger, in a cave? Because there was no room in the inn. Even more: The emperor would be announced throughout the empire as Savior, bringing peace; that’s the good news, the euangelion, the gospel. But the angels use the same language: a savior is born.

These contrasts like other contrasts of the season: light and darkness; the contrast between the emperor who reigns in Rome, and the king who is born in Bethlehem; the empire that rules by violence and intimidation; and the reign of God that ushers in peace and justice.  

Such dichotomies are present throughout Luke’s story. Think of the Magnificat, Mary’s great song of praise:

He has shown the strength of his arm, *
he has scattered the proud in their conceit.

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, *
and has lifted up the lowly.

He has filled the hungry with good things, *
and the rich he has sent away empty.

Such divisions, between the weak and the powerful; rich and power are divisions we know too well today, as the differences between the haves and have nots grow wider, billionaires increase their wealth while people go hungry and unhoused around us. These divisions which we know so well are used to divide and demonize the other.

But it’s not just in the world around us where we see such stark differences. We see them in ourselves, as well. We know the person we want to be, and the person we so often are; the differences between our hopes and aspirations and the realities of our lives; the differences between what we should do, and what we actually do, all the ways we fall short and disappoint ourselves and the ones we love. 

Our tendency, when it comes to our own lives, and the dichotomies in the world in which we live, is to overlook or try to ignore those differences, to hide them from ourselves, to insulate ourselves from the suffering and pain in our hearts and the world around us. We may even want to hide them from Christmas, in our efforts to have the perfect celebration in an imperfect world.

But that’s precisely the sort of misguided exercise we humans tend to attempt. In fact, what we are celebrating at Christmas is the breaking down of those barriers: God becoming human, the word becoming flesh. In the words of a blessing often used at Christmas: “Christ, who by his incarnation gathered into one things earthly and heavenly…”

Or St. Paul: “In Christ, God was reconciling the world to Godself”

Christ comes into the chaos of the world, into its suffering and pain; takes on that suffering and pain, redeeming it, and us. In Christ, we receive adoption through grace, grafted onto his body. In Christ, all things are made new.

We see that taking place as Christ takes on human flesh, as a baby, in all the vulnerability and weakness that symbolizes, in the dependence of a baby on the love of parents and others. 

We will go from this place out into a cold and dark world, the light of our candles extinguished, but the hope in our hearts rekindled. The world will not have changed. There is still suffering, pain, despair; in the dark places of the world, and in the dark places of our heart.

But the coming of Christ brings rays of hope and love into that darkness for the light, the light of Christ, shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it. May the light of Christ, may the light of Christmas, shine in the darkness of the world, the darkness of our despair and fill us with his light and grace.

Christmas Eve, 2024

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“In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus…” 

Once again, we hear the familiar story from the Gospel of Luke; its cadences roll over us like an old familiar song, helping us to settle into our celebration of this holy night. As we listen, we conjure up images of Christmas pageants we’ve attended or been in, of children in makeshift costumes, forgetting or blurting out their parts. As we listen we may find our imaginations wandering elsewhere, to the historical record or to the rather different story in the gospel of Matthew and asking ourselves how it all fits together. Our questions and cynicism may keep us at a safe distance from the story, blocking our emotions, staving offi its power.

Our human tendency is to ask such questions; and since the Enlightenment our scientific and historic curiosity has so examined this story and stories like it, that we may not be able to approach it with the wonder and imagination that it demands. It starts at an early age—at our 4:00 pm service, I invited the children to come forward to sit around the creche. We talked about it, I asked them what they saw and didn’t see. One of them wondered why it was a cave and not a stable. Well, the answer is, there’s no stable mentioned in the story—a manger, but no stable.

 For it is a story that, in spite of its clear references to historical events—a census taken under Caesar Augustus, among others—exists outside of time and history, in eternity. It is our story, as it is the story of countless generations before us; a story steeped in tradition and symbol, radiating out through history and culture, shaping our imaginations, our hopes, our faith.

It’s a story we know, its familiarity a comfort in challenging times.

But for all its significance and symbolic power, for all its seeming timelessness, Luke roots the story firmly in time: “In those days, a decree went out from Emperor Augustus…” And in so doing, he brings us square up against the historical realities humans faced in the first century, and the realities we face today. A census in imperial times meant one thing—to determine population and to levy taxes. Luke presents it as something of imperial whim—the whole world bending to the impetuous decision of an autocratic ruler; impulsively and arbitrarily forcing the movement of whole populations across boundaries. Sound familiar?

What matters in all this, in the makeshift accommodations, in the forced relocation, in the angelic appearance to the shepherds, is that it all takes place among the most vulnerable, the most marginalized. God intervenes in history, God makes Godself present in history not in the centers of power, in Washington, Beijing, Moscow, Silicon Valley, or Rome, but in an obscure corner of the world, among the poorest and least significant, in the unlikeliest of places, among the unlikeliest of people. 

Allusions abound in this story. The shepherds, out with their flocks feeding on the grass of the fields, find the infant Jesus, lying in a feeding trough. Even more poignantly, Mary wraps the infant Christ in bands of cloth. At the end of Luke’s gospel, another Joseph, of Arimathea, will wrap the body of the crucified Christ in bands of cloth for his burial. It’s not just that God becomes flesh among the most marginalized and vulnerable; the enfleshed God—Jesus Christ shares in that weakness and vulnerability. Christ is that weakness and vulnerability.

But even in that weakness and vulnerability, there is beauty and power. Just as the angels announced Christ’s coming to the shepherds, an announcement that would be more fitting in a temple or palace than in a pasture with grazing sheep, so too would angelic presence accompany Christ’s resurrection.

It’s easy to look past the weakness and vulnerability and to focus on the glory and power. We humans like flashy things—bling, swag, the images posted on social media by influencers; the strutting models and a-list celebrities; the new gilded age of billionaires and techbros. 

We want to look past the weakness and vulnerability of our fellow humans, whether it’s the unhoused people on the streets of Madison, the victims of horrific war in Gaza, or desperate refugees and asylum seekers on our borders. We want to forget about all those people caught up in a healthcare system that cares only for profits, and not for people. We want to downplay or ignore our own weakness and vulnerability, we hide it behind bluster and bravado, or stoicism.

On this night, gathered here in this place, to celebrate Christ’s birth, to sing the familiar carols, to experience Christ’s presence among us, not only in a manger, in a stable in Bethlehem, but in the bread and wine of the Eucharist, the body and blood of Christ.

We see Christ in the manger, we see Christ in the bread and wine, fragile, vulnerable, weak. We bring our own vulnerability, our sins and shortcomings, our broken bodies, our broken relationships, our broken lives. In our weakness, we see Christ’s weakness; in our weakness, we find Christ’s power, Christ’s grace and love.

In a century when we have seen and known such great horror, in a year when there has been so much suffering—Gaza, Ukraine, hurricanes and floods, school shootings across the country and most recently here in Madison. In a year when we have seen spiraling hatred—antisemitism, white supremacy; a year when climate catastrophe threatens, we bring with us, this night all of our fears and anxiety.

Here to this place, to this manger, to this altar. We bring it all to Christ, to the infant, to the body broken; the baby in the manger, the body on the altar. And as we come, he is with us, in our suffering, in our fears, in our doubts. 

Like the shepherds we come, in our terror and amazement, as the glory of the Lord shines around us. Like the magi we come, bearing what gifts we may have. And at the manger, at the altar, we kneel, in adoration and worship, to see the Christ Child, to see our Lord, to receive his grace and mercy, to be embraced by his love.

My friends, as old as this story is, as familiar as it is, its power to move and change us remains as strong as ever. Whatever you have brought with you today, whatever joys and griefs, fears, anxieties, doubts, this story, this child, our God can heal you, give you strength, courage, and hope. Our God is with us, in our suffering, our God is with all those who suffer across the globe and throughout history.

The child born in Bethlehem, the Christ who was crucified, raised from the dead and now reigns in majesty, Christ comes among us, enters our hearts and our expectant world, offering grace, mercy, and peace to all. May our lives be filled with his presence and may the world come to know his saving grace and boundless love. 

Merry Christmas!

Ghosts of Christmases Past: A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2022

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One of the most beloved Christmas stories is Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. It’s often said that Charles Dickens invented modern Christmas. It has been made into films and plays. It has been rewritten and adapted—This past week Corrie and I watched Spirited starring Will Ferrell and Ryan Reynolds. We’ll probably watch Scrooged starring Bill Murray before the holidays are over. We probably won’t watch A Muppet Christmas Carol, even though my social media feeds insist that not only is it the best adaptation of Dickens’ story, it’s the bese Christmas movie of all. 

As I was watching Spirited it occurred to me that I am haunted by Christmases past this year. I’m probably haunted by past Christmases every year, but this year the ghosts of past Christmases seem especially potent.

 Tonight is the first time we gather here on Christmas Eve since 2019; our traditional customs and rituals, our lives and world, disrupted by pandemic. I was asked more than once in the past few days, “We will have services?” “Are there contingency plans?” The concerns were real, of course but driven, not by the continued pandemic, but by the speculation and worry about the weather. We hardly remember that years ago, we wouldn’t have had a second thought about coming out to Christmas Eve services in sub-zero temperatures.

As we gather this evening in this beloved, beautiful space, lovingly decorated by our Altar Guild, surrounded by the sights and sounds of Christmas, we embrace the familiar even as we are mindful of the time that has past, of all that has happened. There are ghosts among us: loved ones who are no longer among us; there is all that we’ve suffered, individually, communally, globally over the last nearly three years. 

There are those who are suffering now: the people of Ukraine, subjected to missiles and drones destroying their homes and culture, leaving them cold and dark. There are refugees and asylum seekers on our borders; people staying in homeless shelters or seeking what shelter they can find, as Mary and Joseph did so long ago in Bethlehem. And tonight, especially, we think all of those still suffering from the impact of the storm and the frigid temperatures in our nation.

Ghosts of Christmases past.  Among them, for me especially, I’m haunted by the images that haunted me every Christmas at Grace up to 2020. For thirty-five years, from 1984 until March 2020, we worshiped in this beautiful space on Christmas Eve while on the opposite side of the courtyard, men huddled on cots, trying to sleep and rest in a crowded basement. The irony of it all was never far from my mind. We, hearing again the story of a pregnant mother and her fiancé seeking shelter in a distant town. We, celebrating the coming of the Christ child, the incarnation, God made man, coming from warm, inviting spaces, returning to celebrations with family and friends; while a few hundred feet away, men were spending the night as they had spent so many nights before and would again and again. And of course, they are not here now, but they are in this city and throughout the world, homeless men and women, homeless families without shelter tonight.

The starkness of that reality is also only a memory, a ghost, let’s say; but even so, for some of us, perhaps many of us, the reality of our lives and our world, the suffering and trauma, may only be masked by the celebration of this evening. Some of us will return to dark and empty homes. Some of us will be mourning lost loved ones; some of us will be facing the realities and pain of broken relationships. Ghosts of Christmases past. Ghosts of Christmases longed for but not experienced. Ghosts of Christmas suffering.

Yet we are here, and in spite of our worries and troubles, we sing familiar carols, we hear the familiar story. In spite of the cold outside, we are here, surrounded by warmth—not just of the heating system. We are embraced in the warmth of community, of joy, of excitement, of wonder. We celebrate Christ’s coming into the world. 

To enter into the story, to hear it read once again, to sing the familiar carols, to be surrounded by the beautiful decorations, connects us with our own stories, and helps us once again to experience the light and love of Christmas. 

The story connects with us because of its familiarity. We have heard it so many times—in the language of the King James Version—swaddling clothes, sore afraid; in modern translations, in countless reinterpretations and retellings, on tv, in artistic depictions, Christmas pageants like the one we saw this past Sunday at Grace. 

It is a familiar story in other ways, some we may not acknowledge. A couple forced to travel by occupying powers; a young girl giving birth in uncomfortable, perhaps even inhumane conditions. A story told about people in a small town far removed from the centers of power, and money, and culture.

Tonight we feel the vast chasm between the world we want and the world we have; the world we had and the world in which we live. But that is nothing new.

The vast chasm between what is and it is meant to be, what will be, is at the very heart of Christmas. It reveals itself in so many ways—in God coming to us in the person of an infant, the power of God becoming the powerlessness, the weakness and vulnerability of Jesus. God coming to us, not in majesty and power but in the silence and darkness of a night; God coming to us not in the center of the world, in Rome, or New York, or Hollywood, but in a little town on the edge of empire. 

In that act, in the manger in Bethlehem, God comes to us, revealing who God is, and revealing also who we are meant to be, what the world is meant to be. 

Jesus comes to us, a frail, vulnerable, weak baby, meeting us in our own weakness, vulnerability, and suffering. God comes down to us, in the darkness and silence of our lives, in the world’s suffering. And as God comes to us, in the silence, we see the world God is bringing into being, the world transformed by the coming of Christ. We see ourselves, transformed by God’s grace and love.

Love came down to us at Christmas, God emptied Godself, taking on human form, becoming one of us, so that we might see and know what love is; so that we might see and know love, so that we might be love in the world. As we go out into the world on this cold night, may our hearts be warmed by God’s love, and may we share that love with the world. 

Singing with Mary: A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2019

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Familiar carols, a beautifully-decorated church, our excitement and joy at the celebration of Christmas. It’s almost enough to take us away from the troubles in our lives and the troubles in our world—climate catastrophe, impeachment, refugees, endless wars and other conflicts.

Almost, but not quite enough. I was reminded of how very different the Bethlehem of 2019 is from that portrayed in the familiar carol by the nativity scene the artist provocateur Banksy produced this year. He calls it the “Scar of Bethlehem.” It shows Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus huddled in the shadow of the concrete wall that separates the Palestinian from the Israeli sides of the town; the light above the manger provided not by a star but by a hole in the wall made by a mortar shell. Today Bethlehem is hardly a town of peace; it suffers from the violence and terror of occupation and intractable conflict.

Our world, today, a creation groaning from the pains of evil inflicted on it by human greed, carelessness, and neglect; a world suffering from endless conflict; Our nation is deeply divided politically; with the gap between the few haves and the many have-nots widening daily; , the crushing burdens of medical and student debt affecting individuals across the generations; racism, America’s orginal sin continuing; The Church, the Body of Christ is torn apart by political and theological conflict.

In this world, in this place, we gather to celebrate again the coming of God to us, in human form, weak, tiny, vulnerable.

We have heard the familiar story, sung familiar carols and with them are brought out of the present day to our memories of Christmases past, but also, all the way back to that first Christmas. We sing in imitation and echo of the angels’ “Gloria in excelsis!” We come, kneel, and worship as the shepherds did, and if we pause for a moment, empty our minds of everything else that worries us or occupies our thoughts, we may, like Mary ponder all these things and treasure them in our hearts.

But if we ponder too long, we may be reminded of the deep wounds in our lives, in our nation, and in our world. We may grow weary, our hearts may grow cold; our despair deepen. If we ponder too long, we may want to avert our eyes, walk away, overcome by the weight of the world. Our pondering may have us contemplating the abyss, the fear, the helplessness, the hopelessness.

There are other ways to ponder. Luke says that when the Angel Gabriel came to Mary and greeted with the words, “Hail, favored one!” Mary was perplexed and pondered. After she learned that she would give birth to the Savior of the world; after she said her “yes” to God, as she reflected on the meaning of these events for her life and for the world, she eventually gave voice to her thoughts in the Magnificat, that great song of praise:

‘My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.

His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty. 

This powerful, prophetic hymn declares to us the work that God is doing here, tonight, in this place, in our world. It is work that God has been doing for a very long time and will continue to do until the final consummation of all things.

We Christians have domesticated and caricatured this great event. We have turned it first into an occasion of saccharine piety and sweetness that comforts and consoles us but never challenges or unsettles us. And our culture has cooperated with us to create and sustain a consumeristic spree of holiday spending and celebration that has nothing to do with the story we heard, the gospel that was proclaimed, the Word that has become flesh and lives among us.

We see a mother and baby, a loving family caring for its own. Onto that image we project our own images of loving families and see modeled ideals that we may or may not be able to achieve, or even want to achieve. The holy family is surrounded by all manner of figures, lost in wonder and worship. We hear the story, recreate and reimagine them but when we do they lose their power. We think of sweet, docile Mary, accepting her role, modeling her faithful and quiet devotion, ignoring the fierceness of her hymn:

He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty. 

As I reflected this week, as I read Mary’s hymn against the backdrop of the news, and the great events that occurring in our world, I was drawn to a sermon preached by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, that great German theologian and martyr. In Advent of 1933, as it was becoming clear the direction that Germany would take under Hitler, Bonhoeffer had this to say about the Magnificat, Mary’s hymn:

For those who are great and powerful in this world, there are two places where their courage fails them, which terrify them to the very depths of their souls, and which they dearly avoid. These are the manger and the cross of Jesus Christ. No one who holds power dares to come near the manger; King Herod also did not dare. For here thrones begin to sway; the powerful fall down, and those who are high are brought low, because God is here with the lowly. …

The manger, like the cross, is the place where we see Christ at his weakest, most vulnerable, most human. The manger is the place where we see Christ profoundly, wholly like us.

Yet the manger is where we also see God working out God’s marvelous purposes. We see God, in human flesh, coming to us, meeting us in our weakness and vulnerability. We see God, in human flesh, coming to encounter the poor, powerless, oppressed. We see God meeting refugees and strangers, prisoners, the homeless and hungry. In the manger, at the manger, we see God turning the world upside down, casting down the mighty from their thrones, turning away the rich, scattering the proud. In the manger, we see God bringing about a new world, a new order.

Into our world full of despair, fear, hatred, and evil, God has come. God has come among us as one of us, as the weakest, least powerful. It is mystery and paradox, that the Creator of the world, the Word, through whom all things came to be is now among us, with us, a wordless infant. His presence fills us with hope, and gives us words to speak.

Into our world, into our lives, God comes. Mary sang of God’s coming and of God’s mighty acts; casting down the powerful, sending away the rich, scattering the proud. Her faith proclaimed and sang those mighty acts, although there was little to show for them. Herod ruled, Rome ruled; the poor and the oppressed suffered.

So too, today. Let us proclaim and sing God’s mighty acts, let us declare to the world that Christ’s coming into it means a new world, a new creation. Let us rejoice and sing to the world that Christ’s coming brings hope to the hopeless, freedom to the prisoner, justice to the oppressed. May our hope burn brightly as our voices carry the tune: ”Gloria in Excelsis Deo” Thanks be to God!

The shepherds were just doing their job: A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2018

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 The shepherds were doing their job. It was a thankless, underappreciated life. They were little more than vagabonds, outsiders, feared and despised because they spent most of their time in the wilderness, living more like animals than humans. But it was a job someone had to do, like all those people who are doing their jobs tonight while we worship and celebrate: cashiers at convenience stores, employees at fast food outlets, hotel workers, doctors, nurses, orderlies, first responders. Continue reading →

God is with us: A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2017

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Is there anything quite so wonderful as a Christmas Eve service? The church is decorated beautifully with poinsettas and wreaths and greenery. Our beloved and beautiful crèche stands where it does each year at the foot of the altar, with its wonderful hand-carved figures. We have heard our choir and organ perform music familiar and new. Some of us have already begun to celebrate Christmas, having come here from parties or gatherings. Others are looking forward to late night festivities, or to lavish dinners tomorrow with friends and family.. Continue reading →

What wondrous love! A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2016

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“In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus.”

They would claim that he was divine, a son of God, Savior. His reign ushered in a new age, a new beginning, world peace. Heralds of his rule would travel throughout the known world, proclaiming the good news of the peace and justice that he would bring about.

Caesar Augustus, Emperor.

There is another side to the story. Thirst for power, brutal repression; execution and assassination of his competitors and opponents. Underneath the glittering facades of temples, fora, and other public buildings that he constructed throughout his empire, was brutal tyranny.

It was now, during the reign of this emperor, that the events recorded in Luke’s gospel occurred. It was during the reign of Caesar Augustus, who symbolizes both the glory and the evil of Rome, another story, a different reign, begins to unfold.

It’s as if Luke wants to present us with the two options as clearly and distinctly as possible—on the one hand, all of the Glory that was Rome, Caesar Augustus in all his splendor and power; on the other hand, Bethlehem, the manger, Jesus Christ, in all his poverty and weakness.

It should be easy for us. Rome is reduced to rubble and ruins while Christianity lives on. But let’s be honest. In fact, it’s not that simple. For fifteen hundred years, Christianity has been intertwined with empire and power. For over 200 years, Christianity has been enmeshed with the American Empire. And maybe, that’s the way we want it.

We want the show, the power. We want the bread and circus, the Hollywood entertainment. We want something, anything to numb us from the brutal reality in which we live.

We see a bit of that brutal reality in this story. A ruler’s whim, to count all of those he ruled, so that he could tax them more efficiently, control them easier, meant that in distant lands, people were forced to move from place to place in obedience to his power and might.

We are all too familiar with such movements by people, forced by events outside of their control. The sheer immensity of the refugee crisis throughout the world as people flee their homes because of bloodshed, and terror, and climate change. Human catastrophe on a scale not seen in generations. Just this week ending a 4-year horrific spectacle as the world looked on, forces backing President Assad of Syria seem to have reconquered Aleppo. The rubble, carnage, and human suffering went unabated while we watched, the international community’s efforts to end it ineffective, half-hearted.

Syria. The word evokes for us the immensity and intractability of the problems we face as a world. Suffering humanity, horrifically efficient technologies of war, unspeakable human evil, helplessness, futile diplomacy. Syria—a word, a region that links current events with the events of 2000 years ago.

The suffering has continued for so long. The endless war that began in 2001 shows no sign of coming to an end; the divisions, hatred, and distrust in the region show know sign of ending. We have grown so accustomed to it that we hardly notice, or care anymore. And we can’t imagine a world at peace.

With such enormous, intractable problems, we grasp for solutions and saviors: More and better weapons, more resolute use of power, political strong men, easy answers. If only someone with the political genius and ruthlessness of Caesar Augustus could save us.

Such desires, such hopes are not only on a geopolitical scale. They are also on a personal, intimate scale. Our private concerns and worries, our fears about our own lives, our families, our futures—we pin our hopes on miraculous, magical deliverance; a superhero who will make all things right, fix our problems.

We even treat religion like that. We believe in a God who will intervene and make things right, delivering a miracle when we need it most, or perhaps coming soon, at the end of time, to rescue us and make everything right.

We want easy answers, miracles, fireworks, and spectacles.

Instead of that, we hear this simple, familiar story from Luke, the birth of Jesus Christ in a manger, in a tiny town, on the edges of empire.

Christmas tells a very different story. God came to us, not as a superhero, not as easy answers. God came to us as one of us, in all of our frailness and messiness. God came to us, God came to the world, in the embarrassment of a stable, in the weakness of a newborn baby.

But you know, I don’t think we get that. I don’t think we understand or take to heart what it all really means. Oh, sure, we say the words, we sing the carols, we come to Christmas Eve services, light our candles, say Merry Christmas, but I’m not sure we grasp what it’s all about. Quite frankly, I’m not sure we’re able to grasp what it’s all about.

God came to us became one of us, as a tiny, weak, powerless baby, utterly dependent on others for survival. It was a life that began in poverty, humility, and obscurity. It was a life that ended with an ignominious an excruciatingly painful execution. To all appearances, it was a life lived in futility, without meaning.

Think about lives like that in our day—refugees fleeing the violence of Syria; mothers here in Madison worried whether there will be food to put on the table tomorrow, let alone whether there will be gifts to share with their children; the men sleeping in the homeless shelter across our courtyard this evening. Lives today lived in pain and suffering, loneliness and despair.

This is our world; the world we have made and inhabit, a world in which the glory of God is overshadowed by the lights of commercialism, and the beauty of God’s creation is destroyed by our hubris and greed. This is our world, in which we belittle, despise, destroy other human beings, created like us in the image of God, bearing like us the image of God.

This is our world. The amazing thing is that God loves it still. This is what we have made of our humanity, what we have done with the image of God in us. The amazing thing is that nonetheless, God became one of us.

In this story from Luke, we are presented with alternatives. Here, at Christmas, we see the power and hope of God’s love expressed in a baby, showing in weakness, vulnerability …

When the angels came to the shepherds, they were not coming to the powerful, the connected, the wealthy. When the angels came to the shepherds, they were coming to the marginalized, outsiders.

Jesus was born, God became flesh and dwelt among us, not among the powerful, the wealthy, the connected, but to poor, oppressed peasants in a backwater of empire.

If we only allow ourselves, we can see in this story, in the babe in a manger, the wondrous love of God. What wondrous love it is, that God took our human form, that God emptied Godself, as Paul writes in Philippians, to show us what humanity could be, what we might be.

What wondrous love it is, that angels appeared to shepherds, the Jesus Christ was born among the poor and oppressed.

What wondrous love it is that the Word became flesh and lived among us, to show us the power and possibility of love.

The manger, birth of Christ is a challenge to us. It is a challenge to us to hope and to love in spite of everything. It is a challenge to us to love our neighbor and our enemy. It is a challenge to us to love outsiders and outcasts, the homeless and the hungry, refugees, the marginalized.

The manger, the birth of Christ, is a challenge to us to see the world through new eyes, to see the world with hearts filled with hope and love bursting to share with others.

The manger, the birth of Christ is a challenge to us. It is a challenge to us to receive the love of God in Christ, to be remade fully in God’s image. It is a challenge to us to love like Christ loved, to go to the poor, the homeless, the hungry, the outcast ,to offer them food and shelter, to share with them the love of Christ.

What wondrous love—seen in the birth of Christ, seen in his giving himself on the cross. What wondrous love we’ve received. What wondrous love is ours to share. w

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Love Beckoning, Love Embracing: A Sermon for Christmas Eve, 2015

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As I was driving home from the church yesterday, a thousand things related to Christmas running through my head, including this sermon, it struck me that I have been at Grace for more Christmases than at any church (or in any city) since I left home for college thirty-nine years ago. In case you wondering, it’s my seventh Christmas here. To some of you who have worshiped here for thirty, or fifty, or more years, and have seen priests come and go, I’m still a newcomer, a transient. To others of us, seven years seems a remarkably long time. Continue reading →

The Light shines in all the dark places: A Sermon for the Feast of the Nativity

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Merry Christmas!

What does it feel like to say that familiar greeting this year? Are you filled with Christmas spirit? Are you ready to enjoy the annual celebration with joy overflowing, get-togethers with friends and families? Are you full of Christmas cheer? Or does it all, in spite of every effort, seem like Christmas this year is a little darker, our hope and joy dimmed by a nation and a world that seems to be spiraling out of control in violence, environmental degradation, and fear. Continue reading →

In this way, God chose to come: A sermon for Christmas Eve, 2013

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In this way, God chose to come

I had great joy in a three-week period this past summer to offer blessings soon after the births of three babies. It’s one of the highlights of my priestly ministry, to be invited to come into a hospital room and be with a new family, new parents, as they rejoice over the gift of a baby they’ve received, to pray with them, to share their joy, their hopes, their exhaustion, and yes, some of their apprehension. For all three families, it was their first child. I could see in the parents’ eyes their wonder, amazement, and love. Although extended families gathered around and they were all in the care of excellent hospitals and medical professionals, I could also sense the awesome responsibility that the parents felt.

As I’ve been talking, many of you will recall your own experience in hospital rooms like that, a few years ago, or perhaps decades ago. Some of you will be hoping for similar experiences in the near or not-so-distant future; and some of you may feel sadness that this is something you will never know personally. Whatever our individual experience may be, we know about the happiness and responsibilities, the joy and the heartaches, that come with newborn babies.

I encountered other babies over the last few months; babies that whatever the circumstances of their birth, were now living with their mothers on the street, or nearly so. Three or four months old; their mothers had come to me for help, for housing, or gas, or food. I could see in the faces of those mothers the same love I saw in the faces of the parents in those hospital rooms; the same hopes for the future. But what I saw most was worry and fear. Like most of you, when I encounter mothers and babies in these circumstances, I feel great compassion and sorrow, but that’s also often tinged with a little judgment, as I wonder what brought them to this place in life. I give them what financial help I can thanks to the generosity of members and friends of Grace, and I also try to point them in the direction of agencies that might help them with some more permanent solutions.

Tonight, at Christmas, we encounter another mother and baby, one whose situation is much more similar to those babies in need that I just described than the newborns I met in the hospital last summer. Mary and her husband may not have been homeless in our contemporary sense, but that night they had to find shelter in a stable, or more likely, a cave.

Mary was pregnant under suspicious circumstances—although she and Joseph were legally married according to Jewish law, the contract or marriage license had been signed, their relationship had not been consummated. According to that same Jewish law, Mary’s pregnancy meant she had committed adultery, and Joseph was legally obligated to divorce her. Mary’s pregnancy brought public shame on her and on her husband.

These are things we tend not to think about when we hear the familiar story of Jesus’ birth. Most of us know it so well, and if we haven’t heard it many times before, we probably still know its basic outline—a manger, a stable, no room in the inn; Mary, Joseph, the baby, shepherds, angels, all of that. We know it but we tend to overlook its messiness, the embarrassment of it all. It is a messy and embarrassing story in spite of everything we do to sanitize it and sentimentalize it.

Our images of Christmas are dominated by paintings like the reproduction on tonight’s service bulletin, crèches like the one that stands before our altar. Mary is young, beautiful, well-dressed; Joseph looks distinguished, mature, an upstanding member of the community. Except for the crude surroundings, things are serene, respectable, beautiful.

The reality was rather different. Mary was young, uncomfortably young by twenty-first century standards, her reputation in danger because of her pregnancy. Joseph too was disreputable, if not already, then he would be by deciding to stay with her. They were not from Bethlehem. They had come here because of imperial fiat, a distant and ruthless ruler imposing its whim on subject peoples. The shepherds who came to worship were even less respected than Mary and Joseph may have been; virtual outcasts living on the edge of society obeying none of society’s norms.

Here, to this place, God chose to come. To a tiny village, a manger, a feed trough in a troublesome backwater province of the greatest empire the world had ever seen.

Here, to this couple, God chose to come. To a young girl and her husband. We wonder about them. Christians have pondered the mystery of God becoming flesh through Mary. We have argued and debated; we have painted, and played music, and sung and prayed to her. We have imagined all manner of things about her. But what we can know is that when word came to her that she would have a son; when God chose her, she said yes. We don’t know much about Joseph other than his name and occupation. We don’t know how old he was; we know he was righteous—the Gospel of Matthew tells us that—and we know that when word came to him that Mary would give birth to God, Joseph said yes. To this couple, God chose to come.

Here, to this newborn infant, God chose to become flesh. If you’ve ever seen a newborn, if you’ve ever seen your own newborn child, you know about the beauty, love, excitement of a new baby. You also know about their weakness, vulnerability, their complete and absolute dependence on others for everything. Without the help of other humans, a baby will die in a few minutes or hours. They are utterly helpless. They are weak and needy and messy. In such a form, in such a body, God chose to become flesh.

The miracle of Christmas is not just the lovely story. In fact, the miracle of Christmas has nothing to do with virgin birth, or shepherds or wise men or angels. The miracle of Christmas is that in that newborn baby, we see God become human, God become one of us. In the vulnerability, weakness, utter dependence of that infant, we see the face of God. The miracle of Christmas is also that in two quite ordinary people, in Mary and Joseph, in two ordinary people who chose to say yes to God, we learn something important about the nature of faith.

That’s the miracle of Christmas, the miracle of Christianity. The God we worship is not a god of thunder resident on a high mountain. Nor is the God we worship a god who demands we bow to him because of his vast superiority. Our God is a God who created us, knows us, became one of us. The God who created us, knows us, became one of us, that very God chooses us.

We may encounter God or the presence of the divine in all manner of things—the beauty of nature, or of music or art, in a place that is sacred to us or sacred to a memory. None of that is beyond the possible. But our faith proclaims that we encounter God most certainly, most completely in the one who was born in Bethlehem, walked the dusty roads of Palestine, was crucified by Romans and was raised from the dead.

Our faith proclaims that we encounter God most certainly and most completely in a human who was born like us, lived like us, suffered like us and died like us. That’s the mystery of Christmas, the mystery of our faith.

We see the burden and the joy of that faith, the mystery of our faith in that couple as they wrap the newborn in swaddling clothes and lay him in a manger. We sense the burden and joy of our faith, the mystery of our faith as the gospel tells us, “and Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart.”

We cannot hope to comprehend or make sense of God becoming flesh in a newborn babe. We cannot hope to understand why or how or to what end. What we can do is treasure and ponder. We can respond to the needs of those in whose faces we see the face of Jesus Christ; we can wrap them in swaddling clothes and embrace them with the love of Christ. And above all, we can open our hearts and say yes when God asks us to bid God welcome.

May your hearts be filled with the joy and love of Christ, and may you share that joy and love with all those you encounter today and in the days to come.

Merry Christmas!