“What Did You Get For Christmas?”

This is the message that I gave at Pleasant Grove UMC, Brighton, TN for the 1st Sunday after Christmas (27 December 1998).  I came home to Memphis from Kentucky for Christmas and took the opportunity to go back to one of the two Memphis area churches I was a part of before I moved to Kentucky.

The Scriptures for this Sunday are Isaiah 63: 7 – 9, Hebrews 2: 10 – 18, and Matthew 2: 13 – 23.

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Well, Christmas is over. The family has all gone home; the unused wrapping paper has been put in the closet with the unused wrapping paper you stored away last year so that you wouldn’t have to buy any paper this year; and, the presents that haven’t been broken have been carefully been put away, never to be seen again. Sometime today or later this week we are going to take the lights off the tree and put it away until next year or throw it outside for the garbage collector to pick up.

Pretty soon all the signs of Christmas will be gone and life will return to normal. Then we will be wondering what happened to the hopes and dreams for peace and good will to all man kind.

I wonder what it was like for Mary and Joseph back then at the first Christmas. After all, at that very first Christmas, the shepherds came to visit them that night and then the wise men came a few days later. Then it was all over and life as a family began.

Of course, the life of the family took a turn that no one would have expected. When Herod found out that the wise men had lied to him, he sought vengeance. After all, to him the birth of this new King was not God’s promise to us but a threat to his own worldly kingdom. As the Gospel reading tells us,

When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.

Because the newborn Christ was a threat, Herod sought to erase all signs of Christmas. I sometimes wonder if that is not what society tries to do each year. We don’t mind Christmas but we want it to be a single moment in time or at best just a short season during the year. Once it is over, we want it eliminated until we need it again.

But Christmas can never be just a single moment in time or just a few short weeks during the year. God wanted Jesus to grow up in this world so that he would know this world. In the Epistle reading from Hebrews today, it is pointed out that if Jesus is to be our Savior, he had to be a part of our life.

In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers. He says,

“I will declare your name to my brothers’ in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises.”

And again,

“I will put my trust in him.”

And again he says,

Here am I, and the children God has given me.”

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death – that is, the devil –and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death. For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants. For this reason he had to be made likes his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

So, before we take down the Christmas tree and put up all the trimmings until we need them again, let us look and see if there is not one more present that we might have overlooked. Christ is our gift from God, a present to us to remind us of his love and care for us.

I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord, the deeds for which he is praised, according to all the Lord has done for us – yes, the many good things he has done for the house of Israel, according to his compassion and many kindnesses.

He said, “Surely they are my people, sons who will not be false to me”; and so he became their Savior.

In all their distress he too was distressed, and the angel of his presence saved them. In his love and mercy he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old. (Isaiah 63: 7 – 9)

But unlike many presents that we get each year, this present is one that has to be used each day. But using this present means that we make Christ a part of our life. Each day we must keep in mind all that Christ is and we find that to be a very difficult task. No wonder it is much easier to only talk about Christ at Christmas.

Accepting Christ means that we regain our relationship with God and that means that we accept obedience to Him. When Christ speaks of following him, there are no alternatives.

“Man can never escape from obedience to God. A creature cannot but obey. The only choice given to me, as intelligent and free creatures, is to desire obedience or not to desire it. If a man does not desire it, he obeys nevertheless, perpetually, inasmuch as he is a thing subject to mechanical necessity. If he desire it, he is still subject to mechanical necessity, but a new necessity is added to it, a necessity constituted by laws belonging to supernatural things. Certain actions become impossible to him. Others are done by his agency, sometimes almost in spite of himself.

When we have the feeling that on some occasions that we have disobeyed God, it simply means that for a time we have ceased to desire obedience. (From Waiting For God by Simone Weil)

Joseph took his family to Egypt out of his obedience to God. Abraham took his family to the Promised Land without questioning God’s command to go. Neither one asked God what was there nor how they would survive. Our obedience to God has to be the same way. Faithful obedience to God allows him to work effectively in our lives, protecting us from dangers of which we may be unaware, and leading us into new and exciting opportunities we’ve never dreamed of.

We see Christmas as a brief moment in time, to serve as an escape from all the troubles of the world. But the problems don’t disappear. Christ came to save us from our most pressing problem – our sin. “Man’s greatest need is not for a new political or economic order. His primary problem is sin. He is alienated from God, bearing the burden of this guilt and loneliness, facing a frightening future. He needs to be liberated from the tyranny of his sins, reconciled to God, and given a hope that transcends the circumstances of his life. This is what the Gospel message is about.

What presents did you get for Christmas? Did you open the present that God gave you or is it still under the tree?

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