Christmas Eve (Year B) December 24, 2020
Luke 2:1-14-20 Panzer Liturgical Service
If we think of Advent as the time of preparing for a wonderful party, then the seasons of Christmas and Epiphany are the party themselves. In Advent, we have heard messages of hope and promises of salvation through the words of the prophet Isaiah, and from the mouth of Jesus’ cousin and predecessor, John the Baptist. In Christmas and Epiphany, we are invited to celebrate the fulfillment of those promises in the gift of Jesus Christ. Our closing hymn this evening, “Joy to the World,” reminds us that the news is too good to keep to ourselves: "Let every heart prepare Him room, and heaven and nature sing…
These are the days of singing for all of creation. God’s word is fulfilled. The Lord has come, and through him, we will all be saved. Tonight, we celebrated the birth of a child, but not just any child, mind you. Tonight, we celebrate the birth of God’s own son, the very coming of God in the flesh.
The theological term is “incarnation,” means, “God made flesh.” The whole Christmas story, as we piece it together, tells of people who were truly in awe of what was happening around them. The newborn child in the manger, his parents, the angel-struck shepherds smelling of sheep and sweat, the wise men, and their costly, aromatic gifts, all were waiting for God’s blessing. And that blessing came in the person of Jesus Christ, growing from infancy to childhood, and beginning a ministry among God’s people.
Tonight, we celebrate this incarnation, the fleshing out of the story of God’s love for all of God’s people: it is a story of the extraordinary filling the ordinary; it is God’s glory manifested in earthly, ordinary things.
On an ordinary Christmas Day, most of us will sit by our Christmas trees, empty our stockings, open our gifts, play with our toys, try on our new clothes, and share in a special meal. Then we will clean up, gather up the trash, and declare Christmas over and done – forgetting that December 25th is the first day of Christmas, not the last. We will judge it as a success or failure by the general mood of the participants at the end of the day, and by how full we feel when going to bed. But maybe this year will be different. Maybe our experience of the last nine months with all of the changes brought about by Coronavirus pandemic has taught us to think differently about the holiday.
This year, the telling of the story feels different. Previous distractions are gone… no travel, no parties… it’s easy to feel like something has been taken away. But this year, I am reminded that the story of Christmas is about more than the hoopla we build around the holiday. I am reminded more than ever that this night celebrates a miracle. And not just a story of something that happened in the past. The Christmas story is a story for today, and it is true and real and relevant to our lives because it asks us to change the way we live.
Have you ever thought about what if you had to tell someone if they had never heard of Jesus’ birth? How would you share what Christmas means to you? What would you say? It’s not bad to love the shopping and gifts and movies and carols… it’s perfectly OK to plan for travel and fun as we gather with family and friends. But this year, in the absence of the grand holiday experience, how profound the story of Jesus’ birth really is. For the Christmas story is not just a personal story… it’s a story about how everyone got welcomed at the manger.
The presents, the trees, and the wreaths, the shopping, the wrapping, and giving, are neat. But they are not what Christmas is all about. The story’s key ingredients of love and sacrifice can only be embodied most fully within the story of God’s love. Christmas is about the birth of a baby, and everyone loves babies. But Jesus wasn’t just any baby. He was different – more than special. He was God’s gift to us. God sent him to us so that we could have a King, the kind of king that God would choose for his beloved children, the kind of king the world had never known.
And as we tell this story, we are compelled to ask, why did God choose this way to bring us a Savior? Tonight, we meet a baby born helpless, surrounded by animals and shepherds, born in poverty to a couple of limited means, living in a place that wasn’t even their home, in the quiet of a winter’s night. It’s not the way we expect the story to go. But it’s the story we have to tell.
This night is a defining moment for Christians of every time and place. It was also a defining moment for God. On this night, God came to us.
…
God chose to plant himself into the womb of a poor, unwed girl, through nine
months of forming fingers and toes and ears and eyes. Then there was the birth…
like a million before it. God came into the world as other babies do. With
tears mixed with laughter, fear, pain, exhilaration, joy, exhaustion. Anguish
for Mary. Trauma for God. Finally, after all of that, God drew his first human
breath and smelled what? The warm stench of straw and animals. You can’t get
more humble than that. (Betsy Wright, The Virginian-Pilot, 12/16/95)
In Jesus, God becomes totally accessible. In Jesus, God isn’t the one we hide from, as Moses did behind a rock or covered his face, waiting for God to appear. No, in Jesus, we have a God we want to hold in our arms, a God who brings wonder, a God who embodies love in every way!
The nativity of Jesus is an entrée into Jesus’ life. It hits us at a personal level. There’s nothing more special than a newborn baby. But Jesus’ birth was also a world-changing event. It affected everyone, from shepherds to angels to traveling kings. We won’t know it until many years later, but this little baby, born in poverty and political upheaval, will turn the world on its ear. His life, his ministry, his death, and his resurrection will change everything we thought we knew about God, and what God expects of us.
God’s choice to bring his son to us was God’s ultimate sacrifice, for he had to know what a cunning and sinful people we are… that we would not fully accept the challenges that Jesus’ ministry lays before us, and that we would crucify him with our unbelief. But he sent him to us anyway. And on this night, we celebrate and believe in a love that is bigger than ourselves, bigger than we can imagine, a love in which our faith leads us to believe.
So, what can we say to convince someone of God’s love? I think this is the hard part. We can and should speak the truth of Jesus’ love, but the message only makes an impact on others if what we speak gets fleshed out. The love of Christmas is not only a feeling… it’s a way of life for the whole year… for our whole lives. And when we are called to love God, ourselves, and others, that means not only loving those who are easy to love, but everybody and everything God created. On this day, and every day, we are called to live out our love for Christ and be advocates and workers for God’s peace. That is the hard work of Christmas.
The birth of Jesus is supposed to amaze us – that’s why angels bring the news of good tidings of great joy. But the lowliness of Jesus’ birth also says some about our misunderstanding about power… Jesus comes as an infant King, even though the people were looking for someone to stand up to the Roman rulers and their oppression. And when the Word came, it was to people just minding their own business, families gathering for a census, shepherds taking care of their sheep, all unaware that a miraculous thing would take place nearby.
Luke’s account of Jesus’ birth reminds us that while the world wants to build borders and walls, dividing people by their differences, we are called to move toward one another, in terror and in joy. This baby came promising both peace and change to how we are called to live – one is not possible without the other.
The story of Christmas Eve is
not just a story about this one night… it’s the beginning of a lifelong story
that has the power to change the world if we will let it. This year, we celebrate
on Christmas Eve together because, even during a global pandemic, because the
thought of sitting home is something we are not prepared to do. And before we
go home, we will gather outside in the cold, masked and appropriately social
distanced, to light candles and sing the words of probably the most famous
carol of them all. What a great reminder that we are not alone.
Tonight, we look to the manger where we see the savior of the world, swaddled in warmth and in the safety his parents provide. Jesus lies there, fragile and dependent, representing all of us – of every age – who need the care of family and neighbor. It is a reminder that we are the children of God, swaddled by the love of God. And we are the ones called to share that love with all so that they can know the good news, as well. It is the message of today, and every day.
Poet Howard Thurman said it
this way:
When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and the princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
to heal the broken,
to feed the hungry,
to release the prisoner,
to rebuild the nations,
to bring peace among brothers and sisters,
to make music in the heart. (Seasons of Communion, p 16).
* * *
See Robb McCoy & Eric Fistler, Pulpit Fiction Podcast – Christmas Eve
https://www.pulpitfiction.com/notes/christmaseve
See Melinda Quivik, Worshingpreacher.com
Nativity of Our Lord, Christmas Eve 2020
https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/christmas-eve-nativity-of-our-lord/commentary-on-luke-21-14-15-20-18
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