Beware - My Sermon for Sunday, December 17, 2006

This is my sermon for tomorrow morning - about eight hours from now.  If anyone has any comments to improve it, please let me know by 7:00 am eastern time : )   It based on the Magnificat and the reading from Philippians.

If I were to ask you to think of one word to describe Christmas,
what would it be?
Jesus. Joy. Peace. Hope. Love.
These are all good words,
but let me give you another word:
the word is beware.
I think it is one of the most appropriate words for the Christmas season.
You see, I think we had best beware of what is happening in these stories of Jesus’ being born.
We should “be aware” or “be wary” this Christmas,
and the closer we get to the birth of the Baby Jesus,
the more aware and wary we should become.

Of course one should always be careful when Christmas comes around.
For one, you have to be wary of the kinds of presents you give.
As a case in point, men do not assume that your wife will appreciate a home appliance as your Christmas gift to her.
A toaster or vacuum or new stove, while practical, will not warm the cockles of your spouse’s heart.
Beware of the gifts you give.

Beware as well of your behavior as Christmas day approaches.
I remember one year, my brother was a total jerk the last few weeks before Christmas.
He was mean, he was insolent, and he was completely rude to our parents,
and when Christmas day arrived,
imagine his surprise when the first two presents he opened were a box of coal and a bundle of switches.
But then, imagine my surprise when I found the same two things in my presents,
and you know me – I am now and was then the very incarnation of goodness,
a veritable angel,
and yet I got coal and switches too.
To this day I still feel the injustice of those gifts.
And to this day, I blame my brother Kevin for my receiving them.

And do I even need to say that you should beware of visiting with your family over the holidays.
While it is Christmas, and one might expect some good cheer,
the truth is that tensions are high and nerves are frazzled in this most wonderful time of the year,
and you never know when an innocent comment or remark will draw the ire of a sibling or an uncle or aunt.
Beware. Be careful.

And the same is true as we draw close to that manger in Bethlehem.
We need to beware and to be careful there as well,
and not just because we want to avoid stepping in the mud or the cow patties scattered around the stable.
No, what we really need to beware of is that little baby Jesus,
that innocent infant in the feeding trough.
We need to beware because this babe in a manger is a revolutionary in diapers or swaddling clothes to be more accurate,
and he will turn our lives upside down if we get too close to him.

A cursory look at the things Jesus said as a grown-up shows us how dangerous this man would become.
‘Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst, for they will be filled.

`You have heard that it was said, “You shall not commit adultery.” But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.

`You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well;

`You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven;

“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
(Matthew 10:34-39)

Now I don’t know about you,
but its clear to me that this Jesus is a dangerous man,
and we had best be very careful around him.
In fact, it is obvious from the scripture we have been reading these past few Sundays, that anyone who comes even remotely close to him will suffer the consequences of the encounter.

Take Paul for instance.
Paul, as you may know, is sitting in prison when he writes his letter to the Philippians.
In fact, many biblical scholars feel that this is Paul’s last visit to a prison cell and that he will soon be facing the executioner’s sword.
Paul probably even knows this,
and yet he has the gall to write:
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to all people. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication and with gratitude let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Finally, brothers [and sisters], whatever is true, whatever is honest, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think on these things.

And let us not forget about Elizabeth.
She and her husband Zechariah, a priest, have been chosen to give birth to John the Baptist,
the man who will precede the coming of Jesus and his ministry.
Now Zechariah himself is still in the middle of nine months of enforced silence because of his doubt,
and Elizabeth, she who was once barren,
a woman who is already collecting her social security and medicare benefits,
finds herself pregnant with the forerunner of the Messiah.
What kind of upside down world is that.

And lest we forget, there’s Mary - young, unmarried,
and certainly the most celebrated single mom in history
Of course over the years we have tended to transform Mary from being the single teenage mum, weary from travel,
rejected by all but her husband and cousin into a Christmas card, a stained glass window, or a stone statue sitting on a pedestal.

And what about Mary’s song?
My favorite comment on it comes from a preacher who tells the story of a college student talking to him about how the virgin birth was just too incredible to believe.
The preacher responded, “You think that’s incredible, come back next week.
Then, we will tell you that ‘God has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.’
We’ll talk about the hungry having enough to eat and the rich being sent away empty.
The virgin birth?
If you think you have trouble with the Christian faith now, just wait.
The virgin birth is just a little miracle;
the really incredible stuff is coming next week.”
It was the German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer who stated,
before he was killed by the Nazis,
“The song of Mary is the oldest Advent hymn.
It is at once the most passionate, the wildest, one might even say the most revolutionary Advent hymn ever sung.
This is not the gentle, tender, dreamy Mary whom we sometimes see in paintings..
This song has none of the sweet, nostalgic, or even playful tones of some of our Christmas carols.
It is instead a hard, strong, inexorable song about collapsing thrones and humbled lords of this world,
about the power of God and the powerlessness of humankind.
These are the tones of the . . . prophets of the Old Testament that now come to life in Mary’s mouth.”

21 Old Testament references in Mary’s song: quotes from the Psalms, Exodus, Job, Isaiah, Daniel, Amos and Micah
“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit exults in God my Savior,
for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaid.
He has scattered the proud in the imaginations of their hearts.
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly;
he has filled the famished with good things and sent the rich away empty.

And even if these words are not the most revolutionary ever spoken,
they certainly cut through any niceness that we might want to spread across the top of biblical texts.
After all, Mary doesn’t just talk about the poor.
She is one of them, and the whole story of the birth of Jesus is the story of God’s identification with the poor.
He comes not for the well – they have no need of him.
He comes not for the rich – they already have their reward.
He comes not for the powerful, they already have the means to exercise justice but choose instead to oppress.
No, God comes that the poor, those on the edge may know those things too.
He comes to fill the hungry not just with the crumbs that fall from the master’s table,
but with all manner of good things.
He comes that those who do not have life, may have life abundantly.

And that is the Good News, even the scandal, of the incarnation.
That Jesus came not to the temple, the cathedrals or even the mega-churches.
That he came not to the Roman Palaces, to the seats of power in Washington or London or Berlin.
He came, bringing good news, to the poor.
So when one hymn writer wrote a hymn based on the Magnificat that begins ‘Sing we a song of high revolt’ and ends
‘He calls us to revolt and fight with him for what is just and right,
to sing and live Magnificat in crowded street and council flat’,
he may offend our delicate sensitivities,
but he is not far from the spirit of Mary’s song.
For Mary sings a song of revolution.
She sings about a world turned upside down.
So, my friends, beware.

You see, now, do you not, that God’s ways are not our ways.
God’s ways are not about the mighty or powerful.
God’s ways are not about the rich or prestigious.
No God is all about the ones on the bottom,
those that no one else cares about or even recognizes.
The despised, the rejected, the outcast, the lost, the least, the lowly, the dying, the dead – these are the ones God sees, even if no one else sees them.
These are the ones God loves, even if human love for them is non-existent.

One of our United Methodist Bishops, Melvin Wheatley, spoke at Drew when I was a student there,
and he told the story of one of his sons.
A boy that was different from his brothers.
While his other sons were all outgoing athletes,
this boy was more withdrawn and artistic.
On family outings, while the other boys were running around throwing rocks or balls at each other,
this son would be noticing the beauty of the world around him,
pointing out to his father and mother the crystalline structure in the rocks,
the colors in the flowers and trees.

Bishop Wheatley said that in time he came to appreciate this son’s special sensitivity to the world,
but he also added that he came to know two things about his son which brought great pain to the whole family.
The first was that the son was gay.
Now this was in the 70’s and most homosexuals were firmly locked behind closet doors,
especially if they were the children of church pastors.
Bishop Wheatley knew how hard it was for his son to be honest about who he was and how that made him, his son, unacceptable to most people.
The second thing he learned was that his son had cancer and they would live to see him die.

Bishop Wheatley recalled how he met regularly with his son for lunch and conversation.
One day his son met him with a couple of paper bags in hand and said,
“We are going to do something special today dad,
I have something I want to show you.”
They walked through the city streets till they came to a street corner where there was a little park with a few trees and a little grass.
They sat down at a park bench, and began to eat their lunch,
and to throw a few crumbs to the birds.
The Bishop had learned to wait patiently in such situations to see what his son would do,
and after awhile the young man got up and began shooing the birds away, until there was just one left,
and he began to throw this one bird his bread crumbs.
“Here dad,” he said, “This is what I wanted you to see.
That bird has a bent beak,
and so it has to turn its head to pick up the crumbs,
and then it can’t see the other birds and they attack it.
That is why I shoo them away to feed it.”

“Because you see, Dad, God loves him too.”
God cares for those who do not fit it,
for those who are different and are not accepted by the rest of the world.
God cares for the lowly, the brokenhearted, the lonely,
the ones no one else cares for.”
It was in that moment, says Bishop Wheatley, that he came to understand what it is like to be a misfit in society,
and to know what God’s love for the least of us really means.

Mary sings,
“Blessed be God, for God has regarded the low estate of his servant.”
God has scattered the proud in the imaginations of their hearts.
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly;
he has filled the famished with good things and sent the rich away empty.
And in singing this song, Mary ushers in the revolution that will find its focus in her son, Jesus.

So be careful, and watch your step this next week.
You are approaching a dangerous manger.
Beware, for the one you seek did not stay a baby.
Jesus, nursed and cuddled by Mary, later claimed everyone who does God’s will as his mother.
Jesus, worshiped by shepherds, later challenged us to seek out not lost sheep, but lost people, all the lost, the least, the lowly ones.
Jesus, given gifts by wise ones who had traveled from afar, called us to go out of our way to care for the hungry, the lonely, and the homeless.
Watch your step as you take this Bethlehem baby into your arms and whisper to him.
You may find him taking you into his arms, whispering new life into you.
(Last Paragraph adapted from a devotional by George White from Alive Now)

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