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Christmas Eve – Year B

Preached on December 24, 2011

At St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Brookline, MA

The Reverend Jeffrey W. Mello

Isaiah 9:2—4, 6—7; Titus 2:11—14; Luke 2:1—20

One of the great ironies of Christmas, I think, is that the most radical, terrifying, game-changing event in all of human history is portrayed in images that are soft, nostalgic, bordered by holly and cast in the soft glow of a candle.

How very far from that first Christmas we have come. It is hard for us to imagine shepherds being afraid, because, really, who can be afraid of a pudgy little baby with wings, carrying a golden banner announcing Peace and Goodwill on earth?

But the scene into which the Christ child appeared that first Christmas was as scary a scene as they come. Born into poverty, to a marginalized family in an occupied territory. Born to turn the world upside down in a lifetime. How threatening this small baby must have been.

How terrified those who came into contact with this family must have been.

Who among them – the shepherds, the innkeeper, Mary or Joseph – who could ever have imagined that God would make good on God’s promise to come and rescue all of creation from itself – starting with them. Surely the Messiah would come from a better family. Surely the King of Kings, this Wonderful Counselor would rise up from the powerful in order to have access to the power needed to make the change for which all the world longed.

But here? In a stable? Among the animals? To these two – Mary and Joseph?

This was not how it was supposed to happen.

By being born in this place, at this time, among these people, God breaks all the rules and challenges what everyone, including the shepherds, thought about how God would act and when God would act.

There was a particular safety that came with believing that God, when God came, would come from some other place. A great comfort to believe God would come to some other people at some other time. That is what everyone thought. So inn the meantime, all they could do was watch and wait.

That’s what they were all doing – watching and waiting for God to come. And while they were watching over there, God came right where they were. While they were waiting for “some time in the future” God came among them right then, in that moment.

While they were waiting, God didn’t wait. God didn’t wait until ‘more acceptable candidates’ could be found. God didn’t wait until a more acceptable place could be found.

God did not even wait for a vacancy to open in the inn before barging on to the scene. Uninvited, God came anyway into a world that was as inhospitable a place for Love to come and live as we could possibly imagine.

…

And two thousand years later, we have recreated that first scene into which God was born -- all over again.

Just as they imagined God coming among them, breaking into their world happening at some other place, at some other time, with some other people, most of us imagine the very same thing.

The difference is that while the shepherds imagined God would come some place and time in the future, we tend to imagine God coming to a place and time and people in the distant past; the people and places and time on the front of our Christmas cards.

And so we watch and wait. But we watch into the past and we wait to remember what happened long ago.

But tonight/today is the night/day. Now is the time. Here is the place. You may not imagine yourself Mary or Joseph, but God longs to be born in the world again through you. You might not identify with the shepherds, but it is to you whom God wants to be known. You many not feel terribly angelic, yet it is through you God wants to be known to others.

You may think this whole Christmas story is all pleasant enough, but that the realities of your life seem to point far away from this scene at the manger.

But you are the very inn itself. And God will not wait for a vacancy to open up in you before coming and being born in your heart.

I said earlier that God came anyway into a world that was as inhospitable a place for Love to come and live as we could imagine.

Impossible to imagine, maybe, if we didn’t live in such a similar time ourselves. As hostile a place for Love to come and live among us as any time before. And while we are tempted to see this as proof that God is not on the scene, it is, in fact, proof that this is the scene into which God will be born.

As terrifying as it sounds, now is the time when God will be born into the world. And you are the very one God chooses to make it so!

“Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in your hearts a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”

Glory to God in the highest!

AMEN.

© 2011 The Reverend Jeffrey W. Mello