Christmas Day B - 25 December 2008

The Feast of the Nativity B - Christmas Day - 25 December 2008
Isaiah 62:6-12; Titus 3:4-7; Luke 2:1-20
James V. Stockton

“The claim that Christianity makes for Christmas,” says author Frederick Buechner, “is that at a particular time and place, God came to be with us Himself. When Quirinius was governor of Syria, in a town called Bethlehem, a child was born, who, beyond the power of anyone to account for, was the high and lofty One made low and helpless.” It is this singular birth, I think, the birth of God made not just human, God made not just man, but God made baby, that continues for most of us to reach through and touch us where we most fondly and preciously live. And it is here that we most innately understand not just the ‘what happened’ of Christmas, but the ‘why.’

I once received in the mail a complimentary copy of the December Reader’s Digest. It included a collection of short stories of Christmases Past, from a variety of folks, widely and not-so-widely known. Of the thirteen stories in the collection, most tell of the authors’ own childhood experiences of Christmas, of formative episodes in their early lives, episodes of remarkable kindness and charity, of optimism and good cheer. Almost as many of the stories tell of the Christmas time experiences of a child whom the author knows, usually the author’s own. Perhaps what we can observe from this, and from our own favorite memories of Christmases gone by, is that whatever magic there is about Christmas, it is that the story of the Christ child, renews the child within each of us.

Safely, unassailably tucked away within the midst of the yearly shopping blitz, the series of parties, and the worn checklist of things to do, Christmas still conceives within each of us a childlike faith. And, at least for a while, it brings that faith to life in our world today. From beyond the hard realities of the rest of the year, from far beyond the year’s discouragement and disappointment, and the impatience, anger, and despair that they breed, comes a soft and gentle reminder of innocence; of hope, of ideals, of faith. And it brings a renewed desire among people to make these qualities more often their own, and more thoroughly those of the world around them. From the world beyond our own, Christmas brings here to our particular time and place today, peace, joy, and love. And it brings alive again the belief that these still make a difference.

A true story: it happened two weeks before Christmas one year. A nine-year-old girl, Laura and her friend Jenny are walking home one day, sliding on the ice and talking about what they hope to get for Christmas. They stop to talk to an old man in the neighborhood. Harry is on his knees pulling weeds from around a large oak tree in his yard. He’s wearing a worn out old wool jacket and a pair of torn up garden gloves. His fingers are protruding from the end and are kind of blue from the cold.

Harry explains to the girls what he’s doing. “I’m getting the yard in shape as a Christmas present for my mother. She passed away several years ago. My mother was all I had. She loved her yard and her trees, so I do this for her at Christmas.” His eyes are teary as he pats the old oak, and returns to his pulling the weeds. Laura and Jenny are touched by his words. They stop to help Harry pull weeds from around the trees. When they’re done, Harry presses a quarter into each girl’s hand. “I wish it could be more,” he says, “but it’s all I’ve got right now.” If at no other time, then at least at Christmas, the good news breaks in again; the good news that we can help, that we can care, that love, given hands and hearts and lives, makes the biggest difference of all.

God is Love, and Love has changed the world. Mary’s love for God, Joseph’s love for Mary, God’s love for the world. In nothing so much as Love God has come amazingly near, into this imperfect world, as the innocent, pure, sweet Love of an infant child; wonderfully perfect, and perfectly wonderful. And by this, I think, Christmas touches in each of us the child that never ages, the child that still embodies holiness and grace in our world, the child that understands good will, peace, and joy, and before we ever even learned to name them; and long before we ever learned to doubt that they have a real and lasting influence on the community of humankind.

When you and I remember Christmas, at the heart of what we remember is that greatest of all good news, that ‘joy to all,’ that God has not just one of us, but even a helpless infant. As Buechner goes on to say: “The One who inhabits eternity comes to dwell in time. The One whom none can look upon and live is delivered in a stable under the soft indifferent gaze of cattle. The Father of all mercies puts Himself at our mercy.”

When we remember the amazing miracle of Christmas, what we celebrate this day is the miracle that the God of the universe, God Almighty and everlasting, has entrusted the fullness of God’s very Presence in our world to fragile human form, completely vulnerable, except for fragile human care. When we gaze upon the infant Jesus, when God touches us in the child Jesus, and raises up the child he has birthed in each of us, we find the good news first heralded by the angels of heaven. God tells us, “Don’t be afraid. I long not to see you far away and terrified of me, but coming near as my family. I long for you to know my love for you, and so come, please come, and find your love for me.”

And we begin to understand that in the birth of the infant Jesus, God means to come ‘down to us,’ so to speak, in order to lift us up to God. God intends to bring heaven near, so we may come near to heaven. In the infant Jesus, God tells us, in effect, “I want you to trust me, so, I will begin by trusting you.” “I trust you to care for me among you; I believe in you in me.” What happens among us at Christmas happens because, as poet John Donne has put it, God most high did become God most humble and lowly;’ it is because the God of mercy calls forth our mercy. It’s because before God ever asks your or me to believe in Jesus Christ, it is in Christ Jesus, that God first believes in us.

And so it is that somehow through Christmas, God replaces our mature prudence, with our sweetest generosity instead. God exchanges our realistic despair over what is, with our most idealistic hope for what yet may be. God puts aside our angry mistrust of the stranger, with the innocence of a child’s faith, and our most god-like desire to love and to be loved.

It seems the girls, Laura and Jenny, had often passed by Harry’s place before. They remembered that the house was a shabby one, with never a wreath or tree at Christmas, or any other decorations to add some cheer; just the lone figure of Harry sitting by the window. The next day Laura and Jenny agree to put their quarters into a jar, marked ‘Harry’s Christmas present.’ They begin to find small jobs to earn more, and every nickel, dime, and quarter goes into the jar. Two days before Christmas, the girls have earned enough to buy Harry a gift. Christmas Eve finds them knocking on Harry’s door, singing Christmas carols. When Harry opens the door, Laura and Jenny present him with his gift wrapped in pretty paper, a card, and pumpkin pie still warm from mom’s oven. Harry’s hands are trembling as he tears the paper wrapping. He sees his gift, and to Laura’s surprise, and Jenny’s, he holds his new gloves to his face and cries like a baby.

Thanks be to God, at Christmas time there survives and thrives, somewhere within, the child, the child born in Bethlehem, the child born within each of us, whose presence tells us, ‘yes,’ we are right to have faith in God, and ‘yes,’ God is right to have faith in us.

And so may God, who wonderfully created us and more wonderfully restores the dignity of human nature, grant that we may share the divine life of the One who humbly shares in our humanity, Jesus the Christ, who lives and reigns with the Heavenly Father and the Holy Spirit, One God, for ever and ever. Amen.

© 2008, James V. Stockton