Sermon Year A Christmas Eve Midnight Mass

God Came and God is not disappointed

Love came down at Christmas

Love all lovely, love divine;

love was born at Christmas,

star and angels gave the sign...

Those words were written by poet Christina Rosetti in the year 1885.

Those words have been put to music by a variety of diverse artists,

from Irish folk musicians to John Rutter to Jars of Clay.

You will find one version in our hymnal (page 84 I believe).

Love came down at Christmas.

This is the good news. 

Love came.

We didn’t have to plead or beg or accomplish anything.

Love just came.

Pure gift. Unexpected.

Greg Boyle is a Jesuit priest,

who works primarily with gang members in east Los Angeles.

He started a business called Homeboy industries

which provides employment for young people

who want to learn business skills and turn their lives in a different direction.

Greg Boyle also wrote a book 

titled Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion.

I read this book while on sabbatical 

and it was one of my favorite reads

during that time.

Recently Greg Boyle’s name surfaced again

in a daily meditation I receive by email.

This time it was in reference to the song

O Holy Night.

He pointed out a line in this song

that we sometimes overlook.

O holy night, the stars are brightly shining 

(We remember that line pretty easily)
It is the night of the dear Savior’s birth

(We’ve got that line memorized, too)
Long lay the world in sin and error pining 

(Oh yeah! Got it covered)

       --and then comes the final line of that verse

and it is the one that we too often forget--

’Til He appeared and the soul felt its worth.

Til he appeared.

And the soul felt its worth.

This is the meaning of Christmas.

Jesus appears.

Love comes down.

So that our souls might feel their worth.

So that we might come to realize, to remember,

that we are loved by God

deeply, widely, completely,unconditionally.

Love comes down in the form of this baby named Jesus

so we might realize and understand that we matter.

We matter!

‘Til he appeared and the soul felt it’s worth.

On this holy night we are reminded

that we belong to God

and we belong to each other

and that God has created each one of us to be 

exactly the person we already are.

And God is not disappointed.

Love came down at Christmas

so God might meet us face to face

and God is not disappointed.

You are exactly the person God wants you to be.

I am exactly the person God wants me to be.

We spend so much time trying to perfect ourselves,

to live up to and into the expectations of other people.

That’s not a totally bad thing.

We all have room to grow 

and ways we can improve.

BUT we need to remember that God is not about perfection.

God is about love.

God calls us to be about love as well.

Messy, imperfect, chipped around the edges love.

Remember, if God was about perfection and meeting human expectations,

Jesus would have been born in a gilded palace, 

arriving just as many people hoped and predicted,

as a royal king,

swaddled in soft velvet robes,

with multiple bowing attendants.

But look--

he and his family were pushed into the least elegant accommodations--

no Hilton Diamond Honors Suite for this family.

The attendants at the birth were more likely a cow and a donkey,

maybe a chicken or two and some mice that lived under the straw.

There is nothing perfect or easy about this birth scene.

We sometimes sanitize it;

we have tried to make it picture-perfect over the centuries.

We have added rosy cheeks to Mary

and beaming light and singing blonde angels playing little golden harps.

But the truth is, it was more likely a rough and gritty scene.

But even in the grittiness of it all,

love still came down. 

Even in the grittiness of our own lives,

God wants to enter and be with us.

God loves us--each one of us--

more than we can possibly ask or imagine.

We don’t have to ask for this love

or earn this love

or perform for this love.

God’s love is pure gift.

Pure and abundant and amazing grace.

Why are we here on this holy night?

We are here to say, " Okay! Come in, God!

Come down, love!"

We are here to rejoice!

Christ is born.

The time of waiting is over.

In the story and song,

in the flowers and the greenery,

in the quiet light of candles and sparkling lights,

our souls remember their worth

and we bask in the light of this love.

Love came down at Christmas

Love all lovely, love divine;

love was born at Christmas,

star and angels gave the sign.

Sermon for Year C Christmas Eve Midnight Mass 2012

CHRISTMAS EVE ALIVE!

I live in Black Mountain.

Every day I come to St. John’s 

by traveling west on Highway 70/Tunnel Road.

I pass the Ingles warehouse,

the VA hospital and Sonic drive in.

Then when I come up the hill I turn onto Beverly Road

at Groce Methodist Church.

Groce is a fine church.

We share the Welcome Table Ministry with them.

Their Senior Minister Gerald Davis 

is a kind-hearted man 

and a fine pastor.

Last week as I left the Saturday evening Eucharist 

here at St. John’s--

it was about 6:30 PM--

I was at the stoplight on Beverly Road,

waiting to make my left turn onto Tunnel Road 

and head back home towards Black Mountain.

Groce has had this large plywood nativity scene 

in front of the church for quite a few weeks now.

In fact, the nativity scene went up

about the time their Pumpkin Patch came down.

I like their nativity scene.

I have seen it every day

and have thought on more than one ocassion

that it was nicely done,

I wondered

if they had an artist in their congregation 

who created this nativity scene.

Last Saturday evening 

I am waiting at the stoplight

and I glance over at the nativity scene--

and then.....

WHAT?!!!!

It’s moving!!

The figures are alive!!

I blinked and shook my head

and thought,

“Help me, Jesus! 

I am seeing things!!”

And then,

and then I realized,

the plywood figures 

had been replaced my real living people

who were acting out the scene.

I may have sat through several lights.

I don’t know.

No one was behind me honking 

or anything

and I was absolutely entranced.

I watched as a shepherd

walked over 

and knelt down next to the manger.

I know that Groce is not the first church

 to ever do a living nativity,

but I have to tell you,

for me,

this was the first time 

I ever felt so moved by it.

It reminded me 

that this scene from long long ago

is not just out of a storybook--

this is a story that happened.

It may not have happened 

just as we portray it in Christmas carols

and picture books,

but the truth is--

well, the truth is

this story is true.

Remember: 

    Things can be true without being factual.

We Americans 

(and I can only speak from this point of view 

since it is the only one I have)--

we Americans are obsessed with facts.

We like information.

Even trivial information.

We are Wikipedia addicts.  

Wikipedia has 326 million users a month.

People looking for facts.

We don’t want anybody pulling the wool over our eyes.

No sir-ee.

For those of us old enough 

to remember the old television program DRAGNET,

we remember Capt. Joe Friday’s line,

“Just the facts, Maam.”

“Just the facts” may be very helpful 

for a detective trying to solve a crime mystery,

but “just the facts” is not very helpful 

when we are pondering 

how the birth of Jesus intersects and affects our own life,

when we are pondering the depths of holy Mystery,

There was an interesting article 

in the recent issue of THE WEEK magazine 

(Volume 12 issue 588-589, page 11):

It was about the facts--and the discrepancies-- around the first Noel.

It is more likely that Jesus was born around 5 or 6 B.C.

We think that because historical and biblical references tell us 

Jesus was born during the reign of Herod the Great--

well, Herod the Great died in 4 B.C.

So Jesus was most likely born 1 or 2 years prior to his death.

Everyone does seem to agree that Jesus was born in Bethlehem--

so we can say that is a fact.

December 25th?

Most likely a date picked by the Church in the 4th century

to co-opt a pagan feast day.

Scholars think that Jesus was probably born in the summer

because of the star that is mentioned.

Astronomer John Moseley of the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles

recently suggested that

the Star of Bethlehem was actually a convergence

of Jupiter and Venus that took place on June 17 in 2 BC.

He writes,

“The two planets had merged into one single gleaming object

in the direction of Jerusalem as seen in Persia.”

The wise men--who certainly could have been Persian--

all we know is that they came from the East--

see this star and follow.

It is factual that people-- “magi”--

sought guidance from the stars. Some people still do.

Plus there is a reliable 8th century text that offers an account

from the magi’s point of view of their travel to Bethlehem

following a star.

Our tradition and our hymns tell us that Jesus was born in a stable, 

because there was no room in the inn.

This is probably a result of a mis-translation of a Greek word--

which was translated in the King James Bible as “inn”

but  a more accurate translation would be “a spare room”.

So if no one had a spare room 

to offer Mary and Joseph and the soon-to-be-born Jesus,

what they were most likely offered--and where Jesus was born--

  was the first floor of a lowly peasant house--

and yes, if this were the case, there were animals there .

People at that time did not have separate barns or outbuildings 

for their animals--they brought them into their house--

into the ground floor level , at night.

The animals lived downstairs, the people lived upstairs.

Every one seems to be in agreement 

that Mary placed the newborn baby in a manger, a feed trough.

When Jesus was born

Augustus Caesar, way off in Rome, was at the height of his power.

Augustus was the adopted son of Julius Caesar.

After a bloody civil war Augustus established himself as the head.

As a god really.

First, he established his father as a god 

and thus, he then often referred to himself as the ‘son of god.’

Augustus saw himself as the king, the lord.

Does this language sound familiar?

Even though they were alive at the same time, Augustus never met Jesus.

There was no Facebook, no twitter, no CNN,

no leaving on a jet plane.

But it did not take too long 

for those who came after Augustus

to hear about this Jesus and his followers.

And they did not like what they were hearing.

This Jesus was born far away to the East,

born in poverty--

yet people were saying that Jesus was the true son of God,

the real king?

Get real!

This did not sit well with those in power

and in the generation that followed Augustus

they set out to do everything they could

to annihilate all followers of Jesus.

The birth of Jesus is the beginning of a war between the kingdom of God

and the kingdoms of the world.

This war is still raging.

That is a fact.

However, within three centuries after Jesus’ birth,

the Emperor himself, Constantine,

converts to Christianity.

Okay, let’s be honest--

this conversion was likely not as much for spiritual reasons

as for political ones

(not to mention making his mother happy)

but Christianity suddenly shifts 

from being revolutionary

and punishable by death 

to being the approved norm.

The verdict is still out 

as to whether making Christianity “mainstream” 

was good news or bad news.

But it is a fact.

So you see there are plenty of facts

and yes, 

there are plenty of discrepancies as well.

But remember--what we know from the gospels

is not intended to be a complete historical narrative.

The word “gospel” means “good news”--

the writers of the gospels were sharing good news,

news they were excited about,

news that made their hearts race with joy and excitement,

events and people that had changed everything for them.

Mary and Joseph and Jesus and the shepherds--

were living, breathing human beings.

What exactly happened that night--

this night we call Christmas Eve--

we do not know.

But something happened that changed the world

and continues to change not only the world,

but us.

Each of us

who is willing to take this story 

into our hearts

is changed, transformed.

Sometimes there is a truth that is greater 

than any collection of facts.

Sometimes even the most skeptical

have been surprised by how the Spirit moves

in the mess and muddle of everyday life.

We can look at the story as two-dimensional plywood cut-outs.

We can obsess about the factual.

But we just might miss the deeper truth.

We can stand in the skeptics corner

but I will tell you--from my own personal experience--

baby, it’s cold over there.

As Joan Chittister writes:

There is a child in each of us waiting to be born again....Christmas is not for children. It is for those who refuse to give up and grow old...for those who can let yesterday go so that life can be full of new possibility always...for those in whom Christmas is a feast without finish...

(from Joan Chittister's book IN SEARCH OF BELIEF)

The call is to keep our eyes open this Christmas Eve

and all the eves that follow.

Because we might see something move,

come to life,

capture our hearts.

We might find ourselves falling in love--

for the first time--

or for the four-hundredth time--

with a baby whose name is Jesus.

We may not have all the facts

but we may discover

that following a star 

is the journey our hearts truly long to travel.

Amen.

Silent Night (NOT)...Sermon for Christmas Eve Midnight Mass 2011

There are two things that I especially love about this midnight mass.
The first is that it really is a midnight mass.
We will pass over from Christmas Eve into Christmas Day
as we celebrate the Eucharist.
It is so wonderfully counter-cultural to have church at midnight.
People are usually NOT at church at midnight.

I love this.
Because what it really says is
the Holy Spirit comes at odd and unusual times,
not necessarily prime time or convenient time.
What it says is that God is always doing the unexpected
and urging us to do the unexpected--
like come to church and stay past midnight.

It also reminds those of us who are usually in bed by 9 PM
that there are still some things
worthy of staying up late.
I do realize-- that for some of you,
midnight is hardly late--not late at all in fact--
but hopefully you too will admit
that midnight on Christmas eve
holds a magic for all ages,
for both night owls and early birds.

The other thing I love about this midnight mass is
after we have received communion,
the church lights are dimmed into darkness
and we each hold a lighted candle
as we sing.

We sing
the well-known
and much loved Christmas carol
"Silent Night."

Silent night, holy night....

Yet the truth is
it is unlikely that the night of Jesus’ birth was silent.
Holy, yes.
Silent, no.

Babies coming into the world generally don’t tend to be quiet affairs.

Think about the sounds.
Perhaps Mary crying out during the birth.
Joseph reaching for the child, whispering words of comfort,
to both baby and Mary.

Our theology teaches us that Jesus was fully divine and fully human.
I imagine that fully human baby
came into the world
not with uplifted hands in the orans position of blessing,
but wailing at the top of his little very human lungs.

Perhaps there were others there as well.
Joseph may have sent for help--
there may have been women from that Bethlehem neighborhood
that came to assist with the birth--
or if they weren’t there for the birth,
surely they came not long after--
bringing food, chattering, cooing,---
word of a new baby spreads quickly.

Tradition tells us there were animals--
lambs bleating, donkeys braying, a cow or two mooing--
perhaps even a crowing rooster and a clucking hen or two.

There may have been noises from the town streets-
a heated argument spilling out from one of the overly-full inns,
people chopping wood for fires,
peddlers calling out in the wee morning hours.

What a world of noise it must have been
for the newly-born Jesus.
Merry Chaos, little one!
Happy not-so-silent night!

Our culture today tends to make the Christmas story
a Hallmark special of sentimentality.
There’s nothing wrong with sentimental,
but it’s highly unlikely that this first century birth
was a Charlie Brown sort of Christmas.

There were noises and smells--
some not too pleasant no doubt.
I don’t think Mary--or Joseph-- was baking sugar cookies that night.

Mary, like most mothers who have just given birth,
was probably exhausted.
And like any new parents,
both she and Joseph probably can’t take their eyes off this baby.
They already know that God will use this child
in ways they cannot really imagine.
That in itself is both wonderful and terrifying.

Jesus is entering the world in a time of strife and terror.

There was no doubt great tension throughout the city--
everyone having to report for the census.
Be counted, be registered and then be taxed.
Not showing up was not an option.

Though surely at least one or two
thought of starting an Occupy Bethlehem movement.
Risky probably to even THINK such thoughts
under that regime.

Herod was not known as a good and generous ruler.
He was known as an executioner, a slaughterer.

The world was in desperate need of good news.

The baby is born and immediately the angels go out to tell the world.
They go out into the fields to tell the shepherds.
The good news did not go first to the wealthy and the privileged.
The news came first to the poor, these rural laborers--shepherds.

Can you imagine-- there you are living outdoors,
sitting beneath the night sky
and an angel shows up and says,
“Guess what? God’s Messiah, has been born--
just up the road! Come and see!”

At first the shepherds are afraid.
Surely there must have been at least a few moments of unbelief!

The Messiah? Just up the road? Really?!!
(Whoa! Angels, get a grip!)

But regardless of what the shepherds were thinking
or muttering under their breath,
Luke’s gospel says they went.
They went to see for themselves.

How important it is to go and see for ourselves.
How easy it is to discount even good news,
to scoff it away.
But the shepherds went.

You have to wonder--
if the news had gone first to the wealthy and the privileged--
would they have gone to see for themselves?
Would we?

The shepherds went with haste.

And what do you know?!!
There was a baby--a child lying in the feed trough, the manger--
and there was the mother, Mary
and the father, Joseph.

The shepherds heard, they went, they saw, they were stunned--
they worshipped--and they went out and told others.
Today we would call that model evangelism!

What does this story mean for us today?
How do we find light in the darkness
in a world today
which also seems in desperate need for good news?

Repeatedly God calls us to pay attention to “babies in mangers.”
I don’t mean that literally.
I mean we are called to pay attention
when we see God at work in the world in unexpected,
in surprising ways.
We are called to not expect God
to fit neatly into our or the world’s little box of expectations.

We are called to pay attention when love comes down
in unexpected places at unexpected moments.

We EXPECT (though it doesn’t always happen)
that we will meet God in church.
Isn’t church where God lives?
Yes and no.
Yes, I hope God lives here.
But God is not confined to church or to one place or to one people.

If we pay attention,
we might hear God speak to us
in the voice of the cashier at CVS
when she shares about the Christmas it snowed and
they lost their electricity
and their house was full of family
and they couldn’t cook the big meal they planned
and they couldn’t even shower
but how her granddaughter who was four years old at the time
remembers that “as the best Christmas ever.”
Sometimes what seems like a disaster
eliminates some of the busy-ness that fills our holidays
and just makes us treasure the being together,
being present with one another is the gift.
Love comes down.


If we listen
we may hear the voice of angels in a prison
or at a hospice bedside or in a school classroom
or in a parking lot.

A friend with three small children
recently shared that her middle daughter told her,
“Every night when Papa comes in to tell me good night,
he always tells me he loves me
and he tells me that I am important.”
Love comes down.

If we push aside our dark tendencies to blame others
or to lament the hard knocks that life has dealt us
(and life can wield some knockout punches),
we might rediscover hope--and even joy.
Love comes down.


When we feel we are too small,
too insignificant to make a difference
we might remember that we have been given immense power.

Last year Americans spent $ 450 billion on Christmas.
Clean water for the whole world--
including every single poor person on the planet,
would cost about $ 20 billion.
We are not without power.
We are just sometimes lost in the darkness
on how to best use that power.
We need to open our eyes and see the baby in the manger.

Coming out of the darkness and noise and conflict
and seeing a newly born baby,
is not the END of the story.

Kneeling or standing in silence
with one small lighted candle
is not the END of our service.

Christmas is the BEGINNING of our story.
Every year we hear the story once again
and every year we are given another chance to begin again.
To embrace the love that comes down.

Yes, we live in a noisy world,
a chaotic world, a troubling world.

But we still hold our candle in the darkness
to remind us of the words of the prophet Isaiah:

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness
on them light has shined.

Christmas is our beginning.
Love comes down and love goes out.

From here we go out into the world
to give voice and vision
to those who have been pushed aside to the harsh margins.

The work of Christmas begins,
but does not end, tonight.

Howard Thurman puts it this way in his poem “The Work of Christmas”:

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and 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.



Love comes down.
Christmas is the beginning of the story.


Silent night, holy night...
love’s pure light....

Love’s pure light.


Merry Christmas.