Rev. Tom Lenhart

Sermon December 30, 2007

“Optimism & Resolutions for Our Church”

Isaiah 63: 7-9 and Matthew 2: 13-23

            Let us pray.

            We have just celebrated the joyous birth in Bethlehem -- the divine gift of the One who revealed God’s love of us and the ultimate power of love over the love of power.  Yet, this is an oddly subdued time of year for some.    The Christmas season is already winding down.  Some have even begun to put the decorations away and to move on. Our holiday vacation time, if we had any, is coming to an end and thoughts of returning to work in just a few days are beginning to take hold of us and not always positively. And then there is New Years just a couple of days away and the celebrations it occasions.  We look forward to them but sometimes there is little energy left to get ready for them. One of my favorite expressions comes from auto racing – one of the rare sports I actually do not follow closely. But I have seen enough races on TV to have observed a lead car on the very last lap with virtually no fuel left desperately trying to avoid a final pit stop for fuel to avoid losing the lead. The announcers describe this desperate effort as “attempting to finish on fumes”. For some of us that is how it feels at his time of year – the emotional tank is seemingly empty.

            As the year comes to an end we also look back at our personal year and at the world’s year to take stock. If you were to look at Time Magazine’s list of the 10 biggest news stories of 2007, you would find among them these:

-- “Transition in Pakistan” (and this was listed even before Benazir Bhutto was tragically and despicably assassinated)

-- “The Mortgage Crisis”

-- “Chinese Toy Recall”

-- “Virginia Tech Tragedy”

-- “Barry Bonds Breaks Record and Is Indicted”

Pretty easy to get depressed and discouraged when we think about such events.

          But then think about the Israelites at the time of our passage from Isaiah. Most of the Jewish people have been forced from the Chosen Land into exile in Babylon. Jerusalem and most importantly, the Temple – the holiest place (God’s dwelling place on earth) – have been destroyed. And there existed no reasonable possibility of a return and the rebuilding of the Temple. Now those were tough times!   

          And think of another time. It is early January in Bethlehem, Mary and her child, Jesus, are dong fine, preparing to return home -- to get on with the normal things of life. Like most parents, Mary and Joseph, want to devote themselves to taking care of the new born, making a living and being with family and friends. Out of the blue three strange -- foreigners from the East -- arrive. They are weird guys -- astrologers/astronomers and the like -- and have been following a star that is supposed to lead them to a new King. They bring gifts to the family, bow in homage to the baby and then leave.  Maybe the angel was right -- so the parents think; this baby is destined for greatness – to lead the chosen people. Life is good. And then an angel appears to Joseph and says, “you must go to Egypt now because Herod, the King, fears your baby is a rival and will kill him.”  And so they flee. They journey hundreds of miles over desert and mountains mother and newborn on a donkey with Joseph on foot. 

And where do they go – to Egypt a foreign land with no obvious support system for this family of Jews. Certainly, a difficult situation especially coming on the heals of the birth story. “Kinda” sucks the joy out of the Christmas story. 

Today’s passage from Matthew is, indeed, a strange story at that.

          We know a lot about Herod. Not simply from the gospels but from Philo and Josephus and other historians of this age. Herod was ruthless; history records in exquisite detail that he killed many of his family and others to stay in power. And yet there is not a single reference in these histories to his killing all the babies under two years of age in  and around Bethlehem as Matthew reports. Such an act seems likely to have been noteworthy and, thus, to have been  recorded in the pages of history.

          But Matthew wasn’t writing a history -- not even a biography. The details were not important to him. No, he was writing a gospel – the story of the Good News. For Mathew it was important to link the life of Jesus with the prophesies and events of the Hebrew Bible. This early  trip to Egypt links Jesus to Joseph and even more to Moses, who comes and goes to and from Egypt in the Hebrew Bible often to avoid the power and retribution of the Pharaoh.  So Matthew is not concerned with being a reporter.  Matthew is preparing us for Jesus’ life. Even in the first few days after his birth and despite his divinity Jesus will be accepted by some and rejected by others.  The story of the family fleeing to Egypt and their return is a microcosm of the entire life of Jesus.  It is a sober reminder to us that after the joy of Bethlehem there will be many bumps in the road  -- a road that will lead to Jerusalem and the Cross. The baby grows up. But that is not bad news but Good News for us. The verdict at Easter is the victory of life over death, and love over power. Without the birth in Bethlehem there is no Easter. But without Easter the birth is not even a minor footnote in history. What Matthew was telling us is that life will always have its bad news. Neither Jesus nor we get to stay in Bethlehem.  The baby grows up to live a life of challenges and set backs that demonstrate what it means to be in God’s image. Ultimately he gives his life so that we know that the darkness – the bad news-- -- does not ultimately prevail despite the efforts of the powerful and the entrenched.

          Some years ago the wonderful writer, Calvin Trillin, wrote a piece in “The New Yorker Magazine” at Christmas. As I remember the article Trillin observed that he and his wife, Ann, were distracted -- indeed consumed -- by the bad news of the world. They were worrying about the troubles in Northern Ireland, the conflicts in Cyprus between the Turks and the Greeks, and worried sick about the Middle East and  all its various  crises and conflicts. Ann, who has since sadly died, apparently come up with a brilliant solution. They would as Christmas presents give each other the gift of worrying about specific places. So she would take Northern Ireland and Cyprus. Calvin would no longer have to worry about them. He in turn would take worrying about some other areas so  she could let them go.

          I thought then and think now that -- humor aside -- those were the most wonderful of gifts and eminently appropriate for Christmas. They were gifts of love. The birth in Bethlehem is not about getting rid of bad news. It is there every morning on the front page and every hour on the hour when the news summaries come across our radio airways. No, it is about the Good News. It is about what in the end is enduring and victorious -- that the power of love can vanquish everything else.  Isn’t that precisely what Jesus embodied and lived and taught. He was exiled in Egypt but returned. He was rejected by the Pharisees, the scribes and the Romans but in death prevailed over all powers to change history. In a sense what Jesus gives us is the gift of hope to replace worry and despair. Hope means “to trust to have confidence in.”[1] Matthew is telling us that we need not worry about the ultimate verdict though we have  bad news in our world. As we seek to follow in Jesus’ footsteps trying to turn the bad news into good news we need not worry over the ultimate outcome even when we are in exile 

          As some of you have noted the title of this sermon is: “Optimism & Resolutions for Our Church.” I suspect you may be thinking “he hasn’t said much that seems to have anything to do with resolutions.” But actually I think I have --for there are two things necessary to truly make resolutions that mean anything. The first is the existence of things that need to be changed.   The Time Magazine list of major news items is proof that there are many, many things that warrant being changed. The second prerequisite for making real resolutions is a real hope that things can be made better. Without that they are pointless.  That is I believe the enduring message of Jesus coming into our world -- that despite bad news the Good News prevails – resolutions do not have to be pointless.  Here are a couple more of the news stories from last year that confirm our hopes

n      Progress on Climate Control in Bali

n      AIDs Estimates Reduced (thanks to education and wider access to the latest drugs)

Knowing that we are nearly at year’s end I thought it would be interesting if those of you so inclined wrote out anonymously your resolutions and hopes for the church and for the world. You can then put them in the offering and I will collect them and find a way to share them at later time.

In thinking about our resolutions the challenge for us is not to pack Christmas away but to let it animate our lives with a hope that fires our  resolve to turn bad news to good news.