Sermon

People who are able to look at the bright side, find redemption after mistakes, offer forgiveness in the face of hurt, live generous lives despite previous pain, sound like they're cheery folks.  But before the cheer came that darkness, those mistakes, that hurt and that pain.  On this Christmas Eve, we have to ask Isaiah what he means when he says “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.”  How do people recover from their darkness?

2 [a]The people who walked in darkness

Those living on the streets.

Those in war zones.

Those in fear of physical violence in their homes.

Those trapped inside their minds

The hungry

    have seen a great light;

those who lived in a land of deep darkness—

Those who struggle under the burden of poverty

Women under Taliban rules

          Protesters in Iran and France

          The people of dry, broken land that is no longer able to support life     

on them light has shined.

As terrible as COVID is and has been, leaving families without loved ones, leaving people with long term effects of being ill, it is not the only thing that has so many just exhausted right now.  We're exhausted on top of exhausted.  Nadia Bolz-Webber reminds us that nobody started 2022 with a full tank. When the world shifts and indeed groans with deep inward pains, we can be at a loss for how to be.  I invite you to take a moment right now, and close your eyes if it helps to imagine, naming the things you are worried about, the anxiety you might have, the grief that won't let you go, the guilt at feeling needy at such a “happy” time of year, the weights of the world you might carry.  As you hold those things in your mind, hear these words:

     Although you walk in darkness, you will see a great light.  Although you live in darkness, on you a light will shine.  The yoke and bar and rod of the burden have been broken.  For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon the shoulders of this child, and he will establish endless peace.  He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness forevermore.

When Mary and Joseph traveled to Bethlehem for the first registration decreed by the Roman Emperor, they had already had a lot to think about.  They both had been visited by angels.  Mary heard the angel and sang her great Magnificat, and pondered these things in her heart.  Joseph was visited by an angel and told “Do not be afraid,”   Angel visits dancing in their heads, they began their journey.  Some time after they arrived, while they were there, Mary gave birth to her firstborn son.    I'm always amazed that there isn't a great earth event that happened just at that time.  Some huge earthquake.  Some unusual volcanic eruption.  I would expect so much noise!  But, no, in a small house, in a small place, a small child came into this earth in the same way as you and I.

Maybe the angel of the Lord that stood before the shepherds shining all around them was that big thing.  But only to them.  “Do not be afraid.”  Maybe the multitude of heavenly host, praising God and singing was that big thing.  Maybe the fact that the shepherds paid attention and decided to also make a journey was the big thing.  The shepherds arrived and witnessed Mary and Joseph and the baby and they just knew.  Then the shepherds were the ones glorifying and praising God.  And Mary did some more pondering.

I once asked a pastor of mine how we would know if Jesus came back.  He jokingly said that CNN would probably carry the news.  Although the word “snarky” hadn't been invented yet back then, I thought that was a snarky answer.  Now though, with the rise of media every where we turn?  Maybe all the news we see will change somehow, marking the rise of a new world. Somehow I don't think that Jesus will come back and open a twitter account, or put up a billboard ad.  Maybe we need to look and listen differently.  What will we see, what will we hear in a new way?

More likely, something quiet and every day and miraculous will happen somewhere off the beaten track, and a seed will be planted.  Maybe a seed has already been planted?  Many seeds.  You and me seeds.  And him, and her, and them.  

A commentator I was reading last week suggested followers of Christ need to be better BEARers of Christ in the world.  Again, me and my too-quick eyeballs, I read instead that followers of Christ need to be better HEARers of Christ in the world.

Wouldn't that be interesting.  How can we be better hearers?  So much of the world comes to us through our senses.  I wonder if we heard things new, what that would be like.  I can imagine I would go to the Pacifica Pier like I do, and watch the king tides that are this weekend, I would see all the power and magnificence, but I'd also hear the roar and the crash!  I might be a better hearer of Christ if I went one more step and said, “Ah, that's the power and majesty of nature, God, right here in front of me, in my ears!”  I could hear a story on the news, and be an aural witness to the work of Christ somewhere where another might not have noticed.  Maybe Christ has arrived again inside of all of us.  As better hearers of Christ in others, we could find ways to join, not to divide.  We could find ways to trust and hope.  But how.  President Zelenskyy just came to Washington despite great danger and with much secrecy, so that devastated land but not broken land might be front and center in our minds.  How can we live in hope with even just one example of God's children suffering so?

Our next hymn is “Do You Hear What I Hear?”  Written in 1962, the writers, a married couple, were asked to write a Christmas song, but they were reluctant because of the commercialism of Christmas.  They loosely took events from the Matthew gospel version of the birth of Christ, and surrounded the story with even bigger Christmas messages.  Not a bright light and loud roar of heavenly hosts speaking to the angels, but a night wind to a little lamb.  A little lamb to a shepherd boy.  Do you hear, he asks?  And see, and know?  “Pray for peace, people everywhere” we sing.  In an interview years later, the lyricist told of how neither of the two could sing the song completely through at the time they wrote it, because it was written against the back drop of the emotions of the Cuban Missile Crisis.  “Our little song broke us up.  You must realize there was a threat of war at the time.”

The miracle of Christmas is the birth of a babe, sent as God's only son to everyone.  The miracle isn't just the events.  It's not just the God part at the time.  The miracle is the God part now too.  The part where you and I repeat and rehearse a scene exactly like every other year, and simultaneously very different than any other year.  

Any joy that exists, is ours to have and share.  Any peace that exists, is ours to have and share.  Any love that exists, is ours to have and share.  And tonight, all of the light that exists, The Light that was born on this night in order that it will shine on all who walk in the land of darkness, is also ours to have and share.

On this most holy night,

Let us pray,

Holy God, all-glorious giver of grace,

you are light, shining in darkness;

you are life, the life of all people.

Fill us with the light and life of Christ,

through whom all things were made,

so that we may be faithful disciples,

bearing witness to your grace and truth;

through Christ, your Word made flesh.

Amen.