He Speaks in a Baby's Cry

“No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.”  St. John 1:18

God speaks to His people.  This is where all Biblical religion begins, with a God who knows us and who addresses us, who wishes us to know Him and the truth about Him.  He has spoken, our Epistle lesson says, “at sundry times and in divers manners.” 

All things began with His speaking, “let there be,” and it was—by the Word, Saint John assures us, “everything was made that was made.”  God speaks through the creation itself—in vistas that take our breaths away, in the ordered progression of sun and moon, in the complex laws of nature.  The heavens tell His glory, the Psalmist assures us,[1] and all things return the cry, “bless the Lord, praise Him, and magnify Him for ever.[2]”

God speaks in the conscience, our common faculty for knowing right and wrong, that “light that enlightens every man that comes into the world.”  He speaks through our deepest longings and highest aspirations, our yearning to know that which is noblest and best, and to be united with it.  He speaks in our desire to love others, in our search for deep stillness, in our persistent sense of justice. 

God's Peculiar People: A Christmas Sermon

“He gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity,and purify unto himself a peculiar people.”  Titus 2:14

Christmas is our American family holiday.  Or maybe better, it’s the holiday when we all aim to cobble together, if only for a few candlelit hours, the version of family we would really like to be.  Expectations are ratcheted up by Norman Rockwell paintings, sentimental holiday movies, and “There’s No Place Like Home for the Holidays,” and most of our families have at least one special “holiday person,” who seems to live for the thrill of whipping the whole spectacle into shape each year. 

Most families have Christmas rituals, even if they aren’t otherwise all that ritualistic.  There’s a certain way we open gifts.  Decorations go in certain places.  The main meal is always served at the same time (and we simply can’t imagine how anyone would do it another way).  A few of you may have ended up here this evening for reasons that run along these same lines. 

A Gift and a Bringer of Gifts

Also printed in The Potomac Almanac, 22 Dec.

I fumbled in my wallet for a bill, my fingers a little numb from the frosty air.  The man ringing the bell flashed me a smile and waited patiently for me to drop it into the red kettle.  “God bless you, my friend,” he said.  I thanked him for what he was doing, grateful he’d given me the chance to bless someone else in this special season. 

This is my first Christmas in Potomac.  It’s only been a few weeks since my family and I moved here from Virginia so I could begin serving as the pastor of Saint Francis Church in the middle of the village.  But like many of you, I’ve been dropping money in those kettles for years.  It was a comforting sight to see the ringer and the kettle outside the Giant last Saturday. “The Salvation Army,” I thought to myself, “they’re here, too.  They make Christmas feel a little more like Christmas, and this town feel a little more like home.”

Christmas Makes People Crazy

“I am bringing you good news of great joy for all people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”  St. Luke 2:10-11

Perhaps you’ve noticed that Christmas makes people crazy.  About a month ago, my neighbor affixed a two foot-tall stuffed antler on either side of her SUV and a red pom-pom the size of a basketball on her front grill.  She’s a very sensible person really, a German, for heaven’s sake, but—you know, it’s Christmas.   Only at Christmas do we get up on ladders to affix dozens of tiny lights to our down spouting.  It’s our only time for drinking out of vessels that look like a deer’s head or an elf’s boot.  Christmas is the only time quite a few of us would be caught dead singing in public.

It’s not just that we become silly at Christmas.  It’s also the season for generosity.  We remember to greet people at Christmas.  We set aside a little gift for so many of those folks that we usually take for granted: the poor fellow who delivers the newspaper so early in the morning, our children’s longsuffering teachers.  I heard a story on the radio last week about an anonymous man who went into two Walmarts in Cleveland and paid for everything on layaway.  He spent over $100,000 buying items from socks to big screen TVs for people struggling to get by.   And of course, he did it at Christmas. The official Walmart spokesman put it this way: “Christmas is a time of year when many people go above and beyond to give back to their neighbors and communities.  When customers anonymously pay off others’ layaway items we’re reminded of the amazing things people will do to support each other.”[1]

Ponder: A good start along the path

“So yeah, most of what I loved about this time of year was secular and perhaps even a bit shallow. I had no sense of Advent at all, except that it was the churchy name for getting ready for Christmas. But even in the middle of all the hoopla in my thoroughly secularized Christmas, there was a strange kind of grace imparted to me. There was a magic and wonder to the whole thing that was not just about Santa Claus. It was not intellectual. It was an experience, a feeling even, almost imperceptible, that Christmas meant that the world could change. Christmas meant that old things would die and something new and larger than life would be born. Christmas meant the beginning of the end of evil, as good was being born into the world — not exactly the doctrine of the Incarnation in all its fullness, but a good start along the path.”

Jonathan Mitchican, “Stop Being Jerks about Advent.”  Covenant, 15 Dec. 2015

Rend the Heavens: A Meditation for Advent

“O that thou wouldst rend the heavens and come down.”  Is. 64:1

The Church’s faith and proclamation seldom clashes as sharply with the world as in the early days of December.  The world is well into its “holiday season,” a time of meaningless jollity, excessive consumption, and a sentimental delight in the vague pleasantries of the comfortable home and the stable family. 

But the Church is keeping Advent.  We sit with those “who dwell in deep darkness” and follow the Baptist out into the desert.  We call for the Lord to come with power and set this sad and broken world to rights.  We scan the distant mountains for the first rays of the coming dawn.