Irrational Joy to the World (Reflections on the Nativity of Our Lord, 2024)

 

The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen as it had been told them. (Luke 2:20)

God has a way of showing up in unusual ways.

I heard this story recently on NPR on a segment all about holiday disasters. It was told by a lady named Faye Lane, who is an airline flight attendant. Faye recounted a flight to New York’s JFK airport during the holiday season. As you can imagine, the plane was stuffed full to darn-near bursting with folks intent on visiting their loved ones or heading back to hearth and home for a cozy Yuletide.

Alas, as happens during this time of year, there was snow. Lots and lots of snow.

JFK’s runways were consumed by the fluffy white stuff, and, although, I’m sure they looked lovey in a frosty holiday sort of way, they couldn’t be cleared in nearly enough time to accommodate all the aircraft scheduled to land on or take off from them. Flights were canceled. People got angry.

Faye’s plane was forced to divert to Washington’s Dulles International. This, in and of itself, would’ve been rather discouraging for the hundred or so on board, but, making matters worse, the snowstorm had closed the terminal at Dulles. The aircraft and all passengers would have to sit on the runway until such a time when it would be safe to take off again for New York.

Being stuck might’ve been bad enough, but the plane was also out of food. And the toilets were filling up. You can bet this was taking the Ho-Ho-Ho out of Christmas for the weary travelers.

Faye recounted a predicable response when the passengers were informed of their condition. They were angry. Really angry. I can imagine them looking for someone to blame. “Didn’t the pilot know this?” “Why didn’t they tell us?” “What’s wrong with those people at JFK? Is there a strike or something?” “I’m going to demand a refund!” “I’ll never fly this airline again!”

Indignant rage lasted for about an hour before subsiding into pure exhaustion. But, by the fourth hour of the flight’s captivity on the frozen tarmac, Faye noticed a very different change of mood. The passengers began talking to each other. Strangers were having conversations. “Little families were forming,” Faye said. By the time the plane finally took off and made the short trip to New York City, the mood was practically festive. Passengers who, hours before had expressed murderous anger, hugged Faye when they disembarked and wished her “Merry Christmas.[i]” I’ll bet the people stuck on that plane will remember that particular Christmas long after more “perfect” holidays have been forgotten.

So often, it’s in the moments of our frustration, or anxiety, or hurt that we learn to appreciate the serendipitous goodness of God.

The whole Christmas story is about God doing the unexpected, violating the value systems of this world, and showing up where least anticipated. God came to a pregnant, unmarried teenage girl. God came to a family experiencing homelessness who would soon become refugees. God came to peasant workers on the third shift—many of whom might never live long enough to experience that baby in the animal’s trough preaching his revolutionary message. God came to foreigners who saw a sign in the heavens.

Christmas is an irrational holiday. We might even call it defiant. It comes for us in the Northern Hemisphere in the bleak midwinter when we experience more hours of darkness than of light. Our Christan ancestors appropriated this holiday and many of its traditions from pagan Romans who were celebrating a feast called Sol Invictus or the Unconquered Sun. Christians remembered the promising words of the prophet Malachi:

But for you who revere my name the sun of righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. (Malachi 4:2)

They knew the real unconquered sun was the Son of God who was crucified and raised. So, they took this pagan festival—the festival of an empire that wanted nothing less than to slaughter them and obliterate their religion—and they blew a big raspberry at the earthly powers and turned their astronomical party into Christ’s Mass.

For two thousand years Christians have celebrated this season of irrational joy. We light lights, we sing songs, we give gifts, we decorate our homes with evergreens—symbols of the imperishable. We throw big parties and cook big meals to share with family and friends and we eat too many sweet things and sometimes party a little too hard. We exhaust ourselves with celebrating—even when we know there may be precious little to celebrate in this fractious and all-too-often violent world.

I guess if we were to identify with any characters in this crazy story, it would have to be the shepherds. Average guys, doing hard work, just trying to get by when un unbelievable messenger tells them an unbelievable story. But they go to Bethlehem and see a baby. They find a homeless family with a baby who is resting in an animal’s food trough, and they are filled with great joy and begin to praise God. Their lives circumstances won’t change, but still they praise God. Their work will still be hard. There will still be sickness and death and taxes to be paid and family to fret over—but still they glorify and praise God.

Nothing may have changed, but everything has changed.

We celebrate the birth of Christ to remind ourselves that God is still with us. We are not forgotten or abandoned. We celebrate the truth that God can use ordinary people like us for the healing of the world. We celebrate knowing when our lives seem stuck on a frozen runway God can use that time to bring new people into our lives, create community, change our perspective, and lead us to an understanding of gratitude, hope, and joy.

Whatever your circumstances are right now, know that Jesus came for you. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. Party on. God is with us.

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[i] You can hear Faye tell this story herself by clicking https://whyy.org/episodes/thanksgiving-disasters-and-how-to-avoid-them/. I may have taken a few liberties with it, but I don’t think she’d mind.

O Little Town of Bethlehem (Reflections on Advent 4, Year C 2024)

 

Christmas Lutheran Church of Bethlehem, Palestine

“But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days.” (Micah 5:2)

Some years ago, I was visiting my sister who lived in Washington state. My stepdaughter, Sandra, who was living in Seatle at the time, was kind enough to put me up while I was in town. She even treated me to dinner at a really cool Seatle-style sea food restaurant where they dump piles of shellfish on a sheet of butcher paper right on your table and you get to crack the shells with a wooden mallet. We talked about a lot of things that night, but I remember telling Sandra the very worst thing that could ever happen to me would be if something happened to her. If she were to die before her time, I would never know how to comfort her mother. That grief would be overwhelming. Our children are supposed to bury us, but we’re never supposed to bury them.

The gospel lesson in the Revised Common Lectionary for Advent 4, Year C (Luke 1:39-45) has both the exquisite delight of motherhood and the specter of losing a child. It’s this incongruously celebratory family reunion between two ladies both rejoicing in their pregnancies. Here are Mary and Elizabeth sharing that mystical secret of carrying human life within their bodies. Neither of these women should be pregnant. Mary is a thirteen or fourteen-year-old unmarried child. Elizabeth has been thought infertile, possibly post-menopausal, and probably cursed by God. But the real incongruity comes from our knowledge of how this story will play out. The love and rejoicing which abounds in this meeting is under the shivering shadow of the fate we know the baby boys of these mothers will suffer. John will be beheaded. Jesus will be crucified. Both mothers will lose their children to violence.

Last week we heard again the news of yet another school shooting, this time a girl, no older than our Virgin Mother might’ve been, took the lives of two people and wounded six others in a Christian school in Madison, Wisconsin before taking her own life. I have to wonder about the mothers and fathers of those who were killed and injured—as well as the parents of the shooter herself. Again, we see the juxtaposition of a season of joy, family, and togetherness with devastating tragedy. Where is the “peace on earth and good will” we’ve been promised?

I try to take comfort from our gospel lesson. These two mothers are rejoicing because, even in a violent and oppressive world, God is still active. God has come to a woman thought cursed and to a powerless peasant girl and told them they matter. They will be part of healing this sinful, confused, and insane planet.

The prophet Micah predicted this in our First Lesson (Micah 5:2-5a). Out of tiny, insignificant Bethlehem would come the ruler who would restore Israel and be the bringer of peace. Micah would make an excellent Lutheran because his book of prophecy follows a pattern of Law and Gospel, the schema Luther used for preaching God’s Word. First, the Law of God brings us to contrition, and then the Gospel of Christ reminds us we are still loved and valued and capable of changing and knowing the fullness of the joy God desires for us.

If it’s been a while since you’ve read the prophet Micah, let me remind you of his back story. This prophet comes on the scene around 700 BC, just s the Assyrians are threatening both the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. They gobble up Israel but are just barely defeated before they can capture Jerusalem. Micah excoriates the leadership of both kingdoms for their neglect of the poor, their corruption, and their rapacious greed which he sees as bringing about God’s wrath. But, after each passage of condemnation, the prophet reminds God’s people of God’s infinite mercy. A Savior will come from the little town of Bethlehem.

I take a small amount of comfort in knowing the crucified Messiah is still alive and well in the little town of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank of Palestine. The website of the Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church proclaims hope in the midst of conflict:

There are about 45,000 Palestinian Christians today who live in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza, making about 1.5% of the population. The Palestinian Christian community continues to decline in numbers, mainly due to the political challenges and the reality of the Occupation. Today, Bethlehem is almost entirely besieged by the Separation Wall and the Israeli settlements, which affect all aspects of life.

Despite the challenges, we are steadfast in the land, building our hope on the Risen Christ. We pray to continue the Lutheran heritage in this land by serving our neighbors and community, through our different Lutheran ministries. At Christmas Lutheran, our vision is “to continue Christ’s ministry of preaching, teaching, and healing in His birth place.”[i]

Our faith teaches us to hope—to believe God is still active even when our lives and our worlds seem hopeless. If there is any possibility for peace between Israel and Palestine it will not come from terrorist organizations like Hamas or Hezbollah. It will not come from Netanyahu and the Israeli government. It certainly won’t come from Donald Trump or his equally unqualified son-in-law.

But it can come from Jesus Christ. Only Jesus teaches us love of enemies, forgiveness, and inclusivity. I like to believe that Pastor Muther Isaac and his congregation at Christmas Lutheran of Bethlehem, by mentoring youth, providing for the poor, and making Christ known, are inching that volatile region just a little bit further from violence and hatred every day, and, perhaps, saving some other mother the grief of losing her child. Out of little Bethlehem a light is shining to illuminate a darkened world.

As we celebrate this season of Our Lord’s coming, we’d be remiss if we didn’t consider those who are grieving, addicted, depressed, or living under the terrors of war, gun violence, and political oppression. Let’s embrace hope, and pray for the coming of the Kingdom when there truly will be peace on earth and goodwill among all people.

PS – I urge you to read Pastor Isaac’s open letter. “Christ Under the Rubble.” All Americans should try to learn and understand the point of view of our brothers and sisters in Palestine. You can read the article here: https://christmaslutheran.org/?page_id=141

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[i] Learn more about this Lutheran ministry by clicking here: https://christmaslutheran.org/?page_id=222 

Just Do the Right Thing (Reflections on Advent 3, Year C 2024)

 

“So, with many other exhortations, (John) proclaimed the good news to the people.” (Luke 3:18)

If the above verse isn’t the punchline of a joke, I don’t know what is! Good news..? In the Gospel appointed for Advent 3, Year C (Luke 3:7-18) John the Baptist just told the people they were a bunch of snakes and warned them if they didn’t get religion in an almighty quick hurry, they were going to be destroyed with unquenchable fire. Is it just me, or does anyone else have a hard time accepting that pronouncement as “good news?”

I guess there’s a certain amount of good news in being warned that there’s going to be some wrath to come. If you can’t flee from it, maybe you can do something to make it a little less wrathful. The children of Abraham knew God had set them apart and blessed them so they could be a blessing to the world. I’m thinking the folks out at the Jordan listening to John preach were just a little too smug being blessed without having to bother blessing anyone else. It’s pretty easy to slither into complacency, don’t you think?

Earlier last week I was listening to NPR and heard a chat with a sociologist named Musa al-Gharbi[i]. This rather impressive fellow was being interviewed to promote his book, We Have Never Been Woke: The Cultural Contradictions of a New Elite. Mr. al-Gharbi maintains that lots of well-meaning people get blessed—that is, make names for themselves—by denouncing the injustices which have afflicted racial minorities, women, the LGBTQ+ community, etc. Yet they have done practically nothing to alleviate the conditions they decry. Al-Gharbi recounted seeing a vast host of “woke” protesters on New York City’s Broadway holding up “Black Lives Matter” signs following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. People drove past this protest parade and honked their horns in support as the protesters dutifully cheered them. What struck al-Gharbi, however, was noticing how the protesters, in their righteous zeal, ignored the community of obviously homeless individuals on the very same street.

The crowds asked John the Baptist, “What, then, should we do?” Mr. al Gharbi suggested that the BLM protesters—most of whom seemed to be affluent members of the Columbia University community—might’ve advanced the cause of social justice less by waving signs and more by purchasing a meal or a pair of shoes for one of the unhoused of Broadway. Doesn’t that sound logical?

The good news might be that doing the right thing, that which is the fruit of repentance and the joy of the Lord, isn’t really that hard. What does John ask of the people but that they care for the less fortunate? If you have two coats, give one to someone who doesn’t have one. Share your food. See that the needs of your brothers and sisters are met. You’ve been blessed, so bless others.

The cool thing about John’s preaching is he doesn’t tell the tax collectors, “Quit your job and stop working for the Roman scum, you traitors!” He knows these guys are just trying to earn a living like everybody else. He doesn’t judge or condemn. He just tells them to do what they do with honesty and integrity and trust that God will provide for them. Similarly, John doesn’t call down opprobrium on the police for their brutality. He offers them the simple exhortation: do your job and don’t abuse your authority.

Is this the good news, that we already know what God asks of us? And that it isn’t all that hard to bear fruits worthy of repentance?

Christ in our hearts answers the question of what we should be doing. Did you know that 40% of all US charitable organizations are religiously affiliated? 45% of churchgoers volunteer their time in their communities, compared with 27% of non-religious folks. 65% of religiously observant folks gave to charity last year, compared to 41% of non-religious. Christians give generously to secular causes as well as to religiously affiliated charities, and the majority of refugee and migrant resettlement is done by Christian charitable organizations[ii]. Faith in Christ makes a difference, a material difference, in this world.

I rejoice to know the little congregation I pastor here in Northeast Philadelphia helps secure food for 3,500 families in this neighborhood. We give Christmas gifts to orphans. We provide fellowship space for senior citizens and a place where the addicted can come for healing. I rejoice to know we are bearing such fruits. This is good news.

The American church is changing. Congregations are closing, but I see this as the chaff being burned away. The old 1950’s notion of church being about our individual salvation is being replaced by a leaner, more socially active church which keeps asking, “What then should we do?” Yes, times change, and so will the church. We may not escape “the wrath to come,” but we don’t have to succumb to it. What then should we, as Christians, do?

St. Paul told us what to do in the epistle lesson assigned for Advent 3, Year C:

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

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[i] You can listen to this interview by clicking here: https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510053/on-point

[ii] You can check out the stats by reading this article: https://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/magazine/less-god-less-giving/

Remember the Wilderness? (Reflections on Advent 2, Year C 2024)

 

The Baptist by Titian (Ital. 1540)

“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight…” (Luke 3: 4b)

 Location, location, location.

Martin Luther King told us about his Dream in front of a gigantic statue of Abraham Lincoln—an obvious symbol for the liberation of African Americans. Ronald Reagan called for the liberation of Eastern Europe while standing at the Brandenburg Gate. Barack Obama announced his candidacy for president from the steps of the Illinois State House, the place where his life in government began. President Biden spoke about democracy from Philadelphia’s Independence Hall. Locations have symbolic resonance, and sometimes the place where an announcement is made is just as important as the announcement itself.

Every year on Advent 2 our Revised Common Lectionary gospel pulls out into the wilderness to hear that funky, skin-wearing, bug-eating prophet, John the Baptist. I think John gave some thought to his location. He wasn’t about to stand in the temple of Jerusalem amidst all the noise and hullabaloo of that metropolitan local, and he certainly wasn’t going to preach from some dinky synagogue in some dinky town. Not old John. He’s calling people out to the River Jordan in a wild, uncultivated, and uninhabited place. Why? Because the wilderness (in Greek eremo, which means an abandoned or desolate place) reminds folks of where they came from. John’s calling them out of their place of business or anxiety or apathy and asking them to remember their heritage and the source of their faith and identity.

And John’s not subtle about this. The gospel says he’s the voice of one crying out in the wilderness. He’s not lecturing or discussing this stuff. He’s yelling it out at the top of his lungs. He’s using his passion to afflict the comfortable and startle the stupefied because these folks need a wake-up call. He’s telling them to look at themselves so they can be ready for what God is about to do.

So out they come to the Jordan. Out into a landscape that’s dry and full of bugs and critters where they can remember their ancestors. They can think about that sorry bunch of ex-slaves whom Moses led around a similar environment for forty years. They can recall the stories of hunger and thirst, hardship and battles with the folks who didn’t take kindly to a roving horde of displaced people. They can remember stories about poison snakes and God’s mercy. And they can remember that it was in that location that God gave them the Law and made them who they were—a strong nation, children of Abraham, who would be blessed to be a blessing to the world. Yes, under years of persecution and occupation they might’ve forgotten that promise. But God didn’t.

Maybe you’ve been in a wilderness of your own. Do you remember the time when everything in your life seemed crazy or uncertain? When you didn’t have enough cash or you felt you’d been deserted?

Just before Christmas 1987 two important things happened in my life. I was teaching part-time at a small community college, and I’d finally saved enough cash to move out of my parents’ home (My dad said he’d give each of his kids only four years to complete a bachelor’s degree and then he’d street us. When I returned from graduate school he had changed his mind. He did the same for my two sisters). I paid my security deposit on a nice apartment (nicer than the ones I’d lived in as a grad student, at least) and bought a whole house full of furniture on my credit card. A week later I was informed the college was cutting two thirds of my teaching load—which meant two thirds of my salary was going along with the cut. I had a nice new home and new furnishings and no way to pay for them. Bummer. There would be no Christmas tree in my flat that Christmas.

What to do? Sell everything and move back in with Mom and Dad? Or, just maybe, my choice was to grow up, get another job, and support myself like an adult. I did the latter. I took a desk job with an investor relations firm. It was boring work, and it involved an almost hour-long commute in stop-start LA traffic each way. My 1984 Ford Escort frequently overheated on the 91 freeway. The job didn’t pay much, but it kept the rent paid and the credit card bills semi-current—even though I was constantly charging for car repairs. There was no money for entertainment. I didn’t like it, but it really was the best choice. I struggled through much of 1988, but, by year’s end, I found a new calling as a secondary special ed teacher in the Los Angeles School District. That experience, seeing kids dealing with real poverty issues, led me to consider ordained ministry.

I think back on that unsettled “wilderness” time not to pat myself on the back or recall how crappy it is to take a job just because you need the money, but to remember just how good and faithful God has been to me. Sometimes God has to call us out of our hurried or anxious lives—especially at this time of year when we can so easily be preoccupied with holiday planning—and take us back to the wilderness of our lives to remind and refocus us on God’s steadfast love.

A detail I always liked about this gospel lesson was Luke’s very conscientious naming of all the potentates in verses 1 and 2. I’m certain Luke did this just to set the story in its historic context, but I think it speaks about our time, too. Pontius Pilate and Herod and Caiaphas may figure into the story later, but here Luke uses them only to put John the Baptist on the calendar. Those curious or anxious or confused folks who made their way out to the wilderness by the Jordan to hear the prophet weren’t going to hear a stump speech about how their country should be run. They couldn’t do anything about that anyway. John was calling them to address something they could change—themselves. He called them to this lonely place, away from their distractions, to confess their sins and be forgiven. That way they could make the paths of their lives straight for Jesus to enter in.

It's not a bad idea to look backward at this time of the year. I don’t mean to glorify Christmas Past like Scrooge or to get melancholy for things which aren’t as they used to be. But maybe we can get back in touch with why this time is so special and, at the risk of sounding trite, remember what it is we’re really celebrating—God’s presence among us. Remember your wilderness and the goodness of the Lord.

Happy Advent, my friend! May this season draw you closer to God and to those you love.