By Another Road, a sermon based on Matthew 2: 1-12, preached on December 31, 2023

According to Rolling Stone magazine, it’s number 15, but some might say that the best Christmas movie of all time is 1965’s A Charlie Brown Christmas. In it, all the Peanuts characters work to bring the story of Christmas to the stage in a nativity play. Charlie Brown is the director, which is as frustrating for him as is trying to kick a football. In the hopes of bringing some Christmas cheer to the production that’s going downhill fast, he picks out a thread-bare Christmas tree from the lot because he feels sorry for it. When he’s ridiculed for his choice, he throws up his arms in exasperation asking, “Doesn’t anyone here know what Christmas is all about?” Linus, who’s been picked at for carrying around his blanket more than usual during this episode, takes the stage to prove that he does know what Christmas is all about. From memory, he quotes from the second chapter of the Gospel of Luke, saying, And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for behold, I bring unto you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. He says all that and more from memory. Inspired by his example, our Director of Music and Fine Arts, Dr. Jeffrey Meeks, has this passage memorized as well. If you’ve seen A Charlie Brown Christmas as often as I have, then maybe you can picture Linus saying these powerful words, only, there’s one detail I hadn’t noticed. Right in the middle of his recitation, Linus drops his blanket. Until Mary Anne Lanier, one of our church’s elected leaders, mentioned it in her devotion to the session last month, I knew Linus recited the passage from memory, but I didn’t know the passage enabled him to drop his security blanket. I was so taken with this detail that I looked it up, and interestingly, a lot has been written about why the character Linus drops his blanket while he’s proclaiming the Gospel. Specifically, he drops the blanket the moment he utters the words of the angel to the terrified shepherds, “Fear not.” In that moment, Linus was unafraid. In that moment, the Gospel gave him the strength he needed, not the blanket. This is the power of Jesus. Jesus brings us strength and comfort, joy and peace, and so those Magi from the East were drawn to Him. They traveled from home down one long road, bringing gifts to the Christ Child, a road that took them right by the home of King Herod, yet after seeing Jesus, they traveled home by another road. That’s what our second Scripture lesson from the Gospel of Matthew says. “They left for their own country by another road.” Today, I invite you to think about how Jesus enables us to do the same, for the Gospel separates us from our fears, and by the power of the gospel, we may find ourselves able to drop those old habits to which we’ve clung for security just as Linus dropped his blanket. The Good News in Jesus Christ can set us free from our fears so that we might drop the old routines we’ve been stuck in to travel by new paths, just as the Magi went home by another road. That’s what I’m trying to say this morning. It’s nothing too complicated. The Christians life, the new life Jesus enables us to live, is marked by less fear and more faith, so we can let go and move on, no longer bound to the false security of pleasure, power, or routine, but are set free to live a new life, forgiven, changed, renewed, and restored. From the wise to the simple and from the humble to the proud, Jesus invites us to drop our security blankets and to follow Him down a new road in this new year, only the Magi make it look too easy. The kind of change that I’m talking about this morning isn’t easy. Lasting change takes time, so if you really pay attention to Linus in A Charlie Brown Christmas, then you’ll notice that as soon as he completes his recitation of Luke’s Gospel from memory, he steps out from the spotlight to pick up his security blanket once again. Why would he do that? Maybe you know. The power of the epiphany fades. Our spirits are willing, but our flesh is still weak. The old road that we know starts to look good compared to the new road with its destination unknown, so many of us who find the strength to make a change go back to our security blankets a few times before truly letting it go. For example, during the Pandemic, many families slowed down. We did less and were together more, yet I’ve now returned to the old habit of staying busy because it is difficult to stay on the new road. Losing weight is one thing; keeping it off is another. Giving up alcohol for January is something that many people do, yet how long will the new practice last? Change is difficult to embrace. People are afraid of change, though what should scare us more than change are the monsters we become when we can’t let go of our addiction to control. We’ve been thinking about the new road the Magi travel down. They embody the most faithful response to the Christ Child in our second Scripture lesson for this morning, yet as we face our own reluctance to change, consider with me Herod’s fear. When Herod heard about the newborn King of the Jews, Matthew tells us that he was afraid, and that the whole city of Jerusalem was afraid with him. Out of fear of losing his grip on power, Herod asked the Magi to tell him once they found the baby, although he wanted to find the child to kill him. When the Magi went home by another road, Herod killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or younger. Think about that. In the face of fear and anxiety, many cling tightly to control, or the illusion of it. I heard someone say, “My least favorite Christmas tradition is waking up for two hours every night to worry about things over which I have no control.” Can you relate? Sometimes, when I look out on the world and feel truly afraid, or when responsibilities pile up, and I feel anxious or overwhelmed, I’ll fold laundry. At least I can control that, or so I think, until I get to a fitted sheet, and then I feel out of control all over again. Still, think with me about how we respond to fear. Like Linus, many respond to fear by holding tightly to their security blankets. Others, like Herod, hold tightly to the control they think they have. I believe that faith calls us away from both those well-traveled paths to another road: the road modeled by the Magi, who respond to the Christ Child and the chaos of the world around them by giving gifts. Herod lived in such a way that he acted as though he had everything to lose, yet the Magi had so much to give, so they laid gold, frankincense, and myrrh at the Christ Child’s feet. Compare those two different responses and think with me about the difference that people make when they show up at a grieving neighbor’s home armed with a casserole. When a neighbor dies, that’s what we do. On the other hand, in the book of Job, Job’s friends show up to sit with Job for 40 days, and after that, they try to explain his tragedy away. When we face the uncertainty of life on earth, when we feel afraid, and that fear creeps into our bones so that it keeps us up at night, we might get out of bed to fold laundry, we might tighten our grip on the power that we do have, but better is for us to ask ourselves, “What do I have to give?” We are always thinking about what we have to lose, but better is to ask, “What does this situation need from me?” This is the way of Jesus. It’s there in the words of our second hymn, “What Child Is This?” We sang some Christmas carols this morning. Up until now, my family’s been giving me a hard time for making y’all sing too many Advent hymns. “Now that Christmas is over, we’re finally singing them,” I can hear them say, but listen to the second verse of “What Child Is This?” Nails, spear, shall pierce him through. The cross be borne for me, for you. Even in the Christmas carols, we remember that in the face of so much suffering, Christ did not try to control the world. He rejected the throne. He refused to take over. Instead, He offered a broken world His body and blood. My friends, this response to fear is a different road, for over and above all our culture’s many addictions is the addiction to control. We want to hold so tightly to what we have. We want to wrap our kids in bubble wrap, and we stay up late at night worrying over that which we can do little to nothing about, for in the end, how much control do we really have? What can we do about the suffering of the world? We can give of ourselves. We all have something to give. So bring him incense, gold, and myrrh. Come, one and all, to own him. The King of Kings, salvation brings. let loving hearts enthrone him. That’s how the hymn goes because that’s how Jesus lived. Follow where He leads by giving of yourself, and in so doing, perhaps you’ll find that you are afraid no longer and that you’ve made the world a little bit of a better place. I remember so well this one scene in the movie Stepmom. Have you seen that one? Julia Roberts plays the new wife of Ed Harris and the stepmom to his two children. She’s learning the ropes without much success, until Ed’s first wife, the mother to his two children, is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Before Susan Sarandon’s character dies, she gives her children two gifts. She gives her son a cape because he was into magic, and her daughter a blanket. Both gifts are covered in pictures that their new stepmom took of the children with their mother, and by this gift she not only honored their past but paved the way into the future. There are so many things that make me feel out of control. Our best response is not fear, but faith. Give of yourself and pave the way to a brighter future. Amen.