What Child Is This?

Scripture Lessons: Ezra 3: 10-13 and Luke 1: 46-55 Sermon title: What Child Is This Preached on December 13, 2020 Some years ago, I was a camp counselor at Camp Cherokee, which was a church camp the churches in our Presbytery organized up on Lake Allatoona. My sister Elizabeth and I grew up going there. When we were old enough, we both became counselors. Every week of camp there’d be a different preacher who would lead the evening worship service for all the young campers, and one of their sermons comes to mind in thinking about this passage of Scripture, where Mary reacts to the news that she will be the mother of our Savior. This preacher didn’t beat around the bush. He had something he wanted to say, and he was going to say it whether it was appropriate for young ears to hear or not. He was really focused on the Lord’s crucifixion. “Did you know children,” he says, “that after the Lord was betrayed, he was arrested, but the Roman soldiers weren’t kind to our Lord. No, they whipped him. They whipped and whipped him within an inch of his life, but it wasn’t quite enough to kill him.” “So, after they whipped him, they put this awful crown of thorns on his head so that blood dripped down his face. But children, it wasn’t the crown of thorns that killed him either. Since he was still within an inch of his life, they took these old rusty nails. They took these big rusty nails and they nailed him through the arm and to this wooden cross, only it wasn’t the rusty nails that killed him either. Do you know what finally killed him children?” And I could hear it from the back of the group. Just a whisper from a boy of 8 or 9: “Was it tetanus?” I love that story. The preacher is trying to make one point, but a young boy speaks up to make another, and in that moment one sermon gave way to an experience that brings me joy every time I think of it. That’s one place joy comes from isn’t it? This Sunday of the season of Advent we light the third Advent Candle, the Candle of Joy. It’s particularly appropriate that the Foster Family light the Joy Candle, because that was Natalie Foster’s mother’s name, so today we celebrate joy, but think with me about where joy comes from. Don’t we so often find joy in the unexpected. Don’t you see joy when the daily grind blooms in surprises. That’s how it is sometimes. Because sometimes when everything goes according to plan life becomes boring and monotonous, and sometimes when everything goes wrong, it goes exactly right. Sometimes the best laid schemes of mice and men fall apart, and what gives way are stories truly worth telling and remembering. The best Christmas movies are like that. Think about Home Alone. In the movie, Home Alone, in one sense, everything goes absolutely wrong. What could be worse than forgetting your child at home when flying to Paris? That’s what happens to the main character, Kevin, who was no older than the little camper in my story and yet he’s left all alone at Christmas. At first, it’s an exciting adventure for him. For his mother it was her worst nightmare, but what starts off in a nightmare turns into little Kevin learning to value his family. A lesson is learned because they forgot him and left him at home all by himself. Now that wasn’t a well-executed family trip, yet something so good came out of it. In the same way, think about How the Grinch Stole Christmas. No one hopes to have their tree stolen by a broken-hearted man covered in green fur, but when the Who’s down in Whoville find that everything is gone on Christmas morning what do they do? They sing. Then there’s our family favorite, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. We watched it last weekend and our daughters couldn’t believe how their parents laughed at all these jokes they considered to be highly inappropriate, yet it is hilarious. It’s hilarious how Clark Griswold works and works and works to enhance everyone’s Christmas cheer, yet nothing goes right. The turkey is dry, one lady wraps up her cat as a present, Snot the dog gags on a bone from under the table, and Cousin Eddie empties the-you-know-what in the storm drain, for despite all our hard work it appears as though all we’re going to get some years is a subscription to Jelly of the Month Club or worse. This has been a challenging year. In some ways, this has been a nightmare of a year. Have you seen the 2020 themed Christmas ornaments? We have special, commemorative ornaments on our tree that represent different milestones. The 2002 ornament from Sara’s Mom has wedding bells on it because that was our first Christmas together as husband and wife. Sara’s Mom also gave us new baby ornaments for 2009 and 2011 for our daughters’ first Christmases. But have you seen the 2020 commemorative ornaments? One has Santa with a N-95 mask on. Another is a garbage dumpster on fire. I just designed one for the Foster’s, because little Harry, their four-year-old, got his head stuck in the banisters of their staircase. Jon made the mistake of sending me a picture, which I’ve sent off to a company to turn into a glass ornament, so they’ll always remember just what this crazy year was like. The Grinch would say that this year stink, stank, stunk, but if we look to Mary then comes the reminder that among our shattered expectations is the promise of God. We know her song well. It’s been sung and sung, again and again. We call it the Magnificat, but consider the context she sang that song in. She had just been told by an angel that she would become the mother to our Savior, but what child is this? Being pregnant wasn’t part of her plan. She wasn’t even married. Do you think she grew up dreaming of the year she’d become an unwed teenage mother? Do you think she was hoping to be the subject of whisper and rumor, a stress on her poor mother and a shame on her father? That Christmas so long ago, was anything going according to how she envisioned it? No. But consider how when all her plans go up in smoke, she sings, because Mary sees something larger than life unfolding before her. She feels a promise growing in her womb. She knew that in her life a dream was becoming a reality, a bright future that she could not have imagined, only for it to be realized she must accept that Christmas can no longer be about her plans. What we see in her song is that faithful Mary knows that this is about God’s plans, so rather than sing a sad lamentation as everything she wrote down in her wedding book planner is going up in flames, Mary rejoices for she knows that sometimes God makes a mockery of our best laid plans to give a gift that’s even better. That’s what happens in all the best Christmas movies. Do you remember how Cousin Eddie kidnaps Clark’s boss and brings him back hog tied in his bathrobe? Now the Griswold’s are truly in the midst of a disaster. Clark has basically already ruined everything in his attempt to hold it all together, only it’s about to get worse, because the SWAT team is poised to capture the kidnapper and Clark is can see himself spending the rest of Christmas in jail. Think about what all is going on here. Things are now very bad, when suddenly the boss can see that not giving his employees their Christmas bonus was the wrong move. Everything is falling apart, but somehow, in the midst of the chaos he is busy recognizing what really matters. Clark’s boss is facing the uncomfortable truth about himself, and wrestling with what he should have done all along but didn’t and what he can do next to somehow make it all right. That’s what he sees as his world is turned upside down. He’s seeing things while at the mercy of a kindhearted doofus, but through his unexpected Christmas Eve this powerful corporate mogul discovers what Christmas really is. The mess has to happen, for the proud must change and be reborn. That’s another reason we love Mary’s song. We love to hear it, because it’s beautiful, only it’s not holly-jolly, radio ready, Christmas fluff. It’s justice, righteousness, and joy springing from ashes. My soul magnifies the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones. Are you ready for that? Are your eyes open to that? They may as well be, because we’re right in the middle of it. This year we can’t gather for Christmas Eve services as we always have. I’m the most disappointed that we can’t have our family service, but that doesn’t mean families aren’t gathering here. In fact, 350 families are lining up in our parking lot every Monday to receive a box from the Atlanta Food Bank containing five complete meals. For some reason the Atlanta Food Bank gave us boxes and boxes of garlic last week. Thank goodness no one brought all those boxes inside or we’d still be smelling it, but that’s hardly the point. The point is that there is such a profound need in our community, but had we all been rushing around like always, I don’t know if I would have seen it, whereas this year the unemployed and underemployed are impossible for me to ignore. My eyes are open, though my plans are falling apart. We want Christmas to be perfect, but this year it’s being interrupted. Some of us will have to adapt to new ways of doing things. Some of us will be by ourselves this Christmas, which I hate, but consider this: every year some people are alone on Christmas, we just don’t always think about it. Now that you’re thinking about them, hear the invitation to really see them. That’s what Christmas really is. In Home Alone, it took having a nightmare Christmas to discover the miracle of family that they had been taking for granted. In How the Grinch Stole Christmas, it took stealing Christmas for him to understand. In Christmas Vacation, Clark’s plans must go up in flames for him to erupt in joy as his bosses hardened heart changed, finally seeing his employees as people. This year we all have to think about Christmas differently. Inspired by Mary’s song we faithful people must imagine how that can be a blessing. We sing, “What child is this?” And the answer is, he is the one who changes things. Take this year of change as an opportunity to value what you’ve taken for granted, to celebrate what’s become tired routine, and to find joy in the unexpected. May Christ’s peace rise from the ashes of your best laid plans, for he is coming, and he comes to make all things new. Amen.