Holding On To Christmas
Sermon
Christmas Is For The Young... Whatever Their Age
16 Christmas Sermon Stories
Object:
Since I was a small boy, one of my most memorable experiences at Christmastime has been listening to, watching, or reading Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. As a small boy, I remember listening to it on some records my mother had and being carried to another world by the spirits who visited Scrooge at night and the ghost that haunted him. Since that time I have read the story, seen it in productions in the theatre, and watched it on television in various formats. This Christmas season, I saw George C. Scott in a new production of A Christmas Carol, and I always marvel at the wonder of that writing.
Dickens wrote that story over 150 years ago. It is easy for us to forget how long ago it was written. Dickens was only 31 years old when he wrote it and was in desperate financial straits. The story didn't sell very well -- only 15,000 copies the first year. Many of us today would think we had done rather well if we sold 15,000 copies of our books. Some of Dickens' novels, however, sold 70,000 copies in the first month. He wrote another Christmas story, titled Dr. Marigold's Prescriptions, which sold 250,000 copies the first week. Have you ever heard of that one? Don't feel bad, I haven't, either. It didn't last. The story that didn't seem to be so popular at its writing is the one that has become a classic.
Ebenezer Scrooge's Story
The story, as you know, tells about Ebenezer Scrooge, an old skinflint, who has become identified with "Bah! Humbug!" and the hatred of Christmas, along with Tiny Tim, Jacob Marley, and Bob Cratchit, his clerk. Scrooge goes home from work, after already having deflated the enthusiasm of many about Christmas. When he sits down to eat a light meal before he retires for bed, he has a ghost-like visitor, Jacob Marley, his former partner in business. His partner comes fettered down with heavy chains. When Scrooge asks him why he is fettered, he responded: "I wear the chain I forged in life. I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it of my own free will, and of my free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?" His business partner tells him that he will be visited by three spirits -- the ghosts of Christmas -- past, present, and future.
The Ghost Of Christmas Past
Scrooge thinks that he is just having a bad dream. The dream, he believes, has come about because he has eaten the wrong thing, so soon he drops off to sleep. Suddenly he is awakened by the visit of the first spirit who takes him back to four Christmases in the past. "Long past?" Scrooge inquires of the spirit. "No, your past," the ghost replies. He carries him back to his childhood where familiar sights and sounds remind him of the joy he experienced at Christmas. He next sees himself when he was a young boy in a boarding school where all the other students have gone home and he is seen alone reading on Christmas day. Then he is taken to a Christmas party at the office of Mr. Fezziwig where he had served as an apprentice. He rejoices in the memory of that party. He sees the young woman whom he almost married. He sees himself rejecting Belle because money had become his chief desire in life. Later he sees Belle married to another and surrounded by her children.
The Ghost Of Christmas Present
Next, he is confronted by the Ghost of Christmas Present. This ghost carries him to visit some poor people, living on the edge of town, who are having a difficult struggle in life. He realizes that these are the very people he had rejected and wanted to do nothing to help them. For the first time, he sees them as good people. He sees a father who wants to work but cannot find work, yet he has a family to support. Then the ghost takes him to the home of his clerk, Bob Cratchit. There he sees a man who struggles to provide for his family on the meager salary that he gives him, and yet there is much happiness and joy in their family. He sees their young son, Tiny Tim, who has an illness and will probably die unless he receives an operation.
The Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come
The last spirit to visit Scrooge was the one who showed him Christmas yet to come. The spirit shows him a vision of some of his business associates who are laughing and indifferent at the news of the death of one of their members. They express no regret or sorrow. One of them declares, "Unless there is lunch, I won't go. I must be fed." He is taken next to a pawnshop where he sees some people bartering over some merchandise they have stolen from the house of a dead man. He realizes that the items they are bartering are his possessions. Finally he is taken to a grave, which he realizes is his own grave, and there is no one to weep or mourn for him. Overcome by what he has experienced he asks, "Are these shadows of the things that will be or are they shadows of the things that may be only? ... Good spirit, assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life!"
Christmas Day Arrives
Suddenly Scrooge awakens in his own room. Through this experience, a conversion takes place in his heart. There is no other word to describe it. He is converted by what has happened to him in the visitations of that night. He throws up the window and asks, "What day is this?" He discovers it is Christmas Day. He asks that the biggest goose in the village market be taken to his clerk's home. He rushes off to see his nephew and surprises them by his pleasant visit. He promises to give a large sum of money to help the poor. The next day, he gives a raise to his clerk. His whole life is filled with an understanding of the great joy that has come at Christmas. Dickens concludes that marvelous story with these words: "And it was always said of him that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge."
Keeping Christmas
He knew how to keep Christmas. Do you? Do I? Do we really know how to keep Christmas? Soon we will be taking down the tree. The needles are already dropping off in some houses, aren't they? The presents will be put away -- some exchanged first. Some folks are already tired of turkey and ham. "Not again!" they cry. Others are like the young boy on Christmas morning who is surrounded by toys after he has ripped open his packages, and he then asks: "Is this all?" There are some people who already have post-Christmas blues. They were disappointed. Christmas wasn't what they thought it was going to be. Some people are still suffering from their Christmas hangovers. They tried to celebrate in a different kind of way to cure their blues and disappointments.
But remember, even at the first Christmas, the shepherds went back to work. The star disappeared and the wise men returned home. Even the angels ceased their singing. Sooner or later, Mary, Joseph, and the baby returned to Nazareth. How do you hang on to Christmas? Is there any way to capture the sense of joy, peace, mystery, and wonder of Christmas and hold onto it? Or is Christmas just something we put away with all of the decorations? I think there are at least three suggestions in the Christmas stories about how to hang on to Christmas. Let us look at these for a moment.
Different Because Of Christmas
The first possibility comes to us from the story about the wise men. After the wise men had traveled to the manger, knelt down and worshiped the Christ Child, and presented him their gifts, they were warned in a dream by God not to tell Herod where the child was. To avoid seeing the king, they went back a different way from the way they had come. That expression can be almost parabolic for us. Can anyone come to Bethlehem and go away from the manger in the same way? Can you? How can one kneel at the mystery and wonder of the Christ Child and not be different? In this Christmas season, as the wise men did centuries age, let's come again to Bethlehem and kneel before the Christ and go away different because of that meeting.
Who among us has not committed some mistakes in his or her life that we wish we had not done? There are things we wish we could do differently. We have made wrong turns and have hurt others. There are sins that need to be forgiven. There are old grudges that need to be forgotten. Mistakes need to be erased. Sarcasm, bitterness, and hostility need to be eradicated from our lives. Hatreds and disappointments need to be forgotten, misunderstandings must be overcome, and new visions must be seen. Christmas is a time to walk a different path, to go back a different way than the way we came. To celebrate Christmas with feelings of hostility, hatred, anger, and prejudice is to not understand what Christmas really is. There are some of you who are loaded down with guilt and sin. You have the opportunity to walk back a different way, having experienced the forgiveness that you can find at Christmastime.
A counselor had worked with a woman for several weeks trying to help her overcome her sense of guilt and accept the forgiveness of God. But for some reason she simply could not forgive herself nor accept forgiveness. Finally, he brought her into a small chapel at the church and asked her to kneel before the altar. She knelt down and he placed his hands on her head and said: "In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven. Rise up a new woman, forgiven by God's grace to walk in a new way." And she did!
Christmas tells you that message. You don't have to hold on to your sins, your old guilts, or your mistakes. You can rise up as a new person, forgiven by the grace of God. You can be different. Scrooge was converted. Some people sneer at that story and say, "Impossible -- no one could change like that." Read the New Testament and see the radical change in the apostle Paul. Read the history of the Christian faith and see the radical changes made in people again and again as they are confronted by the Spirit of God.
Change Is Possible
If you don't believe in change, then why do we have schools? The whole purpose of schools and colleges is to change individuals into better-equipped people. We believe that people can be changed by education and live differently. They can learn more than they already know so that they can be better people. If you don't believe that people can change for the better what good are our prisons? Prisons provide a place where people who have done wrong can be trained to be made better citizens. We have hospitals because we believe in the possibility of better health. Schools, hospitals, prisons, and hundreds of other institutions are in existence because we believe that change is possible. The old saying, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks," cannot be the motto for the Christian. The Christian faith focuses on the possibility of beginning anew and being different.
I know a social worker who never took his work the same after visiting a family living in a chicken house. I know a minister who witnessed the starving multitudes of India and was never the same in his concern for the poor of the world. I know a college student who worked with blacks one summer and was not prejudiced again. I know a woman who served in a soup line one winter and never felt the same toward the outcast of society. A young teacher spent a year teaching affluent teenagers and witnessed their loneliness, frustrations, and problems with drugs, and never talked again about the easy style of life the wealthy had. People can and do change. Some change for the better; others, unfortunately, change for the worse. The church should offer guidance to the path of renewal for the higher way. Go to Bethlehem and then take a different path home because you have met the Christ and your life is different because of that meeting.
A Time Of Reflection
Another figure rises to teach us a lesson from the Christmas story, and that is Mary. We read that Mary saw the shepherds and the wise men, listened to what they told her, and pondered all these things in her heart. Christmas is a time for reflection, isn't it? To look upon the mystery and wonder of the Christmas story causes us to ponder its message. Who can understand it all? Trivial thinking is inadequate. Deep and profound thought is required. Who can say that he or she understands the incarnation -- the coming of God into the world through Christ? But reflect upon it we must. Like Mary, we deliberate upon it continuously. We think about the God who loved us so much he came among us and shared himself with us.
Reflect on the fact that Christmas is not so much God giving us gifts, as God giving us his presence. He didn't give us presents, but he gave us presence. He gave us the gift of himself. He came among us and we saw what God was like. He has challenged us to learn to give the only real gift any of us has, which is the gift of ourselves. The greatest gift we can ever give to someone, we learn at Christmas, is never things, but our own presence. The best gift is the gift of ourselves, being present, caring, and loving.
A young beauty queen had been hospitalized. Friends had covered her room with flowers. Her minister went to visit her one day. As he walked into the room, he noticed that it looked like a florist shop. "My what lovely flowers," he observed. "Yes, they are lovely," she responded, "but flowers are not people." Then she began to cry. The loveliest flowers or the most expensive gifts can never take the place of presence -- your presence, your concern, and your love. That is the real need of most of us at Christmas. Presence is the most precious gift of all.
Christ has come to give us "life," and in him we experience the abundant life and discover the meaning and richness of authentic life. The presence of God was made known to us through Jesus Christ, and our goal as Christians is to grow in a deeper awareness of what life can be like as we walk in his way. In this Christmas season, as you try to learn how to be more Christlike, focus not so much on what you can get for Christmas, but what you can do for another person. Learn from Bethlehem to be concerned not so much with your own rights, but the rights of others. Focus not so much on your own happiness but what you can do to make others happy. Let your concern be not so much on what you can receive but what you can give. Think not primarily about your own happiness but the happiness of others. Do not look for what others can do for you but what you can do for them.
As you experience the "life" which Christ gives you, let its influence fill your whole person with its warmth and radiance. You will live differently because of it. Reflect on the story of Christmas. You can never grasp all of the mystery of it, but as you reflect on it, your life will be changed as you allow the wonder of the God who has come among us at Christmastime to fill your heart with his presence.
A Glorified Spirit
The shepherds also teach us another way to remember Christmas. We read that the shepherds returned glorifying and praising God for all that they had seen and heard in Bethlehem. The shepherds returned to their normal work. They couldn't stay around the manger forever. You can't remain around the Christmas tree forever, either. We can't stay at the Advent wreath forever. Sooner or later we return to our daily work. But as we return, we should be different because of Christmas. There should be something in our life that will make our work more radiant and more enjoyable. People, hopefully, can see that there is something different in our lives because of Christmas.
When the shepherds came to the manger at Bethlehem, they realized that the ancient prophecy which had come down through the ages had been fulfilled. Prophets like Isaiah, Micah, and Zephaniah proclaimed that the Lord God, himself, would be in the midst of his people. Zephaniah spoke about the golden age that would come to Israel and they would realize the fulfillment of all their hopes and dreams. At the manger in Bethlehem, the New Testament writers are telling us that this ancient prophecy was fulfilled. The shepherds were witnesses to its fulfillment. They did not yet know that his throne would be a cross and his only crown would be a crown of thorns. His reign would be in the hearts of men and women and not on a physical seat of power in Israel.
Suppose years after the birth of Christ one of the shepherds, who had heard the angels sing the good news of that birth, was telling the story to his grandson. "Nathan," he said, "you won't believe it. We were out in the fields taking care of the sheep, when suddenly angels burst across the sky and began to sing. I've never seen an angel before. They told us a message of great joy. The Savior that we longed for through the centuries was to be born in Bethlehem. Then as quickly as they came, they were gone." Then the small boy looked up at his grandfather and asked, "What was it like? What did you see when you went to Bethlehem?" Suppose the old shepherd had said, "Oh, I didn't go."
Some people may hear the angels sing and, then, not go and experience the wonder and joy of their proclamation. But there were shepherds who did go. When they reached Bethlehem, joy filled their hearts, and they were different because of that experience. God, the incarnate one, gives us true happiness. The real meaning and joy of life is found in relationship to God. Cut off or severed from God, there is no authentic life. Real life is found in relationship to God and out of that relationship other relationships grow and develop. Happiness has its source in God, and we can sing praises because we have experienced that inner joy. This inner joy becomes a pool from which we can draw water to sustain our life again and again. He offers a boundless supply.
Samuel H. Miller, former dean of Harvard University Divinity School, observes that Christmas is like a ladder that carries us to a higher level but too quickly we soon drop back to the old level. He suggests:
If, in other words, Christmas could only last -- the wonder of it, the simplicity of it, the thoughtfulness of the wise and the adoration of the humble, if fears could be cast out and faith could move in -- permanently!
Well, that is exactly what Christianity purports to be -- a perennial celebration of joy and peace, such as some enjoy at Christmastime.1
Sharing The Joy
Having experienced this joy, surely we want to share it with other people. How can you glorify and praise God and keep it to yourself? Do you think the shepherds who heard the angels, who witnessed this great event of the incarnation of God, who saw the one they thought would be the fulfillment of all their prophecies, didn't share this news with others? They left glorifying and praising God and told many others, I'm sure, what they had seen and heard. Think of the campfires at night where they must have told these stories again and again. If you have got the real Christmas spirit, you will want to share the great joy of Christ with others. Bill Rittinghouse shared an experience he once had. He and his family were on vacation and driving through Kansas.
A station wagon passed them and, as it did, one of the suitcases that was tied on top fell off. They blew the horn and tried to stop the car, but they could not. They pulled over to the side, stopped, and got the suitcase. They opened it up hoping to find some identification so they could get it back to the owner. The only thing in the suitcase that had any kind of name on it at all was in a small white box. In the box between two layers of cotton was a $20 gold piece. On one side was the inscription, "Twenty years of loyal and faithful service." On the other side it read, "Presented to Otis Sampson by Northwestern States Portland Cement Company."
Rittinghouse wrote to 75 different cities in the northwestern states trying to find a cement company that might help him locate Otis Sampson. Finally, he received a reply back from one company that indicated that Otis Sampson had worked for them but he had retired. They enclosed his address. He wrote to him and informed him that he had the suitcase and the gold coin. He received an immediate reply back. He was told to dispose of the suitcase and its contents except for the gold coin. "That's my most prized possession," he wrote.
Rittinghouse wrote back and enclosed the $20 gold piece. In his letter, he made reference to Mr. Sampson saying that the gold coin was his prized possession. He wrote him about his family and how precious they were to him. He wrote about how precious life was to him. He told him that he had been a prisoner of war in Romania and fortunately he had come back alive. But he wrote this stranger and told him that the most precious possession of his life was Jesus Christ who was his Lord and Savior.
Almost a year went by and at Christmastime he received a small package in the mail. He opened it up and he discovered a small white box with a gold coin in it and a letter. The letter came from Otis Sampson and it read, "Last Sunday, my wife and I were baptized in a little church here in Colorado. We want you to have the gold piece to carry with you at all times. We are two old people. I am 74 years old and my wife is 72. You were the first one to tell us of Jesus Christ. Now he is our most precious possession."
When we have understood the real meaning and message of Christmas, we will want to share it with others. We can't hoard it for ourselves. Too many of us sit around waiting for somebody else to make Christmas happen for us. Childishly, we expect somebody else to do it for us rather than seeking ourselves to make Christmas a reality for other people. We need to reach out and touch other people's lives and see if we can't share the greatness of the gospel with them. Too many of us are like the woman who said, "I hate Christmas. It turns everything upside down." And it does or should if it is real Christmas. When God became incarnate in Jesus Christ, he turned everything upside down. He came into the world in a way that was totally unexpected. And unexpectedly he meets us again and again. Lives have been different ever since his coming. Bethlehem was not a dead-end street. Bethlehem is not a conclusion; it is a beginning. Bethlehem was not a place of death, but a place of birth. It was a time of beginnings. In this Christmas season we come to Bethlehem to find a new start for our own lives. Bethlehem is the place of opportunity to begin again.
What Will I Keep?
In reflecting on the Christmas season, I have wondered what I would keep from it. What will the one who is preaching to others keep for himself? Soon we will take our tree down, put the presents away, and exchange some gifts of the wrong sizes or wrong colors. But I will remember many things. I will remember the cards and notes from friends and church people who said in a thoughtful way, "We remember you and we care about you." I will remember the telephone calls from friends and relatives across miles seeking to touch our lives again. I will remember small gifts given as a way of saying, "I remember you; you are a person I care about." I shall remember the hugs and handshakes of "Merry Christmas." I shall remember the joy I had in trying to find the right gift for those people that I love to say tenderly to them, "I care about you." I shall remember the cakes, cookies, candy, and the gifts I got that depict the love others expressed toward my family and me.
More than all of that, however, I shall seek to hang on once again to the mystery of Christmas. I want to hang on to the mystery of the God who so loves us that he came into the world as a baby who grew up, taught us about the love of his Father, and then laid down his life that we might have life. I hope I shall hold on to the greatest gift of all at Christmas -- the love of God manifest through his son Jesus Christ. I shall seek to go again to Bethlehem and return a different way so that I can love people more, forgive more, and follow more carefully Christ's higher way. I shall seek again to ponder more deeply the real meaning of Christmas with all of its mystery and wonder. I shall seek to return from Bethlehem this Christmas season always praising and glorifying God in all of my living so that people will never have to question whether Christmas has made any real difference in this person's life. These things I shall attempt to hold on to as the real meaning of Christmas becomes clearer to me throughout the year. I hope, I pray, that you will, too.
____________
1. Samuel H. Miller, What Child Is This? (Philadelphia: Fortress Press: 1982), p. 22.
Dickens wrote that story over 150 years ago. It is easy for us to forget how long ago it was written. Dickens was only 31 years old when he wrote it and was in desperate financial straits. The story didn't sell very well -- only 15,000 copies the first year. Many of us today would think we had done rather well if we sold 15,000 copies of our books. Some of Dickens' novels, however, sold 70,000 copies in the first month. He wrote another Christmas story, titled Dr. Marigold's Prescriptions, which sold 250,000 copies the first week. Have you ever heard of that one? Don't feel bad, I haven't, either. It didn't last. The story that didn't seem to be so popular at its writing is the one that has become a classic.
Ebenezer Scrooge's Story
The story, as you know, tells about Ebenezer Scrooge, an old skinflint, who has become identified with "Bah! Humbug!" and the hatred of Christmas, along with Tiny Tim, Jacob Marley, and Bob Cratchit, his clerk. Scrooge goes home from work, after already having deflated the enthusiasm of many about Christmas. When he sits down to eat a light meal before he retires for bed, he has a ghost-like visitor, Jacob Marley, his former partner in business. His partner comes fettered down with heavy chains. When Scrooge asks him why he is fettered, he responded: "I wear the chain I forged in life. I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it of my own free will, and of my free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?" His business partner tells him that he will be visited by three spirits -- the ghosts of Christmas -- past, present, and future.
The Ghost Of Christmas Past
Scrooge thinks that he is just having a bad dream. The dream, he believes, has come about because he has eaten the wrong thing, so soon he drops off to sleep. Suddenly he is awakened by the visit of the first spirit who takes him back to four Christmases in the past. "Long past?" Scrooge inquires of the spirit. "No, your past," the ghost replies. He carries him back to his childhood where familiar sights and sounds remind him of the joy he experienced at Christmas. He next sees himself when he was a young boy in a boarding school where all the other students have gone home and he is seen alone reading on Christmas day. Then he is taken to a Christmas party at the office of Mr. Fezziwig where he had served as an apprentice. He rejoices in the memory of that party. He sees the young woman whom he almost married. He sees himself rejecting Belle because money had become his chief desire in life. Later he sees Belle married to another and surrounded by her children.
The Ghost Of Christmas Present
Next, he is confronted by the Ghost of Christmas Present. This ghost carries him to visit some poor people, living on the edge of town, who are having a difficult struggle in life. He realizes that these are the very people he had rejected and wanted to do nothing to help them. For the first time, he sees them as good people. He sees a father who wants to work but cannot find work, yet he has a family to support. Then the ghost takes him to the home of his clerk, Bob Cratchit. There he sees a man who struggles to provide for his family on the meager salary that he gives him, and yet there is much happiness and joy in their family. He sees their young son, Tiny Tim, who has an illness and will probably die unless he receives an operation.
The Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come
The last spirit to visit Scrooge was the one who showed him Christmas yet to come. The spirit shows him a vision of some of his business associates who are laughing and indifferent at the news of the death of one of their members. They express no regret or sorrow. One of them declares, "Unless there is lunch, I won't go. I must be fed." He is taken next to a pawnshop where he sees some people bartering over some merchandise they have stolen from the house of a dead man. He realizes that the items they are bartering are his possessions. Finally he is taken to a grave, which he realizes is his own grave, and there is no one to weep or mourn for him. Overcome by what he has experienced he asks, "Are these shadows of the things that will be or are they shadows of the things that may be only? ... Good spirit, assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life!"
Christmas Day Arrives
Suddenly Scrooge awakens in his own room. Through this experience, a conversion takes place in his heart. There is no other word to describe it. He is converted by what has happened to him in the visitations of that night. He throws up the window and asks, "What day is this?" He discovers it is Christmas Day. He asks that the biggest goose in the village market be taken to his clerk's home. He rushes off to see his nephew and surprises them by his pleasant visit. He promises to give a large sum of money to help the poor. The next day, he gives a raise to his clerk. His whole life is filled with an understanding of the great joy that has come at Christmas. Dickens concludes that marvelous story with these words: "And it was always said of him that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge."
Keeping Christmas
He knew how to keep Christmas. Do you? Do I? Do we really know how to keep Christmas? Soon we will be taking down the tree. The needles are already dropping off in some houses, aren't they? The presents will be put away -- some exchanged first. Some folks are already tired of turkey and ham. "Not again!" they cry. Others are like the young boy on Christmas morning who is surrounded by toys after he has ripped open his packages, and he then asks: "Is this all?" There are some people who already have post-Christmas blues. They were disappointed. Christmas wasn't what they thought it was going to be. Some people are still suffering from their Christmas hangovers. They tried to celebrate in a different kind of way to cure their blues and disappointments.
But remember, even at the first Christmas, the shepherds went back to work. The star disappeared and the wise men returned home. Even the angels ceased their singing. Sooner or later, Mary, Joseph, and the baby returned to Nazareth. How do you hang on to Christmas? Is there any way to capture the sense of joy, peace, mystery, and wonder of Christmas and hold onto it? Or is Christmas just something we put away with all of the decorations? I think there are at least three suggestions in the Christmas stories about how to hang on to Christmas. Let us look at these for a moment.
Different Because Of Christmas
The first possibility comes to us from the story about the wise men. After the wise men had traveled to the manger, knelt down and worshiped the Christ Child, and presented him their gifts, they were warned in a dream by God not to tell Herod where the child was. To avoid seeing the king, they went back a different way from the way they had come. That expression can be almost parabolic for us. Can anyone come to Bethlehem and go away from the manger in the same way? Can you? How can one kneel at the mystery and wonder of the Christ Child and not be different? In this Christmas season, as the wise men did centuries age, let's come again to Bethlehem and kneel before the Christ and go away different because of that meeting.
Who among us has not committed some mistakes in his or her life that we wish we had not done? There are things we wish we could do differently. We have made wrong turns and have hurt others. There are sins that need to be forgiven. There are old grudges that need to be forgotten. Mistakes need to be erased. Sarcasm, bitterness, and hostility need to be eradicated from our lives. Hatreds and disappointments need to be forgotten, misunderstandings must be overcome, and new visions must be seen. Christmas is a time to walk a different path, to go back a different way than the way we came. To celebrate Christmas with feelings of hostility, hatred, anger, and prejudice is to not understand what Christmas really is. There are some of you who are loaded down with guilt and sin. You have the opportunity to walk back a different way, having experienced the forgiveness that you can find at Christmastime.
A counselor had worked with a woman for several weeks trying to help her overcome her sense of guilt and accept the forgiveness of God. But for some reason she simply could not forgive herself nor accept forgiveness. Finally, he brought her into a small chapel at the church and asked her to kneel before the altar. She knelt down and he placed his hands on her head and said: "In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven. Rise up a new woman, forgiven by God's grace to walk in a new way." And she did!
Christmas tells you that message. You don't have to hold on to your sins, your old guilts, or your mistakes. You can rise up as a new person, forgiven by the grace of God. You can be different. Scrooge was converted. Some people sneer at that story and say, "Impossible -- no one could change like that." Read the New Testament and see the radical change in the apostle Paul. Read the history of the Christian faith and see the radical changes made in people again and again as they are confronted by the Spirit of God.
Change Is Possible
If you don't believe in change, then why do we have schools? The whole purpose of schools and colleges is to change individuals into better-equipped people. We believe that people can be changed by education and live differently. They can learn more than they already know so that they can be better people. If you don't believe that people can change for the better what good are our prisons? Prisons provide a place where people who have done wrong can be trained to be made better citizens. We have hospitals because we believe in the possibility of better health. Schools, hospitals, prisons, and hundreds of other institutions are in existence because we believe that change is possible. The old saying, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks," cannot be the motto for the Christian. The Christian faith focuses on the possibility of beginning anew and being different.
I know a social worker who never took his work the same after visiting a family living in a chicken house. I know a minister who witnessed the starving multitudes of India and was never the same in his concern for the poor of the world. I know a college student who worked with blacks one summer and was not prejudiced again. I know a woman who served in a soup line one winter and never felt the same toward the outcast of society. A young teacher spent a year teaching affluent teenagers and witnessed their loneliness, frustrations, and problems with drugs, and never talked again about the easy style of life the wealthy had. People can and do change. Some change for the better; others, unfortunately, change for the worse. The church should offer guidance to the path of renewal for the higher way. Go to Bethlehem and then take a different path home because you have met the Christ and your life is different because of that meeting.
A Time Of Reflection
Another figure rises to teach us a lesson from the Christmas story, and that is Mary. We read that Mary saw the shepherds and the wise men, listened to what they told her, and pondered all these things in her heart. Christmas is a time for reflection, isn't it? To look upon the mystery and wonder of the Christmas story causes us to ponder its message. Who can understand it all? Trivial thinking is inadequate. Deep and profound thought is required. Who can say that he or she understands the incarnation -- the coming of God into the world through Christ? But reflect upon it we must. Like Mary, we deliberate upon it continuously. We think about the God who loved us so much he came among us and shared himself with us.
Reflect on the fact that Christmas is not so much God giving us gifts, as God giving us his presence. He didn't give us presents, but he gave us presence. He gave us the gift of himself. He came among us and we saw what God was like. He has challenged us to learn to give the only real gift any of us has, which is the gift of ourselves. The greatest gift we can ever give to someone, we learn at Christmas, is never things, but our own presence. The best gift is the gift of ourselves, being present, caring, and loving.
A young beauty queen had been hospitalized. Friends had covered her room with flowers. Her minister went to visit her one day. As he walked into the room, he noticed that it looked like a florist shop. "My what lovely flowers," he observed. "Yes, they are lovely," she responded, "but flowers are not people." Then she began to cry. The loveliest flowers or the most expensive gifts can never take the place of presence -- your presence, your concern, and your love. That is the real need of most of us at Christmas. Presence is the most precious gift of all.
Christ has come to give us "life," and in him we experience the abundant life and discover the meaning and richness of authentic life. The presence of God was made known to us through Jesus Christ, and our goal as Christians is to grow in a deeper awareness of what life can be like as we walk in his way. In this Christmas season, as you try to learn how to be more Christlike, focus not so much on what you can get for Christmas, but what you can do for another person. Learn from Bethlehem to be concerned not so much with your own rights, but the rights of others. Focus not so much on your own happiness but what you can do to make others happy. Let your concern be not so much on what you can receive but what you can give. Think not primarily about your own happiness but the happiness of others. Do not look for what others can do for you but what you can do for them.
As you experience the "life" which Christ gives you, let its influence fill your whole person with its warmth and radiance. You will live differently because of it. Reflect on the story of Christmas. You can never grasp all of the mystery of it, but as you reflect on it, your life will be changed as you allow the wonder of the God who has come among us at Christmastime to fill your heart with his presence.
A Glorified Spirit
The shepherds also teach us another way to remember Christmas. We read that the shepherds returned glorifying and praising God for all that they had seen and heard in Bethlehem. The shepherds returned to their normal work. They couldn't stay around the manger forever. You can't remain around the Christmas tree forever, either. We can't stay at the Advent wreath forever. Sooner or later we return to our daily work. But as we return, we should be different because of Christmas. There should be something in our life that will make our work more radiant and more enjoyable. People, hopefully, can see that there is something different in our lives because of Christmas.
When the shepherds came to the manger at Bethlehem, they realized that the ancient prophecy which had come down through the ages had been fulfilled. Prophets like Isaiah, Micah, and Zephaniah proclaimed that the Lord God, himself, would be in the midst of his people. Zephaniah spoke about the golden age that would come to Israel and they would realize the fulfillment of all their hopes and dreams. At the manger in Bethlehem, the New Testament writers are telling us that this ancient prophecy was fulfilled. The shepherds were witnesses to its fulfillment. They did not yet know that his throne would be a cross and his only crown would be a crown of thorns. His reign would be in the hearts of men and women and not on a physical seat of power in Israel.
Suppose years after the birth of Christ one of the shepherds, who had heard the angels sing the good news of that birth, was telling the story to his grandson. "Nathan," he said, "you won't believe it. We were out in the fields taking care of the sheep, when suddenly angels burst across the sky and began to sing. I've never seen an angel before. They told us a message of great joy. The Savior that we longed for through the centuries was to be born in Bethlehem. Then as quickly as they came, they were gone." Then the small boy looked up at his grandfather and asked, "What was it like? What did you see when you went to Bethlehem?" Suppose the old shepherd had said, "Oh, I didn't go."
Some people may hear the angels sing and, then, not go and experience the wonder and joy of their proclamation. But there were shepherds who did go. When they reached Bethlehem, joy filled their hearts, and they were different because of that experience. God, the incarnate one, gives us true happiness. The real meaning and joy of life is found in relationship to God. Cut off or severed from God, there is no authentic life. Real life is found in relationship to God and out of that relationship other relationships grow and develop. Happiness has its source in God, and we can sing praises because we have experienced that inner joy. This inner joy becomes a pool from which we can draw water to sustain our life again and again. He offers a boundless supply.
Samuel H. Miller, former dean of Harvard University Divinity School, observes that Christmas is like a ladder that carries us to a higher level but too quickly we soon drop back to the old level. He suggests:
If, in other words, Christmas could only last -- the wonder of it, the simplicity of it, the thoughtfulness of the wise and the adoration of the humble, if fears could be cast out and faith could move in -- permanently!
Well, that is exactly what Christianity purports to be -- a perennial celebration of joy and peace, such as some enjoy at Christmastime.1
Sharing The Joy
Having experienced this joy, surely we want to share it with other people. How can you glorify and praise God and keep it to yourself? Do you think the shepherds who heard the angels, who witnessed this great event of the incarnation of God, who saw the one they thought would be the fulfillment of all their prophecies, didn't share this news with others? They left glorifying and praising God and told many others, I'm sure, what they had seen and heard. Think of the campfires at night where they must have told these stories again and again. If you have got the real Christmas spirit, you will want to share the great joy of Christ with others. Bill Rittinghouse shared an experience he once had. He and his family were on vacation and driving through Kansas.
A station wagon passed them and, as it did, one of the suitcases that was tied on top fell off. They blew the horn and tried to stop the car, but they could not. They pulled over to the side, stopped, and got the suitcase. They opened it up hoping to find some identification so they could get it back to the owner. The only thing in the suitcase that had any kind of name on it at all was in a small white box. In the box between two layers of cotton was a $20 gold piece. On one side was the inscription, "Twenty years of loyal and faithful service." On the other side it read, "Presented to Otis Sampson by Northwestern States Portland Cement Company."
Rittinghouse wrote to 75 different cities in the northwestern states trying to find a cement company that might help him locate Otis Sampson. Finally, he received a reply back from one company that indicated that Otis Sampson had worked for them but he had retired. They enclosed his address. He wrote to him and informed him that he had the suitcase and the gold coin. He received an immediate reply back. He was told to dispose of the suitcase and its contents except for the gold coin. "That's my most prized possession," he wrote.
Rittinghouse wrote back and enclosed the $20 gold piece. In his letter, he made reference to Mr. Sampson saying that the gold coin was his prized possession. He wrote him about his family and how precious they were to him. He wrote about how precious life was to him. He told him that he had been a prisoner of war in Romania and fortunately he had come back alive. But he wrote this stranger and told him that the most precious possession of his life was Jesus Christ who was his Lord and Savior.
Almost a year went by and at Christmastime he received a small package in the mail. He opened it up and he discovered a small white box with a gold coin in it and a letter. The letter came from Otis Sampson and it read, "Last Sunday, my wife and I were baptized in a little church here in Colorado. We want you to have the gold piece to carry with you at all times. We are two old people. I am 74 years old and my wife is 72. You were the first one to tell us of Jesus Christ. Now he is our most precious possession."
When we have understood the real meaning and message of Christmas, we will want to share it with others. We can't hoard it for ourselves. Too many of us sit around waiting for somebody else to make Christmas happen for us. Childishly, we expect somebody else to do it for us rather than seeking ourselves to make Christmas a reality for other people. We need to reach out and touch other people's lives and see if we can't share the greatness of the gospel with them. Too many of us are like the woman who said, "I hate Christmas. It turns everything upside down." And it does or should if it is real Christmas. When God became incarnate in Jesus Christ, he turned everything upside down. He came into the world in a way that was totally unexpected. And unexpectedly he meets us again and again. Lives have been different ever since his coming. Bethlehem was not a dead-end street. Bethlehem is not a conclusion; it is a beginning. Bethlehem was not a place of death, but a place of birth. It was a time of beginnings. In this Christmas season we come to Bethlehem to find a new start for our own lives. Bethlehem is the place of opportunity to begin again.
What Will I Keep?
In reflecting on the Christmas season, I have wondered what I would keep from it. What will the one who is preaching to others keep for himself? Soon we will take our tree down, put the presents away, and exchange some gifts of the wrong sizes or wrong colors. But I will remember many things. I will remember the cards and notes from friends and church people who said in a thoughtful way, "We remember you and we care about you." I will remember the telephone calls from friends and relatives across miles seeking to touch our lives again. I will remember small gifts given as a way of saying, "I remember you; you are a person I care about." I shall remember the hugs and handshakes of "Merry Christmas." I shall remember the joy I had in trying to find the right gift for those people that I love to say tenderly to them, "I care about you." I shall remember the cakes, cookies, candy, and the gifts I got that depict the love others expressed toward my family and me.
More than all of that, however, I shall seek to hang on once again to the mystery of Christmas. I want to hang on to the mystery of the God who so loves us that he came into the world as a baby who grew up, taught us about the love of his Father, and then laid down his life that we might have life. I hope I shall hold on to the greatest gift of all at Christmas -- the love of God manifest through his son Jesus Christ. I shall seek to go again to Bethlehem and return a different way so that I can love people more, forgive more, and follow more carefully Christ's higher way. I shall seek again to ponder more deeply the real meaning of Christmas with all of its mystery and wonder. I shall seek to return from Bethlehem this Christmas season always praising and glorifying God in all of my living so that people will never have to question whether Christmas has made any real difference in this person's life. These things I shall attempt to hold on to as the real meaning of Christmas becomes clearer to me throughout the year. I hope, I pray, that you will, too.
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1. Samuel H. Miller, What Child Is This? (Philadelphia: Fortress Press: 1982), p. 22.
