So, there’s a baptism
today! I love baptisms; they’re one of
the best parts of my job. Who else gets
to splash people with water, and not get splashed in return?
Today we welcome little
Lochlin Robert into the family of God here at St. Matthew’s. He’s a bit small yet, but he does show some
promise. I can imagine, though, that
there was perhaps a little bit of stress getting things put together for today,
and a family get-together this afternoon, when after all – tomorrow is
Christmas Eve! The fourth Sunday of
Advent is a great day for a baptism – any Sunday is – but this one, with
Christmas Eve tomorrow; my goodness. On
the plus side, it shouldn’t be hard for you to remember Lochlin’s baptismal
date. Even better, if you began a family
practice of giving a gift on the anniversary of his baptism every
year…’awesome’ is the only word that can describe it.
That’s the funny thing about
dates – some are easy to remember, and some are harder. I can remember lots of various dates that
float around in my head, but others get lost in the shuffle. That may be an occupational hazard; the
church has had much the same struggle for a number of dates.
Take, for example, the date of
Christmas. The birth of Jesus. If you noticed, the winter solstice was
Friday. The world also didn’t end. But for many years, people have wondered if
Jesus was actually born on December 25.
We know exactly when Lochlin
was born; we know exactly when he is
baptised, because this sort of knowledge is really important in our
culture. Not so much for the culture
Jesus was born in to.
Things that were important,
and celebrated, were things like the solstice festival. A few centuries after Jesus’ birth there
arose a new festival in the Roman empire
called natalis solis invicti; or “the
birth of the unconquered sun”. That’s sun, as in the big burning ball of gas
in the sky. Early Christians weren’t so
concerned about the date of Jesus birth.
They remembered the crucifixion (or more importantly, the resurrection),
but it was a moveable feast, usually remembered around the Passover festival
(it’s only much later that the conceit of a concretized calendar became
popular). But since Passover was usually
in the spring, it worked. They were also
concerned with the annunciation of his birth – Mary’s story in the gospel
lesson today is perhaps one of the most important in the early church – and
early Christians placed the date of the annunciation in juxtaposition with the
resurrection (so it was around the same time).
But when early Christians
wanted to figure out an approximation of Jesus’ birth – because the festival
celebrating the sun, and especially the birth of whichever current emperor was
on the throne – they took the time of the annunciation, and added nine
months. So, if the annunciation was in
(what came to be) March, that put the birth of Jesus sometime in December.
But obviously, that creates
some problems. For starters, as soon as
we put sometime in concrete, as a people of faith we tend to stop acting as if
it matters.
Take, for example,
baptism. Many, many, parents willing
stand up and say that it is HUGELY important that their child be baptised. Then, once it’s done, their pastor or congregation
won’t seem them there again, except on….Christmas. But if faith is so important, why not bring a
family to the place where their faith is going to be fed? (though, in your
defence, Winston and Danielle, I will hunt you down.)
So, once we have that fixed
date for Christmas…who cares about the rest of the year? If we can stuff God in a box and only bring
it out once a year, then it’s easy to pat yourself on the back about what a
good person you are.
It’s curious, because when I
wandered through the mall parking lot trying to find my truck a couple of days
ago, I counted thirty vehicles that had some version of the sticker on the back
of their vehicle that says “keep Christ in Christmas,” or “remember the reason
for the season.”
Those are a little
passive-aggressive, are they not? Just
the little hint of a threat, of dire consequences. But seriously, if you just give the Sunday
school answer, “Jesus is the reason for the season” it doesn’t cover a whole
lot of ground. Easter is very nearly just
as commercialized as Christmas, yet no one asks about the reason for the
season, then. Really, that sort of
“remember the reason for the season” gobbledygook doesn’t mean a whole lot,
when you consider that every season the church celebrates, it celebrates
because of Christ.
It’s not even ‘Christmas’,
yet. The season of Christmas does not
start when Walmart gets out its junk or you pick up a “Christmas Calendar” full
of chocolate. The celebration of the
season of Christmas starts Tuesday – December 25 – and lasts 12 days. Just like in the song. But if I were to walk up to someone on
January 4th and say, ‘merry Christmas,” I rather imagine that I’d
get the uncomfortable looks usually reserved for people wearing tinfoil hats.
Come to think of it, I get
that look a lot.
The problem with those little
passive-aggressive signs is that they miss the point. They miss ‘the reason for the season.’ There is only one reason for the season,
beloved of God: one reason for Advent, for Christmas, for Epiphany, for Lent,
for Easter, for Pentecost; one reason.
One reason that is spelled out in the words of every prophet, every
singer, every person who has ever spoken the words of the Lord:
You.
The angels appeared, bringing
their first message to the shepherds: do
not be afraid. And then they
continued: for unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ, the Lord.
You (plural)
are the reason for all the seasons. It
was for you that God came, so that
sin, sorrow, and death would hold no fear for you. It’s right when we say that a great gift came
at Christmastime – and that gift was for you.
Because God loves you. If there were no people; there would be no
need for Jesus. Jesus came because, in
fact, we’re not ‘good’ people; not in the way that the ancient Scripture uses
the term. We’re used to a greek
philosophical ideal in which a ‘good’ person is someone who does the least
possible amount of damage to others.
God’s standards are a little higher; but because we can’t reach them on
our own we are given the Messiah, who gives us the gift of God With Us; so that
we could stop trying to reach up to God.
Little Lochlin is the reason
for the season; his baptism is the reason the church exists. It doesn’t exist to dictate morality or a
socially conservative agenda; it exists to convey God’s love and presence to
the world in it’s gathered community.
I’ll point out to you here at
St. Matt’s: this is what you do. It is
your mission.
God wants you to be part of
his promise to the world, the promise that today binds Lochlin to this family
and to God; the promise that binds you and all believers together – a promise
made to Abraham and Abraham’s descendents, that God would abide with them.
The gift of Christmas is not
that you can go and spend yourself silly at the nearest mall, then piously look
at your gigantic hoard of loot, and say “gee, now someone knows I love them.”
If you think you need to do
that, you need more help than I can offer.
But you can remember that it
was for you that Jesus was
born. Yes, the promise of a Messiah was
a promise made for all people: but it is also a promise made for you.
It’s when you come together,
when you gather for worship that that promise is made visible to you, in your
singing, in the word that is shared, and in your neighbours. Christmas is not about gathering with family
and friends – because even if you have no friends or family to gather with,
Christmas would still happen. It still
happens in the midst of grief, of loneliness, and in the midst of sorrow. Christmas is a celebration of life, a life
shared together with people under God’s promise.
In a world that looks very
dark around us – in the longest nights of the year – God’s promise to Lochlin,
and to us, remains: that the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness
cannot overcome it.
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