The Second Sunday after Christmas – Year A
January 5, 2014
The Rev. Christopher L. Caddell
Merry Christmas!
Yes, I’ll admit to it.
I’m enough of a church geek that it is still Christmas to me - at least
for a few more hours.
Last week while my family and I were travelling, I went to
the post office to mail something. Only
a few days after Christmas day, I wished the clerk a Merry Christmas, and you
would have thought I said something in another language.
After stammering and looking at me cross-eyed, she was able
to squeak out, “Happy New Year.”
I just smiled and went on my way, but honestly it was closer
to Christmas than to January 1.
As I left, I’m sure she thought I was the one who had a
mental lapse.
Nevertheless, consider this your friendly public service
announcement that “The Twelve Days of Christmas” is not just a Christmas song, that
Christmas is a season that begins on
December 25th, and that there really are 12 days of Christmas!
And if that leaves you counting in your head, today is the
twelfth day and marks the end of the Christmas Season.
We still have Christmas hymns, Christmas vestments and
decorations, and though it may not seem like it, a Christmas gospel.
Matthew’s Christmas story does not end on a happy note. The serene scene that we get from Luke of
shepherds and animals surrounding the Holy family in a stable does not appear
in Matthew. The angels do not join in
the heavenly host singing praises to God.
Instead, Matthew’s story revolves on two royal responses to the news of
a new king – Herod and the Magi. One
comes to pay homage and offer gifts; the other seeks to destroy the newborn
child.
Instead of ending this season with the peace-filled scene of
angels and shepherds, the Incarnation is interrupted by panic and a rapid
departure to a foreign land. Herod has heard of this new king’s birth, and he
is not about to be challenged – him or his lineage.
It is not a part of the Christmas story that we like to
remember. I doubt you’ve ever received a
Christmas card that depicts it.
However you imagine the message shared with Joseph in his
dreams, what is clear is that God moves Joseph to take some fairly drastic
actions. When you think about it, all of
what we know of Mary and Joseph has them responding to God in ways that
probably never crossed their mind.
Mary is asked to bear a child that will put not only her
reputation – in a world where reputation is everything – but also her life in a
very perilous situation. Joseph is asked
to go through with a marriage that also puts his reputation on the line. Then they are both uprooted, first with the
flight to Egypt, then the hope to return home to Israel, and finally the
eventual settlement in Galilee.
No matter how you look at it, the Christmas story, for all
that we like to romanticize about it, is a story about real life, real
hardship, real ministry in the name of Christ. Joseph and Mary, as the very
first who were tasked with bearing Christ did not find an easy journey ahead of
them.
I will confess that sometimes I don’t take this seriously
enough. It is, after all, not where I
want to go after experiencing the joy of Christmas. Sometimes I choose to hear it as simply an
historical account of the hardships faced early in the life of Jesus. Other times I choose to write it off as a
rhetorical device used by Matthew to used to identify Jesus with Moses and the
Exodus.
And while one or both of those may be true, neither view
challenges me to weave this story into my own story. Neither stance moves me to consider how God
may be calling me to bear Christ in the world.
And yet, if we allow it, it is what this story does so very well. If we allow it, this story to goes well beyond
“just being about Joseph and Mary,” or a literary allusion to the Old
Testament. If we allow it, we just might
find in this story a piece of our own life and calling as Christians.
The Church teaches that its ministers are lay persons,
bishops, priests, and deacons (BCP 855).
And though it is lived out differently, each of these orders are tasked
with the same ministry – “to represent Christ and his Church”
In other words, much as Joseph and Mary did, The Church
exists as the bearers of the Incarnation today.
We represent Him, bear Him, and carry Him with us wherever we go.
How we do that will differ from person to person, but when
we are living into it fully, it will include:
- · Bearing witness to Him through our words and actions
- · Carrying on the work of Christ in the world
- · And participating in the life, worship and work of the Church
Ending the season on this note reminds us that Christmas and
the Incarnation are not meant to draw us to the manger so that we can stay
there and bask in the glory of a newborn child. Christmas is not simply about the receiving of
a gift. The shepherds don’t do it. The
wise men won’t do it. Even Joseph and
Mary don’t have the luxury of staying in place to enjoy this gift.
Christmas draws us in so that we can witness the birth of
the Messiah but then pushes us out so that we can take our place in the work of
carrying that child with us. And though
that may seem a difficult task, God equips us with both the message and the
individual gifts to the work in ways that often seem impossible and take more
effort or skill than we think we have.
As Christmas comes to a close, I invite you to listen to how
is God calling you to bear Christ in the world and in His Church. Recognize it
or not, respond to it or not, the call is there for each and every one of us.
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