This sermon was only preached in the Chapel service. It had a good visual, but the sermon did not come together all that well.
Introduction: Fourth Sunday of Advent, and we add strangers in the night to the
manger scene – an unknown woman and man (see the question marks over their
heads) who are somehow involved in the birth narrative of the Christ-child.
Reflect on night
and stranger.
Move 1: Part of the mystique, part of the mystery,
part of the excitement of the Christmas story comes because it takes place at night.
a. Strangers who come at night in the story of Jesus'
birth.
1. the angels that talk to Mary and Joseph in their
dreams presumably came at night;
2. The shepherds – see and hear from the angels
while in the fields at night; their dramatic exit from the fields when they
leave their flocks to go to Bethlehem
presumably takes place in the moment, at night.
3. Not sure about the wise men, although they
certainly traveled in the night; the star in the sky that guided them certainly
was easier to see at night.
4. Presumably Jesus arrived during the night.
b.
Night visitors bring excitement.
1.
I have a
friend who is 7 or 8 years older than I am.
I met him as the son of my first boss who also worked for his father,
and also as a student of my father’s when I was in grade school.
2.
When I
was in high school, I started working for him as well. We became pretty close. I was in his wedding; he was in my wedding.
3.
I used to stop by his house to visit him and
his wife whenever I was in town – Christmas break, spring break, week-end at
home;
4.
Since I
knew they stayed up late, I would finish my night by stopping at his house on the
way home. It was often 11:00 pm or
midnight before I would make it to his house.
If there were lights on, I would stop.
Maybe a time or two I even stopped and awakened him. It got to the point that if he and his wife
had heard I was going to be in town, or if they figured I was in town for a
holiday week-end, they would leave the porch light on for my late night visit.
5.
And
those were great visits. Something about
the late night and early morning hours that lent themselves to deep
conversations about hopes and dreams we had for our lives and the world. Lots of major decisions in my life were
discussed in those conversations.
Anything seemed possible as we talked into the night.
6.
I get
that sense about the strangers we meet in the night.
7.
Anything
is possible in the night – a virgin can give birth; the Savior can be born in Bethlehem ; a star can be
followed to make a life-altering discovery.
c. For awhile, my friend and his wife lived
in a small house behind his parents’ house.
That led to a major rule of the night visits – I had to be quiet, and
for no reason could I knock on his parents’ door or ring their doorbell.
1. Why? Because years ago his older sister had been
killed in a car accident in the middle of the night, and his parents were awakened
to the ringing doorbell of the police officer who had come to inform them of
their daughter’s death.
2.
Night
visitors can be scary.
3.
Mary and Joseph getting visited by angels in
the night – I would have become an insomniac after that and never taken the
chance on an angel talking to me again.
4.
Shepherds
in the night – their lives totally disrupted.
5.
Wise men
– follow the star in the night at their own risk.
6.
The
night reveals the risky proposition the Christ-child brings to us – give up the
life you know and follow me.
The night – full
of opportunities and risky challenges.
Move 2: Strangers.
a. The story of Christ’s birth
is not the story of a small clique who only involved people they knew.
1.
Mary and Joseph travel to a place where they do not even have friends
with whom they can stay the night. They are alone.
2. The
shepherds have never heard of Mary and Joseph.
3. The wise men are strangers to the Mary and
Joseph and strangers in the land to which they have traveled to find the new-born
king.
4. The birth of Christ is an invitation to
strangers from anywhere and everywhere
5. Men
or women with the question marks over the heads?
b. And think for a
moment about those people about whom we do not read in the story – people who remained
in the background, but were surely there.
1. At the Sanctuary service, the choir is presenting the choir cantata
“the Other wise Man,” a short story by Henry Van Dyke.
1. It tells about the “fourth" wise man, a
priest of the Magi named Artaban, one of the Medes from Persia.
2. Like the other Magi, he sees signs in the
heavens proclaiming that a King had been born among the Jews.
3. Like them, he sets out to see the newborn
ruler, carrying treasures to give as gifts to the child - a sapphire, a ruby,
and a "pearl of great price". However, he stops along the way to help
a dying man, which makes him late to meet with the caravan of the other three
wise men (from the Bible).
4. Since he missed the caravan, and he can't
cross the desert with only a horse, he is forced to sell one of his treasures
in order to buy the camels and supplies necessary for the trip.
5. He then commences his journey but arrives in Bethlehem too late to see the child, whose parents have
fled to Egypt .
He saves the life of a child at the price of another of his treasures.
6. He then travels to Egypt and to many other countries,
searching for Jesus for many years and performing acts of charity along the
way.
7. After thirty-three years, Artaban is still a
pilgrim, and a seeker after light. Artaban arrives in Jerusalem in time for the crucifixion of
Jesus.
8. He spends his last treasure, the pearl, to
ransom a young woman from being sold into slavery.
9. He is then struck in the temple by a falling
roof tile, and is about to die, having failed in his quest, and yet he knew
that all was well, because he had done the best he could.
10. A voice tells him "Verily I say unto
thee, Inasmuch as thou hast done it unto one of the least of these my brethren,
thou hast done it unto me," and he dies in a calm radiance of wonder and
joy. His treasures were accepted, and the Other Wise Man found his King.
c. That story asks the question: Do you have to make it to the manger to see the Christ-child?
1. We
know that we do not literally have to go to Bethlehem to see Christ.
2. We who are not mentioned in the birth story
see the Christ-child when we give our lives over to serving him.
3. other strangers meet the Christ-child when
they see him living in us.
4. The hopes and dreams of the world are met in
the birth of Christ that night and continue to be revealed in us as we follow
Christ today.
Conclusion: Christmas Eve; cold, snowy night; parked on
the square to save parking; walked down the middle of the street, light shining
off the snow; my breath forming clouds, Christmas carols ringing from the
carillon. Anything was possible. Christ
had come in the night to live among strangers. Amen.
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