Well, all the Christmas celebrations are now done, unless you are among the people who celebrate Epiphany, or Three Kings Day. For most of us, the wrapping paper will be in the garbage. We’ll be thinking about when to take the tree down and put the Christmas lights away. The stores are busy, but for different reasons. Many of those “perfect” Christmas gifts we got for one another will be exchanged or returned. I once remember being in a “return” line for 30 minutes. What a horrible experience!
Others are trying to figure out where to put all the “stuff” they got. Children are playing with the box their “favorite toy” came in. Just think: all that fussing and anxiety over getting gifts, and for so many, it comes down to this. Think about it: can you remember what Christmas gifts you received a year ago? Can you remember who gave you what? Think about the gifts that eventually end up in the cellar, in the Goodwill bin or even on the curb with the rest of the trash. Gifts have their useful life and then, like all material things, they lose their value.
I was thinking of this a few weeks ago while preparing for a funeral. It was for an amazing woman who had a great impact on the life of her family, her friends, her job and her church. I wanted to say something to the family that would help them get through a tough Christmas season. One thing I thought about was gifts. She was a great gift giver. She was especially famous for giving Christmas gifts.
The thought came to me, though, that these gifts were not the important thing. She was. She was the real gift to them. The best gift they received from her was not the material things she gave them, but herself: who she was, what she meant to them – her very presence in their lives. When all the material things fade away, she will remain with them. Her love, her joy, her example was the gift that would last, the gift that would impact them every day of their lives.
Some justify the giving of gifts at Christmas based upon the gift of Jesus to the world. Yet here again, what Jesus gave us was nothing material at all. The gift of Christmas was Jesus himself. His very presence in this world was a gift beyond comprehension. God chose to live among us, as one of us. Jesus was Emmanuel, God with Us. His presence had a deep impact upon all those who encountered him. But it did not stop there. The gift of Jesus is truly that gift that keeps on giving – for over 2,000 years!
Jesus is still among us. Through Jesus, we now know that God is a personal God, a God who wants to have a relationship with us. He wants us to know that he is with us. We know and feel his presence most powerfully when we come together on Sunday morning to worship, yet he abides with us in our daily lives, no matter what. He is there in our joys and our sorrows. His presence gives us strength and faith, it gives us peace and joy. The greatest gift God gives us is himself, a person.
The next greatest gift we have in our lives is one another. So many times, as a church, we can get so busy doing things: meeting, preparing, cooking, planning, that we don’t have a chance to just be one another, appreciate one another and acknowledge the gift we are to one another. As we go about “processing” our Christmas gifts, let us take time to think of the real gifts to our lives, the people whose very presence in our lives has made a profound impact on us. Let us acknowledge these gifts and let people know what they mean to us. And let us pass this gift on to others, especially the next generation.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Puritans and Christmas
A couple of blogs ago, I talked about how the Puritans not only refused to celebrate Chrstmas, but had it banned for 22 years. I just came by this excellent article in the Boston Globe that does an excellent job explaining why.
The Puritans did have a point!
The Puritans did have a point!
Saturday, December 19, 2009
My Sermon for tomorrow
Well, here we go again. For yet another year, one Advent service is being cancelled due to a severe snowstorm hitting us, right when we would be having morning service. I really hate cancelling church, yet I think it is better to keep safe, especially considering that it might be blizzard conditions for us.
Anyway, I want to post my sermon for tomorrow. It is part of my "Carols of Christmas" sermon series. I started out with "O Come, O Come Emmanuel," followed by "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" and "Joy to the World" (see my last blog).
Tomorrow's sermon is on "O Little Town of Bethlehem," one of my favorites. Here's what I would have said:
If you go to Copley Square, Boston, see one of greatest churches in America: Trinity Episcopal Church. Believe it or not, this big beautiful church was built for the writer of “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Phillips Brooks born in 1835 in Boston. He came from established Boston family. He was descended from a long line of Puritans, including many congregational clergy. He was educated at Boston Latin School and Harvard.
After Harvard, Brooks decided to go into ministry, and eventually became an Episcopal priest. He started out in Philadelphia, and developed a huge following, based upon his great preaching skills. The Episcopal Church in Boston wanted him to come back to his native city, so to lure him, they promised to build Trinity Church. Today, you can see his statue as you drive down Boylston street. He’s in a pulpit, with Jesus right behind him with one hand on shoulder. Brooks truly was a “prince of the pulpit.” He became, without doubt, the most famous preacher of his day. When he died in 1893, the whole nation mourned.
Just like “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” “O Little Ttown of Bethelehem” was written for a Sunday School. Each year, Trinity’s Sunday School would have a Christmas program and in 1865, he wrote a poem for it. He got his music director to write a tune for it, and the famous carol was born.
The inspiration for poem came three years earlier, while he was on trip to holy land. On Christmas eve, he was in field overlooking Bethlehem in a field reported to be field where shepherd encountered the angels. He could see whole city before him, including Church of the Nativity, where Christ was born.
If you really think about it, the carol has one of most unique takes on the Christmas story. It’s focus is not on the actual event of Christ’s birth, but on the town of Bethlehem, asleep at night time. The carol is about how whole town is sleeping while one of the most significant events in human history is taking place.
This is an astonishing thought: most important event in history of world takes place in tiny little town while everyone is sleeping. While everyone is asleep, the “everlasting light” is shining in “thy dark streets” “the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”
Perhaps my favorite verse is number 3: “how silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given.” Within that verse lies one reason why the true Christmas spirit can elude us so easily, despite all our preparations and expectations. Both then and now, the gift of Christ to our world is given in amazing silence. There are no public relations campaign, no press releases.
John says at the start of his gospel, “he was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him.” The only ones who knew about this world-changing event were Mary and Joseph and a few shepherds, who were tipped off by angels.
The silence of this wondrous gift speaks of a god who works quietly, silently to work out his plan of salvation for humanity. He does not work this plan through the high and mighty. He goes to a tiny town in rural northern Israel to a common carpenter and a quiet little maiden.
This is a something we need to believe in with even greater faith in these times. While great religious and political leaders make decisions, God’s will is silently, quietly being accomplished beneath it all, hidden from the view of most of us. In world where obvious signs give us no hope, where politicians and leaders are just stuck in old ways, this hymn gives me lots of hope.
“How silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given. So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of his heaven. No ear may hear his coming, but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still the dear Christ enters in.” It is this pure, holy silence that god gives us his blessing.
When people ask me where god is in their lives, why god has never given them a sign, I often wonder what they expect. Perhaps the parting of the Red Sea, or even a little miracle: something extraordinary, supernatural that reaches from the spiritual world to our world to tell us that we are loved, to hold on, be courageous, for I am with you.
Despite all the stories of miracles we hear about, I agree with Phillips Brooks: God imparts his blessings in a quiet, mysterious silence. We may never notice it. The most important step for those who yearn to sense God’s presence in their lives; and especially in this season, is to heed the advice of the hymn, “Let all mortal flesh keep silence.” In other words, slow down, be still, keep silence in heart and mind and spirit.
It seems to me that the only time i can really feel the presence of Christ at Christmas is late on Christmas eve. By then, the presets have been bought, the cards have been sent, the cookies have been baked, the packages have been mailed, the lights are us, the tree is decorated, as is the rest of the house. There is nothing left to “do.” All that’s left is to settle down in utter exhaustion, and just “be” before the wondrous love of god made flesh in the little Christ child.
Although some might not agree with me, i think this is just how god wants us on Christmas eve: tired and exhausted. Exhausted by our efforts to make Christmas a special season for us and the ones we love. Tired of thinking we could do it all and be all things to all people.
Year after year we come before god with this exhaustion, realizing once again, we have missed the Christmas spirit that moves our souls and brings tears to our eyes. On Christmas eve, we realize that we are finite, limited human beings who can only do so much. We finally become the meek souls that Brooks writes about.
We come before God in need of rest, refreshment and a sense of redemption, of salvation from what we have done to ourselves and one another in the rush and crowds, the frustrations and anger of a month of congestion and traffic, horns blaring and tempers flairing.
“No ear may hear his coming, but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still, the dear Christ enters in.” By the light of a simple candle, and in the singing of the simplest, most profound carol written, god does come down to the meek soul, tired and humble. When we are quieted, silenced, god finally comes to offer us the rest, the peace and the quiet joy of Christmas.
Once we are quiet enough to sense God’s presence, we can move onto another step: letting God move us to a deeper place of silence than we can ever imagine. Most of us here have been moved to silence at one point in our lives. Perhaps at the birth of a child, perhaps the first glimpse of the Grand Canyon, perhaps at the end of a profound, moving concert, perhaps in a magnificent cathedral with stained glass, perhaps some other time. When we are moved to this level of silence, when we are stopped in our tracts, and invited into an experience that moves beyond the normal to the sublime, that is when god touches us with power and life.
Christmas is an event that should bring us to this depth of silence. When we become aware of the wonder of it all: how god, the creator of all things in heaven and earth, the sustainer of all life, became a tiny, vulnerable little baby: this should move us to utter silence and wonder.
This is where God speaks the most profound word of love to us, where we realize that this God has been within and among us all along. “O Little Town of Bethlehem” speaks of a town that sleeps while God’s greatest gift is given. It also speaks about us, about a supreme irony: that although we are awake and busy doing so much, we are actually asleep to God coming to us and dwelling with us.
My prayer for all of us this Christmastide would be that god give us the gift of healing, nurturing, profound silence - that we could be still enough to let God’s profound silence speak to us, not with words, but with a presence and a love that speaks volumes.
Thanks be to God for this glorious gospel. Amen.
Anyway, I want to post my sermon for tomorrow. It is part of my "Carols of Christmas" sermon series. I started out with "O Come, O Come Emmanuel," followed by "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" and "Joy to the World" (see my last blog).
Tomorrow's sermon is on "O Little Town of Bethlehem," one of my favorites. Here's what I would have said:
If you go to Copley Square, Boston, see one of greatest churches in America: Trinity Episcopal Church. Believe it or not, this big beautiful church was built for the writer of “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Phillips Brooks born in 1835 in Boston. He came from established Boston family. He was descended from a long line of Puritans, including many congregational clergy. He was educated at Boston Latin School and Harvard.
After Harvard, Brooks decided to go into ministry, and eventually became an Episcopal priest. He started out in Philadelphia, and developed a huge following, based upon his great preaching skills. The Episcopal Church in Boston wanted him to come back to his native city, so to lure him, they promised to build Trinity Church. Today, you can see his statue as you drive down Boylston street. He’s in a pulpit, with Jesus right behind him with one hand on shoulder. Brooks truly was a “prince of the pulpit.” He became, without doubt, the most famous preacher of his day. When he died in 1893, the whole nation mourned.
Just like “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” “O Little Ttown of Bethelehem” was written for a Sunday School. Each year, Trinity’s Sunday School would have a Christmas program and in 1865, he wrote a poem for it. He got his music director to write a tune for it, and the famous carol was born.
The inspiration for poem came three years earlier, while he was on trip to holy land. On Christmas eve, he was in field overlooking Bethlehem in a field reported to be field where shepherd encountered the angels. He could see whole city before him, including Church of the Nativity, where Christ was born.
If you really think about it, the carol has one of most unique takes on the Christmas story. It’s focus is not on the actual event of Christ’s birth, but on the town of Bethlehem, asleep at night time. The carol is about how whole town is sleeping while one of the most significant events in human history is taking place.
This is an astonishing thought: most important event in history of world takes place in tiny little town while everyone is sleeping. While everyone is asleep, the “everlasting light” is shining in “thy dark streets” “the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”
Perhaps my favorite verse is number 3: “how silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given.” Within that verse lies one reason why the true Christmas spirit can elude us so easily, despite all our preparations and expectations. Both then and now, the gift of Christ to our world is given in amazing silence. There are no public relations campaign, no press releases.
John says at the start of his gospel, “he was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him.” The only ones who knew about this world-changing event were Mary and Joseph and a few shepherds, who were tipped off by angels.
The silence of this wondrous gift speaks of a god who works quietly, silently to work out his plan of salvation for humanity. He does not work this plan through the high and mighty. He goes to a tiny town in rural northern Israel to a common carpenter and a quiet little maiden.
This is a something we need to believe in with even greater faith in these times. While great religious and political leaders make decisions, God’s will is silently, quietly being accomplished beneath it all, hidden from the view of most of us. In world where obvious signs give us no hope, where politicians and leaders are just stuck in old ways, this hymn gives me lots of hope.
“How silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given. So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of his heaven. No ear may hear his coming, but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still the dear Christ enters in.” It is this pure, holy silence that god gives us his blessing.
When people ask me where god is in their lives, why god has never given them a sign, I often wonder what they expect. Perhaps the parting of the Red Sea, or even a little miracle: something extraordinary, supernatural that reaches from the spiritual world to our world to tell us that we are loved, to hold on, be courageous, for I am with you.
Despite all the stories of miracles we hear about, I agree with Phillips Brooks: God imparts his blessings in a quiet, mysterious silence. We may never notice it. The most important step for those who yearn to sense God’s presence in their lives; and especially in this season, is to heed the advice of the hymn, “Let all mortal flesh keep silence.” In other words, slow down, be still, keep silence in heart and mind and spirit.
It seems to me that the only time i can really feel the presence of Christ at Christmas is late on Christmas eve. By then, the presets have been bought, the cards have been sent, the cookies have been baked, the packages have been mailed, the lights are us, the tree is decorated, as is the rest of the house. There is nothing left to “do.” All that’s left is to settle down in utter exhaustion, and just “be” before the wondrous love of god made flesh in the little Christ child.
Although some might not agree with me, i think this is just how god wants us on Christmas eve: tired and exhausted. Exhausted by our efforts to make Christmas a special season for us and the ones we love. Tired of thinking we could do it all and be all things to all people.
Year after year we come before god with this exhaustion, realizing once again, we have missed the Christmas spirit that moves our souls and brings tears to our eyes. On Christmas eve, we realize that we are finite, limited human beings who can only do so much. We finally become the meek souls that Brooks writes about.
We come before God in need of rest, refreshment and a sense of redemption, of salvation from what we have done to ourselves and one another in the rush and crowds, the frustrations and anger of a month of congestion and traffic, horns blaring and tempers flairing.
“No ear may hear his coming, but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still, the dear Christ enters in.” By the light of a simple candle, and in the singing of the simplest, most profound carol written, god does come down to the meek soul, tired and humble. When we are quieted, silenced, god finally comes to offer us the rest, the peace and the quiet joy of Christmas.
Once we are quiet enough to sense God’s presence, we can move onto another step: letting God move us to a deeper place of silence than we can ever imagine. Most of us here have been moved to silence at one point in our lives. Perhaps at the birth of a child, perhaps the first glimpse of the Grand Canyon, perhaps at the end of a profound, moving concert, perhaps in a magnificent cathedral with stained glass, perhaps some other time. When we are moved to this level of silence, when we are stopped in our tracts, and invited into an experience that moves beyond the normal to the sublime, that is when god touches us with power and life.
Christmas is an event that should bring us to this depth of silence. When we become aware of the wonder of it all: how god, the creator of all things in heaven and earth, the sustainer of all life, became a tiny, vulnerable little baby: this should move us to utter silence and wonder.
This is where God speaks the most profound word of love to us, where we realize that this God has been within and among us all along. “O Little Town of Bethlehem” speaks of a town that sleeps while God’s greatest gift is given. It also speaks about us, about a supreme irony: that although we are awake and busy doing so much, we are actually asleep to God coming to us and dwelling with us.
My prayer for all of us this Christmastide would be that god give us the gift of healing, nurturing, profound silence - that we could be still enough to let God’s profound silence speak to us, not with words, but with a presence and a love that speaks volumes.
Thanks be to God for this glorious gospel. Amen.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
The Carol That Isn't a Carol
I am having a lot of fun with this year's Advent sermon series. I chosen to take a Christmas Carol every Sunday and talk about how it came to be as well as what it actually says. This morning, I talked about "Joy to the World" - the carol that seems to capture the sheer joy of Christmas.
To the dismay of the congregation, I told them that "Joy to the World" was never intended to be a Christmas carol. It says nothing of Christmas. In fact, there is no way it could have been a Christmas carol, since it was written by a puritan in 1719, when Christmas was not celebrated by puritans. They didn't celebrate Christmas for two reasons: first, they saw how the Church of England celebrated Christmas with all its pomp and pageantry and it turned their stomach. It was this church which they were trying to "purify" and as a result, they were being persecuted.
Second, they saw many in the community celebrate Christmas with such revelry and downright drunkenness that offended their deep faith. The believed Christmas was to be a truly "Holy Day." Take the popular custom of "wassailing" through town. Basically, a bunch of folks would get drunk on the contents of the wassail bowl, go around to houses, and if they didn't get more alcohol for their bowl, they would vandalize that person's property. This is not too far from the problems we have surrounding the secular celebrating of Christmas. Generation after generation has said that Christmas is too commercialized, that we should bring Christ back into Christmas. Is that too far from what the puritans believed? I know they went too far, but I think they did have a point.
Anyway, I digress. Isaac Watts based "Joy to the World" on Psalm 98. But he recast the Psalm in light of the New Testament, "as if David (the supposed writer of the psalm) was a Christian." He recast Psalm 98 not in light of Christmas, but in terms of Christ's second coming at the end of time. The joy he wrote about was when Christ comes to ultimately and finally redeem the whole world from sin, suffering and death. The end of Revelation does not talk about the end of the world, but the transformation of the world through Christ. When he comes there will be a new heaven and a new earth. Mourning and crying and pain will be no more. Death will be no more. God will dwell with humans. Indeed, the earth will be transformed back to its original state: the Garden of Eden. The curse put on humanity and creation will be reversed.
In the meantime, we live between the two comings of Christ: the first on Christmas, 2,000 years ago, and this second coming. The powers of sin, suffering and death are still with us, even though Jesus came to earth in order to redeem us from these powers. Jesus himself said things are going to get much worse before they get better.
Throughout history, Christians have used the season of Advent to prepare for Christ's second coming as much as remembering his first. In Advent, these two comings meet. "Joy to the World" works so well as a Christmas Carol because of the profound relationship between these two comings. It stands as a carol that points us from the initial joy of the first coming, to the overwhelming joy at the second coming.
To the dismay of the congregation, I told them that "Joy to the World" was never intended to be a Christmas carol. It says nothing of Christmas. In fact, there is no way it could have been a Christmas carol, since it was written by a puritan in 1719, when Christmas was not celebrated by puritans. They didn't celebrate Christmas for two reasons: first, they saw how the Church of England celebrated Christmas with all its pomp and pageantry and it turned their stomach. It was this church which they were trying to "purify" and as a result, they were being persecuted.
Second, they saw many in the community celebrate Christmas with such revelry and downright drunkenness that offended their deep faith. The believed Christmas was to be a truly "Holy Day." Take the popular custom of "wassailing" through town. Basically, a bunch of folks would get drunk on the contents of the wassail bowl, go around to houses, and if they didn't get more alcohol for their bowl, they would vandalize that person's property. This is not too far from the problems we have surrounding the secular celebrating of Christmas. Generation after generation has said that Christmas is too commercialized, that we should bring Christ back into Christmas. Is that too far from what the puritans believed? I know they went too far, but I think they did have a point.
Anyway, I digress. Isaac Watts based "Joy to the World" on Psalm 98. But he recast the Psalm in light of the New Testament, "as if David (the supposed writer of the psalm) was a Christian." He recast Psalm 98 not in light of Christmas, but in terms of Christ's second coming at the end of time. The joy he wrote about was when Christ comes to ultimately and finally redeem the whole world from sin, suffering and death. The end of Revelation does not talk about the end of the world, but the transformation of the world through Christ. When he comes there will be a new heaven and a new earth. Mourning and crying and pain will be no more. Death will be no more. God will dwell with humans. Indeed, the earth will be transformed back to its original state: the Garden of Eden. The curse put on humanity and creation will be reversed.
In the meantime, we live between the two comings of Christ: the first on Christmas, 2,000 years ago, and this second coming. The powers of sin, suffering and death are still with us, even though Jesus came to earth in order to redeem us from these powers. Jesus himself said things are going to get much worse before they get better.
Throughout history, Christians have used the season of Advent to prepare for Christ's second coming as much as remembering his first. In Advent, these two comings meet. "Joy to the World" works so well as a Christmas Carol because of the profound relationship between these two comings. It stands as a carol that points us from the initial joy of the first coming, to the overwhelming joy at the second coming.
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