Isaiah 63:7-9
Matthew 2:13-23
December 26, 2010 Sermon
Northridge Presbyterian Church
How many of you experienced a picture perfect Christmas? Show of hands? If we’re honest, none of us has experienced the perfection of Christmas portrayed in a Norman Rockwell painting. There is always a story behind the perfect snap shot. I have friends who are new pastors and due to the business tried to capture that perfect Christmas card photo too late. In one the four year old is looking the other direction, in another the two year old is throwing a tantrum. In all of them the parents are distracted. They decided to forego the perfect picture and emailed a link to the imperfect album on facebook. Perhaps you can identify with a less than perfect Christmas image. Perhaps someone is missing from the Christmas table, the turkey wasn’t quite done, or Sally threw a temper tantrum. Christmas is never picture perfect as the photos we send out to friends and family.
This morning we’re confronted with a less than Rockwellian Christmas story. The lectionary for this year is taking us through the Gospel of Matthew. It doesn’t skip over chapter two, but pauses here on the first Sunday of Christmas. This is not a convenient story for this preacher to reflect on. I’d much rather sit with the angel glorias and the simple narrative of our Christmas eve pageant a bit longer…But, the challenging passage from Matthew while hard to look at, does provide a helpful a fuller and perhaps more realistic picture of Jesus Christ and God at work in the world.
It turns out not everyone was as excited to welcome Jesus as the shepherds, angels, and magi. While Luke tells the full story of the birth of Christ and the angel’s singing, Matthew takes a more sober look at the political and theological ramifications of the birth of Jesus Christ, King of the Jews.
This text is brutal. Where we might expect pomp and circumstance we encounter rejection, violence, and evil in the cold and merciless form of murdering the innocent.
The Gospel of Matthew includes this story immediately after the birth of Christ to set the theological framework for the rest of the book. You see, Matthew is concerned about examining the question of who is Jesus as King and what is the Kingdom of heaven?
Taking a look at these four scenes, this question of authority and power is at the forefront.
The magi come to King Herod looking for another King. Two Kings? How can that be? Jealousy and paranoia take over Herod. His proclivity toward murder is sadly not new. Herod, who was known to be jealous, killed three of his own sons well before Jesus was born. Herod is despised and feared around the world.
Given this violent character, it should come as no surprise that when the magi didn’t play into Herod’s scheme of passing along the location of Jesus, he responds with violence. His kingdom is threatened, his authority just might be challenged there cannot possibly be two kings in one kingdom…what better way to respond to the birth of another king than with violence?
And so, after the birth of Jesus Christ the King there is senseless bloodshed of innocent children in the town of Bethlehem. Herod kills all the male children age 2 and under to preserve his power. Being a small town scholars presume only 20-30 are slain, but that is 20-30 too many, especially after the Advent of Christ.
Mary and Joseph flee with Jesus to Egypt and live life as political refugees for who knows how long. It could have been as short as months or as long as years.
In the kingdom of violence and oppression, the innocent are often the first victims.
You and I see plainly the same drama of Matthew unfolding on this Christmas morning. The God who is born as a baby boy, who is incarnate, leads not to pretty pictures but to real, raw, gritty places. We know the birth of Christ leads from a manger to a cross.
But, isn’t that where we are this morning? The reality of Christmas for you and me is the tension between the manger and the cross.
We live a day to day existence in a world where wars rage on, where power struggles occur in every area of life from the stand-off with the two year old, to the war on poverty we see play out between the pan handling man at the Kroger parking lot and the police officer trying to follow the law, to the extra scanning you’ll undergo at the airport as part of the war on terror.
We follow Jesus out of the comfort of the swaddling clothes in a manger as a refugee, toward some challenging places.
But, the reality is that you and I are sitting in relative comfort and wealth, we experience this raw reality at the center, not as refugees like Mary, Joseph and Jesus. So, we must look to the margins.
One such place is Juarez Mexico…I didn’t hear much about Juarez back in Philadelphia. It never made the news, and when it did it was because an American tourist or wealthy business owner had been shot or held for ransom. But, living here in Texas it seems there is a news story each week about cartels, turf wars, and endless violence. We don’t know the death toll of the many innocent people that have been slaughtered by the kings of violence.
This past week a church member forwarded me a story from the Dallas Morning News about three Texans of the year finalists, including Rich Mackey the director of Arrow Outreach Ministry, one of our longtime mission partners.
I was struck by Rich Mackey’s courage. The article recounts, “The East Texan drove his pickup nine times this year to Juárez. While his Arrow Outreach ministry helps churches there with supplies, construction and planning, Mackey's real contribution has been to bolster the pastors, families and students that his organization supports. Gangs now challenge them and the ministry. This year, gangs took over one building the ministry built, harassed pastors and sprayed violence across surrounding neighborhoods.
Still, families trek to the ministry's community center for medical aid, after-school tutoring and computer training. They now enter a compound surrounded by barbwire and an electronic gate. But they have access to those services, thanks to Mackey's commitment to the deadly city.”
The kings of violence and the kings of peace are at the forefront in Juarez, and in countless other places here and abroad. Yes, tragic human destruction and the slaughter of the innocent is woven throughout the fabric of human history.
The good news is that not even evil brought about by human choice. No, not even the slaughter of the innocents and Herod, the king of violence can destroy God’s ability to save. No, not even the much feared king of violence can overturn the King of Peace. You see, today’s passage shows us that while there are two kings, there is one kingdom…the kingdom of God. God is in the midst of the violence, healing, comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable, creating a kingdom of peace. God doesn’t dictate the evil, but God is in the midst walking with the suffering, and has not abandoned the world or humanity to our own devices of fear, rejection, and violence.
God provides a path toward freedom for Mary and Joseph. An angel appears to Joseph instructing the new family to flee to Egypt. Despite the weeping of the mothers whose children were killed in Bethlehem, the Messiah escaped, and everyone even mothers who lost their sons would be comforted. The hope and promise initiated in this Christmas story is that Jesus Christ, the King of Peace, God in the flesh will ultimately reign one day, and one day there will be no more murder and violence.
The darkness will not be overcome. Violence will not prevail. There might be two kings, but there is only one kingdom. God loves us and chooses to be part of our world in the person of Jesus Christ. The birth of Christ is a sign of God’s kingdom come and God’s will and desire for grace and truth being done. God is walking with us through valleys and up mountains, calling us toward the ways of peace.
A colleague of mine and pastor, Rev. Daniel Meeter reflects on this in his sermon for this Sunday. He writes “It’s always inconvenient when the kingdom of heaven comes on earth. Even for us, for all of us, powerful or powerless, innocent or guilty, it certainly puts us in a time of trial, and forces the issue of our temptations. You can do like King Herod, and try to dispose of the inconvenience, or like Joseph, you can embrace the inconvenience for the sake of the hope that is set before you.”
This is our reality as followers of Christ, to point to the kingdom of God as we live with many kings. With that comes struggle and challenging choices, to be sure. We, who sit in the center of an empire here in the United States of America, are called to look to the margins…seeking out the lost, comforting the grieving, and welcoming the stranger. But, the coming of Jesus Christ, God with us implies that we are not our own, but belong to our Lord and King of Peace, Jesus Christ.
We find ourselves ultimately as citizens of the kingdom of God…living into an inconvenient, yet grace filled truth.
In the name of the father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
December 20, 2010 Editorial “Texan of the Year Finalist Border Heroes”
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