Sermon 12/13/09

Here is my sermon for this Sunday-hope you enjoy it.
There are two questions I'd invite conversation on in the comments 1) what do you do to inspire/practice joy in your life? How do you act to increase your joy? 2) do you have an answer to my closing question-a memory that continues to give you joy, or a plan you are particularly looking forward to this holiday season?


Isaiah tells the people “Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.” Isaiah always goes back and forth between the glorious future that God is preparing for the people and the dangerous moment that Israel is in currently. Here, we are at the very far end of the pendulum, being assured that we will draw water from the wells of salvation, and be able to celebrate God’s mercy, that because God is in our midst, we can celebrate, in the face of all our difficulties.
In the Philippians text, Paul invites everyone to rejoice, because they have been blessed with the Holy Spirit and the peace of Christ, because as he puts it, “God is near.” Philippians is one of the most positive of Paul’s letters, (the people of Philippi have sent him some money) and he pours love upon them, calling them “my joy and crown” and tells them “I rejoice in the Lord greatly” because of their love.


Luke’s story of Mary and Elizabeth is equally a story of God’s presence, and joy. John the Baptist leaps with joy in the womb to hear Mary’s voice, knowing that God is near, and Mary’s soul rejoices in God her savior, for the great things that have been and will be done.
In the first week of Advent, we talked about waiting, and how we might wait well, finding our grounding in the process of waiting, not just in the expectation that it will be over soon.
In the second week of Advent we talked about preparing ourselves-readying ourselves to act when God calls, wherever that might be.
This week, the third Sunday of Advent, we join with Christians around the world and with the great cloud of witnesses through history in celebrating and embracing the joy of the Christmas season.
I broke this quilt out this Sunday because while I was in my office working on this sermon, I notice that three of the blocks have the word Joy on it. This is the quilt that we created together last year right before moving to our new building. It is filled with words we as individuals chose to represent the Saint Louis Mennonite Fellowship, and which became the basis for our church song, “Open our Doors” which we (Steve Boyer-Edwards) wrote, and it suggests that joy important part of what it means to be Christian, and part of this community.
So what do you think of when you think of Joy around Christmas? Are there particular stories that
come to mind? Does you have joyful stories from your past or present that leap to mind when you reflect on joy at Christmas time, that you come back to year after year?
I certainly do. The holidays have almost always been a wonderful time for me. But I confess, I experienced a touch of chagrin when I first learned that the theme of this week was joy. I’m not sure how joyful my holiday season is really going to be this year.
As most of you know, I’m going to be going to Kansas this afternoon, to be with my mother on the one year anniversary of my father’s death. We are going to put a headstone in the Lorraine Avenue cemetery tomorrow, and I have been remembering recently the last days of his life, the long nights of pain he experienced, and the absence in all of our hearts this holiday season. We live in a broken world-I know it, and all of your know it as well, but I am experiencing it most profoundly right now.
It is in this context that I am thinking about joy this morning. Not in the context of everything going well, or joy because our lives are completely put together, or joy even because we can see God in our midst because of how well things are going for us and our community.
Rather, I’m thinking about finding joy today despite the brokenness of the world, joy in recognition that things will be difficult, and there will be tears, and I don’t know what to do. Joy in the face of life as it is. I’m trying to claim joy now, at the time of Christmas, only because this is the time that we have picked to celebrate those things that are good, to rest a bit from the work of our lives, to honor the blessings we have received. While it is good to celebrate Jesus’ birth, there is something arbitrary, even artificial about joy at Christmastime.
Think about this-
Jesus’ birth was probably not on December 25th. The earliest texts about Jesus’ birth say nothing about the time of the year, and the first references to his birthday suggest it happened sometime in spring, in April or May. It was in the 300’s before a tradition grew of celebrating Jesus’ birth at all, and only near the end of that century did the 25th of December became the norm for celebrating the Christ child’s arrival, and at least into the 400’s before all Christians came to agreement. It is not clear how the 25th was chosen, other than its proximity to Epiphany (oddly, a holiday since the 2nd century), but there is some evidence that the reason the 25th was picked was to replace a pagan holiday in the Roman calendar. For most of Christian history then, Easter (which we do have a good date for) was the vastly more significant celebration.
In America, however, Christmas has more or less ruled the roost-I’m not exactly sure why, but I suspect it has something to do with the gift giving tradition on Christmas in combination with the more secular traditions that have grown up around Christmas (Santa Claus, in particular, lends himself well to the less explicitly Christian style of the United States of America).
This arbitrary nature of the Christmas celebration might be reason to come at the season in something of a scrooge-like bah-humbug kind of way. After all, it is an overly commercialized, artificial holiday with many adopted pagan traditions, and celebrating Jesus’ birth misses the proper focus on his life and work in the world. We live in a broken world, and to pretend that God has made everything hunky dory for a few weeks, to ignore our pain, is to blind ourselves from reality, to intentionally look away from those in need. For some Christians, Jehovah’s Witnesses in particular, these problems with the celebration of Christmas have led to a deep skepticism about celebrating Christmas at all, and participating in the gift giving that goes along with it.
There is something ethical about this position, I think. I am certainly not opposed to questioning Christmas’ overwhelming importance as a holiday in our society, and I think it is very useful to question the meaning of Christmas. I love the alternative gift opportunities that our congregation sponsors, and the invitation to focus on giving at Christmas rather than getting connected to requests from social service agencies, Agasteen and Lalitha’s work in India, the gift baskets we give to members of our congregation, the gift giving for people in need in our community, and other ways that we seek to de-commercialize Christmas, and to remind ourselves to share our joy with those in need. I think all these are wise choices.
But thinking about our scripture texts this week, and our own lives, I think there is something beautiful in setting aside time, as a people of God, to practice joy.
In our scripture texts, we are invited to join in celebration, to rejoice in the Lord always, to sing with joy. If we think this is really a commandment, then it is important to practice that commandment-to set aside time where we rejoice, when we acknowledge and practice the things that bring us happiness. Joy, I think, begats joy. Surely it comes naturally, when we see children playing, or participate in activities that delight us, but sometimes it is also an effort-to pay attention to what we like, to what gives us life, to actually do those things we know will give us hope and meaning and love. The gifts we give to one another, the caroling we do this afternoon, the meal with Bethesda next week, the tree and trimmings, the chance to gather with family, these are the practices of joyfulness.
Setting aside time to celebrate the good things of this world, like new babies, and Christmas carols, and presents, and family is a really important thing, because it is easy enough to get caught up in the troubles of the world around us, to almost feel guilty that there are things that we love and are grateful for. Mary and Elizabeth experienced joy together, even though Mary went to Elizabeth’s house to avoid gossip while she spent 9 months as an unwed mother. Their meeting might have been a time of frustration at least, even if not despair, but instead they celebrated together with each other. Paul was writing from prison, rejoicing that his friends remembered him in his time of need, rather than dwelling on his suffering. Isaiah could go from wiping out 90% of the people of Israel in one breath, to rejoicing over the few that remained in the next.
In the same way, I hope that we find ourselves, not denying the brokenness, the wars our country is in, the dangers to our climate, things of this nature, but taking time to rejoice. To build one another up, and practicing the things that make us joyful together this Christmas time.
So as a small way of doing that, I wonder if you might be willing to take a moment, everyone, to share a favorite Christmas memory with your neighbor (not your spouse), a joy you have experienced, or one that you are anticipating, that directly connects with the Christmas story-the celebration of God’s work in the world, in our lives, and in the birth and life of the baby Jesus, who we wait for in anticipation. Maybe the one you thought of at the beginning of the sermon, so as to share joy with one another, and think about, as you swap stories, what it means to practice joy.
Ready? Lets begin.
Did everyone have a good story? I hope that you experience the stories of your brothers and sisters in Christ as life giving, and as a way to learn to love one another more. Maybe someone’s been inspired to try a new holiday tradition.
Now, finally, think on this story, and hear again the praise of a young unwed mother, facing a challenging life, pregnant with the anticipation of transformation, celebrating her time of joy:
46And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, 47and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; 49for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. 50His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. 51He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. 52He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; 53he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. 54He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, 55according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”