Christ Church Riverdale

2 Christmas January 4, 2004 Jeremiah 31:7-14; Psalm 84; Ephesians 1:3-6,15-19; Matthew 2:13-15;19-23

In his story of the life of Jesus, Matthew sets out to prove that Jesus is the Messiah long expected by the Jewish people. He begins with an almost tortured genealogy from Abraham on: fourteen generations from Abraham to David, and fourteen generations from David to the deportation to Babylon, and fourteen generations from the deportation to Babylon to the birth of Jesus.

It’s a very carefully devised and structured explanation of Jesus’ lineage. Then, Matthew describes the birth of Jesus and the visit of the Wise Men. Here, we encounter some surprises. The devious Herod, threatened by the foretold birth of a king, seeks to destroy Jesus. Herod enlists the Wise Men as spies. But, warned in a dream, once they find the child, the Wise Men return by another way, avoiding Herod.

Matthew sends the holy family to Egypt to avoid Herod, a strange and unexpected turn of events. Herod erupts in a furious rage, but to no avail. After Herod’s death, they return to Israel, but avoid Judah for safety.

If Jesus is the Son of God, you might think that things would proceed more smoothly. But life is not like that, and the world is not like that. And God, in Christ, has chosen to be part of humanity and in the world. God is revealing himself, and we are beginning to understand what unfolding revelation is. God speaks and reveals God’s self in surprises. The all-powerful God is known most intimately in the weakness and vulnerability of the baby he came to incarnate.

The world is a mysterious place, and God is beyond our final knowing. In an article about the relativity of time in the paper on New Year’s Day, I was interested in the following statement: “Like believing the earth is flat or that man was created on the sixth day, our willingness to place unjustified faith in immediate perception or received wisdom leads us to an inaccurate and starkly limited vision of reality.” Our unaided sight tells us that the earth is flat and the Bible tells us that man was created on the sixth day, or does it?

The Church has been forced to accept that the earth is not flat, and most Western Christians understand the story of creation in Genesis as a myth with profound truth about our relation to God, not about the way in which molecules coalesced in creation.

The Bible is a fixed canon of writings we revere as holy. But God’s revelation continues. Educated Christians generally accept the Bible as holy scripture by seeing the way in which God continues to reveal who he is to the peoples of Israel and the early Church. Their stories are placed alongside ours as we attempt to understand God’s purposes for us. The process of revelation continues.

Matthew gives us a wondrous vision of surprises as God acts. The history of the star, or the wise men, and even the personality of Herod, are shrouded in the mists of time. What’s important is what the record Matthew presents tells us about God and about how to live our lives.

The genealogy reminds us that we, too, have a past and a future. The star reminds us of the mystery of the world and the signs of God all around us, signs we often fail to notice. Our perceptions are blinded by the mundane and the usual, by what we expect to see. Have you ever walked down a city street and seen a spectacular sunset, only to notice that no one else seems to notice?

Finally, the story reminds us of evil in the world: Herod’s lust for power; his fear of losing the power he has obtained; and his willingness to go to any lengths to protect it. We’re sent back to the beginning, to the story of the garden of Eden, to the human inclination toward wanting control. The sordid histories of regimes in our own lifetimes are equal in horror, and worse, to the reign of Herod.

Faced with this evil, You and I, in our pilgrimage, have the opportunity to lead lives worthy of our Savior, who gave up power and sought out the lost.

Click here for Previous Sermons

Send mail to the Webmaster with questions or comments about this web site.
Copyright © 2005 ChurchLongName.