Readings FIRST LESSON The first lesson is from “In Defense of Humility,” an essay by Bernard of Clairvaux Mary replies then with humility, that the dwelling of grace may be prepared. How sublime is this humility, which is incapable of yielding to the weight of honors, or of being rendered proud by them! The mother of God is chosen, and she declares herself God’s handmaid. It is in truth a mark of no ordinary humility that even when so great an honor is given her, she does not forget to be humble. It is no great thing to be humble when in a low condition; but humility in one that is honored is a great and rare virtue. Whoever we are and whatever our condition, let us mark well what was the reply of her who was chosen to be the mother of God, but who did not forget humility: “Let it be to me according to your word.” “Let it be to me” is the expression of desire, not the indication of doubt. These are words of prayer. Let the Word be formed, not as the word in preaching, not as a sign in figures, or as a vision in dreams, but silently inspired, personally incarnated, found in the body, in my body. Yes, let it be done for the sake of the whole world, but especially let it be done unto me, according to your word. SECOND LESSON The second lesson is from “The Divine Dawning,” an essay by Karl Rahner And yet, what a strange prayer this is! After all, you have already come and pitched your tent among us. You have already shared our life with its little joys, its long days of tedious routine, its bitter end. Could we invite you to anything more than this with our “Come”? Could you approach any nearer to us than when you became the Child of God, when you adopted our ordinary little ways so thoroughly that it’s almost hard for us to distinguish you from the rest of us? In spite of all this we still pray, “Come.” And this word issues as much from the depth of our hearts as it did long ago from the hearts of our forefathers, the kings and prophets who saw your day still far off in the distance, and fervently blessed its coming. Is it true, then, that we only “celebrate” this season, or is it still really Advent? Are you the eternal Advent? Are you the one who is always still to come, but never arrives in such a way as to fulfill our expectations? Are you the infinitely distant One, who can never be reached? But still you will come again, because the fact that you have already come must continue to be revealed ever more clearly. It will become progressively more manifest to the world that the heart of all things is already transformed, because you have taken them all to your heart. Behold, you come. And your coming is neither past nor future, but the present, which has only to reach its fulfillment. Now it is still the one single hour of your Advent, at the end of which we too shall have found out that you have really come. Grant us the grace to live now, in the hour of your Advent, in such a way that we may merit to live in you forever, in the blissful hour of your eternity. |
This Week's Sermon Date: December 24, 2009--Christmas Eve Title: Waiting for the Light: The Light Has Come Message Delivered By: Rev. Dr. Joe McMurray A few years ago, a little boy and his Grandmother came to see Santa at the Mayfair Mall in Wisconsin. The child climbed up on Santa’s lap, holding a picture of a little girl. "Who is this?" asked Santa, smiling. "Your friend? Your sister?” "Yeah, Santa," he replied. "It’s my sister, Sarah. She’s really sick." "Well, I know it's really too much to ask you, Santa, but ..." the old woman began, shooing her grandson over to one of Santa's elves to collect the little gift which Santa gave all his young visitors. “The girl in the photograph ... my granddaughter ... well, you see she has leukemia and isn't expected to make it through the holidays," she said through tear-filled eyes. "Is there any way, Santa, any possible way that you could come see Sarah? That's all she's asked for, for Christmas, is to see Santa." Santa blinked and swallowed hard and told the woman to leave information with his elves as to where Sarah was and he would see what he could do. Santa thought of little else the rest of that afternoon. Yet he knew what he had to do. "What if it were my child lying in that hospital bed, dying," he thought with a sinking heart, "It’s the least I can do." So when Santa finished visiting with the children that evening, he retrieved the name of the hospital where Sarah was staying from his helper. He asked Rick, the location manager, how to get to Children's Hospital. "Why?" Rick asked. Santa relayed the conversation with Sarah's grandmother earlier that day. "C'mon. I'll take you there," Rick said. Rick drove them to the hospital and came inside with Santa. They found out which room Sarah was in. A pale Rick said he would wait out in the hall. Santa quietly peeked into the room through the half-closed door and saw little Sarah on the bed. The room was full of what appeared to be her family; there was the Grandmother and the girl's brother he had met earlier. A woman whom he guessed was Sarah's mother stood by the bed, gently pushing Sarah's thin hair off her forehead. And another woman who he discovered later was Sarah's aunt, sat in a chair near the bed with weary, sad look on her face. They were talking quietly, and Santa could sense the warmth and closeness of the family, and their love and concern for Sarah. Taking a deep breath, and forcing a smile on his face, Santa entered the room, bellowing a hearty, "Ho, ho, ho!" "Santa!" shrieked little Sarah weakly, as she tried to escape her bed to run to him, IV tubes intact. Santa rushed to her side and gave her a warm hug. A child the tender age of his own son – 9 years old – gazed up at him with wonder and excitement. Her skin was pale and her short tresses bore telltale bald patches from the effects of chemotherapy. But all he saw when he looked at her was a pair of huge, blue eyes. His heart melted, and he had to force himself to choke back tears. Though his eyes were riveted on Sarah's face, he could hear the gasps and quiet sobbing of the women in the room. As he and Sarah began talking, the family crept quietly to the bedside one by one, squeezing Santa's shoulder or his hand gratefully, whispering "thank you" as they gazed sincerely at him with shining eyes. Santa and Sarah talked and talked, and she told him excitedly all the toys she wanted for Christmas, assuring him she'd been a very good girl that year. As their time together dwindled, Santa felt led in his spirit to pray for Sarah, and asked for permission from the girl's mother. She nodded in agreement and the entire family circled around Sarah's bed, holding hands. Santa looked intensely at Sarah and asked her if she believed in angels. "Oh, yes, Santa, I do!" she exclaimed. "Well, I'm going to ask that angels watch over you," he said. Laying one hand on Sarah’s head, Santa closed his eyes and prayed, asking that God touch her and heal her body from the disease. He asked that angels minister to her, watch and keep her. When he finished praying, still with eyes closed, he started singing softly, "Silent Night, Holy Night—all is calm, all is bright." The family joined in, still holding hands, smiling at Sarah, and crying tears of hope, tears of joy for this moment, as Sarah beamed at them all. When the song ended, Santa sat on the side of the bed again and held Sarah's frail, small hands in his own. "Now, Sarah," he said authoritatively, "You have a job to do, and that is to concentrate on getting well. I want you to have fun playing with your friends this summer, and I expect to see you at my house at Mayfair Mall this time next year!" He knew it was risky proclaiming that, to this little girl who had terminal cancer, but he had to. He had to give her the greatest gift he could – not dolls or games or toys – but the gift of HOPE. "Yes, Santa!" Sarah exclaimed, her eyes bright. He leaned down and kissed her on the forehead and left the room. Out in the hall, the minute Santa's eyes met Rick's, a look passed between them and they wept unashamedly. Sarah's mother and grandmother slipped out of the room quickly and rushed to Santa's side to thank him. "My only child is the same age as Sarah," he explained quietly. "This is the least I could do." They nodded with understanding and hugged him. One year later, Santa, Mark, was again back on the set in Milwaukee for his six-week, seasonal job which he so loves to do. Several weeks went by and then one day a child came up to sit on his lap. "Hi, Santa! Remember me?!" "Of course, I do," Santa proclaimed, as he always does, smiling down at her. After all, the secret to being a good Santa is to always make each child feel as if they are the only child in the world at that moment. "You came to see me in the hospital last year!" Santa's jaw dropped. Tears immediately sprang in his eyes, and he grabbed this little miracle and held her to his chest. "Sarah!" he exclaimed. He scarcely recognized her. Her hair was long and silky and her cheeks were rosy—much different from the sick little girl he had visited just a year before. He looked over and saw Sarah's mother and Grandmother in the sidelines smiling and waving and wiping their eyes. That was the best Christmas ever for Santa Claus. He had witnessed—and been blessed to be instrumental in participating in—this miracle of hope. This precious child was healed. Cancer-free. Alive and well. Santa silently looked up to heaven and humbly whispered, "Thank you, God. It is a very, Merry Christmas, indeed!" Will you pray with me? O generous and most loving God, tonight we celebrate the birth of the Christ Child, the one you sent to change the world, to change how we think, how we act, and how we engage one another and all humankind. Through you all things are possible. By the example of Jesus, the one whose birth we celebrate this evening, we know there will always be a chance, there will always be hope for the world. Make us mindful of this hope, not only during the Christmas season, but all the year. Make us worthy of this great gift, Emmanuel. And may my words and all of our thoughts be filled with honor and praise to you. Amen. As I drove around Key West late this afternoon, finally getting to some of the Christmas shopping I’d been wanting to do, I realized that my patience was nearly at an end. You see, it’s been a very busy month leading up to the holiday season, beginning well before Thanksgiving and, well, not really ending yet. In fact, I realized and told a friend yesterday that I really hadn’t had much time for the spirit of the season to build up within me and take hold as I’d wanted it to. I’d complained that though this is my favorite time of year, the pace had been so hectic that there just wasn’t time for me to stop and enjoy the season. I was even feeling a bit resentful about it. The day started innocently enough—putting the finishing touches on 12 food baskets with Christmas wrap in preparation for their pickup and delivery at noon. Ruth Cahoon came in to fit the altar with its beautiful new cloth. Ed Flack came by to finish filling the baskets and distributing and delivering them to the families to whom they were promised. I called Robert Cooley to see if he would come in to vacuum the Sanctuary because Frank Kelley brought 35 poinsettia plants from MARC House, and we made a little bit of a mess setting them out. Knowing we had a few food baskets that were unclaimed, I called Fr. Steve Braddock, who gratefully came by to pick up the extras and deliver them to some of his clients who could use them. I called Richard Dennison who had offered to bring flowers for the service, and though I’d initially said “no,” I changed my mind at the last minute, and he said, “Anything for you—you know that.” Then I went out for a bit, had a late lunch, picked up some groceries, and was getting some last minute shopping in. As I went from place to place, I kept running into people—some whom I knew, some who I didn’t know but somehow knew me—and everyone was saying, “Merry Christmas!” “Have a wonderful service tonight!” “Good luck with your shopping!” Even the check-out clerks at the particular stores I went to seemed to be in the Christmas spirit. And I thought, “What a wonderful spirit there is in the air today. All the church folk who are helping out on Christmas Eve—giving their time as they always do—even on an important day like this. And the people all over town who are just in the best mood. Then I realized it. Then it came to me. I felt so stupid. I felt so ridiculously stupid. You see, I’d failed to realize that the spirit of Christmas had been there all along. It had always been accessible; always within my reach. I had failed to see it, failed to reach out and touch it, failed to see it in the faces of everybody else. So there I was, driving through the streets of Key West. And I was having my own little “Miracle on 34th Street” moment. I felt like George Bailey from “It’s a Wonderful Life” and Ebenezer Scrooge from “A Christmas Carol” all rolled into one. Several years ago when VCRs first came into vogue, someone gave me a boxed set of those three films, since they are among my favorites. And though I loved each of them, I hadn’t realized until I thought about it that they all had a very similar theme. In each film, the storyline was about people who decidedly saw things one way; and when they finally allowed themselves to see more deeply, they found a profound meaning to life; they were able to literally transform themselves and create a new life. In “Miracle on 34th Street,” Doris and Susan discovered that when you really allow yourself to believe in something, it surpasses any fear you can possibly have. It causes you to open your heart to things beyond your comprehension. Not only can you let go of the material, you can appreciate the intangibles of life—the real meaning beyond life’s practicalities. George Bailey, in “It’s a Wonderful Life,” doubted the value of his own existence. He ultimately realized how rich a man he was, but came to that conclusion only by wishing that he’d never been born. His guardian angel, Clarence, granted his wish. George was tortured by the eerily unfamiliar until he discovered what he didn’t really believe before: that he already had a wonderful life. And we all know Ebenezer Scrooge quite well. Ebenezer spent a lifetime expecting and thus receiving the worst in people, and then gave it back ten-fold. He changed only when he was confronted by three spirits—past, present and future—who catalogued changes in him as they transpired over time. He reclaimed his life again by accepting the fact that though change is never easy, being caught in the fear of change comes at too steep a price. So, there I was driving around the island, realizing all this and applying it to my own situation. But I couldn’t just let it go. I had to speak it out loud. I had to share it with someone or it might not appear to be real. If no one else witnessed it, I might wake up tomorrow and think I just dreamed it. I couldn’t allow that to happen. And so I decided to share what I learned with you tonight. As the more I thought about it, the more I realized something more about the Christmas season: that it isn’t just about the work and getting things done. It’s not just about ordering the candles, the flowers, and the food. It isn’t just about the meetings and the conferences, the phone calls, or the details—all the details. Christmas isn’t just about the obligations, the parties and get-togethers, the decorating, the carol singing and gift-giving. It isn’t only a matter of crossing things off the “to do” list until the next day pops up and a frustrating new list appears. Christmas isn’t just about peace on earth, good will to women and men. It isn’t even just about the birth of Jesus and the lovely stories of Mary, the angels, or the shepherds and the Magi. Christmas is also about possibility. It’s about hope. It’s about miracles. Christmas is about transformation. And it’s about redemption. Christmas is the one time of year when you can and should set aside absolutely everything else, take a few deep breaths and say, “Everything is now possible.” Change is possible because I have hope in tomorrow. Peace is possible because I have faith in people’s better judgment, and even more faith in the power of God. Miracles are possible because I know they’ve already happened—even in my own life—and they can and will happen again. Transformation is possible because people can and do change. Many people, every day, realize they can do better. They make choices that, though difficult and seemingly impossible, transport them from one place to another. Often those choices are made because we make choices to intervene on their behalf. And we make choices because God calls us—God asks us to choose—and to intercede with others. And finally, redemption is possible because we can choose to look in the mirror every day and challenge ourselves, as God challenges us. We can honestly look at ourselves, our environment, our life situation and say, “I can do better.” If we possess the faith it takes to require something better of ourselves, then redemption for us is possible. The little child born in Bethlehem teaches this to us every year. May we take Christ’s lead, and follow where God is leading. Amen. |
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