12.24.2022 - Great Light

Luke 2:1–20 NRSV

1 In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 All went to their own towns to be registered. 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. 8 In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: 11 to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. 12 This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, 14 “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!” 15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16 So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17 When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

Great Light

Surprise!

Have you ever received a good gift you did not appreciate? I remember one of my grandmas always got me socks for Christmas. As a young boy, socks were not the most exciting Christmas present. On cold nights like tonight, though, they seem a lot nicer.

We ask for things we know we don’t need. We unwrap them, use them a few times, and then look for opportunities to give them away to someone we think someone else might need them more than us. Sometimes we realize later how good those unappreciated gifts were. I have given away more toys, books, and electronic gadgets than I can count, but I’ve worn my socks until they were too stretched or full of holes to be worn anymore.

Some of the most important gifts we get at Christmas don’t come in wrapped packages. They are memories from time spent with friends and family, along with the pictures and stories we pass down through the ages. We often don’t realize how much we need those gifts until it is too late. They are better than we imagine and more extraordinary than we should even ask for, yet God gives them to us.

God has a way of surprising us even when He is not trying. Mary was surprised when the angel came to tell her she was going to have a baby. Joseph was too. Her cousin Elizabeth was surprised that she was also going to have a baby, but unlike Mary, she had been praying for a baby for many years. She and her husband, Zechariah, had prayed for a baby, and they were surprised when God answered their prayer.

Why were they so surprised to have their prayers answered? Why are we so surprised when God gives us better than we even dare to pray?

The season of Advent culminates tonight as we celebrate the promises God fulfilled in the birth of Jesus Christ. Those advent candles represent centuries of prophets who foretold God’s plan of salvation, extended to everyone, and the centuries of waiting for that plan to be realized in the lives of the faithful few who gathered at the manger that night. They remembered God’s voice enough to hear it whisper to them in the dark times in which they lived, and they were courageous enough to follow that voice into the light.

God brought us a great light, and we must decide if we will approach it.

Deep Darkness

There are times when the darkness is so deep that we forget what the light looks like. War and violence become commonplace, and starvation and sickness are the new norms. Loyalties are bought with promises of protection and prosperity. None of this is God’s way.

Abraham was promised a nation and given one miracle child. Joseph was shown visions of authority but had to languish in an Egyptian dungeon before rising to be a ruler of Egypt. Moses wielded plagues against an oppressing empire, but only after failing to free his people by himself. Even with God’s power, Moses was reluctant to lead.

It is hard to see in the darkness. It causes us to rely on other senses and makes us look for others to lead us. Two thousand years before the birth of Jesus, God told Abram and Sarai to pack their bags and go, and they obeyed. After 400 years of silence from God, the people of Israel may have forgotten His voice, so He worked through the Roman Empire to get Joseph and Mary to pack their bags and go to Bethlehem, the place God promised to send the Messiah.

Great Light

All across history, God reached into the darkness and put His light in the most unexpected place: a burning bush, a prophet wearing camel skins and living off locusts and honey, a tiny, helpless baby born to a young mother, hidden away in a manger. Every time, God has changed the world with these little specks of light, and our world has known the names of those that carried it for thousands of years: Moses, John the Baptist, Mary, and Joseph. Jesus.

Jesus is the Great light of God that pivoted creation out of the darkness and back to God. The heavens were filled with the praise of angels, and the shepherds came in from the fields to see the birth of the King of kings. This Holy Light was brighter than any of the other stars in the sky and would bring wise men from hundreds of miles away to visit the newborn savior of the world.

In the days that followed, others would come to Jesus, drawn by the light of God found within Him. Some, like Simeon and Anna, were led by God’s Spirit and promised an opportunity to see the infant Messiah. Others followed the words of the Old Testament prophets to find Jesus. The Shepherds followed the directions given to them by the angels.

But not everyone came to the manger that night to see God’s light. Some of the people of Bethlehem stayed home, minding their own business. Some of the wise men from far away may have decided it was too costly or dangerous to travel to Israel to meet the newborn king. Many of the Jewish leaders of the time were threatened by the idea of a new king and wanted nothing to do with Jesus.

Those who came to Jesus, those who sought Him out, made a choice to seek the light in spite of the darkness around them. They waited patiently on God’s timing and direction rather than working to create their own light. They chose to trust God and be faithful to His ways rather than their own way, and their faithful patience paid off. Jesus was far better than anyone dreamed He would be.

Come to Jesus

Who is the one who commands even the wind and the sea? Who is this Jesus who sends demons running with a mere word? Who is this teacher who teaches with authority, unlike our scribes and teachers of the law? Who is this Jesus who can heal the sick, give sight to the blind, make the deaf hear and the mute speak? Who is this man who can call Lazarus out of the tomb after being dead for three days?

His name is Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God, and our Savior and Lord. God sent Him into our world to be the light in your darkness, but you must choose to approach Him. You have to leave the familiar darkness behind and come into the light where you can see and be seen clearly. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from, lowly shepherd or powerful king. God did not call us into comfort or power.

God wrote his own story in a way that we could never write our own. Before Jesus breathed His first breath with human lungs, He chose the manger, just as He chose the cross. He chose a life that would reach those stuck in the deepest shadow of death, and He chose to serve rather than be served Himself. When we listen carefully to the Christmas story, there is nothing in it that makes us say, “I wish that were my life.” There is nothing that makes us jealous or envious of the life that Jesus had, except perhaps for one thing. The love of God. The love of God that shone in and around and through Him every second of every day He spent in this world with us.

That love of God is the surprising gift of Christmas right in front of our faces, yet somehow, we keep overlooking it and following false lights around us because they seem easier. They look more like the things we expect. We keep looking for something else, something more, something that looks like the vibrant life we think we are missing on these cold nights. But Jesus shows us that all we need is God’s love to fill us and the opportunity to share it with others to live the best life of all.

So, we gather tonight to thank God for sharing that love with us in Jesus Christ and for inviting us into a relationship that allows us to share His everlasting light and ever-surprising love with everyone around us.

PRAYER OF CONFESSION and PARDON (Tony):

Everyone: Merciful God, we confess that often we find darkness more comfortable than light. We confess that we find your good news frightening and unsettling, especially when we consider its demands as well as its promises.

We confess that Christmas has become more to us than the birthday of the Christ, partly because we do not want a Christ-Child in our lives or in our world. Forgive us, break us, bend us, remake us.

Give us the courage to lay ourselves open to the wonder and healing of your coming.

Be born again into our world, be born again into our hearts and lives.

Hear now our silent and personal confessions as we prepare ourselves for your nativity. Tony: The true light that enlightens all has come into the world. That light shines on in the darkness, and the darkness has never been able to put it out.

This is the good news: God has heard our confession. God has forgiven our sin. Everyone: Thanks be to God! THE GREAT THANKSGIVING (Tony): The Lord be with you. And also with you. Lift up your hearts. We lift them up to the Lord. Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. It is right to give our thanks and praise. It is right, and a good and joyful thing, always and everywhere to give thanks to you, Father Almighty (almighty God), creator of heaven and earth. You created light out of darkness and brought forth life on the earth. You formed us in your image and breathed into us the breath of life. When we turned away, and our love failed, your love remained steadfast. You delivered us from captivity, made covenant to be our sovereign God, and spoke to us through your prophets. In the fullness of time you gave your only Son Jesus Christ to be our Savior, and at his birth the angels sang glory to you in the highest and peace to your people on earth. And so, with your people on earth and all the company of heaven we praise your name and join their unending hymn: Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. Holy are you, and blessed is your Son Jesus Christ. As Mary and Joseph went from Galilee to Bethlehem and there found no room, so Jesus went from Galilee to Jerusalem and was despised and rejected. As in the poverty of a stable Jesus was born, so by the baptism of his suffering, death, and resurrection you gave birth to your Church, delivered us from slavery to sin and death, and made with us a new covenant by water and the Spirit. As your Word became flesh, born of woman, on that night long ago, so, on the night in which he gave himself up for us, he took bread, gave thanks to you, broke the bread, gave it to his disciples, and said: "Take, eat; this is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me." When the supper was over he took the cup, gave thanks to you, gave it to his disciples, and said: "Drink from this, all of you; this is my blood of the new covenant, poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." And so, in remembrance of these your mighty acts in Jesus Christ, we offer ourselves in praise and thanksgiving as a holy and living sacrifice, in union with Christ's offering for us, as we proclaim the mystery of faith. Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again. Pour out your Holy Spirit on us gathered here, and on these gifts of bread and wine. Make them be for us the body and blood of Christ, that we may be for the world the body of Christ, redeemed by his blood. By your Spirit make us one with Christ, one with each other, and one in ministry to all the world, until Christ comes in final victory, and we feast at his heavenly banquet. Through your Son Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit in your holy Church, all honor and glory is yours, almighty Father (God ), now and for ever. Amen. THE LORD'S PRAYER (Tony): Our Father, Who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name. Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen. BREAKING THE BREAD/GIVING THE BREAD AND CUP (Tony) PRAYER AFTER COMMUNION (Tony): Everyone: We are filled with joy for we have heard good news of great joy. We are filled with love for we have tasted the sign of God's great love. We are filled with hope for the angels still sing in our world and there is a Light for us to follow. (Lights are turned off as prayer ends) THE PASSING OF THE LIGHT You are invited to join us tomorrow at 10 am for Christmas Sunday Worship!