Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Welcome

Well, good morning Lifepoint! If we haven’t met before, my name is Dan and I serve as the Teaching Pastor here at the Worthington Campus.

If you’re new…

Offering…

Introduction

Who has a favorite Christmas story? A movie counts. Shout it out. Favorite Christmas story or movie.

PAUSE

I hear a lot of wrong answers…though Elf is certainly up there. A Christmas Story is a good Christmas story…It’s A Wonderful Life is not a Christmas movie. It’s like Die Hard—it just happens to take place during Christmas.

The correct answer, as I’ve shared here before is: A Christmas Carol and I would accept either the original, unabridged book by Charles Dickens or the 1990’s adaptation, A Muppet’s Christmas Carol.

You know the story—you have Ebenezer Scrooge, the old, grouchy, stingy business man who won’t be bothered with anybody else’s problems. He’s visited by four Ghosts, his Old business parter, Jacob Marley—or if you have the Muppets adaptation, Robert Marley…Bob Marley. And then, of course, the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Christmas Yet to Come. And in dramatic fashion, Scrooge comes to his senses, has a change of heart, and becomes the biggest advocate for Christmas there ever was.

You might not know, that when Dickens first sat down to write this book…he wasn’t actually thinking about writing a Christmas story. In fact, he was first working on writing a book on the unjust treatment of the poor in England at the time. But after working on it for a while, he decided that an allegorical story, might be a much better way to get his message across. [EXPAND]

But in the process, literary historians notice that Dickens inadvertently started a new trend in the “Christmas” world. See, he was describing all these different Christmas scenes that were, by the standards of people alive at the time, completely over the top…no one actually celebrated Christmas the way Dickens made it look in A Christmas Carol. He wanted it to be unrealistic as a way to make his point. But what’s interesting is that his depiction of Christmas celebrations was so compelling, that many literary critic say Dickens actually defined how most people now wanted to think about Christmas! It created a mental picture for the ideal Christmas season.

In many ways he started this phenomena of looking back and sentimentalizing what Christmas used to be like…and ideal that we’d like to get back to!

That’s why we dream of a white Christmas…like the one’s we used to know.

That’s why sing of “Christmas’s long long ago.”

That’s why we keep singing the same songs over and over and over again every year—at least the ones that are on the radio…

It’s why every Hallmark movie is set in the a charming, old world, small town—to draw us out of the modern chaos and get us back to the simpler times.

Our imagination is drawn back to the past of what the Christmas season was. And we love it!

But what if, in our our quest for Christmas “as in olden days, happy golden of yore” we have missed something? What if, in being drawn back to a simpler time, we have unintentionally “disnyfied” and sanitized the Christmas story? What if the reason we keep wishing for merry little Christmas next year is because each year, on December 26th, we wake up to find things almost exactly as the were back in November? We discover again that this Christmas did not change anything—but then again, there’s always next year, right?

Well, today, in the few short moments we have together, I want to take some time to talk about this Christmas phenomena of looking back. And we will look back for a moment. But what we’ll discover is that the story the Scriptures tell is us not one that simply calls us to look back, but much like a slingshot is pulled back, only to powerfully launch forward, so the Christmas story casts us out of the past changing the way we live the rest of our lives!

So if you have a bible with you, open up to the New Testament book of Colossians. We’ll be in chapter one today. If you need help finding Colossians in your bible, it’s a smaller one towards the end…and always remember that the table of contents is your friend!

Colossians 1:21-23. I’ll read the passage, pray, and then we’ll discover why this actually has way more to do with the traditional Christmas story than we might first imagine.

Colossians 1:21–23 ESV

21 And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.

Let’s pray.

PRAY

We Look Back - Find an Dark Reality

Alright, let’s get started.

Just as a quick refresher, the book of Colossians is actually a letter written a man named Paul who was one of the earliest leaders among followers of Jesus. His MO was traveling to major cities within the Roman empire and starting communities of followers of Jesus that we call churches.

If you’ve been with us the last few weeks, you’ll remember that Paul never actually traveled to this church in the Roman city of Colossae, which is in modern-day Turkey. He’s only heard about the church through some of his co-workers and he’s heard about some of the things they’re wrestling through so he writes this letter to encourage, correct, and challenge them in what it looks like to follow Jesus.

Now, the question is, and I think it’s a fair one: what does this have to do with Christmas?

You may be familiar with the biblical Christmas story, of Joseph and Marry, shepherds, angels…interestingly enough, no drummer boy…but it is the story of Jesus birth. And I think it many ways, these are the main ingredients of this holiday we celebrate as Christmas. In the minds of many, it is at most, a birthday. And you don’t even have to identify as a Christian to believe that, at the very least, Jesus was an incalculably influential person in human history! And if we get a day off for Washington, maybe Jesus probably warrants a few!

So we have our parties, our traditions, our songs, and movies that, year after year, either numb the pain for bit or genuinely makes us feel better for through much of December.

But if you dig just a little deeper, we find imbedded within the Christmas story an idea that is not very warm and fuzzy; one that doesn’t neatly align with the holly jolly spirit of the age!

We find a story of brokenness and pain.

The Gospel of Matthew gives some of the most recognizable details of the Christmas story as we know it. Though we usually skip over some of this. You remember the main characters.

Mary and Joseph. They are betrothed; that is, engaged to be married. And this would not have been a private matter, this would have been well known to their friends, family and entire community.

And, the first miracle in the New Testament is that Mary is pregnant—she’s carrying a child from the Lord. And if you find that hard to believe, then you’re in good company. Because according to the book of Matthew, Joseph didn’t believe her either. We’re told that because he was a righteous man, because he was a decent guy, he decided to divorce her quietly…not to make a scene, but to call off the wedding.

Why?

Because he doesn’t believe her.

And so the beginning of the Christmas story starts with a failing, broken relationship that will be devastating and humiliating for everyone involved. We don’t often talk about that…

But at the last moment, before Joseph goes through with his plan, he is visited by an Angel:

Matthew 1:20–21 (ESV)

20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus…”

and here it is, the part that we don’t really like to talk so much about:

for he will save his people from their sins.

You see, from the biblical perspective, the whole point of the Christmas story is not that Jesus was born…it’s not about celebrating a birthday. It’s about what he was born to do. He was born to “save his people from their sins.”

And it’s not hard to understand why we don’t like this part of the story so much. Because Christmas is supposed to make us feel better. It’s supposed to be that time of year when we forget about our problems for a while and let the goodness of humanity shine through the gloom of every day life if even for a moment!

We don’t want a conversation about what is wrong with the world right now, we want to talk about what is good and right and beautiful!

And so, at Christmas, we look back to a birthday, if even that, and leave the rest of story in the past.

And yet, the reality is, we can’t pretend forever that everything is alright in world. In fact, we are confronted every day with more and more evidence that there is something off…something broken about the world we live in. We might even be honest enough to admit that the problem is more than just things happening “out there” in the world around us…but part of the problem is in here.

The problem is that we often only look back this time of year—and when we only look back, we end up sanitizing the story, cleansing it from anything that promotes the unwelcome truth that there is something wrong.

George Saunders, who is Humanities Professor at Syracuse and named by Time magazine as one 100 most influential thinkers of our age, wrote a fascinating editorial called, “The Problem with being Human.” And I think he gives some incredible language to describe this “brokenness” I’m talking about. In it, he makes the argument that we seem to have “survival” hardwired into our very nature and that we tend to ascribe to ourselves the most significant level of meaning we can imagine. He says this:

The mind takes a vast unitary wholeness and selects one tiny segment of it (me, my body) and starts narrating stories from that point of view and – just like that – that entity [me] becomes real and is (surprise, surprise) located at the exact center of the universe, and everything that is happening is happening in [my] movie, so to speak; it is all, somehow both “for” and “about” [me]. And, in this way, moral judgment arises: what is good for him is… good. And vice versa.

We are navigating, in every moment, through a terrible, beautiful, confusing landscape, with a deeply flawed navigational tool.

In other words, each and every one of us believes that we are the very center of the universe and problem is we tend to live as if that’s true. And when we all believe that, we are inevitably going to invade someone else’s territory when it suits us best. Simply put, “selfishness” is a part of our hardware. And it will try and destroy what ever gets in it’s path.

This is why we can get so angry when…

This is why we can shut down when…

It’s the part of the Christmas story we don’t like to talk about—that the world is broken, that we are broken, and need a savior.

Now, let’s jump back to the passage in Colossians because this is exactly what Paul’s talking about. Look with me again at v. 21:

Colossians 1:21 ESV

21 And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds,

As we look back over the course of our own lives, we can see a trail of evidence of that brokenness infecting everything in our lives! And when we’re honest with ourselves, even through all the warm fuzzies of Christmas, we can say that was me…that IS me!

But do you see how we tend to cut this part of the story out of our Christmas celebrations? We want baby Jesus, born in a manger, we want the drummer boy, we want the gifts and kindness, but at the end of the day, we don’t really want a savior because we don’t want to need a savior.

And, again, what ends up happening, without us even realizing it, is exactly what happened with Charles Dickens Christmas Carol. We recreate an artificial story! We end up telling and retelling a story that has been sanitized and robbed of it’s power all in an effort to make us feel a little bit better for while.

I wonder if you’re like me. And this could be just because I am basically Ebenezer Scrooge.

But as I get older, I feel more and more of a let down this time of year. And it’s not because I’m squashing the Christmas Spirit…I love Christmas music! I love Christmas movies! But I just feel like there is something artificial…and as much as I love my traditions, as much as I love my songs, as getting together with family, it’s like a wake up from a Sugar comma on the 26th to find, once again, that all the things I worried about back in November have not been magically solved. I find out that the brokenness inside of me, the selfishness, the anger, all that stuff has not just been erased—nor has impact of my brokenness on others been somehow smoothed over by the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.

And again, this may be a big IF, but IF you are anything like me, you too find you are still hurt. You’re still frustrated. You’re still worried. You find that there is still brokenness in your life that the Christmastime has failed, once again, to deal with.

And this, I think, is what we are left with, year after year, when we only look back to a Christmas story devoid of brokenness and silent on sin.

We Look Forward - Find Hope

But, this is not were the Christmas story ends. The Christmas story in the scriptures calls us backwards but does simply show us a birthday! It reveals our brokenness and the brokenness of our world, but also reveals our Savior!

And this is exactly what Paul’s talking about!

Keep reading v. 21.

Colossians 1:21–22 ESV

21 And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him,

Friends, this is the work of Jesus on our behalf. That he has taken those of us who were and are broken…he takes those of us who have been wounded, worn out, tired, ragged and empty, and HE brings healing!

Last week, we talked about how it was the work of Jesus, his death and resurrection, that makes it possible for us to have a restored relationship with God the Father, that in Jesus we find we are rightly aligned the Maker and Ruler of all things.

But I love the way Paul talks about this here, because what it makes clear is that Jesus enters into our brokenness with us and for us! Jesus does not just sit back and judge but he takes on himself all of our brokenness, the full weight of our guilt and shame, all on himself as His body is broken on the cross in our place, for our sin!

And the story of the gospel tells us that a great exchange takes place, where all of Jesus’ perfection, his righteousness, his blamelessness, is then transfered to us. As in, God now sees you as having Jesus’ perfection; as having Jesus’ righteousness. He sees you as He sees Jesus! This is what Paul means when he says we who were alienated, hostile, doing evil deeds have been reconciled! We have been reconciled in our relationship with God!

Friends, this is the Jesus we worship at Christmas! This is the Savior/King! And we celebrate not just he was born, but what he was born to do…to Save His people from their sin…

Faith as Entrance To the Kingdom

And this is what we can’t miss. Instead of Christmas being about a story that leaves us in the past, we find in the Scriptures a story that grabs ahold us, body and soul, and says there is a new kind of life, there is a new way of life in which you find healing, wholeness, forgiveness and joy! You can find life the way it’s meant to be lived…and all of this offered to you by faith not in a tradition, not in a season, not in a birthday, but new life offered to you by faith in the Savior!

And this is exactly what Paul’s talking about as he finishes this section out. Look again at v. 22.

Colossians 1:22–23 ESV

22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.

Faith as Allegiance

And I know we’re getting close to the end here, but I think we need just to explore what that means for a moment, because we have a problem with the word “faith.”

Think of it this way for a moment. Words, just like food, have a distinct flavor. And the word faith has a strong “religious” flavor, doesn’t it? We generally use it today talk about religious things. But this is not really the way Paul thought of this word when he originally used it.

Remember, the New Testament was not originally written in English, but in Greek. And one of the advantages of that is that we have an enormous number of books and other documents from that same time period all written in Greek. And it allows us to compare some of the words that show up in the New Testament to how other thinkers, writers, politicians and leaders of the ancient world were using those same words. And what we find when we do that with the word faith is that in Paul’s day, it didn’t really have a strong “religious” flavor, but a “political” flavor.” It was almost exclusively used to describe, not someones relationship to a deity, but to describe someones relationship with a King or Ruler! It was word that meant something much more like “allegiance” or “loyalty.”

And I think drastically changes how we understand a phrase like “Faith in Jesus” because all of a sudden it moves from this vague idea of “belief” to something much more concrete like, “allegiance.” It’s to say that you are on His team. You are with Him. More than that, keeping all of that rich political flavor, it is a statement that He is your King!

And when He is your King, this changes the way you live. You no longer operate from the default setting we talked about earlier, that “I” am the center of the universe…that was is good for “me” is…good full stop! No, a pledge of allegiance to King Jesus is and will aways be a declaration of war against yourself.

But friends, this after all, is both the wonder and power of the Christmas story! That the one who was and is, holy, blameless, and perfect…the King…has stepped into our broke-down, beat-up world to become like us SO THAT, by faith, we could become like Him!

You see, this is the Good News of Great Joy for all people that the Savior/King we need has come and offers us new and everlasting life!

And so this year, do not look back to just a birthday. Do not look back just to the birth of Jesus, look back and be both confronted and comforted with what he was born to do.