Nativity Of The Lord
Preaching
Lectionary Preaching Workbook
Series VIII, Cycle A
Object:
Theme For The Day
When the angels promise "a sign for you," it is a sign for us, as well -- and, for all people.
Note: The comments below are on the Proper I texts. Propers II and III (alternates for this day), are as follows. The three sets of propers occur in all three cycles of the lectionary:
Proper II
Old Testament Lesson
Isaiah 62:6-12
New Testament Lesson
Titus 3:4-7
The Gospel
Luke 2:(1-7) 8-20
Proper III
Old Testament Lesson
Isaiah 52:7-10
New Testament Lesson
Hebrews 1:1-4 (5-12)
The Gospel
John 1:1-14
Proper I
Old Testament Lesson
Isaiah 9:2-7
A Great Light
(The first verses of this passage will recur in several weeks' time, as the First Lesson for the Third Sunday after the Epiphany/Third Sunday in Ordinary Time.)
"I will wait for the Lord," says Isaiah, in the verses leading up to this passage, "and I will hope in him" (8:16). God's hand has long been hidden from the people, Israel, who have long known only "anguish" and "deep darkness" (8:22). Yet, into that darkness there now comes "a great light" (v. 2). Once again, we need to ask the question what that "great light" would have meant for the people of Isaiah's time -- for it would have provided scant comfort for them to hear a prophet unveil a prediction of salvation not to be realized for many centuries. Clearly, the "great light" for Isaiah's time is the birth of the good king, Hezekiah, who would far surpass his father, Ahaz, in faithfulness and piety. This is a powerful passage for Christmas, as God's people move from the darkness of the Advent fast into the brightness and glory of the Nativity.
New Testament Lesson
Titus 2:11-14
Between Grace And Glory
Bold is the preacher who selects this short text from a little-known epistle for a Christmas sermon, when the people are hungering for the familiar fare of angels, shepherds, and the babe in the manger! Yet, there are rewards in this little gem of a passage. The verb, "has appeared," is epiphaino, which means not merely "appearance," but specifically the inbreaking of light. It is an aorist, or perfect, tense: the light is already here. No longer do we need to scan the night sky, hoping for the dawn. The coming of Christ, the light, requires his disciples to live in certain ways. The new life requires both a "no" and a "yes" -- no to "impiety and worldly passions" (v. 12) and yes to self-control and godly and upright living (v. 13). There is a second occurrence of epiphaino, or epiphany, in this passage. The word shows up again in verse 14, where it describes good news yet to be realized: the full glorification of Christ. Christians live, therefore, between grace and glory. The grace, we have already come to know: in the babe in the manger. The glory, we shall yet discover: when he returns to redeem all creation.
The Gospel
Luke 2:1-14 (15-20)
The Birth Of Jesus
Many of us grew up watching the animated short, "A Charlie Brown Christmas," on television. We remember the climactic moment when Linus steps out onto a bare stage, saving the failed Christmas pageant with a simple, unadorned recitation from the second chapter of Luke. These are the words he spoke, from memory. And these are the words that echo through the consciousness of most worshipers, as they wait, expectantly, to hear the good news of Christ's birth. There are historical difficulties, here. The Emperor Augustus never ordered an empire-wide census (or, if he did, the typically thorough Roman historians inexplicably neglect to mention it). A certain Quirinius was indeed the Roman governor of Syria, but his term of service did not begin until after the reign of Herod, during which Matthew has Jesus' birth taking place. Luke's mention of these historical figures is more of a literary device than a historical benchmark. His goal is to place the decidedly local event of Jesus' birth into the larger world context. The fame of the babe of Bethlehem will, of course, eventually eclipse that of the once high-and-mighty Quirinius, and even that of Augustus -- the first Roman emperor to demand that his people venerate him as a god. The circumstances of Jesus' birth are rustic. The witnesses -- at least the earthly ones -- are ne'er-do-wells and ruffians. The precise location of the humble lodging-house -- where his parents paused ever so briefly, on a longer journey -- was quickly lost to history (the site of the present-day Church of the Nativity notwithstanding). Yet, the fact of this child's birth -- into a peasant family, in a backwater village of a vast empire -- has changed the human race forever. The shepherds' response to the angelic announcement of the Savior's birth is twofold: they get up and go, then they go and tell. Their response, in other words, transcends mere listening. They also act. So, too, should we: as we witness "this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us" (v. 15).
Preaching Possibilities
"This will be a sign for you: You will find a babe wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger."
Familiar words, these, the stuff of many a Christmas card, many a well-loved carol. But to the company of shepherds, bedded down for the night (or so they think), the words of the angel are truly astounding.
It's incredible enough that the angel of the Lord is there at all. But even more amazing yet is the fact that the angel has come to them -- to them, who are shunned by polite society as rogues and scoundrels. "Never trust a shepherd," was the popular wisdom among those who slept in houses (rather than under the stars); "Why, a shepherd would sooner steal your livestock (or your child!) than put in an honest day's work!"
Yet it is to these fly-by-night characters, these rolling stones that gather no moss, that the angel announces the birth of the Messiah!
"You will find a child," the angel says, "wrapped in bands of cloth...." Not decked in the princely purple of the imperial court, or in the satiny silks of the merchant class, but in the rough homespun of the common folk of people much like the shepherds themselves.
"You will find a child... lying in a manger." Not an elegant cradle, but a feeding-trough for animals: the sort of place that just happens to present itself when you're poor and footloose and a new parent -- and living by your wits.
"A sign... for you," the angel called this baby -- a sign of what? Why, of God's doing something wholly new!
What an amazing concept those shepherds begin to grasp, there on the starlit hillside: of God born into the world as a human child! For us who have heard this story time out of mind, it's comforting and familiar. For them, it turned the whole world upside-down.
The "sign" the angel points out to the shepherds -- "a child... lying in a manger" -- tells out a momentous truth about God: a truth many people today are still missing out on. The truth is: God would rather be loved than feared.
A God who would rather be loved than feared is precisely the sort of God the world doesn't want: not then, not now. The world would rather have a fearsome God, an austere and distant taskmaster -- a God whom it can placate through petty sacrifices and inconsequential virtues, a God whom it can safely ignore, most of the time.
Yet, when the most high descends, and enters this world as "a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger," we just can't think that way any more. All the paradigms of worldly piety are cracked wide open. Between the outstretched arms of the babe of Bethlehem -- in the manger or on the cross -- we see love incarnate (literally, "love in the flesh"). That love cannot be denied.
The Lord is handing out signs tonight, handing them out wholesale: signs of love for us and for all the world. The darkness of winter's night is pierced with the light of a thousand Bethlehem stars. The angel of the Lord speaks again, this time not to shepherds, but to the likes of us: "This will be a sign for you..."
If we accept the sign that is offered, something is expected of us in return. It's the same thing that was expected of the shepherds, long ago. "Let us go now to Bethlehem," they say to one another, "and see this thing that has taken place."
Christmas Eve is the time for hearing that angelic announcement -- and, for those who only come to church once a year, this is all they're likely to hear: the preview of things to come. It's kind of like renting a video, watching the coming attractions at the beginning, then turning it off before the feature presentation!
When the last carol is sung this night... when the candles are extinguished... when the closing words of benediction have been cast over the assembled company, we are invited to leave this sanctuary and set out on a journey. The shepherds' journey, measured in miles, was not far -- from a hill outside Bethlehem to the town center -- and neither is our own. For most of us, it's the distance between our home and this church. Yet in a deeper sense, a spiritual sense, the span of this journey is infinite. It's the journey of a lifetime.
What God invites us to do is not to coo over the baby Jesus and have done with it but to follow that child through all his days. We are invited to accompany him and his parents on their desperate flight into Egypt; to stand proudly by his side as he stumps the biblical scholars at twelve years of age; to wonder at the spectacle of his baptism in the River Jordan. We are invited to walk the sands of the Galilean Sea with him -- on a gloriously sunny day, when all seems right with the world -- and to peer out in horror from the shadows of a doorway, as he staggers down the road to Calvary, a cross upon his shoulder.
And when this babe of Bethlehem -- now the risen Lord Jesus Christ -- calls us by name, early of an Easter morning, we must then decide what we really think of him and whether we buy his story of a God who would rather be loved than feared.
What if the shepherds had just stayed on their hillside, receiving the angelic message and revisiting it year after year, telling it to their children with a catch in the voice and a tear in the eye? What if that was all? What if they had never said, "Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place?"
What if we merely hear the story this night, nothing more? What if we drove home afterward impassive and unchanged, to our Christmas trees, our presents, and our pain?
This is no ceramic figure, wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger. He is life itself, the living Lord of heaven and earth. Do we have the courage to take him into our homes, into our hearts, into our lives?
Tonight there is a sign for you.
Prayer For The Day
There are signs all around us, O God:
signs that direct the holiday traffic,
signs that point to the biggest bargains,
signs that proclaim the number of shopping days,
signs that warn, "You break it, you bought it."
May we never miss the most important sign of all:
the sign that says, "Love is born among us!" Amen.
To Illustrate
One of the books many of us loved to hate in school -- not because it's a bad book, but because they required it in English class -- is Silas Marner, by George Eliot. It's the story of a bitter old man, unlucky in love and shunned by his community. He withdraws into an isolated cottage to eke out his days as a weaver.
Silas Marner cares for little, other than sending the shuttle of his loom back and forth -- and the money he earns doing it. And so, one day, when a burglar breaks in and steals every last piece of gold from the hiding place under his floorboards, it seems Silas has nothing left to live for. He spends his evenings standing at the open doorway of his cottage, hoping against hope that someone will happen along and return his treasure.
What Silas receives, instead, is a very different treasure. A little blond-haired girl whose homeless, opium-addicted mother has just died in the snow -- toddles toward the light of his doorway and walks in like she owns the place. The little girl falls asleep on his hearth. As he gazes down at the golden-haired child, Silas thinks to himself,
"Gold! -- his own gold -- brought back to him as mysteriously as it had been taken away! He felt his heart beat violently... the heap of gold seemed to glow... he leaned forward at last and stretched forth his hand; but instead of the hard coin with the familiar resisting outline, his fingers encountered soft, warm curls."
The rest of the novel tells the story of the melting of Silas Marner's heart as he adopts the toddler and becomes both father and mother to her. Plundered of his life's savings, robbed of all that he once held dear, Silas Marner is granted a sign of God's love -- not a babe in a manger, but a little child stretched out upon the warm stones of his hearth.
"In old days," writes George Eliot, "there were angels who came and took men by the hand and led them away from the city of destruction. We see no white-winged angels now. But yet men are led away from threatening destruction; a hand is put into theirs, which leads them forth gently toward a calm and bright land, so that they may look no more backward; and the hand may be a little child's."
***
A story is told about Saint Jerome, that great saint of the early church, who translated the Bible into Latin. In his declining years, Jerome retired to Bethlehem. One night the holy man had a dream. He dreamed the baby Jesus came to him, and the minute he saw the holy child, he felt compelled to give him something. As Jerome reached for his purse, the child spoke.
"I don't want your money," the baby Jesus said.
It then occurred to Jerome that the baby might be hungry, so he offered some food.
"I don't want your food," Jesus said.
Thinking Jesus might be tired, Jerome went to get him a chair.
"I don't want your furniture," Jesus said.
"Then what, Lord, can I give you?" Jerome asked.
"Give me your sins," said Jesus.
Then, as now, Jesus doesn't just come. He comes to us.
***
Behind the pulpit in the chapel of the Charles Cook Theological School in Tempe, Arizona, a Presbyterian training school for Native American church leaders, is a life-size painting of Jesus Christ, his arms upheld in blessing. The first time visitors see this picture, they are often taken aback; it's unlike any painting of Christ most people have ever seen. This Christ is clothed in a tunic and leggings of fringed, white buckskin. The skin of his face and hands is dark, darker than any portraits of Christ in suburban American churches. His hair is long and black, and twisted into the braids of the plains Indians. He is a Native American Christ.
Walk into a Christian church in Japan -- at least one not founded by white missionaries -- and you will discover a Christ there who is Japanese. In Africa, you will find an African Christ -- and so on. The Christ Child is born anew in every culture.
***
In 1994, two Americans answered an invitation from the Russian government to come and teach morals and ethics, based on biblical principles, in the public schools. One of the places they taught was a large orphanage. About a hundred abandoned or abused children lived there, under government care.
It was Christmas, so the teachers from the States decided to talk about the meaning of the holiday. To their astonishment, they discovered that these small children had never heard the story of Jesus' birth -- and so they told them all about Mary and Joseph, the shepherds and the angels, and the little boy born in a stable.
The Christmas story was a big hit with those Russian orphans. The baby Jesus was someone to whom they could all relate. All of them were sitting on the edge of their stools in anticipation.
Next came the craft project. The teachers didn't have much to work with, but they did have some cardboard and some precious yellow paper cut from napkins they'd carried from the States. The cardboard became the manger. The yellow paper, torn into strips, served as the straw. There was an old flannel nightgown left behind by a departing American tourist that they cut into small squares: just perfect for the swaddling-clothes. Each child received a cut-out baby Jesus, in tan felt; this they were to dress and place in the cardboard manger they had built.
As the children bent over their work, one of the American teachers walked around the room, offering encouragement. As she came to the table of a little boy named Misha, she was startled to see not one, but two babies in the manger.
She called for the translator; perhaps the boy had misunderstood the story. But no, he repeated it back to her, in exact detail. When Misha came to the part where Mary puts the baby into the manger, he began to launch into his own version:
"And when Mary laid the baby in the manger, Jesus looked up at me and asked if I had a place to stay. I told him I have no mama and I have no papa, so I don't have a place to stay. Then Jesus told me I could stay with him. But I told him I couldn't, because I didn't have a gift to give him like everybody else.
But I wanted to stay with Jesus so much, so I tried to think of what I had that I could use for a gift. So I asked Jesus, 'If I keep you warm, will that be a good enough gift?' And Jesus told me, 'If you keep me warm, that will be the best gift of all.' So, I climbed into the manger, and then Jesus looked at me and he told me I could stay with him -- for always."
When the angels promise "a sign for you," it is a sign for us, as well -- and, for all people.
Note: The comments below are on the Proper I texts. Propers II and III (alternates for this day), are as follows. The three sets of propers occur in all three cycles of the lectionary:
Proper II
Old Testament Lesson
Isaiah 62:6-12
New Testament Lesson
Titus 3:4-7
The Gospel
Luke 2:(1-7) 8-20
Proper III
Old Testament Lesson
Isaiah 52:7-10
New Testament Lesson
Hebrews 1:1-4 (5-12)
The Gospel
John 1:1-14
Proper I
Old Testament Lesson
Isaiah 9:2-7
A Great Light
(The first verses of this passage will recur in several weeks' time, as the First Lesson for the Third Sunday after the Epiphany/Third Sunday in Ordinary Time.)
"I will wait for the Lord," says Isaiah, in the verses leading up to this passage, "and I will hope in him" (8:16). God's hand has long been hidden from the people, Israel, who have long known only "anguish" and "deep darkness" (8:22). Yet, into that darkness there now comes "a great light" (v. 2). Once again, we need to ask the question what that "great light" would have meant for the people of Isaiah's time -- for it would have provided scant comfort for them to hear a prophet unveil a prediction of salvation not to be realized for many centuries. Clearly, the "great light" for Isaiah's time is the birth of the good king, Hezekiah, who would far surpass his father, Ahaz, in faithfulness and piety. This is a powerful passage for Christmas, as God's people move from the darkness of the Advent fast into the brightness and glory of the Nativity.
New Testament Lesson
Titus 2:11-14
Between Grace And Glory
Bold is the preacher who selects this short text from a little-known epistle for a Christmas sermon, when the people are hungering for the familiar fare of angels, shepherds, and the babe in the manger! Yet, there are rewards in this little gem of a passage. The verb, "has appeared," is epiphaino, which means not merely "appearance," but specifically the inbreaking of light. It is an aorist, or perfect, tense: the light is already here. No longer do we need to scan the night sky, hoping for the dawn. The coming of Christ, the light, requires his disciples to live in certain ways. The new life requires both a "no" and a "yes" -- no to "impiety and worldly passions" (v. 12) and yes to self-control and godly and upright living (v. 13). There is a second occurrence of epiphaino, or epiphany, in this passage. The word shows up again in verse 14, where it describes good news yet to be realized: the full glorification of Christ. Christians live, therefore, between grace and glory. The grace, we have already come to know: in the babe in the manger. The glory, we shall yet discover: when he returns to redeem all creation.
The Gospel
Luke 2:1-14 (15-20)
The Birth Of Jesus
Many of us grew up watching the animated short, "A Charlie Brown Christmas," on television. We remember the climactic moment when Linus steps out onto a bare stage, saving the failed Christmas pageant with a simple, unadorned recitation from the second chapter of Luke. These are the words he spoke, from memory. And these are the words that echo through the consciousness of most worshipers, as they wait, expectantly, to hear the good news of Christ's birth. There are historical difficulties, here. The Emperor Augustus never ordered an empire-wide census (or, if he did, the typically thorough Roman historians inexplicably neglect to mention it). A certain Quirinius was indeed the Roman governor of Syria, but his term of service did not begin until after the reign of Herod, during which Matthew has Jesus' birth taking place. Luke's mention of these historical figures is more of a literary device than a historical benchmark. His goal is to place the decidedly local event of Jesus' birth into the larger world context. The fame of the babe of Bethlehem will, of course, eventually eclipse that of the once high-and-mighty Quirinius, and even that of Augustus -- the first Roman emperor to demand that his people venerate him as a god. The circumstances of Jesus' birth are rustic. The witnesses -- at least the earthly ones -- are ne'er-do-wells and ruffians. The precise location of the humble lodging-house -- where his parents paused ever so briefly, on a longer journey -- was quickly lost to history (the site of the present-day Church of the Nativity notwithstanding). Yet, the fact of this child's birth -- into a peasant family, in a backwater village of a vast empire -- has changed the human race forever. The shepherds' response to the angelic announcement of the Savior's birth is twofold: they get up and go, then they go and tell. Their response, in other words, transcends mere listening. They also act. So, too, should we: as we witness "this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us" (v. 15).
Preaching Possibilities
"This will be a sign for you: You will find a babe wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger."
Familiar words, these, the stuff of many a Christmas card, many a well-loved carol. But to the company of shepherds, bedded down for the night (or so they think), the words of the angel are truly astounding.
It's incredible enough that the angel of the Lord is there at all. But even more amazing yet is the fact that the angel has come to them -- to them, who are shunned by polite society as rogues and scoundrels. "Never trust a shepherd," was the popular wisdom among those who slept in houses (rather than under the stars); "Why, a shepherd would sooner steal your livestock (or your child!) than put in an honest day's work!"
Yet it is to these fly-by-night characters, these rolling stones that gather no moss, that the angel announces the birth of the Messiah!
"You will find a child," the angel says, "wrapped in bands of cloth...." Not decked in the princely purple of the imperial court, or in the satiny silks of the merchant class, but in the rough homespun of the common folk of people much like the shepherds themselves.
"You will find a child... lying in a manger." Not an elegant cradle, but a feeding-trough for animals: the sort of place that just happens to present itself when you're poor and footloose and a new parent -- and living by your wits.
"A sign... for you," the angel called this baby -- a sign of what? Why, of God's doing something wholly new!
What an amazing concept those shepherds begin to grasp, there on the starlit hillside: of God born into the world as a human child! For us who have heard this story time out of mind, it's comforting and familiar. For them, it turned the whole world upside-down.
The "sign" the angel points out to the shepherds -- "a child... lying in a manger" -- tells out a momentous truth about God: a truth many people today are still missing out on. The truth is: God would rather be loved than feared.
A God who would rather be loved than feared is precisely the sort of God the world doesn't want: not then, not now. The world would rather have a fearsome God, an austere and distant taskmaster -- a God whom it can placate through petty sacrifices and inconsequential virtues, a God whom it can safely ignore, most of the time.
Yet, when the most high descends, and enters this world as "a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger," we just can't think that way any more. All the paradigms of worldly piety are cracked wide open. Between the outstretched arms of the babe of Bethlehem -- in the manger or on the cross -- we see love incarnate (literally, "love in the flesh"). That love cannot be denied.
The Lord is handing out signs tonight, handing them out wholesale: signs of love for us and for all the world. The darkness of winter's night is pierced with the light of a thousand Bethlehem stars. The angel of the Lord speaks again, this time not to shepherds, but to the likes of us: "This will be a sign for you..."
If we accept the sign that is offered, something is expected of us in return. It's the same thing that was expected of the shepherds, long ago. "Let us go now to Bethlehem," they say to one another, "and see this thing that has taken place."
Christmas Eve is the time for hearing that angelic announcement -- and, for those who only come to church once a year, this is all they're likely to hear: the preview of things to come. It's kind of like renting a video, watching the coming attractions at the beginning, then turning it off before the feature presentation!
When the last carol is sung this night... when the candles are extinguished... when the closing words of benediction have been cast over the assembled company, we are invited to leave this sanctuary and set out on a journey. The shepherds' journey, measured in miles, was not far -- from a hill outside Bethlehem to the town center -- and neither is our own. For most of us, it's the distance between our home and this church. Yet in a deeper sense, a spiritual sense, the span of this journey is infinite. It's the journey of a lifetime.
What God invites us to do is not to coo over the baby Jesus and have done with it but to follow that child through all his days. We are invited to accompany him and his parents on their desperate flight into Egypt; to stand proudly by his side as he stumps the biblical scholars at twelve years of age; to wonder at the spectacle of his baptism in the River Jordan. We are invited to walk the sands of the Galilean Sea with him -- on a gloriously sunny day, when all seems right with the world -- and to peer out in horror from the shadows of a doorway, as he staggers down the road to Calvary, a cross upon his shoulder.
And when this babe of Bethlehem -- now the risen Lord Jesus Christ -- calls us by name, early of an Easter morning, we must then decide what we really think of him and whether we buy his story of a God who would rather be loved than feared.
What if the shepherds had just stayed on their hillside, receiving the angelic message and revisiting it year after year, telling it to their children with a catch in the voice and a tear in the eye? What if that was all? What if they had never said, "Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place?"
What if we merely hear the story this night, nothing more? What if we drove home afterward impassive and unchanged, to our Christmas trees, our presents, and our pain?
This is no ceramic figure, wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger. He is life itself, the living Lord of heaven and earth. Do we have the courage to take him into our homes, into our hearts, into our lives?
Tonight there is a sign for you.
Prayer For The Day
There are signs all around us, O God:
signs that direct the holiday traffic,
signs that point to the biggest bargains,
signs that proclaim the number of shopping days,
signs that warn, "You break it, you bought it."
May we never miss the most important sign of all:
the sign that says, "Love is born among us!" Amen.
To Illustrate
One of the books many of us loved to hate in school -- not because it's a bad book, but because they required it in English class -- is Silas Marner, by George Eliot. It's the story of a bitter old man, unlucky in love and shunned by his community. He withdraws into an isolated cottage to eke out his days as a weaver.
Silas Marner cares for little, other than sending the shuttle of his loom back and forth -- and the money he earns doing it. And so, one day, when a burglar breaks in and steals every last piece of gold from the hiding place under his floorboards, it seems Silas has nothing left to live for. He spends his evenings standing at the open doorway of his cottage, hoping against hope that someone will happen along and return his treasure.
What Silas receives, instead, is a very different treasure. A little blond-haired girl whose homeless, opium-addicted mother has just died in the snow -- toddles toward the light of his doorway and walks in like she owns the place. The little girl falls asleep on his hearth. As he gazes down at the golden-haired child, Silas thinks to himself,
"Gold! -- his own gold -- brought back to him as mysteriously as it had been taken away! He felt his heart beat violently... the heap of gold seemed to glow... he leaned forward at last and stretched forth his hand; but instead of the hard coin with the familiar resisting outline, his fingers encountered soft, warm curls."
The rest of the novel tells the story of the melting of Silas Marner's heart as he adopts the toddler and becomes both father and mother to her. Plundered of his life's savings, robbed of all that he once held dear, Silas Marner is granted a sign of God's love -- not a babe in a manger, but a little child stretched out upon the warm stones of his hearth.
"In old days," writes George Eliot, "there were angels who came and took men by the hand and led them away from the city of destruction. We see no white-winged angels now. But yet men are led away from threatening destruction; a hand is put into theirs, which leads them forth gently toward a calm and bright land, so that they may look no more backward; and the hand may be a little child's."
***
A story is told about Saint Jerome, that great saint of the early church, who translated the Bible into Latin. In his declining years, Jerome retired to Bethlehem. One night the holy man had a dream. He dreamed the baby Jesus came to him, and the minute he saw the holy child, he felt compelled to give him something. As Jerome reached for his purse, the child spoke.
"I don't want your money," the baby Jesus said.
It then occurred to Jerome that the baby might be hungry, so he offered some food.
"I don't want your food," Jesus said.
Thinking Jesus might be tired, Jerome went to get him a chair.
"I don't want your furniture," Jesus said.
"Then what, Lord, can I give you?" Jerome asked.
"Give me your sins," said Jesus.
Then, as now, Jesus doesn't just come. He comes to us.
***
Behind the pulpit in the chapel of the Charles Cook Theological School in Tempe, Arizona, a Presbyterian training school for Native American church leaders, is a life-size painting of Jesus Christ, his arms upheld in blessing. The first time visitors see this picture, they are often taken aback; it's unlike any painting of Christ most people have ever seen. This Christ is clothed in a tunic and leggings of fringed, white buckskin. The skin of his face and hands is dark, darker than any portraits of Christ in suburban American churches. His hair is long and black, and twisted into the braids of the plains Indians. He is a Native American Christ.
Walk into a Christian church in Japan -- at least one not founded by white missionaries -- and you will discover a Christ there who is Japanese. In Africa, you will find an African Christ -- and so on. The Christ Child is born anew in every culture.
***
In 1994, two Americans answered an invitation from the Russian government to come and teach morals and ethics, based on biblical principles, in the public schools. One of the places they taught was a large orphanage. About a hundred abandoned or abused children lived there, under government care.
It was Christmas, so the teachers from the States decided to talk about the meaning of the holiday. To their astonishment, they discovered that these small children had never heard the story of Jesus' birth -- and so they told them all about Mary and Joseph, the shepherds and the angels, and the little boy born in a stable.
The Christmas story was a big hit with those Russian orphans. The baby Jesus was someone to whom they could all relate. All of them were sitting on the edge of their stools in anticipation.
Next came the craft project. The teachers didn't have much to work with, but they did have some cardboard and some precious yellow paper cut from napkins they'd carried from the States. The cardboard became the manger. The yellow paper, torn into strips, served as the straw. There was an old flannel nightgown left behind by a departing American tourist that they cut into small squares: just perfect for the swaddling-clothes. Each child received a cut-out baby Jesus, in tan felt; this they were to dress and place in the cardboard manger they had built.
As the children bent over their work, one of the American teachers walked around the room, offering encouragement. As she came to the table of a little boy named Misha, she was startled to see not one, but two babies in the manger.
She called for the translator; perhaps the boy had misunderstood the story. But no, he repeated it back to her, in exact detail. When Misha came to the part where Mary puts the baby into the manger, he began to launch into his own version:
"And when Mary laid the baby in the manger, Jesus looked up at me and asked if I had a place to stay. I told him I have no mama and I have no papa, so I don't have a place to stay. Then Jesus told me I could stay with him. But I told him I couldn't, because I didn't have a gift to give him like everybody else.
But I wanted to stay with Jesus so much, so I tried to think of what I had that I could use for a gift. So I asked Jesus, 'If I keep you warm, will that be a good enough gift?' And Jesus told me, 'If you keep me warm, that will be the best gift of all.' So, I climbed into the manger, and then Jesus looked at me and he told me I could stay with him -- for always."
