December 26, 2021                            Text:  Isaiah 9:2

Dear Friends in Christ,

    Ever asked an older person what they want for Christmas and they tell you that they don’t need anything, they have everything they want.  I get that sentiment as I get older.  I would not have understood it as a child.  But you and I look around at all the blessings the Lord provides and we really do have everything that we need.

    Almost everything.  We need the Lord.  You light up every room in your house like the 4th of July but it is not the same as being in the sunshine.  You can live places that get over 300 days of sunshine like Toni and I did in Littlefield, Texas and a person can still be in spiritual darkness.

    Without God’s sunrise in our lives, without God’s Light of day, Jesus Christ, the darkness can be frightening and oppressive.  It’s the day after Christmas and we continue to celebrate . . .

“THE GREAT LIGHT OF JESUS”

    Our text once again, “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined.”  Israel is in darkness at the time Isaiah wrote this.  The Assyrians have invaded and destroyed the land.  A few survivors struggle to hang on in desolation.  When all hope seems lost, God’s promise comes.  A Light will dawn on them.  It is so certain it is even described in past tense.  “They have seen a great light,” and “on them has light shined.”

    This light is not just for those people despairing in Israel.  It is for all people, Jew and Gentile.  That means when we see our nation growing morally and spiritually weak, when we see so many signs of the last times and when we deal with the upheavals in our own lives, the Light shines for us.  The light shining from Jesus shows He is the way to the kingdom of God.  He keeps us safe through faith no matter what darkness we walk through.  When we have faith in Jesus as our Light, guess what happens to our fears of death and darkness?  They melt away.  They are replaced with joy.

    Seven hundred years after this promise from Isaiah, the Light, dawned.  That’s the message of Christmas.  A few shepherds first receive him.  Later a few Wise Men receive the Light of the world.  While the world is filled with those who received the Christ child in faith the last few days, the doubters and rejecters are all around.

    Herod rejected him.  The priests, Pharisees and Sadducees, for the most part, reject Jesus.  Not many people welcomed Jesus as the Light.  Most people liked the way things were.  After three years of Jesus’ ministry, how many were there in the Upper Room on the Day of Pentecost?  Only about 120.  John says in his Gospel that Jesus “the true light, which gives light to everyone . . . came to his own and his own people did not receive him.” (John 1:9, 11)  The people who needed Him the most rejected Him.

    A Pastor once called on a woman who was very ill.  She was not going to get better.  She was so afraid that she kept her light on all the time figuring if she were awake she wouldn’t die.  It couldn’t possibly work.  She got exhausted.  Sooner or later she was going to die.  On a spiritual level, she didn’t understand, she was right.  If she could just see the Light, Light with a capital L, she wouldn’t die.  She didn’t need a light bulb.  She needed the light of Christ.  Living by this Light when she took her last breath she would live.  That is the message for us that shines in the Gospel.  Jesus the Light shines in the darkness of death.  He receives us into the eternal light of His heaven.

    There is another story the complete opposite of the lady who was afraid to die.  This woman was in her 80’s and in and out of the hospital.  Her world was shrinking but she still exhibited her faith and generosity.

    Another trip to the hospital came and the Pastor rushed to visit.  She was barely conscious.  The Pastor read Scripture and said a prayer.  He prayed for healing.  He left things in God’s hands and returned a few days later.  His parishioner was now sitting up and talking.  She scolded her Pastor, “I was ready to go and be with Jesus.  But you prayed for me and I got better.”  That woman did not need electric light bulbs to keep her awake.  She’d seen the light in Jesus and could go to sleep in his arms anytime.  

    We don’t stumble in the dark to find Jesus.  On Christmas, the day after Christmas and all the other days we have, Jesus the Light is God’s gift to us through His Word.  Hear the Word with faith, and the Light will dawn.

                                    Amen.

December 25, 2021 – Christmas                    Text:  Luke 2:1-20

Dear Friends in Christ,

    Have you ever thought of the birth of Christ in terms of technology?  We live in a technological world that is such a part of our every day that we hardly notice it.  But the world has always used technology.   Back in the time of Jesus the technology used was mostly different than what we use today.

Let’s take a few moments this special day to see what it looked like . . .

“A TECHNOLOGICAL CHRISTMAS”

    The first use of technology that got Jesus to Bethlehem was the census.  Joseph and Mary had to go there to be registered.  It was the government at work.  Caesar Augustus was God’s instrument.  His call for a worldwide census unwittingly set into motion the events of Jesus’ birth, thereby fulfilling the prophecy from the book of Micah that he would be born in Bethlehem.

    How did you get to your birth?  Technology.  Your mom had to find out she was pregnant.  Many of you popped up on an ultrasound and they could even predict a boy or a girl.  Almost all of us or maybe all of us were born in a hospital.  Technology was all around us.  Monitors and machines and people who were skilled.  After your birth technology was used to find out about movement and hearing and eyesight and reflexes.  You were coming into a new world.

    Joseph and Mary had none of that.  No ultrasound but it didn’t matter God had told them they would have a Son and he would be the Savior of the world.  They had no hospital to go to but they used the technology of the day and were able to travel on the modern roads.  They had a donkey.  They used technology to get to Bethlehem and then Jesus was born.  He was wrapped in swaddling cloths (technology) and laid in a manger (technology).  

    The birth was not announced on Facebook or Twittered out to the world.  It was announced.  Oh, how it was announced.  To shepherds by angels.  “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

    Why did a Savior need to be born?  Because we are breaking down and altering the way we are relating to one another and God.  Technology can have many negative sides to it.  John Barclay, a New Testament scholar at the University of Durham gave a lecture at Concordia Seminary on the age of the Internet, he said this:

    “In an age when people fear the judgment of their peers far more than they fear the judgment of God, we have become increasingly petulant, critical, even cruel, and it’s proving hard to take…Our contemporaries are not primarily trying to win the favor of God; they are trying to win the favor of one another.  The judgment they fear is not the last judgment, but humiliating comments on social media.”

    We have shifted away from God and toward one another.  Instead of worrying if some faceless person in Uzbekistan likes your puppy shouldn’t we be thinking of our choices according to God’s Word?  Instead of tweeting out some inane comment you have to apologize for, maybe you need to hold your tongue because the world doesn’t really care.  A few years back people were eating laundry detergent pods and putting it on social media.  Others saw it and thought that was a good idea and followed suit.  We chase desires because of some twisted envy.  We then start to lose who God made us to be.  We live in a world of mirages and mirrors, screens and shadows.

    Jesus is no shadow.  Promised by God in the beginning, heralded by the prophets, and announced by the heavenly host, Jesus is God Incarnate.  Jesus is fully human – God in the flesh with bone and muscle and blood and skin and sweat and hair and fingernails.  Jesus is as real as it gets. 

    His birth, like all births, involved blood and pain.  He walked real, dusty streets in real places such as Nazareth and Galilee and Jerusalem.  Then touched the ulcerous skin of lepers.  He wept tears at the tomb of Lazarus.  Jesus permitted the technology of the day to put him on a Roman Cross and have his skin pierced and his warm, crimson blood to flow.  Jesus, the incarnate Son of God is reality.

    Step out of your fantasy world this day and hear the words you’ve known since childhood.  Christ came for you.  Christ died for you.  Christ loves you.  Christ forgives your indiscretions and your listening to the voices of our day.  They are transient.  Do you think they really care about you?  Step away from the screen and into your Bible.  Hear the good news of great joy that Jesus brings.  Down deep, don’t you really want that in your life?  May the Holy Spirit move your heart and mind to what you have always known and been taught.

    Technology.  A blessing when used rightly and as God intended.  It brought Him to Bethlehem and into our lives.  Rejoice in that.  He died and rose for you so that you might live . . . because you are important to Him.

                                    Amen.   

December 24, 2021 – Christmas Eve                Text:  Isaiah 62:1-5

Dear Friends in Christ,

    The Spin Doctors had a catchy tune 28 years ago – “One, two princes kneel before you.”  Is it a fairy tale, pursued by two princes?

    The Bible likes weddings.  From Genesis, “man should not be alone,” to Jesus’ first miracle at the Wedding in Cana.  The mystery is profound like Christ and the Church.  Our text for tonight.  “You shall be called My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married; for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married.  As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.”  It’s Christmas Eve and wonderful to hear . . .

“GOD CHOSE YOU”

    The gospel of Jesus Christ tells a love story.  It is THE love story.  And one, two princes kneel before you.  One has eyes for you.  He struts by and leans in.  He has charisma and confidence.  He makes your knees weak.  He has smooth moves and slick lines.  A tailored suit and stylish shades.

    He is going to buy you an expensive drink or two or six.  He has a fast car and faster hands and he swerves in and out of traffic.  He turns heads at every club and the women wink.  They have a history but no interest in a future.

    This one gets around.  This one gets you alone in a corner or in a hallway.  How about his place or a hotel?  This one specializes in no-strings attached, casual, and non-committal.  He excels in one-night stands.  He likes the darkness.  He delivers the danger.  He slips off those clothes and slides his hands over.  You feel his heat and sweat.  He can’t speak your name because he doesn’t know it and he doesn’t care.  It’s nothing like love, just lust enough to get lost in.  Who needs delight when you can indulge?  

    When he has had enough of fooling around with you he throws a few dollars your way to catch a cab.  He didn’t come to take care, only to take advantage.  You can’t decide whether he defiled you or you failed yourself.  When you lack somebody who sees you as precious, you’ll let anybody treat you this way.

    Ask around.  Many know his name, but few speak it out of shame.  Prince?  Prince of demons.  Prince of darkness.  He masquerades as sexual preference and sexual promiscuity.  He has a hundred other aliases:  greed, gossip, envy, anger, idolatry, apathy.

    His given name is Sin.  But he goes by self-expression and personal choice and rights and equality.  Hell himself disguised as death dressed up in freedom and promising heaven to have you in bed.  Sinfulness doesn’t love you.  Sexual choice and immorality don’t love you.  Look at how he leaves you.  Sin doesn’t rescue humankind.  Selfishness doesn’t create.  It consumes.  Death doesn’t redeem.  It discards.  It doesn’t choose you; it uses you and discards you and abandons you.

    But one, two princes kneel before you.  The other has a heart for you.  This one doesn’t need you, yet He wants you.  This one has character and compassion.  He humbles Himself in servanthood.  He bends low not to sweep you off your feet but to sit beside you in the gutter.  He comes near to take you in His arms to strengthen you and stand with you and walk with you.  He takes the blame for indiscretions and idolatries and gluttonies.  He pays the price for your hostilities and apathies and blasphemies.  He leads you to a castle, lifts you up to a kingdom and a mansion, yes, a palace and a paradise, making you His own.

    His scarred hands protect.  His stricken side and stinging scalp preserve.  No pretty pick-up lines, but presence and promises.  No fancy booze, but daily bread.  He doesn’t entice or seduce but embraces, absolves, accepts.  He doesn’t turn away from your wounds but He tends them.  He won’t rip off your clothes.  He will robe you in his majesty.    He’ll outfit you in attire of dignity.  He doesn’t pour sweat over you but for you, yes, He sheds His blood and spends His last breath to cleanse you from guilt.  He advocates and sacrifices for you.  

    This one gives you a new name.  He calls you by name.  He doesn’t ravage your body.  He asks for your hand.  He creates you special and calls you priceless.  In sickness and in health, to love and to cherish all the way to eternity.  Welcome, bride of the Heir, daughter and Son of the King Himself.  Welcome to new life and family and security and home!  Welcome not returning to work but with a purpose.

    Know Him as grace.  Call Him Savior.  Know Him as forgiveness and faithfulness and patience.  Greet Him this night as Jesus, Son of God, and Lord of all.  You chose sin, but God chose you.  Life chose you.  Baptism chose you.  Communion chose you.  Heaven chose you.  Kneel before Him.  Kneel beside Him as prince and princess now yourself.  Each one selected by God.  Each one a gift no matter age, appearance or abilities.  No matter how many princes pass by, you were created for this because God chose you.  A Blessed Christmas in his love.

                                    Amen.