Thursday, December 23, 2021

Christmas 2021

 


God’s grace, peace and mercy be with you. Merry Christmas …  My sermon is entitled “Origin and Meaning” and focus is the Gospel of Matthew. … Let us pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’”[1] Now that our feet are within your gates, we rejoice to hear your Word. As we listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds and move our hearts to love deeply as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most Holy Trinity. Amen.

A question we often ask someone when we initially meet is, “Where are you from?” Because I have lived in Pennsylvania, Michigan, New York, California, Texas, Oklahoma and Illinois, I often tell people, “I’ve Been Everywhere.”

We are familiar with Johnny Cash’s version of “I’ve Been Everywhere” because Choice Hotels aired it for years. Without going into detail[2], I use the song to introduce my sermon – origin and meaning.

We are generally interested in people’s origins, that is, where they are from. While few people consider it rude to ask the question, most of us are quite comfortable answering it. As one who has lived in six houses in the five years I have been married, I am quite comfortable listing the places I have been.

When we ponder the longer history of our origins, the narrative of our personal history reads like the genealogy of Jesus in the first seventeen verses of Matthew. As I ponder the genealogy of my grandchildren, I am fascinated how they might turn out. Will they have their parents’ penchant for sports? Our interest in religion? Their extended family members’ dispositions? I would be fascinated to know extensive details about fourteen or more generations of their ancestors. Would that read like Matthew’s genealogy, complete with irregularities in marriage and ethnicity? So, we turn to Jesus’ origins.

Our passage begins with “Now the birth of Jesus Christ,” or in some versions, “This is how Jesus Christ came to be born.” We wonder if Jesus was born in a stable, cave or barn, and if shepherds visited the birthplace. While some sentimentalize, commercialize or politicize the account, and moved so far from the reason Matthew wrote two chapters of Jesus’ origins, we must ask why Matthew prefaced Jesus’ public ministry with two chapters of his origins. To understand Matthew’s nativity narrative, we must explore it in terms of the entire Gospel.[3]

We know the Gospel is about Jesus of Nazareth from conception and birth to death and resurrection. Matthew’s account, like every story, has a beginning, middle and end. He introduced Jesus; recounted his public ministry; and relayed the account of his suffering, death and resurrection. Matthew placed the conception and birth story immediately after the genealogy to highlight the rest of the story. For in these first two chapters, we find suffering, death and new life.

The key to understanding how the story of Jesus’ birth relates to the rest of the story lies in the interpretation of a little word in verse 18 – the Greek word genesis. Genesis has a wide range of English meanings, depending upon the context of where we find it. Most translators prefer the English word birth, but we can also translate it as origin.

Origin has a broader scope than birth because it implies relationships to parents, grandparents and a line of ancestors. If we consider the Christmas story in relation to the first 17 verses, Matthew summons us to reflect upon not only Jesus’ relationship to Mary and Joseph, but also the lineage of David, Abraham and God.

Matthew calls us to accept the virginal conception and the fulfillment of prophecy regarding Jesus’ birth; and as our narrator, he seamlessly relates the Christmas story to Jesus’ human and divine origins in the 17 verses that precede it and the 27 chapters that follow it. To illustrate that relationship, Matthew focused on the child’s three names and titles: Christ, Emmanuel and Jesus.

In verse 18, Matthew raised the claim that the child is the Christ, the most prominent title. The name Emmanuel fulfilled the divine prophecy of Isaiah.[4] Yet, the high point in naming the child is the angel’s declaration to Joseph in a dream. “You shall call him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”[5] The name Jesus calls attention to salvation. In Jesus, God saves. In Jesus, God is salvation. And so, after Joseph awoke, he did what the angel commanded and named the child Jesus.

Why did Matthew reference three names? He highlighted these names for us to ponder Jesus’ identity and his relationship to his heavenly Father, his spiritual ancestors and us.

As Jesus, he saved his people from their sins. As Emmanuel, one saw in him God’s hand at work. As the Christ, the child’s primary title, one understood that he was privy to the “thinking of God.” Recall Jesus’ words after rebuking Peter, “You are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”[6] As sinful man, Peter was not privy to the thinking of God, but settled on the thinking of men. His Lord knew the difference for only he was privy to the thinking of God.

In two paragraphs, Matthew informed readers of the identity and ancestry of his hero’s origin, ministry and significance. He then filled in the details and related this to the rest of the story.

What does the account of Jesus’ origin mean to me? To answer that, I suggest we ask not only how we relate to our familial and spiritual ancestors, but also focus on what we do at Christmas.

We exchange presents, and our exchange is reciprocal. We give to those who give to us. We give presents to family and friends, employees and beauticians, teachers and pastors. Gift giving at Christmas is unequivocally Christian, but not in the way that we necessarily practice it today.[7] Some of us give to ease fears and feelings of inadequacy, but according to the familiar account in Matthew, the main reason for our custom stems from the presents given to Jesus by the Wise Men: frankincense, gold and myrrh. They presented gifts to him, but he gave them – and us – a greater gift.

The Incarnation and Jesus’s sacrificial gift of his own life on the Cross are the greatest gifts to humanity. When I count as gift God with us and salvation unto eternal life, as well as my own life, I cannot help but thank God.

When you think about it, everything is God’s gift to me. I had no choice regarding when and where I was born. That was God’s gift to me. The color of my eyes and hair – God’s gifts to me. My parents and siblings, the language I speak and my sense of humor – God’s gifts to me. The schools I attended and my classmates – God’s gifts to me. My wife’s family and my grandchildren – God’s gifts to me. Everything is God’s gift.

My friends, if you have a few quiet moments this Christmas, spend it not watching the NBA or cable news, but ponder all that God has given you as gift. When you do, pray these words: Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will – all I have and call my own. You have given all to me. To you, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours; do with it what you will. Give me only your love and your grace. That is enough for me.

When you pray those words, may the peace of God that surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.



[1] Psalm 122

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I've_Been_Everywhere

[3] Jack Dean Kingsbury, The Birth Narrative of Matthew in The Gospel of Matthew in Current Study. David E. Aune, editor. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company (2001), 154-165.

[4] Isaiah 7:14

[5] Matthew 1:21

[6] Matthew 16:23

[7] http://www.christianitytoday.com/women/2013/december/what-we-get-wrong-about-gift-giving.html?paging=off

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