EDITOR'S NOTE: In October 2017 I began a new venture as a synodically authorized minister at Faith Lutheran Church in Wolverton, Minn. The ride over the past 2.5 years has been an amazing journey of learning, growing and the deepening of my theological mind. This sermon originally took place on Dec. 22, 2019.
As some of you may know, there has recently been a big hub-bub about the most recent Stars Wars movie that was released on Friday. It was the last of the nine movies in the main story line, and was about about 40 years in the making.
Believe it or not but this movie event spectacle has been rattling around in my head this week as I grappled with and dove into this week’s gospel.
No … Really!
I mean just picture it: At some point a 33-year-old George Lucas was sitting across the desk from a big-wig movie executive and pitching this: The Imperial Forces … the bad guys … under orders from their cruel leader named Darth Vader hold Princess Leia … the leader of the good guys … hostage. Now Leia and her fellow rebels are in trouble with Darth Vader because they’ve been trying to take back the Galactic Empire from Vader’s buddies.
So, Once Leia is captured, the young swashbuckling warrior of the film, Luke Skywalker, who later turns out to be her brother, and the bad-guy-turned-good character of Han Solo, who has a former pirate ship named the Millennium Falcon, work together with a couple of robots … named R2-D2 and C-3PO ... to rescue the beautiful princess, help the Rebel Alliance, and restore freedom and justice to the Galaxy.
So, there, Mr. Hollywood executive guy, can we have the $11 million bucks we need to make the film?
I have to imagine that Mr. Lucas heard more than a few snickers as he made his rounds around Hollywood to pitch his project.
So, its with this backdrop this week that I encountered today’s gospel: Matthew 1:18-25.
Because, finally after four Sundays of Advent, on this fourth Advent Sunday before Christmas, we get to the birth story. … For the past month of Sundays we’ve been working through the lead up of Jesus’s second coming, which is the whole pretext of advent, to get to this day. … The day on which we receive the story of Jesus’s birth.
But what a fantastic and marvelous story right? It kind of reminds me of an "out there” science fiction movie that stunned the world and made hundreds of millions of dollars.
But isn’t it exactly the improbability and the wonderment and the awe of this gospel message what makes this Christmas season so special to us?
And so I couldn’t help but think about poor Matthew when he sat down to pen this Christmas story some 2,000 years ago. … No, really. … Think about it.
Just as St. Matthew, one of Jesus’s 12 apostles, remember, sits to put down on paper this story, someone he knew may have happened by the little Greek coffee shop he was working at, and they ask in a curious tone, “Hey there, Matthew, what are you working so hard at there, brother?”
And Matthew, leaning back in his chair might have said contemplatively … “Well, I’m writing the story of the birth of our Savior.” A statement which, I might presume would have provoked a follow-up question by the passerby.
“Oh really,” the man might have exclaimed, as he grabbed the seat opposite Matthew at the little table, and said, “Well, I gotta here more about this. … Waiter, I’ll take a coffee too. … Alright, Matthew, tell me more!”
And Matthew being more than excited that someone wanted to hear the good news of our Christ’s birth, may have started … “Well, it’s the unlikely birth story of our Savior, our king who was born to a common couple from Nazareth, and who have to travel a long, long ways to take part in a census decreed by the oppressive emperor,” Matthew responded. “And once they reach the man’s ancestral home in Bethlehem, there are no more rooms for these poor common folks, and they end up sleeping in a barn out back. … And that is where the Savior is born.”
After a short sip of his hot coffee, I imagine Matthew’s friend asking with a quizzical look. … “Well, that seems like quite a fantasy you’re writing there. … Did you come up with the plot all by yourself?”
And Matthew, maybe a bit stunned, may have looked back at his friend and said, “But that’s the thing, this story isn’t just based on true events, as they say to sell movies. ... This story is the story. Every bit of ripped straight from the headlines, and it just happened like 30 or so years ago!”
Now, even more skeptical, I could see Matthew’s friend saying, “Well, that’s quite the story line there Matthew. … A little hard to swallow, but tell me a little more.”
“Well,” Matthew might have said, “The woman was a young woman, say not much more than 13 or 14, and an angel comes to visit her one night and tells her that she is soon going to give birth to a baby boy, and that one day her son will grow up to become the king of their people, in fact … king of all people, regardless of nation. … And that this will happen through the Holy Spirit, never a man laying a hand on her.”
“And while the young woman was terrified at first, the angel reassures her, and then Mary, as this woman is called, comes to accept her fate of becoming the earthly mother of the Messiah,” Matthew may have said excitedly.
“Now, wait a minute,” Matthew’s skeptical friend says. “You want your readers to believe that the future king of all people … the Messiah, as you call him … the one divine son sent to this world by God … was born to a teenager, out of wedlock from a little town in the middle of nowhere?”
“Well, yes,” Matthew may have retorted matter of factly, “But that’s not even the best part! … Now, Jesus’s father, he’s just a common man, a carpenter, in fact, and he’s only about 18 himself. … Well, he is betrothed to Mary, meaning that one day when she comes of age, she will be his wife. … But before all that can happen, Joseph sees his own angel one night in his sleep.”
And I can just imagine Matthew’s friend’s eyes widening in wonderment … or maybe astonishment at this point.
But Matthew presses on: “And that angel tells Joseph that his soon-to-be wife is pregnant with the savior, and that he is to stay with her, support her in having the baby, give it a name as father’s had the right to do then, and raise the little king as his own son.”
“Well, as you can imagine,” Matthew might have said, growing ever more animated, “that doesn’t sit well with this proud man and he begins to scheme how he can wiggle his way out of the commitment to this woman.”
“But, you know what,” Matthew says to keep the story flowing, “the angel snaps him back to attention and says, ‘No, this is what you are going to do Joseph because you are an honorable man, and you will be the father of Jesus.’ … Well, Joseph awakes from the encounter with the angel a new man, and obediently follows the angels orders and stays with Mary, and watches Jesus be born, names him and raises him as his own.”
After a brief silence, I can see Matthew’s friend fidgeting a bit nervously in his seat, maybe silently wondering why he ever sat down to inquire about Matthew’s little writing project in the first place.
And politely, he says, “Well, yeah, that’s a great little story you got started there, Matthew, but I … uhhh … I got to get movin’ along. … You know stuff to do and all that.”
But Matthew may have pinned down his friend in his seat with a wild-eyed stare, and said, “But hold on! … That’s not even the best part of the story!”
“After Mary and Joseph hear from the angels, they have to take off for Bethlehem to answer Emperor Augustus’s decree for a census. You see, the emperor, wanted to be sure he was taxing everyone in the region appropriately.”
So, obediently, Joseph puts a really pregnant Mary on a donkey, and they set off to travel the 90 miles to Bethlehem over dirty and dusty and poor roads. ... But when they get there, all the inns are packed, and this poor common family doesn’t have any connections. So it seems they will be sleeping on the street.”
“But, just at the last minute, an innkeeper has compassion and offers the young couple a stall in his barn out back.”
“So, Mary and Joseph head around back to the barn. And not long later, there along comes Baby Jesus. … Born right there among the cows and goats and chickens, and maybe a pig or two.”
“And then, at that very moment, some more angels appear to some shepherds who are way out in the country sleeping with their herds. ... And the angels, who scared the bewillickers out of the shepherds, tell them, ‘Hey, just chill out a second, and look up in the sky at that huge, bright star. ... You’re going to go follow that star, and it will lead you right to the Messiah … Your new king.”
“And just when you think these poor, frightened shepherds might not be able to take anymore, the sky bursts open and an entire choir of angels start singing ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!’ … And the shepherds go see the Baby Jesus.”
And as Matthew collects himself, I can imagine there was a bit of an awkward silence that hung in the air at the table where he was sitting with his friend.
And after the silence hung in the air for a moment, his friend might have said, “Yeah, well, that’s quite some story you have there, Matthew. … You say it’s based on real events, eh? … Well, that’s just great, but I have to be going now. … You, know, people to see and things to do, and all that. … Good luck with the writing! … And, ahhhh, I wish you well on finding a publisher!”
And with that, Matthew’s friend might have whisked away from the table, from the little cafe … and from that crazy Matthew and his fantastical too tall of a tale.
But Matthew’s problem is our problem too, isn’t it. … Our problem as Christians, I mean.
Because we too know that the story is true. … No matter that some of us may quibble over the smallest of details about Jesus’s birth story, and some others may question some of the vaguest details of how the gospels describe it … We absolutely know that some 2,000 years ago, a scared, but faithful young woman, and a scared, but trusting young man, welcomed the Messiah as their own, and raised him as their son.
And in their acts of faith and trust … they ended up introducing the most perfect gift that will ever be known … to the most imperfect of worlds who didn’t deserve it.
And that is a magical story. … A wondrous story. … A story that cannot be topped by any other story in the known history of mankind on this earth.
And that is what is so very special about this time of year. … What is so special about Christmas. … That is why we Christians burst open with joy and ecstasy this time of year.
Because we are all very familiar with the most improbable of stories ever told, and we just want to share it with the rest of the wider world.
And so when you leave the Sanctuary today, my hope is that you just take a minute revel in this beautiful story that has been handed down to us for generation after generation of faithful believers.
I hope that you take this special gift that we’ve been given and you go forth and tell it to everyone else. Whether, you sit down at a little coffee table and share it with a friend as Matthew did.
Or you share it in your everyday life by showering kindness and compassion on everyone you come across.
Or you share it by listening to your call and trusting in God, just as Mary and Joseph, the birth parents of our Savior did.
However you share this story, the story of Christmas ... I pray for you that you find the passion that young George Lucas had to convince a big-wig Hollywood executive to take a chance on an unbelievable sci-fi fantasy adventure and the very same passion that a young gospel writer named St. Matthew had to convince the world of an unbelievable story that just couldn’t possibly be true. … Could it?
Well, both you and I know that the Christmas story is true. … In all of its unbelievable and fantastical glory, it is true. … And that is what we celebrate this week. … An unbelievable story that changed the course of the world forever.
And that is the good news this fourth Sunday of Advent. … Amen.
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