Drake’s Observation

Luke 17: 20, 21     John 14: 15-17

 

 

          A couple Sundays ago, I dropped in on the children’s Sunday school class. While we are in Telephone Church, they meet in the hall. They line up on the wall and the only chair is for the teacher. I think they sort of like it that way. That particular morning, the lesson was on Jesus’ battle in the wilderness. As is the way of children, that might have been the story in the book, but they had questions and observations that went far beyond Jesus and Satan and those temptations in the wilderness. Somehow, the conversation turned to how it will be when Jesus returns. Everyone had a thought. What happens if we’re alive? How will we meet Jesus? What happens if we’re already dead? How will we meet Jesus then? What will we look like if we’re already dead? And what will heaven look like? Where is it? What’s it like?

          You have to be quick if you’re going to teach Sunday school to young boys and girls. They have more questions than you have answers. And they don’t ever ask simple questions. When children ask about God, they go to the heart of theological discourse. No seminary professor ever asked me questions that hard.

          Amid all these questions, one stood out to me. It wasn’t a question. It was an observation. Drake O’Neal said something pretty simple but very profound. Drake said: “I like it here.” It isn’t that Drake has anything against heaven. In fact, he liked the idea because it would mean he could hook up with his Pa again. Drake has someone in heaven whom he misses. Isn’t that true for all of us! But still, there was that very pointed observation: I like it here.

          Now, Drake’s parents and grandparents can feel flattered. Drake’s experience so far on this planet has been pretty good. Drake likes it right where he is. He’s in no hurry to experience heaven as long as earth goes along the way it’s been going. If heaven is so wonderful, why isn’t Drake in a hurry to get there? In fact, if heaven is so wonderful, how come all of us aren’t in a hurry to get there?

          I’m not. I like it here. Come to think of it, I can’t name a single person that I know who is in a hurry to get to heaven. Even though the Christian religion is based largely upon our salvation, no one is lining up for heaven. It’s a promise that all of us want to claim, but not right now. So Drake is onto something when he says he likes it here. We all like it here. How is that possible when heaven is the ultimate goal?

          I think that we sometimes get off track when we use all our time and energy to point to heaven. Of course, it is the destination we all desire, but the journey is just as important. In fact, it’s pretty much the only way I know to get there.

          Why do we like it here so much? The simple answer is that that’s the way God meant for us. In the creation, God made everything for us that we need. He made us to enjoy the creation, to have dominion over it, to help one another, to be in communion with him. He also gave us freedom of choice and in our desire to be like God, we chose to use that freedom to bring us to a broken relationship with God. But God meant it for good. He always means it for good. The whole Bible is this long story of God rescuing us from ourselves over and over and over again, always loving us and looking after us even when we reject him. Remember what Joseph said to his brothers, the brothers who left him for dead? “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good…” [Gen. 50: 20].

            But why do we like it here so much? One of the reasons has a theological name. It’s called realized eschatology. Eschatology is a big word with a big meaning. It is the study of the “end” things, the “last” things. It’s the study of when and how God’s intentions for the world are fulfilled.[1] When Jesus came, when he died and was resurrected, he brought life. That is, God’s will was and is being done on earth as it is in heaven.[2] It started then and it will never completely finish until Jesus comes again. So we are in the end times, even if they last a million years. The world changed forever when Jesus came and died for us. And if Jesus came and died for us to live, then we are already participating in some way in the kingdom of God. So realized eschatology is a term that instructs us that since Jesus has come and died and risen and defeated death and sin, then we are already in the end times, but since he has not come again to close out all history, then we are also living in the not yet. We live in the already and the not yet.

          I think that’s why Drake likes it here. Jesus has already given us all the hope we need. We are living on the place where God started it all. Even though we have mucked it up a lot, there is so much, so very much, that is just plain wonderful about our world and all the people and relationships that we have here. I agree with Drake. I like it here. I like it here a lot.

          And every time I make a new friend, every time I smile at some act of kindness, every time I see someone giving out love just because they can, I know I like it here so much that I don’t want it to end. Even in the rough times, when someone I care about is hurt or dies, I still am glad they were here and that I got to know them and remember them. They become part of me in some way and in that way, perhaps they never completely die.

          What we are talking about is the Kingdom of God. Is it here? Is it there? Is it coming? Is it now? Yes to all of the above. In Luke’s gospel, Jesus is asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God will come.  Jesus answers them this way: “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, nor will they say, Look, here it is! or There! For behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you” [17: 20, 21].  Before he ascended, he promised the disciples the coming of the Holy Spirit to dwell in the hearts of every believer. Where is the Kingdom of God? It’s inside us and all around us.

          We are between the times; that is, between Easter and the end. In the between times, the battle between God and the powers of darkness is still waged, but the outcome has been sealed. Shirley Guthrie says it this way: “The victory of Christ that has been won is the guarantee of the final victory that is surely on the way.”[3] So yes, the kingdom of God is already here and now, and yes the kingdom of God is not yet complete.

         For Drake, and for many other Christians including me, the answer is pretty simple. I like it here. Why? Maybe it’s because the kingdom of God is already here, just enough to make it special to be alive.

---

     [1] Shirley C. Guthrie, Jr., Christian Doctrine (Louisville, Westminster John Know press, 1994), 281.

[2] Guthrie, Christian Doctrine, 281.

     [3] Guthrie, Christian Doctrine, 284.

Seeing the Invisible

Nehemiah 2: 13-18     2 Corinthians 5: 1-10

 

 

          Don’t you love to be around people who can cast visions! People who can look out into space as if they see something, and as they begin to describe what they see, it isn’t long before you can begin to see it too.  I remember as a college student hearing Robert Kennedy use these words as the theme for his 1968 Presidential bid: “Some men see things are they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.” Just to be fair, he was quoting George Bernard Shaw, but he claimed those words as his vision. Or there was Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech delivered in 1963 in the March on Washington.

          Both these men died casting their vision. They died, but their visions lived. Both these men were vision casters. They looked out into the nothing and they saw not what was, but what could be. Without dream casters, where would we be? They see the invisible. They give it a taste of reality for us.

          We’ve been talking about the book of Nehemiah. Nehemiah is like Kennedy and King. He has even better vision. From his vantage point in King Artaxerxes Persian palace, he can see Jerusalem, a place he has never lived, in a country in which he has never set foot. And his vision of what is there is so real that it brings him to tears.

          I’m thinking that Nehemiah had two visions. The first one was a vision of what Jerusalem looked like. He had the capacity to see in his mind’s eye the ruin and devastation that was there. He could see the broken down walls. He could smell the burned gates. And in this vision, scripture tells us that Nehemiah wept and mourned for days. He fasted and he prayed. He remembered the teachings of his elders and of scripture that if they would return to God, that God would again gather them and bring them to his chosen place.

          It is a powerful testimony that even though seventy years had passed, even though Nehemiah had grown up in a mixed culture where he was constantly exposed, and was successful in, the Persian way of life, he still was profoundly influenced by the power of God. Even though he has climbed the ladder of success, even though he has no physical connection with Jerusalem, he does have this incredible, almost instinctual, connection with his homeland. He knows it is in trouble and for all practical purposes destroyed. It makes him hurt. It brings him to his knees. But this is only the first vision.

          But Nehemiah begins to pray again. You know this is dangerous. When righteous believers begin to pray about something, things happen. Prayer is powerful. We are reminded of that over and over in scripture. What does James tell us? Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective [5:16].

          So Nehemiah prays. And in that prayer, another vision is born. This time, Nehemiah does not see the description of Jerusalem as brought to him by certain men from Judah. This time, Nehemiah sees a different vision. This time, Nehemiah sees Jerusalem rebuilt. He sees the walls rebuilt. He sees the gates restored. He sees the temple as a center of worship. He sees the people no longer as the scattered, but rather coming together to worship as the gathered people of God. Nehemiah sees what to everyone else is still invisible.

          And in that prayer, Nehemiah is emboldened. He is so emboldened by that prayer that he goes to the Persian King and asks for permission to go home and rebuild. Right before he makes this crazy request, he prays again. If you read Nehemiah, you can see a pattern. The man doesn’t go off half-cocked. He is always going to God in prayer before he does or says something big. And it works.

          So Nehemiah sets out to the home he has never known, to the people who are his but know him not, to rebuild a city where no one wants to live. Why? Because Nehemiah has seen the invisible. He has cast his vision for God.

          Hold that thought, the thought of seeing the invisible, while we now turn to another form of vision and another form of re-building. While Nehemiah was concerned with an earthly home, the apostle Paul in 2^nd Corinthians 5 was concerned with a different kind of home.

          Paul calls our bodies our earthly home. He compares them to a tent in which we live, but only temporarily. He talks about being uncomfortable in a way. It’s as though we know that there is something more, something better, but that is in the valley of the not yet. In the now, we groan and carry our burdens, sensing more, but unable to see that which is promised.

          Paul says in verse 6 that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. In verse 5, he says that we have the guarantee of the Spirit until life, life in God that is, swallows up our mortality. Now this is high theological cotton, and Paul is apparently trying to reassure us that when our mortal bodies are separated from our souls, we need not fear, for God in his time will reunite them. But this seems also to be a teaching moment. For me, to be at home in the body is not to be away from the Lord, but to be in community with the Lord through the power of the Holy Spirit. No, we are not yet ready for heaven, but yes we are already in communion with God. I don’t disagree with Paul. I’m just noticing another thing that God teaches me in this scripture.

          But here is what else Paul says. And here, he joins with Nehemiah. Paul says: we walk by faith, not by sight. Paul is reminding us that we too are called upon to see the invisible.

If you can see it with your naked eye, then you don’t need faith, do you. You can rely upon your eyes. If you can feel it with your hands or taste it with your tongue or hear it with your ears, you don’t need faith any more. But if you can’t, then you need faith. You need faith to cast a vision. You need faith to see God in his presence. And you need faith to place yourself in that presence.

          And what is God’s presence? I am God’s presence. When I stand here in faith, talking about what God means to me, I am God’s presence. You are God’s presence. When you rise to sing a hymn, bow to pray, hold the hand of another in Christian love, you are God’s presence. Think about it. You can’t do any of that without faith. And that’s precisely how you see the invisible. Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen, says the writer of Hebrews.

          What is it that you can see? What is that invisible reality that God has shown to you? Kennedy and King and Nehemiah and Paul all had something in common. They saw a world or a place or a people with the eyes of God. Then they set out to get others to see it with them. Your job is no different. What do you see? God has given you eyes for something special. Pray about what you see. Then share it.

It’s Time

Nehemiah 2: 13-18

 

 

          I wish you all could have been with me this week at the National Gathering of ECO. Time after time I was challenged. Sometimes it was by recognized experts in their fields. Once it was by former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. One of the most powerful challenges came from neither, but from a minister named Linda Snyder. Linda is the pastor of Middle Presbyterian Church in Mt. Pleasant, Pennsylvania. It is a small country church with a small membership. Its existence predates the United States itself, having been formed in 1772.  Middle Presbyterian’s future was trapped by its history in both its buildings and its thoughts until it finally had to confront them. In an act of great corporate courage, this little church has gone after its future in God’s plan. It is re-modeling its historic sanctuary. It is replacing its ancient pews with chairs! It has changed its mission statement, which now reads: “To reach the lost at any cost” and its vision statement, which now reads: “To be a historic congregation for a contemporary world.” Middle Presbyterian is no longer in the middle. It’s not just renovating its facilities. It’s renovating its commitment.

          We talked some about Nehemiah a few weeks ago. I want to return to that story today to mine it a little further. In the second chapter, Nehemiah goes out at night to inspect the walls of Jerusalem. They are bad. The walls are down. The gates are destroyed. These are walls made of stones. Big stones.  The walls to be restored were 7-11 feet thick and 9 or more feet high. To undertake the task of rebuilding will require the efforts of all the people and faith in God that transcends all the doubt that not only surrounds their efforts, but threatens their resolve.

          It is not a question of whether Nehemiah is up to the task. He is their leader, but he is only one man. It is not a question of whether God is up to it. We all know that answer. The question is: Are those who would be God’s people up to it? Are they up to the task? It will come at a cost, and there will be those who want them to fail.

          Now I’ve gotta ask. What is the big deal about the walls? Jerusalem’s walls had been down seventy two years. Why rebuild them now? Why was it so important for Nehemiah to take on this project and lead the people of Jerusalem to take part? There was somewhat of a safety issue, but again, the walls had been down for a couple generations. What was it? It was way more than safety.

          For Nehemiah, re-building the walls of Jerusalem was a God thing. There really was not a pressing need, if you think in human terms. But if you’re doing kingdom thinking, that’s a whole new ball game. Think about it. Nehemiah was helping re-build the city of God!  

          The book of Nehemiah is only twelve chapters, but it contains as least ten prayers from Nehemiah. Why is Nehemiah always praying? Because what he proposes to do is too big for the personnel. It’s too big for the schedule. It’s just too big. And that’s how Nehemiah knows that he’s going to be part of a God thing. And prayer is big to Nehemiah, because he knows that the job is too big without God. Nehemiah has to have faith. Big faith. Big enough that with God’s help, he can convince the people to get on board.

          The book of Nehemiah is a story of big faith. The people of God got on board all right. In spite of all the obstacles they faced, in spite of all the other tasks they had to do to live, they brought in the wall project. In 52 short days, the walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt. How did it happen? Why did it happen? It happened because those walls were a symbol of something much bigger. They were a symbol of God’s people dedicating themselves to kingdom work, regardless of what others thought, even regardless of what else they had to do.

Listen again to the words of Nehemiah:

 

          ¹⁷ Then I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in, 

how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come,

let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer derision.” ¹⁸ And I told them of the hand

of my God that had been upon me for good, and also

of the words that the king had spoken to me. And they

said, “Let us rise up and build.” So they strengthened

their hands for the good work.

         

          We have been about the task of gathering information for months now. We have learned a lot. We will never learn enough. There will always be more to know. But it’s time. We don’t need new facilities to be God’s church. We don’t need a sanctuary or a fellowship hall or classrooms to do kingdom work. But we do need to act out our faith. Let’s begin again. It’s time to build something for God.

          Listen today to what your leaders have to say, to what they have learned. Search your heart. Then make your decision and have it counted. And once we have decided, then strengthen your hands for the good work.  Kingdom work. Let’s not just renovate our facilities. Let’s renovate our commitment.

Counting By Ones

Luke 15: 1-7

 

          Have you ever gone to a party or to work or to school, thinking you are on the inside, one of the “in” people, only to find out that it is you who are on the outside? Someone really important shows up, and instead of hanging with you and your “in” friends, she is spending her time with the nobodies or the nerds, the unpopular people. Why would someone who is on top of her game spend time with people who are on the outside?

          I remember a conversation some years ago where the discussion was about the kind of example Christians are supposed to set. The issue was whether it’s OK for a Christian to be seen in a bar. It wasn’t about drinking alcohol. It was about how it would look for a known Christian to be hanging out in a bar. My friends thought it unbecoming of a Christian to be seen in those circumstances. What do you think?

          In the fifteenth chapter of Luke’s gospel, Jesus has gone to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees. We’ve learned by now that the Pharisees were not Jesus’ favorite people. Apparently a large crowd has gathered and Jesus begins to teach in parables. One of those parables is about a lost sheep. Jesus says that the shepherd will go after that one lost sheep, even if he has a hundred others, until he finds it. No time limits. No weather restrictions. Just go until it is found.

          It seems that it is part of the life of a shepherd to take care of all his sheep. If one goes missing, the shepherd will arrange for the others so that he can find that one missing sheep and restore him to the fold. It’s serious business. Tim Laniak tells a story about a Bedouin shepherd named Said. By the age of seven, Said was going out daily into the Sinai with a herd of thirty goats. One day he returned with a goat missing. He told his father he had become distracted watching a shepherd girl with another flock. His father sent him back out with this command: “Go back and don’t come home without it.”

          Such a reaction is reminiscent of the words of Ezekiel who, while describing the gathering of scattered sheep, is really talking about gathering the scattered of God’s people. In chapter 34, the prophet says this:

⁶ they wandered over all the mountains and on every

high hill. My sheep were scattered over all the face

of the earth, with none to search or seek for them.

Behold, I, I myself will search for my sheep and will

seek them out. ¹² As a shepherd seeks out his flock

when he is among his sheep that have been scattered,

so will I seek out my sheep, and I will rescue them

from all places where they have been scattered on 

a day of clouds and thick darkness.

 

God is telling the Israelites scattered across the land that they are not forgotten, that he will be their shepherd, that he personally will gather the scattered.

           Laniak tells another story about a Bedouin shepherd named Ahmed whom he met on sabbatical in Israel.[1] Ahmed said that for over twenty years as a shepherd, he had never lost a sheep that he didn’t find again—dead or alive—except one. But that’s only half the story. The real point for Ahmed was though he had cared for thousands of sheep over those years, the one he never found is the one that he can never forget. That’s the one that is still on his mind.

           In God’s kingdom, we should always “count by ones.”[2] It’s a shepherd thing. Shepherds herd flocks from twenty to several hundred, but they know them all. They act as midwives at birth. All the lambs know the sound of the shepherd’s voice. They can identify it over all others. They learn to trust that sound. In John 10, Jesus tells us that:

…he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the

sheep. ³ To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep

hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name

         and leads them out. ⁴ When he has brought out all

his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow

him, for they know his voice.

 

Maybe that’s why Jesus used so many shepherding analogies. People in that community understood the relationship between a shepherd and his sheep. The shepherd is indeed concerned with the flock, but his concerns do not stop there. He will go after the one who is lost, not occasionally but every time.

          Doesn’t that sound comforting? Once you accept Jesus into your heart, he will come for you, no matter where you are or what you have done. Jesus compared himself and his work to that of a shepherd. Again in John 10,

Jesus says:

I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. 

¹¹ I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays

down his life for the sheep.

 

Why should this story resonate with you? You can probably think of many reasons, but let me ask you to focus on this one.

Look around you. Look at the empty seats. You know who used to occupy those seats. Where is he? Where is she? Where are they? I’m not talking about those who are out of town or on a trip. I’m talking about those who once sat next to you. Where are they today? Or those you have been meaning to invite, but never get around to it. Where are they?

          They are some of those lost sheep that Jesus is talking about. He worries about them. In Luke 19, Jesus is in Jericho and he spends some time with Zacchaeus, a chief tax collector. Zacchaeus is a little guy, and actually climbs a sycamore tree to get a glimpse of Jesus over the crowd. When Jesus sees him, he invites himself to be Zacchaeus’ houseguest. This is all backward to the people looking on. The holy man the houseguest of a sinner! That starts plenty of grumbling. But Jesus does it anyway and Zacchaeus returns to the fold, so to speak. He believes in Jesus and changes his life to prove it. And what does Jesus say? “Today salvation has come to this house, …For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.”

          When you and I gather here week in and week out, this is a good thing. We come to fellowship with one another. We come to worship God in assembly. We come to engage in all those aspects of the purposes of the Church. But we need to understand that to do those things and only those things is, in Jesus words, to acknowledge the ninety and nine and abandon the one who is lost.

         Remember what we have talked about before? Church is a jumping off place. It is a place of worship and fellowship to be sure. But it is also a place where the people of God gather momentum to do the work of God. When I come here during the week, I spend little time on the church property. There are shut-ins to visit. There are the sick to visit. There are those who for one reason or another are not coming to church. Perhaps they have undergone a trauma or a tragedy. Perhaps their conduct has not been up to some self-exacted standard, and they feel too guilty. There are as many reasons as there are people.

          Sometimes sharing a meal or a walk with someone is the way to commune with them where they are. Whatever the way, it is spawned in an effort to meet the lost where they are rather than where we want them to be. That’s why Jesus spent so much time in the houses of tax collectors and sinners. He purposefully surrounded himself with those whom we have exiled or written off. Not so with Jesus!

          Jesus would look at these missing people as the one sheep that was lost. He would send us out to find that one sheep, to bring it back to the sheepfold that we call the community of God. Jesus would go to their house to get them to this house. He would eat their food to get them to partake of his food.  Then, we can gather together our neighbors and our friends and rejoice, for the scattered can be gathered and the lost can be found. We just have to “count by ones.”

          This message began with questions. Why would someone important bypass the “in” crowd to be in the presence of someone no one likes or cares about? Because he or she can see and feel what it’s like to be on the outside. Because he cares. Because she can’t see ins and outs, only people.

          Why would an upstanding Christian go to a bar and hang out with that kind of crowd? For the same reason that Jesus went home with Zacchaeus and Matthew and many other sinners. That’s where some of the lost will be found. If you want to work for God, if you want to help usher in his kingdom, then you need to go find the lost. You need to help gather the scattered. You won’t find them in church until you have first gone to where they are, heard what they have to say, felt their pain and touched them with the compassion of Jesus. Then they might listen to what you have to say. And you will find them one by one.

          Wouldn’t you love to be part of helping someone be found? You can be. Everyone has a little bit of shepherd in him.

“Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’⁷ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in

heaven over one sinner who repents than over

ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.”

---

     [1] Timothy S. Laniak, While Shepherds Watch Their Flocks (Everbest Printing Company, China, 2007).

     [2] Ibid, 79, quoting S.C. Barton.

Why Bethlehem

Matthew 2:1-6, John 6: 32-35

 

          If you were going to make a statement, you would want to stage the announcement, wouldn’t you? You would want to have everyone’s attention. You would want to maybe splash some publicity around. You would want to pick an appropriate place to make the announcement, a place where you could get the most bang for your buck. Barak Obama announced his run for the Presidency in Springfield, Illinois, the place where he started his first job, the place where Lincoln ran for president. And Springfield is more or less in the center of the United States. Obama wanted a place of significance to make his announce-ment. It would give him the most exposure and the biggest audience.

          Presidents and other heads of state make many announcements from their respective seats of government. If they choose another place, it usually is tied to something important to the message they want to convey. They want the place to speak for them in a way that does more than mere words. For instance, Japan’s surrender ending World War II was memorialized on the USS Missouri (Mighty Mo), a highly decorated battleship that still sits at rest today in Pearl Harbor.

          Why would we expect anything else from God? Wouldn’t we expect God to find a suitable venue for such a grand announcement as the Incarnation, the birth of the Son of God?

Of course! It is the greatest gift of all time. Surely the presentation of such a gift should be met with place and circumstance befitting such an entrance!

          Well, then—why Bethlehem? An exploration into this question invites us to journey into the very heart of God—into his promises, into his character—into the love and care and meticulous attention to detail that is there for us to mine. Why Bethlehem? Let’s take a closer look.

          The first biblical mention of Bethlehem comes in Genesis 47. Jacob is old and near death. He is still in Egypt and calls for Joseph to come to him to receive his blessing. He is reminiscing about his life. He recalls the death of his wife Rachel, Joseph’s mother, on their return from Mesopotamia. She was buried near Bethlehem. Even today, her tomb stands at the entrance to Bethlehem.

          So Bethlehem is mentioned early in Scripture. Later, it became famous as the city where King David was born and also where he was crowned king. But in spite of such recognition, Bethlehem was just a suburb of Jerusalem, lying about six miles southwest of that great city. Although it occasionally swelled a bit during religious festivals or occasional censuses, it was always little more than a village. Estimates put its population at the time of Jesus’ birth at less than a thousand, about the size of Jefferson, hardly a place befitting the arrival of a king. And yet, the birth of our Savior in tiny Bethlehem is no accident. Nothing is accidental with God.

          Why Bethlehem? For one thing, it was prophesied. Look at what Matthew says. In chapter 2, he quotes portions of Micah and 2 Samuel, both from the fifth chapter and the second verse. Matthew writes this:

 And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,
 are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
 for from you shall come a ruler
 who will shepherd my people Israel.     Matt. 2:6

 

Seven hundred fifty years before the birth of Jesus, Micah is prophesying the emergence of a shepherd-king, a new David, who will gather and deliver a remnant of God’s people. It’s funny and curious the way the usually very factual Matthew seems to disremember the second line of his quote from Micah. Where Micah says that Bethlehem is too little to be among the clans of Judah, Matthew quotes it as “by no means least among Judah’s rulers.” A different slant. Of course, Matthew is telling the story of Jesus, of victory, and he takes a little poetic license. He also borrows a line from 2 Samuel about the one who will shepherd my people Israel. So Matthew is reminding us that the coming of the Messiah to Bethlehem was prophesied long before it came to pass. God is keeping his promise.

          There is also the star. It is seen by the Magi, wise men from the East, wherever that is. It is specific enough that its genesis is Persian, and vague enough that twenty or more countries claim to be the country of origin for them. There is even prophesy about the star. The prophet Balaam, also called a Magi, predicting a ruler who will destroy Israel’s enemies, says this:

I see him, but not now;
I behold him, but not near:
a star shall come out of Jacob,
and a scepter shall rise out of Israel     Num.24:17

 

So the star is bright enough to catch the attention of Persian astrologers, and apparently it seems to be moving enough for them to follow it. Yet it is specific enough to seem to hover over the very stable where the Incarnation is taking place, so specific as to point the shepherds to the very manger where the new infant king  lies.

          Then, there is the matter of the visit of foreign dignitaries. Magi is one of those words. It can mean astrologers, or wise men, or princes, or even kings. We cannot say which with any accuracy, but we know that these Magi were received at court by King Herod. We know they bore expensive gifts for the Christ child. It is yet another sign that this little baby is already famous and that Bethlehem is the scriptural “X” that marks the spot.

            There is also Herod’s reaction. All of a sudden, the threat of a rival is legitimized by the arrival of these foreign dignitaries. Some scriptural fact checking by his scribes lets him know that the little suburb of Bethlehem, two miles closer to him in Jerusalem than our neighbors in Pageland are to us, has been deep selected by the prophets of old to usher in this new kingdom. Herod takes the news so seriously that when he can’t find the child, he orders the execution of all the boys in the region under the age of two.

            Are you beginning to get the picture? God had a plan for Bethlehem. Bethlehem had the pedigree as the City of David. Bethlehem had been handpicked and the announcement had gone out through the prophet Micah hundreds of years before the event. And Bethlehem also had no other claim to fame. Nothing of note had happened there for centuries. It was just the kind of place where God always shows up. He does that to places just like he does it to people. None of us are qualified to bear the news. None of us are qualified to be the messengers. So God qualifies us. He did the same thing to Bethlehem.

          The word Bethlehem is a compound word, two words put together. Beth means house, like Beth-el, which means house of God. Lehem, or lechem, means bread. So Bethlehem means house of bread. That doesn’t sound so important until you begin to scratch off another layer or so. For instance, in Jewish prayers, the word lechem is used to represent food and sustenance. It’s not just bread, but all that bread means to a hungry people. Bread is the basic necessity. How are prisoners rationed? On bread and water. They can survive with those basic necessities. Bread is that which we most need, that which sustains us, our most basic necessity.

          Put the word Beth with lehem and you have house of bread. What’s the most important thing in your life? Whatever it is, from food to shelter to health to employment, all of it is symbolized by this thing we call bread. So to call a place the house of bread is to call it the place where everything we need, everything we have, is met. Why Bethlehem? Because…it gives us everything we need.

          Why Bethlehem? In the sixth chapter of John’s gospel, Jesus has just fed the five thousand and they are back the next day for more. They want to be nourished. Jesus gives them something bigger than bread for the day. Listen to his words:

          Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you,

         it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven,

         but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.  

        For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven

        and gives life to the world.” They said to him, “Sir, give us

        this bread always.” Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of        

        life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever     

        believes in me shall never thirst.     John 6: 32-35

 

“I am the bread of life.” This is Jesus’ promise to us. We will never have to worry about missing out on anything important. Jesus is all we need. He is the sustenance. He is our most basic necessity. When we walk with Jesus, we will want for nothing that really matters.

          Why Bethlehem? Because it was the house of life for him who was the bread of life. God planned it from the beginning. He connected the dots from generation to generation throughout eternity to come to that village and that stable and that manger under that star on that night. He came down to us. He came down into our lives.

        Remember, nothing is accidental with God. It could never have been anywhere else, could it? The house of life---for the bread of life.[1] God gave us all the signs. Prophets and a star and worshippers and even a house of bread—of life.

On this Christmas Eve, don’t you want to make sure that your house has the right kind of bread? Put the bread of life in the center of your house. He is Emmanuel—God with us.

---

     [1] Jonathan Cahn, The Book of Mysteries, FrontLine, Lake Mary, FL., 1982, Day 34.

Mary

                                                            Luke 1: 26-38

 

          She was a teenager, perhaps as young as 15. She was Jewish, of course. Roman Catholic legend has it that she was the daughter of Anne and Joachim, a wealthy couple who had much trouble conceiving a child. According to the legend, Mary was consecrated to the Lord and went to live in the temple at age 3, much like what Samuel did in the Old Testament. It’s all legend. There is nothing about this in the Bible. It only tells us that she was a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph.

          Her name was Mary. If we can believe any of the legend, then Mary’s life from age 3 to the appearance of the angel Gabriel in the third chapter of Luke’s gospel was anything but normal. Maybe it was better than normal life. Maybe she really did grow up in the temple. We can’t say. We can say that normal life for a teenage girl in Nazareth was not very sophisticated. Life for anyone in Nazareth in the first century was most probably simple and hard. Archeological digs in the area indicate a village centered around agriculture. The dwellings were simple and mostly structured around caves used for their domestic work and the recovery of animals. Tzippori was the trading center of Galilee and not too far away. It may have been that some commuted there to gain work. Perhaps even Jesus and his father Joseph sold some of their work there.

          Whether Mary was raised in the temple or she stayed at home, her life was restricted. The very fact that she was female meant a lack of privilege in the culture. She was either performing chores around the temple or she was doing chores around the house. There were no restaurants, no cafes, no ball parks, no movies or bowling alleys, no public schools to attend. No climate control other than an occasional breeze. But there was plenty of work.

          I wondered about how Mary’s life might compare with that of a teenage girl here in Jefferson. So I put in calls to Brook Clark and Rebecca Horton. Think about that. Here I am, some seventy miles away and I call these young women on their personal cell phones. Instant communication in your pocket or your purse. Can you imagine what Mary would think? It took her over a week to travel the same distance to see her cousin Elizabeth, who was pregnant with the child who would become known as John the Baptist.

          Brook was so busy, I never heard back from her. I did speak to Rebecca. Rebecca is also 15. I asked Rebecca about her week. This week was a typical week for Rebecca. She had three ball games and practiced the other two days. That’s five out of five nights she was out of the house. Think that’s the way Mary lived? Hardly. Then I asked Rebecca what she would think if her parents came in Saturday night and introduced her to this thirty year old guy named Larry, saying that he was a real nice guy and they wanted her to drop out of school and get married to him this spring.  Rebecca’s response to her parents went something like this: Are you out of your mind! What have you been drinking or smoking?

          We think of Mary today and she is accorded this saintly status. We see depictions of this haloed young woman holding a perfect baby. We see beauty and presence and miracle all perfectly packaged in marvelous works of art that hang in galleries and cathedrals and Sunday school classes. Do you think Mary saw herself that way? I’m thinking Mary was already stunned at the recent turn of events in her life. This very nice and respectable, but older man named Joseph had asked Mary’s parents for her hand in marriage, and the next thing she knew, she was betrothed to him. Such a nice word, betrothed. But what does it mean? It’s sort of like our modern day word for engaged. But what is different is that it was highly unlikely that Mary had any say in this bargain. It was probably just announced to her. Mary, this is Joseph. He has taken quite a shine to you. He is going to be your husband. What do you think of that?

          Is our culture different from that in which Mary grew up? Of course. But Mary was still a teenager. She was still very young and very inexperienced. Chances are that unlike Brook and Rebecca, she had no one to turn to, and no recourse except to run away.

          Now, try to imagine how Mary must have felt when Gabriel showed up on her doorstep. She has already had the rest of her life arranged for her, and now, even before she has married, she is told that she is about to become pregnant. And not just pregnant, She is going to bear the Son of God as he becomes human. Mary reacted quite calmly, but she had a question. How can that be? I am a virgin.

          No problem, says Gabriel. Just wait for the Holy Spirit to come upon you. And also, the power of the Most High will overshadow you. You see, says Gabriel, nothing is impossible with God.

          If that message came to Rebecca or Brook, what do you think their response might be? Can you see a Facebook message going virile? You are going to bear a son out of wedlock, not by your husband to be, and the Holy Spirit of God will be the father of that baby, and…that baby is the Son of God.

          Rebecca’s favorite TV show is Stranger Things. It’s a story about a young boy who vanishes, and the small town that uncovers a mystery involving secret experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one strange little girl. That sounds a lot like Gabriel’s visit to Mary. Maybe these teenagers have more in common with the mother of our Savior than they might have thought.

          There is one thing perhaps almost as striking to me as the incredible story of the birth of God’s Son to a poor teenager from Nazareth. And that is the incredible faith and hope of Mary, just a young, small town Jewish girl from the lake country of Galilee. Mary had faith in God. And she had hope, hope the way it was defined in first century Israel. Hope is the expectation that things that are promised by God come to pass in God’s time. Not maybe. They do. Mary had that kind of hope.

          And Mary had faith.  Listen to her response to the angel Gabriel as Luke records it: “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” Just that simple. That’s all she said. No what ifs. No buts. Just I am God’s servant. Let it come. In that way, Mary has just left all of us in the dirt. If we can believe what the gospel writer reports, and we can, then Mary had no questions. She took the news and reported for duty. The next sentence says that the angel departed from her.

          I would love to say that I have that kind of hope, the kind of hope that promoted a teenage girl to say let it be. This is the Advent season. Hope is one of the themes of Advent. And the kind of hope that Mary displayed is the kind of hope that our Savior wants to see in us. Not when or whether or if or maybe. Just…let it be.

          It would be just a matter of a few months. Mary and Joseph would travel the eighty miles from Nazareth down to Bethlehem. They would use a donkey, which only slowed them up, but probably gave this young mother a little rest from walking. Mary would witness the birth of her son in a stable. having to lay him in a feed trough to keep him off the ground. She would witness shepherds from the fields with great stories of angel filled skies. And at the end of that beginning, she would, as Luke tells us, treasure up all these things, pondering them in her heart. The mother of the Son of God, even as a naïve teenager, knew that she didn’t need to publish what had happened. She pondered the events of the day. There would be a time for her to talk later. In this way, Mary was wise well beyond the years of her life. She was ready for what God had asked of her. She seemed to know that while the world has seen a thousand or more babies who became kings, there has only been one king who became a baby.  She couldn’t possibly know how much would happen, how much that baby boy would change the world.

          Mark Lowry and Buddy Greene teamed up to write a Christian song that was first sung by Michael English. The lyrics capture some of what Mary must have pondered that night and the nights to come. Listen:

Mary did you know, that your baby boy will one day walk on water?
Mary did you know, that your baby boy will save our sons and daughters?
Did you know, that your baby boy has come to make you new?
This child that you've delivered, will soon deliver you

 

Mary did you know, that your baby boy will give sight to a blind man?
Mary did you know, that your baby boy has walked where angels trod?
And when you kiss your little baby, you have kissed the face of God

 

Mary, did you know…

 

          Mary’s journey was hardly over with the birth of Jesus. She was always there. She was there in the beginning to give birth. She was there to get him safely to Egypt and back to protect him from a murdering Herod. She was there when he began to discover himself and his mission and debated with the scholars in the temple. She was there at his first public miracle, urging him to go ahead and help the wedding guests with more wine made from water. And she would be there at the end, watching him give himself for us on that unholy cross.

          Mary was always there. It was thought that she was one of those accompanying Magdalene to the tomb to dress Jesus for burial, and probably was with the disciples in that upper room at Pentecost. She was never in the foreground. That territory belonged to her son. But she was there. The Bible never mentions a time when Mary sinned. Not David, not Joshua, not even Moses, can make such a claim. And when Mary was called upon, she was ready and was filled with the faith from which all real hope springs.

          May we all come a little closer to being like Mary in the new Christmas season. May we be servants of the Lord. And may we let it be…according to His Word.