Christmas 2010

Isaiah 9.2-7; Titus 2.11-14; Luke 2.1-20

It's one of the smallest words in our language; and it describes probably the most elusive of human emotions. It's something that is promised to us all by God, yet is something we seem to have to look for all of our lives. It's a word that rings out and runs through the message of Jesus Christ from beginning to end as we read it in St. Luke's gospel. It's right at the heart, especially of the good news of God Incarnate, right at the heart of the message of Christmas, and it's what we all look for IN our Christmas celebrations. The word I'm referring to is the word 'Joy'.

'Do not be afraid, for see - I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people'. So says the angel as he visits the shepherds. The good news; which IS joy and which brings joy. And not simply for a small group, an isolated and privileged band; but for ALL the people. And the sign of that good news, the sign of that joy, so the angel tells the shepherds, is 'a child, wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.' That child IS joy and brings joy. Because that child is God; God here; among us. And God is here today, Christ is born today. An ancient liturgy, an ancient form of worship that is repeated in part of the Church every Christmas says: 'Today Christ is born of the Virgin in Bethlehem. Today He who knows no beginning now begins to be, and the Word is made flesh. The powers of heaven greatly rejoice, and the earth with mankind makes glad. The Magi offer gifts, the shepherds proclaim the marvel, and we cry aloud without ceasing: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will among men.' The idea behind this celebration (today) is that we don't just remember how wonderful it was for the shepherds and magi 2,000 years ago and celebrate their joy. We are joyful because that world saving event of God becoming Man fills us with such joy too and we join in with the joy of the shepherds and the magi. Because that joy promised by the angel, that joy of ours, of the whole human race is unending.

Well, that's all very well but how does it tie in with what we all know and what I said at the beginning about joy being something we all seem to have to search for in life and seems so elusive? Always there comes along something to stand in the way of our experience of joy, of any lasting and real joy in life. And that betrays what seems to be true of God also; that we all at one time or another have a need for God and yet He also seems so elusive for much of the time; not there when we need Him or quickly departing after an encounter with Him. As I think about all of that I can't help but remember a scene from Emmerdale a couple of weeks ago. It's the Christmas Carol service and the vicar, Ashley, is waxing lyrical about how wonderful God is and how wonderful Christmas is and how God and Christmas are the answer to all our prayers. Sitting in the congregation is Hazel, the mother of the young man who's in hospital, recovering from an accident and paralysed from the neck downwards. All that Ashley is saying about God and Christmas seems so far away, light years away from Hazel's immediate experience that she becomes violently angry, curses God and smashes up the crib with the collection box in which is money to help her son. In one way or another, I guess we have all been there. In one way or another, maybe all of us are actually, right now, just where Hazel is in heart and mind, to a greater or lesser extent. Christmas and life experience for the most part, don't really fit together very well. And yet, and yet, we are here in faith and hope. We are here in faith, and in the hope that what the angels promise the shepherds is actually true; that this child IS 'good news of great joy for all people.' We wouldn't be here if we weren't at the very least, hanging on by a thread in faith and hope.

And that faith and hope, and this celebration here now, is where we begin, it's the road by which we journey, and it's journey's end. Because in that faith and hope, and in this celebration and in that child who is God, lies the joy. We don't find the joy we are promised by the angel to the shepherds in our Christmas gifts. We don't find the joy we are promised even in the people sitting by us or living with us and around us. If we are fortunate and we experience love of another human being and we have loving relationships and receive gifts given in love, they are to us signs of that joy. They are signs of joy that lead us on to the real and deeper and greater joy that is in God Himself. And His coming to us in that child in a manger makes His joy accessible to us. It COMES to us.

All that happens to us in life is what life is and brings us joy and sorrow in, very often, seemingly unequal measures. But it IS life and we can't depend upon what life brings to give us real and lasting joy, it just won't happen, it never happens. The only lasting and real joy can be found in God. That's what the angels tell us, that's what the saints down the ages tell us and that's what we celebrate and come near to ourself tonight, we come near to the lasting 'good news of great joy for all the people.' So how do we make it real in our lives, this good news of great joy for all the people?

Thousands of years before the events we celebrate tonight, the prophet Isaiah says of God, 'my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways'. And that has been humankind's biggest stumbling block in our relationship with the living God. We want to see and think and do it our way, when God's ways are quite different. Human pride and ego and vanity have always stood in the way of our having a real and true, loving and living relationship with God. His way is faith, His way is trust, His way is real love. And it seems that we only realise that when we are washed up on the rocks of life, feeling outcast, spent and exhausted and half dead, maybe just like Mary and Joseph felt as they arrived in Bethlehem with nowhere to stay and only a stable to find shelter for themselves and their baby. We only realise that we have to think and do life differently to get to know God in real terms, when life's nearly done us to death and we seem to have lost all faith and hope.

And yet, ever again, round and round it comes; Christmas. Here comes the promise of the angel once again 'I bring you good news of great joy for all the people.' God is here again amongst us, inviting us once again into faith and trust and love, never giving up on us no matter how much we give up on Him. And it's the promise that when we follow Him in faith and trust and love, then and only then does that good news of great joy become real in us; only then will we know it; only then can we really rejoice and return, from that encounter, like the shepherds, glorifying and praising God for all we have heard and seen.

So (today) we look again at that sign of great joy, 'a baby wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger'; and God invites us to put to one side our own thoughts and our own ways and look deep within, within Himself, within that child, within ourself and look there for the good news of great joy for all the people, because we won't find it anywhere else; and thanks be to God for that. Christ is born; glorify Him.

I wish you all a very happy, blessed and joyful Christmas.