What Christmas is all About 4, Christmas is all about Hope

Christmas is all about Hope.

Start with clip from opening of A Charlie Brown Christmas 

Contrary to what Linus thought, Charlie Brown was in good company, there are all kinds of folks who feel the same way about Christmas.  They are confused because they don’t feel jolly, they aren’t experiencing Christmas cheer and they don’t understand the phrase Ho Ho Ho.   

Instead of wanting to celebrate they would like to find a room where they can be all by themselves and hide until Christmas is over.  I love the significance of Christmas but I’m not necessary a Christmas fan.  I could do without the tree, the meal and the gifts, and I’m not sure if it’s because I’m lazy or apathetic.   

But for some people it’s deeper than that, Christmas is a reminder of what their life isn’t or perhaps what their life is.    

Christmas seemed to magnify and polarize what Charlie Brown felt his life was like the rest of the year, in one scene he goes out and looks in his empty mail box for the Christmas Cards that aren’t there and he says.  “I know nobody likes me why do we need a holiday season to emphasize it?”  

But there are other reasons as well.  Maybe because there is an empty place at the table this Christmas.  At a time of the year when family is being celebrated their loss is magnified and it doesn’t matter if it’s the first Christmas or the tenth Christmas it doesn’t seem to get any easier. 

And maybe the loss is because of death or perhaps because a relationship is different than it was last year.   

Or maybe it is the harsh reality of economics.  You can’t provide the trappings and gifts that are expected, or you do provide them and aren’t sure how you will pay for them when the bills hit. 

Or maybe you’re just a melancholy person, and if so you are in good company.  Winston Churchill often spoke of the Black Dog, his term for the depression that followed him throughout his life.   

Charlies Spurgeon one of histories greatest preachers struggled with depression throughout his ministry.  In a paper entitled “When a Preacher is Depressed” Spurgeon wrote “Fits of depression come over the most of us. Cheerful as we may be, we must at intervals be cast down. The strong are not always vigorous, the wise not always ready, the brave not always courageous, and the joyous not always happy.”

And you don’t have to read very far in the Psalms to discover the same David who wrote “The Lord is my shepherd” also wrote in Psalm 22:6  But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people.  

And maybe you don’t fit in any of those categories, you don’t understand why, but Christmas just isn’t merry for you, at least not this year.

And this service isn’t designed to drag you unwillingly into the joy of Christmas but instead perhaps to offer you hope that God is there and that God cares.  

There is a story in the book of John that more than any other reveals the human side of Jesus’.  Because that is the mystery of the incarnation, that Jesus is 100 % God and 100 % human.   And because we are afraid that people might miss Jesus’ divine nature we sometimes neglect his humanity.   

The story is told in John chapter 11 and happens just a week before Jesus and his friends would celebrate the Passover.  And in many ways our celebration of Christmas would have many things in common with how the Jews celebrated Passover.  It was about food and family and celebration.  But this year would be different for one family who lived in the village of Bethany. 

They were close friends of Jesus, two sisters named Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus.  And we discover that in the midst of preparation for the Passover Lazarus become sick and dies.   

Would Passover ever be the same for Mary and Martha?  Or would it always be a reminder of their loss?  On my sister’s birthday in 2001 she sat in the funeral service for her middle daughter and unborn granddaughter, who had been killed in a car accident just days before. And every birthday since has been coloured by that event. 

When Mary and Martha realized just how sick their brother was they sent for the friend Jesus, who they believed had the power to save their brother, but it was days before Jesus arrived and by then Lazarus had been in the tomb for four days. 

And we pick up the story in John 11:32-36  When Mary arrived and saw Jesus, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if only you had been here, my brother would not have died.”  When Jesus saw her weeping and saw the other people wailing with her, a deep anger welled up within him, and he was deeply troubled.  “Where have you put him?” he asked them. They told him, “Lord, come and see.”  Then Jesus wept.  The people who were standing nearby said, “See how much he loved him!”  

There are three things we notice here that we normally don’t see as characteristics of Christ and perhaps when we see them in ourselves we feel guilty of being less than Christ like.  But is that fair?

So John tells us that a deep anger welled up within Jesus. Jesus was Angry So, what was Jesus angry about?  If you go back it says that when Jesus saw Mary weeping and the other people wailing with her that this anger welled up within him. 

Surely he wasn’t angry over the tears of Mary?  Some suggested that Jesus saw hypocrisy in the tears of the crowd, that they weren’t really friends of Lazarus and his sister and were simply weeping for show.  But there is nothing to indicate that their tears were anything less than genuine.  

And understand that anything I say is simply speculation but I would suggest that Jesus was angry at the unfairness of life. 

We don’t know how old Lazarus was but it seems that he was a peer of Jesus and if that was the case than Jesus would have felt that death had come too soon for his friend.   We are told in Psalm 90:10  Seventy years are given to us! Some even live to eighty. . . And Lazarus wasn’t anywhere near that old.  And so Jesus was angry that Lazarus didn’t get the years that he should have had and he was angry that Mary and Martha would be missing their brother and I think he was angry that Lazarus would no longer be a part of his life.

I think we all have points in our lives that we are angry at the unfairness of life, the chronic illness of a child, the suffering of a loved one, perhaps even something that we are struggling with ourselves. 

And I would suspect at times like that, that we feel a deep anger welling up within us and we want to demand “Why God? Why?”  Perhaps you feel like Job did when he demanded of God Job 10:3  What do you gain by oppressing me? Why do you reject me, the work of your own hands, while smiling on the schemes of the wicked?

And then we feel guilty for being angry, and that just spirals us deeper in despair. 

But cheer up, you aren’t alone. Jesus got angry as well, angry at the injustice of Lazarus’ death, angry at the unfairness of life, perhaps angry that he wasn’t able to be there for his friend.

The secret of course is found in Ephesians 4:26  And “don’t sin by letting anger control you.” Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry,

But it wasn’t just anger that Jesus expressed here, the verse continues and tells us that he was deeply troubled.  Jesus was Troubled It bugged Jesus that Lazarus had to die and Jesus had perfect wisdom.  He knew more than anyone the reason, he knew that he would raise Lazarus from the dead and it still bugged him.

A good friend of mine is going through some fairly serious medical problems.  Recently he had surgery and the news wasn't good.

And when we broke the news to him he was angry and troubled and so was I.  The next day I went back in to see him and I told him “To save time I’ve made a list of platitudes for you, these are the same ones that we have used as Pastors from time to time.”  And I read him the list, “God never gives us more than we can handle”  “All things work together for the good of those who believe.”  “God has a reason”  “We just need more faith” “think of all the people worse off than you.”  And that made him laugh, which made him hurt.  oops, sorry Nick.

And as true as some of those platitudes are they normally aren’t all that helpful.

And ultimately we read in John 11:35 Then Jesus wept. Jesus was Sad

Again Jesus knew that he would raise Lazarus from the dead, but he still wept.  He wept for Lazarus, he wept for the sisters and he wept for himself.

It was Washington Irving  “There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love.”

So don’t feel bad for your tears, Jesus wept as well and for the same reasons, there were no words.

Often you will hear people refer to John 11:35 as the shortest verse in the bible, which isn’t entirely accurate.  Actually it’s only the shortest English verse in the bible.  But remember that the bible wasn’t written in English it was written in Greek. 

So in the Greek “Jesus wept” is actually the second shortest verse in the Bible, it contains 16 letters, in comparison 1 Thessalonians 5:16 Always be joyful. contains only 14 letters in the Greek.   Interesting. 

And then Jesus Reached out to Others and Reached out to God But then Jesus did something, he reached out to the girls, because as deep as his grief was he understood that theirs was greater.  And then he prayed. I love how he begins his prayer.  John 11:41-42   Then Jesus looked up to heaven and said, “Father, thank you for hearing me.  You always hear me, but I said it out loud for the sake of all these people standing here, so that they will believe you sent me.”

Prayer was where Jesus turned, prayer is where David turned and prayer is where Spurgeon turned.  It connected them and grounded them.  Did it cheer them up? I’m not sure that was the intent. It was the opportunity to connect.  To connect with others and to connect with God, because in the dark of the night we need others to bring warmth to our souls.    It was the Spanish writer Miguel De Unamuno who reminds us “Man dies of cold, not of darkness.”

And from the despair of Jesus came the resurrection of Lazarus.  We will never know the impact the raising of Lazarus would have on the people who witnessed it, but Jesus could never have raised him from the dead if he hadn’t of died.

Another thought from Spurgeon, “Some plants owe their medicinal qualities to the marsh in which they grow; others to the shades in which alone they flourish. There are precious fruits put forth by the moon as well as by the sun. Boats need ballast as well as sail. A drag on the carriage wheel is no hindrance when the road runs downhill.”

And so on this, the shortest day of 2015, I offer you hope, hope in the reality that every night has a dawn, every storm has an end and every mountain has a top.

When Matthew was writing his gospel he reached back to the Old Testament to describe why Jesus came and this is the passage he landed on Isaiah 42:1-3  “Look at my servant, whom I strengthen. He is my chosen one, who pleases me. I have put my Spirit upon him. He will bring justice to the nations.  He will not shout or raise his voice in public.  He will not crush the weakest reed or put out a flickering candle. He will bring justice to all who have been wronged.  

And today for those who feel like a weak reed or a flickering Candle, Jesus reaches out to you.  And he wants you to know that he is angry and troubled by what you have gone through or are going through, and he wants to be there with you to bring you strength and to bring you hope and to intercede with the Father on your behalf. 

What Christmas is all About #3, Christmas is about our Reaction

Last week we celebrated Christmas with our children’s presentation, which I’m sure Marilyn and her crew would testify is kind of like herding cats.  And that was part of the process that led Charlie Brown to ask in frustration, “Isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?”

And that is the question that we’ve been attempting to answer this year, which bring us to week three of our Christmas Series:  What Christmas is all about.

This is the fiftieth anniversary of this iconic Christmas special, and for a Television special that was supposed to have a very short shelf life. . . one year it has had an incredible staying power.  Even if you have never seen the original show you know what is meant by “a Charlie Brown Christmas tree.” 

And so in week one we looked at how the various characters in A Charlie Brown Christmas responded to Christmas.  You’ll remember that we discovered how for Snoopy Christmas was all about the season of Christmas, the lights the food, all the glamour and glitz that surrounds Christmas.  For Lucy Christmas was all about what had to be done, all about the effort.  From organizing the Christmas Play, to making sure they had the perfect tree to counselling Charlie Brown on how to achieve Christmas bliss, her solution.  Get involved.  For Sally, Charlie Brown’s little sister Christmas was all about Sally, what she wanted and expected Santa to bring her on the big day.  And for Charlie Brown himself Christmas was about despair he was down and depressed and the holiday did nothing to improve his mood. 

And then there was Linus, two weeks ago I mentioned that for Linus Christmas was all about the Christmas story.  But I wondered if that was as far as it went with Linus.  While Snoopy was quite happy for Christmas to be nothing more than a holiday it seemed that for Linus it was nothing more that then that fragment of the Christmas story.

Two weeks ago we went a little deeper and dug into the scripture that Linus has been reading for us and we discovered that for Linus Christmas was all About the Shepherds, the Angels and the Baby.  But even that doesn’t tell us all of the story.  Because none of those things in themselves truly explain Christmas.  Not even the baby in the manger.

This morning we are going to dig a little deeper into what Christmas is all about and we’ll start with Mary’s story.

Luke 1:30, 35, 37  But the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favour with God.  You will be with child and give birth to a son.” . . . "How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?"  The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” . . . For nothing is impossible with God."

The first thing that The First Christmas was all about Faith The visit of the angel Gabriel was really where the entire story began; now you know the rest of the story, the Angel tells Mary that she is going to have a child who will be the son of God, Mary tells the angel that isn’t going to happen because she isn’t married and besides that she’s still a virgin, even then the two didn’t necessarily go hand in hand.  And then the angel tells her, no problem, the father will be the Holy Spirit. 

Now before we go on with the story I have a theory, which I’m sure you’re dying to hear. 

This would probably be the time to insert my theory on the Angela Gabriel, do I hear groans?  I think that we mispronounce the angel’s name.  I don’t think it was Gabriel I think it was Gabrielle. Think about it if you were God and you were sending an angel to talk to a teenaged virgin about reproduction would you send a male angel or a female angel?

 Now I know that you’re thinking, “That’s just dumb Denn, angels aren’t male or female they are asexual.”   So, close your eyes and picture an angel.  Now is your asexual angel a boy angel or a girl angel?”  But my theory really isn’t all that important because we aren’t all that interested in Gabriel or Gabrielle this morning we are interested in Mary and her response to the angel.  So the angel comes tell this young virgin that she’s going to have a child and the father’s going to be the Holy Spirit.  Listen to Mary’s response: Luke 1:38 Mary responded, “I am the Lord’s servant. May everything you have said about me come true.” And then the angel left her.

Can you imagine the faith that Mary must have had? She must have known that people would talk about her and question her morals. 

And when she tried to tell people that she was still a virgin I’m sure that people were thinking, “You keep using that word but I do not think that word means what you think it means”

And so Mary responded with faith. Even though Mary couldn’t understand everything, even though she didn’t have all the answers or even know where this was going to lead she was willing to trust God.   

That’s why they call it faith, remember how faith is defined in Hebrews Hebrews 11:1 Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.  Listen to how it is written in the New King James Version

NKJV Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.  What is it that you can’t see that you can only hope for?

Edward Teller gave this great definition of faith, “When you get to the end of all the light you know and it's time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: either you will be given something solid to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly.”

Mary had no idea how she could conceive a child without a man being involved, had no idea what would happen after she conceived the child and no idea what would happen after the child was born, but she believed that Her God was in control and if He said this was what should happen then far be it for her to disagree.

If we are walking with God then there will be times that he asks us to do the incredible and even though we won’t be able to see the end result we are going to have to step out in faith and say, “Ok God, you are in control.”  It’s at that point that we are going to have to believe that he will give us something solid to stand on or teach us to fly.

We need faith to exercise our Christian life to the fullest and we need faith to be everything that God would have us be as a church.  If we only ever try to do what we know we can do then we don’t need God.  It’s by faith that miracles happen, it’s by faith that people come to know Christ personally, and it’s by faith that people are healed and the bible tells us in Hebrews 11:6 And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.  And faith will never ask more than that you believe.

But the story didn’t end with Mary, let’s pick up Matthew’s account  Matthew 1:18-20 This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit. Joseph, her fiancé, was a good man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement quietly. As he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. “Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit.”  And so The First Christmas was all about Trust. 

You see Mary wasn’t the only person visited by an Angel.  You may remember that although Mary was a virgin, she was engaged to be married, to a man named Joseph.  And she was about to have some heavy duty explaining to do. What would she have said, “Joseph you know how much I love you and I know that you are the most understanding and trusting man in all of Nazareth and I have something to tell you.” 

Mary gets a lot of Credit for the Christmas thing and while she should but let’s not forget about Joe, after all Mary knew what she did and didn’t do, Joseph didn’t have the luxury, he could only take her word for it. “You’re what?  Pregnant?  How could that happen, I mean I know how it happens but how did it happen without me? I thought you loved me, I thought we were waiting until we were married, and now this.  Oh an angel, right, an angel and the father is the Holy Spirit. Sure, so now you think I’m stupid as well, no don’t touch me, don’t talk to me, I need time to think.”

Now let’s be honest, if your daughter came home with that story you wouldn’t believe her, so why should we expect Mary’s fiancée to believe what she said? It shows us the type of man that Joseph was that even though he could have publicly denounced Mary for having been unfaithful to him he chose to quietly end the engagement without any fuss.  But that night an Angel appeared and basically told Joseph that he would need to trust Mary on this one.  Joseph’s response is found in Matthew 1:24 When Joseph woke up, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife.

Now people weren’t dumb then, they knew how long it took for babies to be born.  Joseph would be viewed as the guilty party in this case and yet he must have just smiled and nodded and protected the virtue and reputation of his fiancé. Maybe he had adopted the philosophy of Elsa Einstein Albert Einstein’s wife who said “No, I don't understand my husband's theory of relativity, but I know my husband, and I know he can be trusted.” 

As we go through life we will either make a conscious decision to trust the people we meet or trust no one and while it might be safer to trust no one it’s not a great way to live.  Author Frank Crane said “You may be deceived if you trust too much, but you will live in torment if you don't trust enough.”

And so after his encounter with the Angel Joseph believed Mary and gave her his trust.  And with that decision he became the earthly father of the son of God.

And the story continues Luke 2:8-11 That night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep. Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord’s glory surrounded them. They were terrified, but the angel reassured them. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people. The Saviour—yes, the Messiah, the Lord—has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David!”

The First Christmas was all about Praise It’s obvious that the Angels weren’t unionized because they even worked on Christmas day.  Jesus had been born in the stable and the heavens were rejoicing, and the angels think, “Hey this is too good to keep to ourselves; we need to share it with others.” 

Put yourself in the Shepherd’s place, so there you are out in the field, minding your own business and minding your sheep when suddenly the entire field lights up and there stands this dude in a shining white robes with great big wings, I know what I said earlier about wings, this is artistic licence. I don’t know what your reaction would be but mine would probably be the same as the shepherds, sheer terror.  But quickly the angels reassure them and tell them, we bring great news, the Messiah has been born. 

Two weeks ago I spoke about the Shepherds and if there was one group in the Christmas story that we can identify with it would be the shepherds. 

They weren’t renowned scholars from the East who travelled across countless miles of desert to be there, they weren’t a King like Herod, they were just ordinary folk, who had an extraordinary encounter with the son of God.

No other group in the story better exemplifies the concept of grace than the shepherds. They hadn’t done anything to deserve the invitation to meet with Jesus, there wasn’t anything they could bring, no gold or myrrh or frankincense.  All they had was themselves and that wasn’t much, when you think about it they weren’t much and they really weren’t all that important, they were just hired hands, and they had no place in the society and certainly weren’t listed in “Who’s Who of Israel”. 

And yet they were offered a gift they didn’t deserve and could never earn, kind of like salvation, we don’t deserve it and we could never earn it. 

You know the story, the shepherds went and saw the baby in the manger and after meeting the messiah went away telling everyone they met about the child. 

The scriptures tell us that this went on even as they returned to their flocks.  Luke 2:20 The shepherds went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. It was just as the angel had told them.

What is your reaction to meeting Jesus?  He has given you eternal life, or at the very least he has offered it to you, it’s really up to you to accept it.  Because of what God has done for you do you praise him?  Do you thank him?  Probably, you may not skip and dance and tell the world but I’m sure that you tell God.  You probably don’t regret becoming a Christian, and you probably aren’t bitter with the person who told you about Christ. 

This Christmas the greatest gift you can give someone is to tell them what Christmas is all about, remember what the angel said, Luke 2:10 but the angel reassured them. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people.”   And that is what you have to offer those who don’t know Jesus, Good news of great joy.

But the shepherds weren’t alone in celebrating the birth of the baby Jesus.  What would Christmas be without the Magi?  Their story is told in the book of Matthew, we pick it up in Matthew 2:9-11  After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was.  When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.  On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh.

The First Christmas was all about Worship

There are those who would deny that the wise men made it to the first Christmas, that they probably showed up two years later, some would say because they were Wise “Men” that they had probably gotten lost and wouldn’t ask for directions. 

But we won’t spend any time on that this morning, this year if you want my opinion on that it will cost you a coffee.

What we do agree on, even if we don’t always agree on the time frame was what happened after the Wise Men arrived.  Matthew tells us that they bowed down and worshipped the Christ child.

But what does that mean?    For many people they see worship as simply the act where the Magi knelt at the manger.  And so for folks like that worship is simply the act of attending Cornerstone and singing some songs, listening as Denn tries to make a point and then tossing a few dollars in the offering box. 

But the reality is that for the Magi the act of worship began when they left their home in Persia long before they presented their gifts to Jesus.

And most of know what the gifts were that the Wise men brought to Jesus, gold, frankincense and myrrh.  And they were really nice gifts, a little impractical for a baby but again they were men and shopping for baby gifts really wasn’t really their thing. 

But the most valuable gift they gave was the gift of worship. 

There is a difference between what happened with the Shepherds and the Magi.  The shepherds, came and praised God but it really didn’t cost them anything.  And there are folks today who still misunderstand, they think they have come to worship God but really they have come to conveniently praise him.   

It is interesting that in all of the gospel accounts this is one of the few time it says that someone came to worship Jesus.  There are any number of times we are told he was praised, often by the very people who would later turn their backs on him when he was arrested and crucified, but there are only a couple of times that we are told Jesus was worshipped.

The Magi’s worship started when they gave up their time.  There are different estimates of how long it would have taken the magi to have made the trip from Persia to Bethlehem, the longest being measured in years and the shortest in months but the reality is that these men gave up a precious commodity to worship Christ and that was their time. 

And that’s where worship begins, when we step away from the ordinary to spend time in his presence. 

And I know that our time is valuable, and I know that there is so much going on that it’s hard to carve out time on a Sunday morning, but that’s part of what makes it worship, giving God the gift of your time.

And the trip certainly wasn’t convenient, they had to make their way across inhospitable terrain, with only the promise of a distant start to guide them.  In the heat of the day and the cold of the night I’m sure there were times that they wondered what they were doing.  When they explained their upcoming trip to friends and family their sanity was probably questioned.

Serving Christ won’t always be convenient and neither will church, it goes back to:  If it was easy everyone would be doing it.  There are times that people won’t understand your decision to follow Christ and maybe even times that you will question the decision you made.  There will be times that even the guidance of a distant start would be welcome but that’s when we just have to take it on faith.  I’m sure the Magi could agree with the words of Hebrews 11:1-2  Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.  

And their worship was made complete with the gifts that they brought.  I joked early about the gifts being impractical but there are two things you need to know, there was all kinds of symbolism wrapped up in those gifts and they were incredibly expensive. 

From the very beginning of the bible worship has always involved sacrifice, worship has always involved giving back to God part of what he has given to us.

 And so this year will your Christmas involve Faith, trust, praise and worship?  Because unless it does you will be missing out on what Christmas is really all about.

What Christmas is all About # 2, Christmas is about the Story

For millions of people over the past fifty years the only exposure they have had to the bible happened each Christmas as Linus read Luke chapter 2 verses 8 to 14 from the King James version in response to Charlie Brown’s questions:  Doesn’t anyone know what Christmas is all about.

And when Linus is done he turns to Charlie Brown and tells him, “and that’s what Christmas is all about.”

But is that it? Can Christmas really be summed up in 6 verses of the bible?  And understand that isn’t the entire Christmas story it is really just giving us a glimpse of the entire story, but for Linus this is what Christmas is all about.

A Charlie Brown Christmas celebrates its fiftieth anniversary this year, and millions of people around the world have watched as Charlie Brown struggles with his conflicting feelings over the Christmas Season.  Finally, after watching how his peers react to the season Charlie brown asks his friend Linus in frustration, “Isn’t there anyone who know what Christmas is really all about?” 

And that’s a good question, a question that he felt wasn’t being answered by those around him.  Last Sunday when we began our series we took a little bit of time to see what it was that Charlie Brown saw in those around him.

For Snoopy Christmas was all about the season of Christmas, the lights the food, all the glamour and glitz that surrounds Christmas.  For Lucy Christmas was all about what had to be done, all about the effort.  From organizing the Christmas Play, to making sure they had the perfect tree to counselling Charlie Brown on how to achieve Christmas bliss, her solution.  Get involved.  For Sally, Charlie Brown’s little sister Christmas was all about Sally, what she wanted and expected Santa to bring her on the big day.  And for Charlie Brown himself Christmas was about despair he was down and depressed and the holiday did nothing to improve his mood. 

And then there was Linus, last week I mentioned that for Linus Christmas was all about the Christmas story.  But I wondered if that was as far as it went with Linus.  While Snoopy was quite happy for Christmas to be nothing more than a holiday it seemed that for Linus it was nothing more that then that fragment of the Christmas story.

But is that enough?  Can we capture all of the Christmas story in those six verses?  Well today we are looking at What Christmas is all about, according to Luke 2:8-14.

Let’s start where Linus started: 

Luke 2:8  And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

For Linus Christmas was About the Shepherds

And really shepherds are an iconic part of the Christmas story.  They play a prominent role in Christmas cards and Christmas carols, when we have extra kids for the Christmas pageant we give them a towel and a bathroom and voila we have more shepherds. 

Linus was even geared up to play a shepherd in the Christmas play that Charlie Brown was trying to direct.

But what do we know about these shepherds?  Not much, and that’s what makes the story so great. 

Because they made it into the Christmas story we make them special, but they really weren’t, they were just a bunch of guys who watched sheep for a living. They probably didn’t need an advanced degree in agricultural science to qualify for the job. 

I know, it seems as if God has a special place for shepherds in the bible.

Abel who was commended for his offering was a shepherd.  Abraham who would be the father of Israel had flocks of sheep, Moses who led the people of Israel out of the slavery of Egypt was a shepherd and David, Israel’s greatest king and the writer of the psalms, was a shepherd.  

When King David was looking for just the right description of the compassion of God he wrote in the 23^rd Psalm “The Lord is my shepherd” and Jesus referred to himself as the good Shepherd.

To my point exactly, Israel was an agricultural society and sheep made up a big portion of that industry.  There were all kinds of shepherds and it was a natural illustration and analogy because everywhere you looked someone was tending sheep.

And that is what makes this part of the story great, the fact that they weren’t special. 

I mean if I was God, creator of all things, master of the universe and I was announcing the birth of my Son I'm not sure that shepherds would have made the short list.  Or for that matter the long list.  Kings, emperors, potentates they would have been the ones on my list, not the keepers of sheep.

But these guys were just ordinary people with ordinary jobs.  Nothing special, just a bunch of shepherds doing what shepherds do, watching their flocks.  These guys weren’t even the first string, they were the night shift.

Now that being said there are those who have speculated that even though they were shepherds they may not have been your everyday run of the mill shepherds.  Culturally we are told that because of the frequent sacrifices at the temple, every morning and evening an unblemished lamb was to be sacrificed, that the temple authorities kept their own private flock of sheep. 

And historically we are told that these sheep would have been pastured near Bethlehem.  And if all of those things are true then there is a pretty good chance that these shepherds were in charge of the flocks from which the temple offerings were chosen.  And if that is the case then it is pretty cool that the birth of the “Lamb of God” who would take away the sins of the world was first announced to those whose job it was to take care of the temple lambs, who were sacrificed for people’s sins.

But we don’t know that for sure, what we do know is that into the ordinary lives of ordinary men is injected an extraordinary event.  Most of us aren’t special enough for God to take an interest in our lives, but He does.  Remember the words of Jesus in Luke 12:6-7 “What is the price of five sparrows—two copper coins? Yet God does not forget a single one of them. And the very hairs on your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.

  Let’ continue with the story,  Luke 2:9,10,13 & 14  And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.  And the angel said unto them, “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people” . . . And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”

For Linus Christmas was About the Angels
What would Christmas be without angels?  They are an integral part of Christmas, if we didn’t have angels what would we put on the top of our trees?  And what would the little ones dress up as in the Christmas play; you only need so many shepherds.  The Christmas story starts and ends with angels along with angels in the middle, and how could we expect anything less.  It’s not everyday that God, the creator of the universe forsakes heaven and comes to earth born as a baby in a stable outside a crowded inn. For an event that was so incredible only angels could be the appropriate messengers.

Now for a little background.  Although angels are mentioned over 300 times in the bible we really don’t know a lot about them, and most of what we know is tradition and myth pure speculation fuelled by what I call the “Angel Cult”.

During recent years angels have become the spiritual creature of choice.  And why not? According to the angel cult angels are loving and caring, they’re cute and cuddly and make no demands on our spirituality or morality and are there for everyone.

Don’t want to burst your bubble but It’s only speculation that angels have wings, wear halos and play harps.  We no more know what an angel looks like then we know what an angel eats.  Although Mark Twain said “When one has tasted Watermelon he knows what the angels eat.”  And while I normally am in agreement with Twain I think Angels probably eat burgers.

The Christmas story is rife with Angels.  It begins with the birth of John, Jesus’ cousin.  You probably know the story, but here’s a refresher. 

Mary, Jesus’ mother had a relative, we’ll call her a cousin, named Elizabeth, who was married to a priest by the name of Zechariah.  In Luke’s gospel we are told that Elizabeth and Zechariah were unable to have children and that they were very old.  Probably in their forties. 

And listen to what happened one day when Zechariah had been chosen to go into the temple sanctuary to burn incense as an offering.  We pick up the story in Luke 1:11-13  While Zechariah was in the sanctuary, an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing to the right of the incense altar.  Zechariah was shaken and overwhelmed with fear when he saw him.  But the angel said, “Don’t be afraid, Zechariah! God has heard your prayer. Your wife, Elizabeth, will give you a son, and you are to name him John.  That child, born six months before Jesus would go on to become the man we know as John the Baptist, who announced the beginning of Jesus’ ministry and actually baptized Jesus in the Jordan river.  And going back to the story we read, Luke 1:26-27 In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a village in Galilee,  to a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of King David.

And it was that angel who announced to Mary that she was going to become pregnant, or as we would say in Australia “She was going to fall pregnant.”  When Mary objects, telling the angel that she was a virgin, and the word that Mary uses for virgin means virgin.  Not young lady or unmarried maiden but virgin, we read Luke 1:35 & 37  The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the baby to be born will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God. . . For nothing is impossible with God.”

And Mary said “Ok”, well that was actually a paraphrase but you get the gist.  And you have to wonder what her family thought when she broke the news to them.  We know that her fiancé, Joseph. struggled with her story.  He wanted to break off the engagement and it was only when an angel appeared to him that he accepted what she said. 

Matthew 1:20 As he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. “Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit.

And the angels don’t end there.  In the passage we started with it’s as if the angels can’t hold back their joy as they appear to the shepherds in the sky, bringing Tidings of Great joy.

And then an Angel appears to Mary and Joseph again, this time not with an announcement but with a warning.  When Herod heard about the Christ child he went berserk and ordered all the boy infants in Bethlehem to be killed and we pick up the story in Matthew 2:13  After the wise men were gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up! Flee to Egypt with the child and his mother,” the angel said. “Stay there until I tell you to return, because Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”   And when Herod died the angel appeared to the family once again to let them know it was safe to return home. 

So yeah, Linus is pretty much right on, Christmas is about Angels, but there is more to the story. 

Luke 2:11-12  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.  And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

For Linus Christmas was All About the Baby   It’s interesting that Linus doesn’t go deeper than that specfic verse, he doesn’t name Jesus as a matter of fact he leaves a whole bunch of questions unanswered:  Who was the child?  Why was he born in Bethlehem?  Why was he born in a stable?

But fifty years ago there was a pretty good chance that most people would have known the answers to those questions. 

Did a little digging on line and discovered that in the US, in 1965 47 percent of the population said they had been to church in the past seven days.  47%, that’s impressive.  Even non-churched families got their kids into Sunday School because it was the right thing to do and so the Christmas story would have been fairly well known.

Most folks would have known about the Shepherds and the Angels and the baby Jesus.  And they probably would have known that his mother was a virgin named Mary, and that her and her husband, Joseph, were in Bethlehem for a census where they couldn’t find a room to stay in and ended up in a stable.  And they probably would have at least had a passing knowledge that Jesus was the Son of God.    

Two thousand years ago the Christ child was a surprise to the people of Israel.  They were waiting in anticipation for their Messiah, for God to appear and make everything right, but they weren’t expecting Him to come as a child.

The poet George MacDonald wrote, “They all were looking for a king
To slay their foes and lift them high;
Thou cam’st a little Baby thing
That made a woman cry.” 

But the baby really isn’t a surprise today, we may bemoan the fact that people don’t know the story, but to be truthful, even today a lot of folks know about the shepherds, the angels and the baby Jesus, if only vaguely.  Instead of learning about the Christmas story in Sunday School, now they are educated in Christmas by Christmas cards, Christmas carols and Christmas specials.

And most people don’t have a problem with the baby Jesus.  After all he’s safe and doesn’t demand much of us, not even the demands of most newborns.  The baby Jesus doesn’t demand to be fed on a regular schedule, doesn’t ask that we change his diaper and doesn’t keep us up at night.  Kind of like having a grand-kid

And so Linus figured he had nailed it, Christmas was all about the story.  And Linus had all the main characters safely where they belonged, the Shepherds in the fields, the Angels in the sky and the baby in the manger.  It was a simple as arranging a nativity scene.

And so Christmas is about the story, and the essence is summed up in those 6 verses that Linus reads so eloquently. 

Because as hard as people might try, they can’t separate Christmas from the story.  Christ is an integral part of the word Christmas, take out Christ and you are left with Mas, a shortened version of the word Mass, which is the celebration of the Eucharist, or Communion in the Catholic church.

The star on top of our trees reminds us of the star that guided the wise men to Bethlehem, the songs we sing remind us of the angels proclaiming the birth of the king. 

The tree was given to us by Martin Luther a Catholic priest who was the father of the reformation and the protestant church.  We give gifts to remember the gifts that were brought to the Christ Child on that first Christmas. 

Without the story we have no Christmas. 

But that doesn’t answer Charlie Brown’s question, because what Charlie Brown’s question.  Because what Charlie Brown asks is “Doesn’t anyone know what Christmas is all about?” And while Christmas is about the story, that’s not what it’s all about. 

In the scripture that Linus read it ends with verse 14 which in the King James Version reads,  Luke 2:14  Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

And if that is what Christmas is all about then John Lennon was right when he wrote these words, clip from Happy Christmas. 

But the newer translations put a little different spin on the words of the Angels, the New International version says Luke 2:14^NIV “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests.”  While the New Living Translation reads Luke 2:14 “Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased.”

And who is God pleased with?  The gift of peace, isn’t an absence of war, regardless of the theology of John Lennon’s song, it is an internal peace.  It is the peace that Jesus spoke about in John 14:27  Jesus said “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” 

And the gift of peace, like the gift of grace and the gift of forgiveness doesn’t come from believing in a baby born in a manger, but from believing and following the man Jesus became and not just a head knowledge, but a heart knowledge.  And so let’s tie things up with a couple of scriptures.  Ephesians 2:8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith. . .  And we are told in Hebrews 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.   

Has the baby in the story become real for you?  Until that happens you really won’t understand what Christmas is really all about.