A Christmas Message

“To You is Born a Savior”

Luke 2: 1-20

Rev. Dr. Teri McDowell Ott

December 4th, 2012 – MC Christmas Convocation

 One of the most often quoted movies in the Ott household is Will Ferrill’s classic comedy Talladega Nights.  I can’t recommend the whole movie to you, clearly Anchor Man is Ferrill’s best work, but there is one gem of a scene from Talladega Nights that is worth quoting.  In this scene Ricky Bobby, the NASCAR racing sensation played by Will Ferrill, sits down with his wife, Carly, and his family to say grace before enjoying a fine meal of Domino’s, KFC, and, in Ricky Bobby’s words, the always delicious Taco Bell.  Ricky Bobby begins to pray…

“Dear Lord baby Jesus, I just want to say thank you for my family, my two beautiful handsome, striking sons, Walker and Texas Ranger, and of course my red hot smokin’ wife Carly.  Dear Lord baby Jesus, we also thank you for my wife’s father, Chip.  We hope that you can use your baby Jesus powers to heal him and his horrible leg. Dear tiny infant Jesus….

Carly interrupts… “Hey, um, Ricky, ya’ know—Jesus did grow up.  You don’t always have to call him baby.  It’s a bit odd and off-putting to pray to a baby.”

Ricky Bobby responds, “Well I like the Christmas Jesus best and I’m saying grace.  When you say grace you can say it to grown up Jesus, or teenage Jesus, or bearded Jesus, or whoever you want.”

Carly sighs and Ricky Bobby begins again. “Dear 8 pound 6 ounce newborn infant Jesus, don’t even know a word yet, just a little infant and so cuddly…but still omnipotent.  Dear tiny Jesus with your golden fleece diapers and tiny little fat balled up fists we just thank you for all the races I’ve won and the 21.2 million dollars that I have accrued (Whoot!) over this season.  Thank you for all your power and your grace, dear baby God.  Amen.”

Now, as silly as this movie is, there really is some truth to us liking the little baby Jesus, or the Christmas Jesus best.  The Easter Jesus doesn’t get nearly as much air time as the Christmas Jesus.  The allure of a newborn baby is inescapable as we oooh and ahhh over the colored lights, tinsel, and greenery strung up to celebrate his birth.  But as we tickle this newborn’s toes and delight ourselves over his gummy smiles, Luke breaks into our romanticizing, our commercializing, and our trivializing to remind us that Christmas is about something more.  In the words of Luke, Christmas is about good news of great joy for all the people…for to you is born a Savior.

Written at the beginning of the 2nd Century, the Gospel of Luke tells the story of a down-to-earth, country prophet named Jesus who became a sage of the people.  Through his masterful storytelling, Luke’s Jesus found broad appeal as the author sought to unify and universalize the Christian identity.  For Luke the birth of Jesus the Christ really was good news of great joy for all the people because Jesus transformed his society’s consciousness and offered real hope to the empire’s vast underclasses of hard-pressed and overworked children, women, and men.[1]  Jesus really was their Savior by highlighting the injustice of their social and economic circumstances and by proclaiming the Good News that their suffering was not of God.

What about those of us living in the 21st century?  How might this 1st century, country prophet, be our Savior?  What forces of oppression would Jesus highlight in our lives?  From what do we need to be saved?  I have long believed that we must acknowledge what is killing us, before we can know what will save us.

So ask yourself, “What is killing me today?”

Of course your first response will likely be “FINAL EXAMS!  That’s what’s killing me today!!”  Well, you’re on your own with those.  Jesus is not going to earn those grades for you.

But perhaps your anxiety is killing you, or your fear of failure.  Perhaps what’s killing you is the idea that “real life” and the “real world” come later, that today and today’s actions don’t really count.  Perhaps your dependency on alcohol is killing you, or a deep insecurity that tells you you’re no good.  Perhaps it’s your anger that you struggle to keep in check, or your failure to maintain a healthy relationship.  Or perhaps what’s killing you is the feeling that you are completely out of control, that the world is conspiring against you and that there is nothing you can do about it.

I imagine this was what was killing Mary and Joseph when they were told that the Emperor’s census would force them to travel all the way back to Bethlehem.  Traveling in your third trimester is painful enough.  Just imagine traveling by burro.  There are no ‘thought bubbles’ above Mary and Joseph’s heads, but their inner monologues could not have been pleasant.  Then they arrive in Bethlehem and what do they find?  There is no room for them in the inn.  All we have to do is imagine our connecting flight being cancelled leaving us to spend Christmas Eve at O’Hare, to understand how frustrated, and tired, and upset Mary and Joseph must have been.  I imagine they felt completely out of control and it was killing them.

These were the circumstances into which Jesus was born.  The Christian birth narrative tells of God entering human life precisely at that moment when we realize that we are not enough, that we cannot do it all, that we are not in control, and that we cannot save ourselves.  That’s when Jesus enters the picture–a beautiful, precious, newborn baby, his whole life ahead of him– is born into all of this mess.  Why?  Well, perhaps to let us know that the mess is not all there is.

The hope, inherent in the Gospel of Luke is that there is something or someone to turn to for salvation. In Luke this turning, or metanoia in Greek, is a turning away from the oppressive forces that kill and a turning toward the saving forces that offer the possibility of new life.[2]

For as long as I have been leading Christmas services such as this, I have always recognized someone sitting in the congregation who did not expect to be there.  Perhaps he was dragged there by a zealous mother-in-law, or perhaps he had just decided on a whim to check out why scores of people were pouring into the local church on a cold, dark Christmas Eve.  He usually sits somewhere in the back, or in a far corner of the balcony, with body language that conveys he feels completely out of place.  Unbeknownst to him, though, he can be clearly identified from the pulpit as he leans in to hear the Christmas story and as his eyes reveal a longing to be included in the good news of great joy. Sometimes those eyes even start to shine as his tears betray the reality that he is dying inside.

It is this person, this dying person, whom Luke desires to expose in a full spotlight of grace.  Luke’s spotlight sears the darkness of this person’s despair with messages of hope.  You are welcome here!  You are included in all of this!  Your suffering is not of God!  Your life means something!  You are worthy of love!  Luke invites him to reorient and transform his life around the saving hope that the darkness, the mess, and all that is killing him today, is not all there is.

Christmas reminds all of us that there is something more.  For to you is born a Savior.

When I finish we will sing O Come, All Ye Faithful.  I chose this hymn because I love it!  It is big and grand and beautiful.  I asked our organist to play it loud.  I asked the Chorale to sing it big!  Because this is a hymn that beckons to us, it calls us to Come!  Come!  Come and know the saving power of God breaking into the darkness, of God breaking into all of our mess.  Come and hear the saving message that your life means something, that you are worthy of love, and that grace abounds.  Come, let us adore him, because Christmas reminds us there is something more.  Christmas reminds us of the good news of great joy for all the people…for to you is born a Savior.

Now to this Savior, be all honor and glory, thanksgiving and power, now and forevermore.  Amen.

*Let us stand and sing together, O Come, All Ye Faithful.

 

 

 

 


[1] Richard A. Horsley, “The Message and the Kingdom,” (Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 2001), pgs. 226-228.

[2] Joel B. Green, “Body, Soul, and Human Life,” (Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2008), pgs. 106-139.

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