‘Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests.’
Luke 2.14 (NIV)
There’s the message of Christmas: peace on earth. Three simple words: peace on earth. It’s a lovely message, and I’m sure few would disagree with it.
Really?
Here’s the problem: if Jesus came to bring peace on earth, where is it? Not a day goes by without the news mentioning war, fighting, death, famine, disease, struggle. It’s rather like that little girl who visited Santa. Santa asked her “what would you like for Christmas little girl? “ And she replied “peace on earth and goodwill to all humankind.” And Santa said “I’m sorry. That’s far too difficult, here’s adoll.” Peace on earth? They cry peace peace where there is no peace. We were at the midnight service at the Leper Chapel last night. Ros the chaplain in her sermon said we’ve stopped being shocked about Ukraine.
It’s been going on nearly two years. We’ve also stopped being shocked at Gaza after three and a half months of hell on earth there. It’s like war and inhumanity are part of just how it is. It’s never going to end.
So where’s Christmas Peace then? Well here’s the point. We cannot just do peace. We have to experience it. Peace comes down to us in this story. One of my minister friends puts it well in her Christmas letter:
“If we want to see it, all we need to do is to look down. We’ll find, beneath our feet, the ground.”
This Christmas we cannot not go to Bethlehem. One of the churches has placed a baby Jesus under the rubble of their bombed-out sanctuary. The minister maybe has it right. He says:
In Gaza today, God is under the rubble.
And in this Christmas season, as we search for Jesus, he is to be found not on the side of Rome, but our side of the wall. In a cave, with a simple family. Vulnerable. Barely, and miraculously surviving a massacre. Among a refugee family. This is where Jesus is found.
If Jesus were to be born today, he would be born under the rubble in Gaza. When we glorify pride and richness, Jesus is under the rubble…
When we rely on power, might, and weapons, Jesus is under the rubble…
When we justify, rationalise, and theologise the bombing of children, Jesus is under the rubble…
Jesus is under the rubble. This is his manger. He is at home with the marginalised, the suffering, the oppressed, and displaced. This is his manger.
THIS is the incarnation. Messy. Bloody. Poverty.
This child is our hope and inspiration. We look and see him in every child killed and pulled from under the rubble. While the world continues to reject the children of Gaza, Jesus says: “just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me.” “You did to ME.” Jesus not only calls them his own, he is them!
We look at the holy family and see them in every family displaced and wandering, now homeless in despair. While the world discusses the fate of the people of Gaza as if they are unwanted boxes in a garage, God in the Christmas narrative shares in their fate; He walks with them and calls them his own.
This is Christmas today in Palestine and this is the Christmas message.
Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace on those in whom God’s favour rests. Announced by angels, experienced by shepherds. A gift for a weary war-torn world.
You know thinking what to say to you this Christmas morning has been hard going. I want to say there is no peace on earth. Maybe my favourite spiritual writer Nadia Bolz Weber comes to my rescue…she’s struggling too. She says:
“ I cannot sit here and claim that I know what gift the birth of the Christ Child will bring this year, only that whatever God delivers, it will be needed, and it will be unexpected. Like the first time.
Thank God. Because I need this birth to be something I do not expect. I need it to be something I could not imagine. I need to be shocked by the glory of God shining on my mud-caked soul, and I will search like hell for even the tiniest sign of it. The tiniest sign of God’s glory will do for me this year.”
Remember this year what Christmas is. Think about Bethlehem.
He comes under the rubble. He comes with a different agenda. He comes to herald peace, mad as that sounds. The heart of Christmas is that peace is possible. Even when it’s absolute chaos.
I know a lot of you have had a sad 2023 with loss and illness and uncertainty. For you Christmas though hard to do like the world does with its bonhomie and frills, can be a time God would give you his peace. Remember he comes into the heart of human experience, under the rubble of shatteredhopes and uncertainty ahead. He comes also to turn mourning into dancing. That’s why Christmas carols were originally to be danced to!
We sang Hark the herald angels sing a moment ago. Peace on earth, and mercy mild: God and sinners, reconciled.’ Peace on earth, that is the message of Christmas in a nutshell: not world peace, but God and sinners, reconciled.
God’s gift to you this Christmas – and every day – is his Son Jesus. God’s gift to you is peace – reconciliation – shalom.
And we change things slowly and quietly when we know God’s amazing love for us. We lament over where the world isn’t at peace and we commit ourselves to live Christmas all year. Let’s believe in peace and hurry like the shepherds to see this thing which has taken place which the Lord has told us about.
Even in the chaos of war and uncertainty we can wish each other a happy Christmas. Glory to God in the highest heaven and on earth peace.That’s our gift. And after Christmas is done and we’ve had our dinner and a sleep and whatever we do to celebrate today we respond to what’s been told us. Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me…
The Coming of God” by Ann Weems
Our God is the One who comes to us
in a burning bush,
in an angel’s song,
in a newborn child.
Our God is the One who cannot be found
locked in a church,
not even in the sanctuary.
Our God will be where God will be
with no constraints,
no predictability.
Our God lives where our God lives,
and destruction has no power
and even death cannot stop the living.
Our God will be born where God will be born,
but there is no place to look for the One who comes to us.
When God is ready
God will come
even to a godforsaken place
like a stable in Bethlehem.
Watch … for you know not when
God comes.
Watch, that you might be found whenever
wherever God comes.
No comments:
Post a Comment