Sermon:
December 27, 1998

Scripture:
Matthew 11:2-15

Yesterday's wire service report put it succinctly:

Cold winter sunshine splashed the yellow stones of Jerusalem's old walled city on Friday, at the intersection of Via Dolorosa and El-Wad (a jostling, noisy crossroads of faiths). For while Christians celebrated Christmas, Muslims were marking the first day of the holy month of Ramadan, and Jews were preparing to usher in the Sabbath at sundown.

The implication being that all was proceeding peaceably. For which I say: "Praise God." Even a small dosage of peace is a welcome tranquilizer for the world's soul. And, if history has anything to tell us, a small dosage it will be. For a cursory glance at December's news reminds us that munitions factories are still being built, and still being bombed, even as people are still being beaten, boats are still being burned, houses are still being burglarized, and children are still being borrowed (for all kinds of reasons, most of them sick and twisted). And lest we get too seasonally euphoric, there comes the announcement from the land of Jesse "the Body" Ventura, that Minnesotans are literally snapping up T-shirts that read: "Our governor can beat up your governor."

Ah, the world is strangely with us this Christmas. But when was it ever any different? Christmas cannot be isolated from life, because Jesus cannot be separated from history. The smell of the world, both sweet and foul, was with him then. And the smell of the world, both sweet and foul, is with him now. And, to whatever degree we are where he is, the smell of the world is with us, too.

Consider Bethlehem ... both then and now. Bethlehem sits just over the hill from Jerusalem, where (on Christmas Eve) the population swells beyond the town's capacity to contain it, even as pilgrims vie with pickpockets for space in the streets. Kerry Bond writes:

My mini-sabbatical to Israel was about to end. I decided to spend part of my last full day at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Many busloads of pilgrims were already there when I arrived. So were the ever-present street vendors of religious souvenirs. I toured the church, making videos of its exquisite mosaic floors, smelling the incense and experiencing the excitement of the Nativity as never before.

Who can walk through this church without a sense of awe? A group of nuns sang "Silent Night" as they stood before the niche. A mother with an infant child laid her upon the niche, while cameras and videos lit up the tiny space where we all stood ... the devotion of the pilgrims giving it a sacred aura.

Yet the most revealing moment of my visit did not happen within the church, but just outside. As I emerged, a look of panic was in the eyes of the souvenir vendors. A puff of white smoke arose over some nearby buildings. Several dozen men, women and children ran from the smoke toward the church. Soon my eyes and the eyes of those around me began to water uncontrollably. My throat tightened. Tear gas! Meant to quell a disturbance in a narrow street, the gas was carried over the church by a gentle, westerly wind. I remember a young Palestinian boy asking me why I wasn't using my video camera to record this. I told him I didn't know. Maybe I never expected something like this to happen.

But he should have, given that life in Bethlehem has never been quiet. Or easy. In the year of Jesus' birth, scarcely 300 persons lived there. But a census may well have swelled the streets, making a restless ruler sit troubled on the throne. And when the ruler is troubled, everybody is troubled.

But there was something else going on in Bethlehem. It never crossed my mind until Jim Forbes suggested it. For it was Jim who forced me to look at what he calls "the Battle of Bethlehem." He invites us to read the words of Phillips Brooks lovely carol, taking pause when we get to the last line of the first verse ... the one that reads: "The hopes and fears of all the years, are met in thee tonight." Jim then encourages us to ponder what kind of battle might have been raging, assuming that the hopes and fears of all the years really were coming together in that tiny little town.

Forbes continues:

Christmas is about much more than a little baby born in Bethlehem. It is about a battle of cosmic significance. It may focus on the action in the City of David, but it is linked with the action in any city, in any community, in any home or heart (for that matter), where hopes and fears compete with each other for territory, and where men and women are forced to decide which way they shall lean ... whether they shall lean in the direction of their hopes or in the direction of their fears.

For make no mistake about it. There is much to be afraid of. There is much that overwhelms. My candle is so small and the winds are so mighty.

Consider the assessment of Jesus himself. When we pick up the story in Matthew 11, Jesus is well into his ministry. John the Baptist is in prison. The disciples of John come to Jesus, asking: "Are you the one who is to come, or should we wait for somebody else?" Behind this question clearly lies another: "If you are the right one, why don't we see more happening?" To which Jesus says: "Go tell John what you do see happening. Tell him that the blind guys see, the deaf gals hear, the lame ones walk, even as the lepers are cleansed, and the poor have good news preached to them."

But then something interesting happens. Jesus stops talking to John's disciples, and commends John the Baptist to the crowd, during which time he adds this strange, yet accurate assessment: "Since John the Baptist came, up to this present time, the Kingdom of Heaven has been subjected to violence; and the violent are taking it by storm."

Now you could take that to mean that, from the time of John the Baptist to the present, God's people (the Kingdom people) have been the victims of violence. Or you could take that to mean that, from the time of John the Baptist to the present, God's people (the Kingdom people) have been guilty of violence. And the text would support either interpretation. As would history.

Strife underscores and undercuts all of life. It is bred into us. Start with biology. The whole evolutionary process is a food chain. What a striking term, "food chain." What does it mean? It means that we eat each other. Yet no species willingly offers itself to be eaten.

Not that long ago, I read that marine biologists in Seattle were trying to figure out how to keep sea lions from eating steelhead trout, as the trout migrate from Puget Sound to the fresh water lakes inland. One group wanted to solve the problem by salting a few steelhead with a chemical that would make the sea lions sick. Another group wanted to net the sea lions and ship them to Southern California. But the advocates of the first position argued that once a sea lion develops a taste for steelhead, he won't let a little trip to Southern California get in his way. He'll be back in Puget Sound in less than three weeks. It's the food chain. It's the struggle of life. We live off of each other.

Consider territorial prerogatives. All species, all groups, tend to outline their territories. They define their turf, marking off the boundaries. Then they defend that turf. It is the essence of tribalism. Go anywhere in the world where there are still tribes and you will see the same story. Boundaries are made, attacked and defended. Or stay closer to home and try counting the street gangs in the city of Los Angeles. Last May ... at a wedding ... a LAPD police detective (in the midst of recounting stories that curled what's left of my hair) told me that even he didn't know how many gangs there were in his precinct.

Remember Chuck Long ... one of a host of forgettable people who once tried to quarterback the Detroit Lions to respectability. When asked if he was afraid of making his first pro start against the Chicago Bears, Chuck said he wasn't ... in the slightest ... before adding: "I'll tell you what fear is. Fear is being in high school and playing an away game in Camden, New Jersey, and knowing that you've got to make it back to the bus when the game is over ... especially if you've won." Strife goes with the territory, don't you see? "From the time of John the Baptist to the present time, the Kingdom of Heaven has been subjected to violence, and the violent are taking it by storm."

Consider the strife that can be found within our more congenial units, like churches. I know of a large congregation with a proud history, good leadership and unlimited resources, but whose people are hell-bent on destroying each other this Christmas. It happens all the time. When our District Superintendent, Linda Lee, was here for our Charge Conference, she looked across the room and commended us for our wonderful turnout. Since she had shared similar compliments in previous years, I asked: "Don't you see good crowds for Charge Conferences anyplace else but here?" To which came her answer: "Only when they're out to get the preacher."

Consider families. Consider Cain and Abel. Such an early story it is. One wonders why the Jews bothered to keep it. The first family produces the first domestic tragedy. Brother against brother. One kills the other. Then there's Jacob and Esau. Another early story. Jacob cheats Esau out of a birthright and Esau threatens to kill him. Think of it. A birthright! Yet how many families today find themselves split down the middle over an inheritance ... over who got what, or who didn't get what from daddy. Again, it's a matter of territory. Somebody dies, and somebody else gets "handsy." They grab too much, stake a bigger claim, or empty the house of jewelry before anybody else can get there. It happens over and over again. It's happened in my family. It's happened in yours.

Even mates fight each other. We'd like to pretend that they don't. Socially, we cover it up. It, too, has to do with territory. Husbands and wives have priorities .Each has things to protect. The other encroaches, and has to be beaten back. It happens. It is so terribly understandable. And, apparently, inevitable. "From the time of John the Baptist (who, as you will remember, was not only imprisoned but beheaded) until now, the Kingdom of Heaven has been subjected to violence, and the violent are taking it by storm."

But the whole burden of the Gospel ... the whole thrust of the New Testament ... the whole energy of the ministry of Jesus, is slanted toward the idea that it isn't meant to be this way.

This is his message. This is why he is remembered. This is why the centuries pivot around Jesus. From his time to the present, there is a different reality in the world. This new reality is forced to co-exist alongside of the violence, alongside of the strife, and alongside of the fears. But this new reality isn't afraid of any of it. Nor does it yield to it.

It is the possibility of love as the law of life. It is the possibility of harmony and cooperation. It is the possibility of looking at the neighbor differently, especially the neighbor who happens to be "enemy." It is giving consideration to the fact that forgiveness may, indeed, be the most practical way of dealing with hate. Duncan Littlefair writes: "Two thousand years we've been working out this idea ... very dimly ... very feebly. But some innate wisdom in us, sensing the rightness of this idea, caused us to re-do the calendar so that the centuries came to turn upon Jesus. That wasn't just an accident. Somebody recognized that when Jesus entered the world, a different idea entered with him."

And "different" need not necessarily mean "new." Maybe the idea was there all along. Maybe it was bred into us alongside of the other ideas about territory and tribalism and turf. But with Jesus we saw it in a new way. Or maybe we felt it in a new way.

Jesus comes into the "Battle of Bethlehem" and arranges a cease fire, just long enough for us to cool down to some things and warm up to other things. Do you think it is merely happenstance that every Christmas story on television ends in one of two ways? I haven't seen a Christmas story yet that doesn't end with the rewarming of one who was previously cold, or the re-uniting of two who were previously distant.

But how hard it is to get there ... albeit not impossible. Consider yesterday morning ... the day after Christmas. The delightfully peppy voice of the woman I live with wakened me from sugar-plum-filled slumber and said: "Let's go to Hudson's for the half-off stuff." Forty minutes later, awake but unshaven, I found myself pulling into the parking lot of Northland because, as she put it: "I've seen everything they've got at Somerset."

Mere minutes after that, I was in a line ... a long line ... a long, slow line ... at a register. The lady ahead of me had one of every Christmas item ever made. But I was patient ... so much so that Miss Lil noticed me and said: "My, aren't you patient." Miss Lil was one of the two check-out ladies at the register ... the faster of the two check-out ladies ... albeit, not my check-out lady. But she noticed me because I was the only male in a half mile radius.

People were mumbling. Several were grumbling. The line was lengthening. And it was only 8:30 in the morning. Suddenly, another Hudson's employee happened by, surveyed the scene, and said to Miss Lil: "We'd better bust our whatevers, or we'll have a repeat of Oakland on our hands." For the uninitiated, a lady customer punched out one of Miss Lil's counterparts at Oakland Mall, just last week.

But this bothered Miss Lil, not one iota. Instead, surveying the scene (which still included yours truly ... who was a minority in more ways than one) she calmly said: "It'll never happen here ... because this place isn't Oakland." I guess some places really can be different.

* * * * *

"From the time of John the Baptist until now, the Kingdom of Heaven has been subjected to violence, and the violent have been taking it by storm." But it doesn't have to be that way. Contrast the way we go at each other, with the way God comes at us ... silently ... unagressively ... not so much commandeering our attention as inviting it.

We who dwell in a violent land ... and have learned to face and fear the violence that is in ourselves ... have looked long and hard for such a God as this. Some of us believe that we tracked Him down last Thursday night in Bethlehem.

Note: I am indebted to James Forbes and his essay, "The Battle of Bethlehem." Kerry Bonds' remembrance of the Church of the Nativity was printed in a publication called Pulpit Resource. Duncan Littlefair is the pastor emeritus at Fountain Street Church, Grand Rapids. And Miss Lil is a salesperson at the J.L. Hudson Company, located at Northland Mall.