Christmas Sermon 2009

There are moments that change everything. My friends who have been blessed with children tell the stories of how dramatically their lives changed with the birth of their children – especially the birth of the first born. The details vary, but each story centers on the moment when that new little life, wrapped tight in a blanket, was placed in their arms and suddenly the world around them shifted. The new parents could almost feel their priorities realigning, and their lives that previous had been sharply focused other places now becoming re-focused on this child. They themselves suddenly took on a new identity – as mother or father and all that those words might mean. For those whose first children were born outside of their carefully laid life plans, the shift was even more momentous; as much as they had tried for months to find a way to fit a child into their lives, the moment they received the baby in their arms, the life they had before changed.

Tonight people around the world are gathered together to remember and celebrate the birth of a child. We hear again the birth announcement given by angels: unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, who is Christ, the Lord. Tonight we remember and celebrate this most miraculous birth – the birth of a firstborn son – the birth that changes everything.

Mary and Joseph’s lives had already begun to change mightily nine months before that night in Bethlehem. The angel’s announcement to Mary that she would have a child certainly shifted everything she thought she knew and understood about the world and herself. Mary’s announcement to a most surprised Joseph, followed by his own angel visitation, changed his life in ways he was only beginning to understand. And then came the birth itself. This great event in human history is told so simply: “And while they were there,” Luke writes, “the time came for her to deliver her firstborn son and she wrapped him in rags of cloth and laid him in the manger.” Such a simple, straightforward way to tell the story of the moment the world changed forever.

You see, Jesus’ birth didn’t change only the lives of his mother and her fiancé. No, the moment Jesus was born countless lives took on new possibilities – none of these people knew it yet, some of them were not born, but that child wailing in Bethlehem would one day radically change the lives of twelve men he that he would call to follow him, of a man possessed by demons, a blind beggar, a man lying paralyzed on a mat – Jesus would one day change everything for a woman at a well, a dying girl and her parents, a beloved friend called out of his tomb and a centurion who would stand at the foot of a cross and see the son of God. So many lives were about to change – and it all began with the birth of Mary’s first born son.

One of my favorite holiday movies is the cheesy classic, It’s a Wonderful Life. Even though I could probably recite it by heart, still every year I put in the tape and watch the story again. If you are one of those people who has never seen this movie, and I feel sorry for you if you are, it’s the story of George Bailey, the first born in his family, incidentally, who abandons the plan he had for his life in order to take on his father’s mission of running the local Building and Loan. There was no predatory lending at the Bailey Building and Loan – quite the opposite. It’s hard and frustrating work and there are days when George wonders if it’s worth it. He grows tired of being frustrated by the town’s big man, Mr. Potter, who is forever trying to use his money and power to put the little Building and Loan out of business. One Christmas a crisis sends George to the brink of despair – George is contemplating suicide when he is met by a goodhearted, if bumbling, guardian angel. George tells the angel he wishes he had never been born. The angel grants his wish and George is given the opportunity to see what life would have been like if he had never entered the world. George is surprised to see the people he’s loved living lives of misery and hopelessness; he sees his sleepy little town of Bedford Falls destroyed and torn apart by Mr. Potter’s greed. He is given the amazing opportunity to see how his everyday acts of love, forgiveness and courage forever changed the lives of the people around him. The birth of George Bailey into the world had forever changed the lives of the people and the little world of Bedford Falls. The moral of the story is that even one ordinary life can make a world of difference.

But as much as I love George and his story, I have to say that the first born child of Ma and Peter Bailey has nothing on the firstborn son of Mary and Joseph. Because the birth of Jesus did not just change the lives of his parents or those he met in the course of his life on earth. No, the birth of Jesus, the Savior, Christ the Lord, changed everything – EVERY thing. As Mary delivered her first born son and wrapped him in bands of cloth and laid him in the manger, the entire cosmos shifted. As the world received the God made flesh, the stars themselves realigned so that one would twinkle brightly over Bethlehem. The night sky above the shepherd’s field was suddenly filled with a multitude of the heavenly host and shone with the glory of God. With this birth the focus of the world shifted, shifted from the power of sin and separation from God to the power of forgiveness and God’s unbelievable love and desire to come and live among us – shown in the tender flesh of that baby. With this birth reset the course of human history; and so we even reset the calendar to mark the date. The power and wonder of this birth – of the moment when God Almighty took on the frail, human flesh of an infant and entered our world – would radiate out from that time and that place to touch every time and every place with the indescribable power of God’s redemption and salvation and everything changed.

We can look around us and see all the things we wish we could change. The problems of the world, the challenges and grief of our own lives, the sense that this world is headed into chaos and death. But then we remember that night – and we know that the change we desire has already begun. When Jesus was born, when he came as Immanuel, God with us, the sin that had kept us separated from God found a remedy in God’s love and forgiveness. The despair that threatens to overcome every generation now was touched and changed by a hope born of the certainty that God has laid claim to this world and will redeem all things. Even death lost its power at the moment – no longer would it be able to ensnare us in chains of fear because this child would soon destroy the power of death through his own resurrection, as he became the first born of all the dead. That night new life came into the world – and it was not just the new life of another baby. Jesus was not the only one born that night when Mary delivered her first born son. John writes it this way, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.. he was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being…(and) to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of flesh or of the will of man, but of God.” That night when the world received and held the miracle of God made flesh, the world itself was reborn. This world was reborn as a place where healing can and will happen, reborn as a world where the blind will see and the deaf will hear, reborn as a place where good news is brought to the poor, reborn as a world where sin no longer can hold us in its bondage, reborn as a world in which forgiveness has more power than vengeance and life will always conquer death. The world and the cosmos are fundamentally different because they once received and held the Word made flesh. And so even though we could probably all recite this story by heart, still each year we come to hear and tell the story again – because it is our story. We come to hear our birth announcement – unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior. And each time that good news is laid in our arms we are born anew – reborn as people of hope, reborn as people of grace, reborn to live with fullness of life, reborn as children of God. Unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, Christ the Lord. The first born son of God who changes everything. Amen.