December242006AM - St. Matthew's United Church of Christ

A Narration
Presented by Rev. Merlin T. Batt,
Interim Pastor of St. Matthew’s United Church of Christ
At Maiden, North Carolina,
On the Fourth Sunday of Advent,
December 24, 2006

Scripture Texts: Micah 5:2-5a; Matthew 1:18-25;
Luke 1 & 2 (selected verses); Colossians 1:15-20
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Introduction
On this Christmas Eve day, we begin our celebration of the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. Our choir will offer a selection of Christmas songs. They will be interspersed with Scripture readings and reflections about the Messiah’s birth, through the eyes of the prophet Micah, of Joseph, of Mary, and of the Apostle Paul. We begin by seeing through Micah’s eyes.

The Messiah’s Birth Through Micah’s Eyes
It may sound like a silly question, but I’ll ask it anyway, “What is Jesus’ last name?” If you answered “Christ”, you would be in the majority, but you would be wrong, nonetheless. “Christ” is a title, not a family name like Bumgarner, Campbell, Goodson, Herman, and Shrum! To speak of Jesus more accurately we would have to say, not “Jesus Christ,” but “Jesus the Christ.”

You may know that “Christ” is an English translation of a Greek word (“Christos”), which itself is a translation of a Hebrew word (“mashiach”) which means “anointed one” or “messiah”. So, when we say “Jesus Christ,” we are not speaking Jesus’ full name, but making a statement about who He is - “Jesus is the Messiah, the Anointed One of God.”

Now, that term was first used in Israel as a title for the king of Israel – God’s anointed - a political ruler like David or his son Solomon. But over the centuries, as one king after another proved to be a disappointment - to have “clay feet” - and as things went from bad to worse for God’s people, there developed a hope that God would send Someone finally to set things right, not just another run-of-the-mill king, but Someone to rescue Israel from her pagan enemies. And that Someone, according to prophecy, would be in the family tree of King David.

This is the hope we hear in the heart and words of the prophet Micah, writing 700 years before the birth of Jesus. Micah had no idea that a particular man from Nazareth named Jesus would be that longed-for Messiah, but he believed that whoever God sent would be born in Bethlehem, the town from which King David had come. Listen for God’s Word as I read this passage from Micah:

But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from old, from ancient days…And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they shall live secure, for now he shall be great; and he shall be the one of peace.

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The Messiah’s Birth Through Joseph’s Eyes
If your only exposure to the story of Jesus’ birth has come through Christmas pageants and the like, you will be surprised to learn that there are two stories about Jesus’ birth in the New Testament – one in Matthew’s Gospel and a second in Luke’s Gospel. While these two stories have some things in common, they are really quite different stories. You ought to take a look sometime in the opening chapters of both Gospels.

You might say that Matthew’s story is told through the eyes of Joseph, while Luke’s story is told through the eyes of Mary. To understand why there might be two stories, it might help to recall what happens when you cover one of your eyes – you lose your depth perception. Try it! It takes seeing through both eyes to enable you to see with depth. Maybe that’s why the Spirit has given us two, not quite the same, stories of Jesus’ birth, through the eyes of Joseph and the eyes of Mary, that we may see more deeply into the mystery of God’s coming among us.

Listen for God’s Word as I read from Matthew’s Gospel:

Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”…When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.

This is the only place in the New Testament where we hear anything about the man who raised up Jesus from an infant to a young man, and who served as a model of what it means to be a mature man of faith. Everyone in the small village of Nazareth would have agreed with Joseph’s initial solution to the problem of his fiancée being pregnant before they had been intimate with one another – a quiet separation; nothing said; Mary’s reputation tarnished; Joseph’s reputation kept intact.

But this man Joseph had the faith to pay attention to God’s word and the courage to do what God required of him, even if it didn’t make any sense then, and even if it would open him to being criticized and ridiculed by his friends. Maybe what allowed Joseph to do what he did was the angel’s saying to him in a dream, “Joseph, Son of David, do not be afraid…”

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The Messiah’s Birth Through Mary’s Eyes
She was a young Jewish girl, barely into puberty, when her parents arranged her engagement, as custom would have it, to a fellow in the village named Joseph. Until she would be formally married to him, however, Mary would live in her parents’ home, provided for, protected, and sheltered until her wedding day. All was proceeding quite according to custom when Mary had an experience which would transform her life, not to mention the life of the world, and not to mention our own lives 21 centuries later!

One of God’s messengers, Gabriel by name, came to young, innocent Mary. “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you,” said the angel. Hearing this, she was terrified, confused, bewildered…speechless. She hadn’t done anything to earn God’s favor, but here was a messenger from God saying that she was favored by God and that He was about to take the initiative in her life! The angel said, “And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”

Stunned, Mary stammered, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?”

“The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God.” The angel went on to say, and this really caught Mary’s attention, “For nothing will be impossible with God.”

Mary might have said to the angel, “No way! Not me! Find somebody else. I’m not your girl!” But, no, what she did say was this, and it has echoed down through the ages as a refrain for all those who are willing to allow God to use them for his purposes, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

The months passed by; Joseph had a change in heart; Mary’s abdomen grew in stature (!), and she found herself and her devoted husband on a difficult journey south to Bethlehem to fulfill political necessity. And while in the crowded, small town, “the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger…”

As the years unfolded and she watched her firstborn grow into a fine, young man, Mary often thought to herself that she probably wouldn’t have so willingly and completely given herself, her body, her life, her future over to God if that angel hadn’t said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary.”

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The Messiah’s Birth Through Paul’s Eyes
The Apostle Paul never knew Jesus, at least in the sense that the original twelve apostles did. Paul didn’t come on board as a follower of Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, until several years following Jesus’ death and resurrection. This Pharisaic Jew, Paul, was chosen by God (and a great choice it turned out to be!) to take to the Gentile world the Good News that Jesus, risen from the dead, was now the world’s true Lord.

But in none of the letters of Paul does he tell the story of Jesus’ birth. Neither Matthew nor Luke had written their Gospels yet; that wouldn’t happen until after Paul was beheaded for his faith. It’s possible that Paul was never told this part of the Jesus Story. In any case, he didn’t make anything of it in his letters.

What Paul adds to our understanding is the cosmic significance of the birth of Jesus the Messiah. Listen to what he wrote to some groups of Jesus’ followers in Asia Minor:

(Jesus) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers – all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

There’s far more in these exalted words than we can explore today, but, on this day when we are entering into the celebration of the birth of Jesus, we should take note of what Paul is saying here about Him. First, it is by looking at Jesus that we discover who God is. And, second, Jesus is the one in whom we discover what it means to be truly human!

No wonder we Christians employ our most beautiful songs and our most exalted words to praise God on the day we celebrate the birth of Jesus the Christ, our Savior and our Lord.