Christmas Not Just for Christians Anymore

       Christmas isn’t just for Christians anymore.  Actually, it never was.  The baby was born to all this [Christmas] day in the city of David, just happens to be Christ the Lord.  Sure, I know the Jewish context.  Yes, I’m aware of the fact that Christians are the ones who have kept his birth front and center for a couple of thousand years.  Yet God came into the world, the light entered into the darkness, to save the world, and to illumine the darkness—all of it.  Just because we Christians “get it” doesn’t mean the nativity was just for us. 

Think of it this way:

         You develop a vaccine for AIDS.  Do you sell it to the highest bidder knowing that it will be safeguarded for those who have the wealth to afford it?  Or do you do everything in your power to make sure that those who are at risk can receive it, no matter what the cost?

         You hear a song so beautiful that it inspires the heart of all who hear it.  Do you sing it for yourself and your family and friends? Or do you bombard the airwaves for those whose lives are devoid of inspiration?

         You happen upon a protein rich, delectable vegetable that can grow in nearly all conditions and is about as hard to get rid of as a thistle.  Do you leave it to the small remote tribe that thrives on it or do you take the seeds and send them to Sub-Saharan Africa, ship them to the protein poor Altiplano in Bolivia, or offer them to Palestinian women in the Gaza strip to supplement their meager gardens?

         You have a dear friend who can literally fix anything.  If it’s broken, unassembled, if you cannot figure out how to make some project around the house work—you know you can call him and he’ll drop what he’s doing and come over and within the hour he’ll have the problem solved.  He’s retired and he loves to be needed (and he’s truly a great example of servanthood).  Do you keep him your little secret, knowing that you’ve got more than your fair share of things that need fixing?  Or do you introduce him to friends and acquaintances that could use his help?

         I know that Jesus shows up as a new born baby.  He’s extraordinary, I know that, but I also know that as far as babies go he’s pretty much limited to crying, eating, sleeping, and dirtying his swaddling cloths.  He’s born to poor parents on the run from the authorities, refugees in another nation, and then goes on to become either an apprentice carpenter or a rabbi-in-training with the local teacher of the law.  It’s going to be a while until he sets out to publically reveal that he is the long-awaited Anointed One of God.  But we know who he is because we’re experiencing this celebration in rewind/reverse.  We see the manger in light of the cross.  We see the angels coming down from the heavens from the perspective of Jesus ascending upward into heaven.  As Christians, we experience Christmas the birth of our Savior from the perspective of sinners who have already been saved—as the blind who can finally see—as lost souls who have been found and restored to our place as sons and daughters of royalty.

         If we just go about our advent season, if we just chug along toward our family Christmas celebration, without inviting the folks who populate our daily lives to come and join us, it would be the equivalent to keeping the vaccine, the beautiful song, the life sustaining vegetable, and our miraculously gifted friend all to ourselves.  And in each of those contexts we would consider such behavior unconscionable.  We would consider it heartless.  Keeping Jesus to ourselves—hoarding his grace and forgiveness for ‘me and mine’—especially during this holiday season, is equally unconscionable for followers of the living Christ.

         Christmas is not just for Christians, in fact, if you go back and reread the Christmas story you discover that Christmas was specifically directed to those who could be found outside the synagogue and Temple of the day:  scruffy shepherds, foreign magicians, provincial out-of-towners holed up in the caves on the outskirts of the city, and so on and so on.  I don’t so much think God cares how you do it, but I do honestly believe that God expects you and I to share the incredible news that “God is With Us”.  And, though we are often reticent to mention it in today’s church, I think God will hold us accountable for what we do with the Good News He has entrusted to us.  I suspect it will be part of that difficult conversation some of us will have with our Creator when He brings us Home once and for all.

         I’m going to invite a few folks I know who don’t attend worship to join me during this advent season at St. Andrew.  I’m going to be a little more eager to offer to pray for those who share a concern or worry with me in the course of my day.  I’m going to put a yard sign in my front lawn, a window sticker in my car, and I’m going to carry a few cards in my pocket that include an uplifting Christmas promise and the times for our Christmas Eve worship.  I may or may not knock on doors up and down my block, but when I stop and consider—even for a moment—how richly the Christ of Bethlehem has blessed me, I know that I should not and cannot keep it to myself.

         It helps to remind myself:  Christmas is not just for Christians anymore.