Recorded
Version Don’t Miss Christmas

David Orendorff · Matthew 3:1-12 · December 9^th 2007

Christmas Eve has strong childhood memories for me.  We went to Christmas Eve services were often there was a children’s pageant in which I was almost always a shepherd.  At home we would have some kind of treat and then it was off to bed.  Oh how I desperately wanted to go to sleep so the morning would come more quickly but I would lay awake thinking about what gifts there might be, what family would be together, and what food, especially desserts, we would have.  My child’s brain would become filled with thoughts of anticipated joy and I would lay awake waiting for the dawn; waiting with Christmas excitement and hope for tomorrow.

John the Baptist would tell us that everyday ought to have the excitement of Christmas Eve.  He invites us to repent, that is to look at life and our lives with new a new way of thinking, for the kingdom of heaven is very, very near.  And John chooses a passage from Isaiah to inspire us, “A voice cries out: In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”

It is inspiring because Isaiah is writing to his family and nation as they live enslaved to Babylon and exiled from home.  It is a wilderness time for the people of Abraham and they are low in their hopes for tomorrow.  But Isaiah sees beyond the wilderness and into the promised future of God.  In their deepest darkness Isaiah says, “Get ready for God to come.”

John’s times too were a wilderness time.  The Roman army occupies the nation.  The religious establishment seems to collude with the enemies of freedom and peace.  The people are high in fear and low in hope.

But like Isaiah John sees God’s coming as right around the corner and an everyday possibility.  The messiah is coming with forgiveness and love; the messiah is coming to lead the world toward peace and joy.  For John there is no time for pessimism, cynicism or fear.  All time is a time to prepare, a time to make straight the paths so that the Christ of Christmas can come straight to us.  John, living in the wilderness, dressed in miserable itchy camel hair, eating wild locusts covered with honey, remained a child filled with Christmas Eve sleeplessness.

In Advent we too are called to look beyond whatever wilderness or darkness is ours.  Be it issues of mental or physical health, struggling relationships, war or politics, we are invited to set aside our worries and fears and prepare for God to be with us, to care for us and heal us, to save us from that which would harm us and our world.

And wouldn’t it be wonderful if we enthusiastically anticipated the kingdom of heaven not only in December but also in July?  Much of the year we tend toward cynicism, or at best guarded optimism.  Much of the year we focus on wars, hurt feelings, various anxieties, and health.  Much of the year we think of Christmas as months off and a child’s, even a childish, dream.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful to extend the excitement of God’s coming with peace in Christmas to the whole of our year?

To face what threatens us in life with the belief that God is immediately with us and is going to make it alright is the change of mind, the change of perspective into which Isaiah and John invite us.

When we face life expecting to see and be in Christmas soon Christmas comes to us.  Or maybe it is not so much that Christmas comes as we are awake to the coming.  Christmas is around us and in us all the time.  The same people we love at Christmas are the ones we long to be with on birthdays and for no good reason.  The same peace we seek in December is the peace we would have in April and September.  The values of Christmas that light up our hearts with hope are the values of our deepest longings.  The excitement of Christmas changes our lives and our world.

World War I was one of the great dark and wilderness times of our history.  But even it had some great Christmas moments.  Stanley Weintraub, Professor of History at Pennsylvania State University wrote a book entitled Silent Night: The Story of the World War I Christmas Truce.1 NPR Radio, Dec. 1, 2001, Christmas Truce - this interview can be called up from NPR’s archives at www.npr.org.  Weintraub sets the stage for his remarkable tale with how, in order to go to war, in order to kill fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers, it is necessary to demonize the enemy.  He talked of WWI and WWII cartoons and posters which showed our enemies as half human or insane.  He told of how the news and rumor would carry stories of horrible torture and atrocities, some of which were true, some of which were exaggerations, and some of which were simply lies.  War is a time of great wilderness and deep darkness.  Then he told this history of WWI:

It was Christmas on the front line between the British and the Germans.  Germany had sent her soldiers small Christmas trees.  It seems that at the time Germany didn’t go in a big way for gifts, it was the decorations that made Christmas.  The British sent brass boxes with candy, cigarettes, and some small gifts to her soldiers.  When the Germans got wind of this, they sent boxes of small gifts and treats to their soldiers.  And when the British saw the small decorated trees appear along the German trenches, they began their own decorating project.

At some point on Christmas Eve the soldiers began singing Christmas Carols and the fighting stopped.  At first they sang to their own comrades, and then a friendly competition began of one army singing to the other.  And then they sang together.

During the night a few British crawled out of their trenches and into no-man’s-land to watch the Germans celebrate.  When the Germans saw this, some of them crawled out and shared gifts of jams and homemade cookies.  Soon both armies were out in no-man’s-land sharing Christmas carols and gifts from home.

On Christmas Day the celebration continued.  Together they buried their dead, soccer games were organized and played, pictures of lovers, wives and children were shared, and a Christmas dinner was held.  It was a Christmas miracle.

The Generals of both sides, following the Christmas Truce, found that if they were to start up the killing again, they had to replace their soldiers on the front lines with reserves from the rear who had not celebrated Christmas with the enemy, soldiers for whom the enemy was still a demon and not human.

Then Weintraub went on to say that there were, of course, some soldiers who refused to celebrate Christmas with the enemy.  One of those soldiers was Adolf Hitler.  Hitler refused to see the enemy as anything less than demonic.  He wrote in his diary of the incident that he would never have Christmas with the enemy. Hitler was one of those who could not have his mind changed toward the always coming of the loving God.  Evidently he was one of those folks who would not or could not see Christmas.  In the midst of a major miracle he could not see the kingdom of heaven surrounding him with song, celebration, soccer and love.

Isaiah’s call and John the Baptist’s cry sometimes seems futile.  Who will listen when the world is so obviously wild and dark?  But Isaiah and John still fervently call to Hitler, to all those like him and to us through the centuries no matter how dry, barren or wild we or the times might be.  They call because today just may be the day we have eyes to see and ears to hear.  Today just may be the day we change our minds, repenting of pessimism and embracing a divine optimism that anticipates the coming of the Christ.  Today may be the day we look upon our lives and the world with new hope.

To look at life with Christmas eyes is faith in God.  To see Christmas as always coming is to know peace in the wilderness and joy in the suffering; it is to change our minds and trust that the kingdom of heaven is at hand, truly right here right now. 

As Christians we are the Isaiah and the John the Baptist of our time shouting as a voice crying in the wilderness, "Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths" for the kingdom of heaven is near and Christmas is soon to come.  So my friends, we watch and prepare with joyful expectation for Christmas to come in this season and in all seasons.

Shalom and Amen.