Sermon Archive

As we sang that carol, one of my favorites, I remembered that yesterday was the birthday of Phillips Brooks, the author of the words. He was born in Boston, one hundred and seventy-three years ago to William Gray Brooks and Mary Ann Phillips Brooks. Of their six sons, four became Episcopal priests.

Phillpis Brooks was the rector of Holy Trinity Church on Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia when in 1865 he traveled to Jerusalem and then to Bethlehem to assist in the Christmas Eve service in the Church of the Holy Nativity. Three years later, reflecting on his experience in the Holy Land, he wrote the carol by which he is primarily remembered. His organist at Holy Trinity, Lewis Redner, wrote the music to which it is sung in this country. Ralph Vaughn Williams introduced the carol to England in 1906, arranging it to the tune Forest Green, to which it is still sung there.

Phillips Brooks went from Holy Trinity Church in Philadelphia to Trinity Church, Boston, in 1869. He was consecrated Bishop of Massachusetts in 1891, a post he held for less than two years. He died in 1893 at the age of 59. He never married.

Against that background, I want to read another song of Christmas, Mary's Magnificat, as we have it in Luke's Gospel, the first chapter, verses 46 through 55.

This past week I was sitting in Starbucks, when a man struck up a conversation with me. He asked me if I was a businessman. I was on my way to making a hospital visit, so I was wearing a necktie and blazer. I gave him an evasive answer. He asked if I was in management. I told him, No, I'm in sales. He proceeded to give me a copy of a well-know financial magazine and suggested I read it and consider subscribing. I would have invited him to come to church here, but I thought he might see it as an opportunity for expanding his customer base.

Two things struck me in the magazine's articles. One author wrote that President Bush "is not lacking in courage or the powers of decision making. But the fact that he will soon leave the White House has limited his willingness to take on radical commitments." Personally I'm not sure that's a bad thing, but it does leave a leadership vacuum in Washington until January 20, 2009.

A second author wrote about how the entrepreneurs of California's Silicon Valley voted for Obama in large numbers, even though he doesn't represent some values the writer ascribes to those entrepreneurs. The author wondered why. His answer: "hope and faith!" Hope for a better future.

What does that mean if, in truth, "the hopes and fears of all the years" come together in Jesus of Nazareth, the one through whom we learn what God is like?

What are your hopes this morning? What are your fears? An honest reading of the Bible leads us to understand that God never tells us we will get everything on our wish list. Yes, there are verses in the Gospels that say, "Ask and you will receive." But the asking is to be done "in Jesus' name," which means asking for what Jesus would have asked for, asking for what God intends for us, what we need and not what we desire.

People who know about such things tell us a basic human fear is fear of abandonment. We seem to be afraid of finding ourselves alone, of there being no one to care about us or care for us. God doesn't find a mate or partner for every one of us, at least not the mate or partner we think would satisfy all our needs or desires. But God does provide us with communities where we can find support and friendship, families of different kinds, families we can create where we can own up to our loneliness and feel it changing into a sense of belonging.

There is, of course, the fear of death, our own or the death of people we love. When I was in seminary, in my early twenties, a professor invited all his students to his home in small groups. He and his wife served coffee and cookies, and they invited us to see his extensive library. We all knew that they had lost a son in World War II, but I didn't know there was a picture of that son in the father's library. I was struck by how handsome the young man was in his military uniform, and I was even more struck by what his father had written at the bottom of the picture: "We asked for him length of days, but Thou gavest him eternal life." I remembered those words forty years later when I was burying my thirty-one year old daughter. It wasn't what I wanted for her, but there were gifts in it.

What are your fears, what are your hopes as we experience the uncertainty of worldwide economic crisis? The print and electronic media were talking this past week about the growing resentment that Washington can bail out banks and investment houses but asks assembly line workers to take pay cuts before bailing out the automobile manufacturers in Detroit. As I think about the wildly complex issues confronting the people trying to deal with what is surely a depression, I hear the words of this morning's readings from the Bible, and I am aware of the fact that they speak of God's care and concern for the lowly, the poor, the hungry, the brokenhearted.

What I come up with is that we desperately need to repair and enlarge the safety net that has become so torn in the last several years, fix it so that no one goes without food, shelter, medical care and the basic necessities of life. I don't believe God guarantees us the job we want or the living space we desire, but I do believe God wants every human being to have the basics of a decent life, whatever that may mean. At its very deepest level, I believe it means that God is with us, with us when we feel abandoned, with us when we feel beaten down and defeated, with us in life and in death.

Almost two thousand years ago, God said to the world through Jesus, "I am with you." That is at the center of Christmas truth. I invite you and I encourage you to relax and hear it. God is with you. God is with us. It is ironic that in celebration of a very simple story, we throw ourselves into a frenzy of complicated activities. It's easy to miss the good news of Christmas: God is with us. The hopes and fears of all the years are met in that reality: God is with us.

One of the best ways to honor the truth of Christmas is simply to be there for another human being in this season. Not in a frantic way, not worrying about having the perfect gift—simply being there, perhaps listening to or even touching another person on the arm or shoulder. What a gift—simply being there!

We need to be in touch with God, and with one another. We yearn for God-with-us the way we long for the touch of one we love.

More than thirty years ago a television drama based on a true story gripped the hearts of millions. A boy was born without an immune system. He was placed in a "bubble," and spent all his time there. He could tolerate no germs of any kind. The slightest infection would kill him. Anyone passing things to him as he lived in his antiseptic bubble had to wear rubber gloves. His parents could not touch him, and he could not touch them. After some years of such an existence, the boy began to deteriorate medically. The doctors wanted to keep him alive, but the boy said he had a simple request. He wanted to leave the bubble and hold his parents' hands--no gloves, just one hand in another. Reluctantly, knowing it would hasten his death, the doctors agreed. The appointed day arrived, and the boy held his parents' hands for the first time. His smile lit up the room.

Some things we can hardly live without: a sense of meaning, the awareness of being loved, the assurance that God is with us. This Christmas, wherever you are on your journey, may you entrust your hopes and fears to the God who self-disclosed in Jesus. And may you know the deep joy that is not tied to any particular circumstance, but that emerges from the unshakable conviction that nothing can separate you and yours from God's unconditional love.