Sunday, Dec. 22, 2019 Fourth Sunday in Advent; and Dec. 24, 2019, Christmas Eve – Titus 2:11-14; Luke 2:1-20
“For the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation to all…while we wait for the manifestation of the glory of God in Jesus Christ.”
“Love came down at Christmas, love all lovely, love divine; Love was born at Christmas; star and angels gave the sign.” (UM Hymnal)
Courtesy of Jeremy Smith
Christmas Nativity
On bright starry nights reflecting off the new snow, Jan and I like to stand on a hillside and watch the silent stars go by. Once in a while we also see some amazing unexplainable lights flash across the sky. Jan is sure it is visitors, I am not as sure, but then I have no better explanation.
This I know for certain: On Christmas Eve 2019 as we might stand on that hill, the old planet, our mother, will be following its orbit around the sun at a speed of six thousand miles per hour, and in so doing create the season of winter in the Northern Hemisphere and summer in the Southern Hemisphere. While it races around the sun, the earth revolves on its axis at more than a thousand miles per hour; turning from west to east, it creates night and day.
And Jan has it right: out beyond our world, other worlds are spinning and racing through the heavens. But here on this amazing blue planet, a bit egg-shaped, that we call Mother Earth, it is Christmas Eve, we are alive, and life is abundantly given.
Tilt this old planet just few degrees in either direction and we would either burn up or freeze. But she hangs there just right, one of God’s Christmas tree ornaments carefully placed.
Can you imagine John looking up into the starry night and declaring his Gospel? In the beginning, there was the deep silence, darkness. The Word proceeds out of the darkness. Much of what we know is first preserved in darkness.
We have all heard the sounds that break the silence:
Taps on a lonely hillside,
the ticking of a clock,
a baby’s cry at midnight.
And when the house is shut for the night, we think, “’Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.”
Ignatius of Antioch spoke of how God framed silence: Three great mysteries — the virgin Mary, the birth of Jesus, the death on the cross – all wrought in silence.
Christmas begins in silence
Angels speak to shepherds
There is a baby’s low cry
What is conceived in silence
Is first heard as a whisper
But soon it will be shouted from the rooftops:
Love is stronger than death!
We are not abandoned to darkness
Starlight invades our darkness
Angels sing and the vaults of heaven ring.
Meanwhile, here in Iowa, the faithful gather,
Light candles, and sing “Silent Night.”
And wait for the glad morning.
The Rev. Bill Cotton of Des Moines is a retired clergy member of the Iowa Annual Conference. Together with friends and colleagues, he produces the weekly sermon resource, "MEMO for Those Who Preach." His reflections are published here with the author's permission.