Episodes
Thursday Dec 24, 2015
Now. Here. This.
Thursday Dec 24, 2015
Thursday Dec 24, 2015
A homily preached by Rev. Ginger E. Gaines-Cirelli at Foundry UMC, December 24, 2015, Christmas Eve.
Text: Luke 2:1-20
I don’t know about you, but Christmas pulls me in all sorts of directions. Memories of Christmases past, joyful nostalgia, and grief for what—and who—is no longer present pull me backward. Anticipation and anxiety of a new year looming so close—what I know is coming up and all that I know will come as a surprise—pull me forward. At this time of year, there are many different places that I feel I need to be, often at the same time. The many needs and concerns of family, church, city, and world weigh heavy and tug at my heart and attention. Perhaps you experience some of these things too during this season.
As I prepared for this Christmas Eve, I found myself thinking about the way that coming to worship on this night provides a place to stop, to rest midst all the activity and the pushes and pulls of our lives. I thought about how tonight gives us an opportunity for all the disparate parts of ourselves to be “gathered in,” an opportunity to regain perspective, to be silent and still enough to remember what is most true, most real, what matters most of all. It makes me think of the way my friend David describes his weekly experience of Shabbat within the Jewish tradition. After sharing Shabbat dinner with David’s family, he sent me a copy of one of the prayers. It begins, “As I light these Shabbat candles, I feel the frenzied momentum of the week slowly draining from my body. I thank You, Creator… for moments to redirect my energies toward those treasures in my life which I hold most dear. Had You not in Your infinite wisdom created this Shabbat day, I may not have stopped in time.” That last phrase is the one that captures my attention… “I may not have stopped in time.”
“Now hear this” is a phrase used in the United States Navy to instruct personnel to give attention to an order or command about to follow. Tonight, we don’t receive an order. We receive an invitation. The invitation is to “stop in time,” to replace the frantic “When? Where? What?” with the gift of now…here… this. We are invited to settle in for a handful of minutes to be in this time, in this place, to let go of whatever would pull us away or distract us from the experience of this present moment and all that it offers to us as a gift. If we can stop in time and be attentive to now, here, we might be open enough to receive the extraordinary message first delivered to those shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night: A child has been born for us, a savior, who is the messiah, the Lord.
Tonight we find ourselves among the throng who have gathered around the firelight for centuries to recount this ancient tale. And regardless of our various levels of acceptance for the details of the story, regardless of whether you are in a position tonight to claim belief in angels, in miracles, in a virgin birth, even in God-incarnate, we have all been drawn to the deep blue of night around the light of candles, beckoned by a message, a promise, a glimpse, perhaps of the glory of God, and we are drawn together again, just as those shepherds and animals and kings were drawn together so many years ago, to gather around a baby in a barn. There is a truth so deep in this story, a promise so compelling, a quickening of the heart that is so strangely familiar, that we gather again and again to try our hand at holding this precious life.
Now…here…this… if we are willing and able to be fully present and to muster even a tiny hope, then we open ourselves to receive the gift that is given on this holy night. The gift is the assurance of God’s love. The promise is that this precious life that has come into the world, this Christ child we yearn to hold—is always, already holding us. God’s love has held us all from the very beginning. That is why Jesus was born…to show us the depth of God’s love for us, to reveal to us God’s dream of healing and liberation of this beautiful, broken world, and to reveal God’s vision of love, peace, and reconciliation among all God’s children. It is a very simple message, really, the message of Christmas. The divine creator and source of all that is has a heart. And that heart once beat in a flesh and blood person who was born to love us, and by that love to save us all—you and me and the whole world, even those among us who are hardest to love and save. We are—every one of us—held in the love of God. Now. Here. In whatever state you are in, whatever situation weighs upon you, whatever decision has to be made, whatever struggle persists in your life. Now. Here…This is the gift: A child has been born for you, a savior, who is the messiah, the Lord. And that savior bears a love that sets you free, that believes in you, that gives you courage, that forgives you, that comforts you, that grants you peace, that gives you hope, and that honors you with responsibility for your own life and grace to persevere and to thrive.
God’s love is like a light that, once it dwells in us, can shine through us to give light to others. The Shabbat prayer ends this way, “Light kindled…is a reminder. It reminds us that a solitary flame can light up darkness, that hope can be kindled even in despair, that we can wrest light from darkness. May my life be strengthened by hope. May my life be warmed by the divine light of compassion; may my life with others reflect that light.” Now. Here. May the light of God’s love be kindled within you, strengthening your life by hope. May your life be warmed by the divine light of compassion, may your life with others reflect that light, may God’s heart beat in yours. Merry Christmas!
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