Gloria Dei Lutheran Church | Urbandale, Iowa

Is Christmas Over Already?

Pastor Robarge’s Sermon

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Christmas is over. For some, that brings excitement and for some, depression. My wife’s best friend is kind of known for the 26th of December to have every single Christmas decoration boxed up and put away. That means inside the house and outside the house. It doesn’t matter, by the 26th of December, she has everything put away. She doesn’t want to see it anymore. She takes it down and boxes it up and stores it away until next year.

Is that what you’re doing this year? Boxing things up and putting them away? I came across an international holiday that’s not celebrated here in the United States but it’s called “Boxing Day” and that’s actually not the connotation but it just sounds to me that it’s very similar to what it is that we do after Christmas. Something doesn’t fit, we box it up and we take it back. Maybe we box up all the stuff that we don’t need anymore because we have all this new stuff. We box it up and give it away.

Is that what we’re going this Christmas is we’re just ready to box it up and put it away? Is that what happens already? This morning, I’ll make a bit of a confession. Christmas is not my favorite holiday. And if you talk to my wife, she’d probably put it a little bit harsher than that. There’s something about the season that is somewhat of a letdown for me. There’s so much anticipation, so much time that is built up to get to a point where it doesn’t seem to satisfy. I can’t tell you directly what it is that does it, but I get to a point where there is so much build up, there’s so much preparation, earlier and earlier it happens and then the day gets here and it’s like, “Oh, something’s missing. What did I miss in all that preparation?” Maybe you missed out, too.

It’s hard for me, as preparing for this message, to find out why it is that I shouldn’t tell you to box things up and put them away because sometimes that’s the way I feel about Christmas. Why not box it up and put it away? And as I’ve explored it, as I’ve contemplated this very issue, I’ve noticed that I failed. These years that I’ve been let down, these years that I haven’t taken part of the full season of what it’s meant to be, I failed. I failed to see the awe and the wonder that’s found in Jesus. Everything else seems to surround it. Everything else seems to be hyped up but not failing to see the awe and the wonder that’s found in Jesus Christ. Maybe you’re with me this morning. Maybe something was a letdown this past Christmas.

We’re not the only ones. Look at this story from the two people who we would assume wouldn’t miss the awe and the wonder, let’s look at the story that we find today in our text. Mary and Joseph taking Jesus to the temple to have Him dedicated, just as every Jewish male boy must, on the eighth day, be circumcised. So they bring Him to the temple to get all that stuff done. People start talking about Jesus. They’re pointing things out about Jesus and it says that “Mary and Joseph were marveled at what was said about Him.” This is the same Mary and Joseph that, days before, shepherds out of nowhere came to see the birth of this baby boy. It’s the same Mary and Joseph who, nine months prior to this, were visited by angels telling them about who this child will be. And yet, here they are in the temple hearing these words from other people. They’re marveled. They’re amazed. They’re probably puzzled. And we ask, “Why is that?”

Mary and Joseph, it seems, need a constant reminder of who it is that this child is because the story continues later on when we see in Luke what happens next. We see Jesus at 12 years old. They’re in the temple. They’ve gone down to Jerusalem for the feast of the Passover and, as it is, most of the families would travel together down to where it is in Jerusalem they needed to be. But as they traveled back from the feast, they noticed that Jesus wasn’t with them. And it probably wasn’t even until they were almost home that they noticed, “We’re missing somebody.” So Mary and Joseph traveled back down to Jerusalem to find Jesus.

And where was Jesus? This is what it says. “They find Him. He’s sitting in the temple. He’s listening, asking questions. People are marveled and amazed at what Jesus is saying. Mary and Joseph say, ‘Son, where have you been? Why have you done this to us?’” This is what Jesus said, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” And this it what it says about Mary and Joseph, “And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them.” Mary and Joseph continue to need to be reminded. It seems that they boxed up what was there at Jesus’ birth. They said, “Well, let’s box this up and put it away. We’ll take it out sometime when we need it.” But they need a continual reminder over and over again that this child, this teenager, is something special. But they failed to see the awe and the wonder that was found in Jesus. They needed to be reminded.

Well, it looks like Mary ends up needing to be reminded again. This happens later. We look at the gospel of Mark Chapter 3. This is when Jesus just starts His earthly ministry and He’s out doing the things that are prophesied of Him. He’s out healing people, proclaiming the good news, raising people from the dead. And this is what it says about His family, “And when His family heard it, they went out to seize Him for they were saying ‘He’s out of His mind. He’s crazy. He doesn’t know what He’s doing.’” So here’s Mary again. Jesus is starting His earthly ministry. She doesn’t realize that this is what He’s supposed to do. This is His reason for coming to the earth. She needs to be reminded of who He is.

So this is the story as it continues, “And His mother and His brothers came standing outside. They sent to Him and called to Him. The crowd was sitting around Him and they said to Him, ‘Your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.’ And He answered them, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking about at those who sat around Him, He said, ‘Here is my mother and my brothers, for whoever does the will of God, He is my brother and sister and mother.’” Jesus in no way was trying to deny His relationship with His mother but yet He was reminding her about who He was, about what He was called to do, about the message that He was supposed to proclaim.

Mary needed reminding and maybe we do, too. Maybe we need that constant reminding of who this Jesus is, as we fail to see the awe and the wonder that’s found in this Christ child on Christmas Day. But we have a reminder today. We have a reminder that’s found right in our text. We have a number of individuals who don’t fail. They see the awe and the wonder that’s found right here in Jesus Christ. There was a man named Simeon. It says he was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel. He sees Jesus. He puts Him in his arms and this is what he says, “Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.” This man, Simeon, a little bit older in age, says that the Lord calls him to that place, calls him to the temple to see this Christ child. He didn’t fail to see the awe and the wonder, for when he saw Jesus face to face, he looked Him in the eyes and he said, “This is the salvation that you have prepared for your people.” That’s where the awe was. That’s where the wonder was, the salvation found in Jesus Christ. He said, “This is the salvation of Jesus. He’s come to live but He’s also come to die.” This is awesome. This is wonderful.

We see another woman, prophetess Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin. And then as a widow until she was 84. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping and fasting with prayer, night and day. She was coming up at that very hour, she began to give thanks to God and speak of Him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Israel. So here it is, we see another woman. Her name is Anna. It says that she stayed in the temple. She was 84 at this time. It says she was only married seven years. In that time, in that custom, she was probably married at around teenage years. She was married only seven years and then stayed in the temple the rest of her life. We’re looking at somewhere between 50, 60 years probably that she was in that temple, waiting to see, waiting to hear about the salvation from God. And then she saw Him. There was Jesus. She didn’t fail to see the awe and the wonder that was found in the Christ child. She didn’t fail to see that this child was something special, but she began to tell all the people around her. “This child contains salvation. This child is God in the flesh. And He’s come to save His people.” She didn’t allow people to not see the awe and the wonder that was found in this child.

And there were others. We look at the shepherds as they were out in the fields in the night keeping watch over their flocks. When the angels came to them, they said, “Fear not for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people.” And when the angels went away from them and went into the heavens, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem to see this thing that has happened.” And there they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in a manger. So we see these shepherds. The shepherds quake at the very sight and the sound of the angels as they come to visit them. They hear the story of Jesus being born. They don’t wait. They don’t say, “Ah, that’s a great message. Let’s box it up and wait until next year.” But they run in haste to go and see what has happened and they stand at that manger and they look into the eyes of Jesus and they see the salvation that has come in Him. They see the awe and the wonder that’s found in the Christ child.

But the shepherds quake. Why don’t we? We know of Jesus’ birth, His life, His death and His resurrection. We know so much more. We know of the place where He was doing His earthly ministry. We know the message of forgiveness, the message of love and what an awesome message that is. It should leave us quaking at the very sight of it. It should leave us quaking at the very presence of our God as we come here and worship Him. And yet, do we fail to see the awe and the wonder? The gift of Jesus is found right there at His birth. It all starts at His birth. So it doesn’t matter what time of year we look at it. We can always go back to His birth. We don’t have to spend Christmas saying, “Let’s worship Him here, box Him up and put Him away until next year.” We can say the salvation starts here as a child. That’s where the awe and the wonder are first found. The salvation for us, His people.

Just like the shepherds, we can then go and tell others of what we have seen. The awe and the wonder move people to want to share. The awe and the wonder that are found in that Christ child move us to want to share with others the message of salvation. It says it doesn’t matter if you’re poor or rich or educated or uneducated or young or old. It doesn’t matter who it is or what it is. Tell the story. Tell the story that is within you. All of creation needs to know of its Creator. All of creation needs to know the salvation that’s found in the Christ child.

So this year, if you’re like me and sometimes ready to just pack it up and leave it behind, I’ll tell you what, this year maybe we should just box it up but not to move on, not to leave it behind but maybe it’s so we can start to focus on the awe and the wonder that’s found in Jesus Christ. Don’t just let this remain another story. Don’t let it just remain something that we take out once a year. Continue to see the awe and the wonder found in Jesus Christ. Amen.