Text: Luke 2:1-20
In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governing Syria. 3 And everyone went to register, each to his own town. 4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the town of Nazareth, into Judea, to the town of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was from the house and family line of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, his wife, who was pledged to him in marriage and was expecting a child.
6And so it was that while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son, wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
8There were in the same country shepherds staying out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock at night. 9 An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified! 10 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. For behold, I bring you good news of great joy, which will be for all people: 11 Today in the town of David, a Savior was born for you. He is Christ the Lord. 12 And this will be a sign for you: You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” 13 Suddenly, there was with the angel a multitude from the heavenly army, praising God and saying, 14“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward mankind.”
15When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Now let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16 So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. 17 When they had seen him, they told others the message they had been told about this child. 18 And all who heard it were amazed by what the shepherds said to them. 19 But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. 20 And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
Sermon
Our Christmas tradition in the Zarling house is that our family goes to church on Christmas Eve. Then we come back to our house, change into pajamas, and light a fire in the fireplace. We eat appetizers and drink grasshoppers. We go through our stockings. Then one of the girls sits by the Christmas tree handing out presents for everyone to open.
What are your family Christmas traditions? Maybe it’s going to church and then going to Grandma’s house on Christmas Eve. Or maybe it’s getting up early to open presents before church on Christmas Day. Maybe as you’ve gotten older, your tradition is traveling to see your grandchildren in their church’s or school’s Christmas service.
We find comfort in our traditions. There can be a sense of peace from doing the same things year after year. A smile can come to your face when you remember what you’ve done in years gone by.
But what happens when those familiar traditions don’t happen? Or can’t happen? Maybe your children have grown up and moved far away. Or maybe a family member is ill or in the hospital. Or maybe your home has been broken by divorce. Or maybe a parent or spouse has died and things just aren’t the same anymore.
Traditions can feel peaceful, but what if the peace is broken by anger. We can find comfort in similarity, but what if dissimilarity makes us uncomfortable. What if instead of joy and happiness, our Christmas celebration is filled with grumpiness, anxiety, and depression.
As children grow older, traditions change. As our world continues to corrupt what is good and godly, traditions change. As family moves away or loved ones pass away, and we are left alone and lonely, traditions change.
Christmas traditions are wonderful, but we need to be reminded that as Christians we do not find our comfort, peace, and joy in Christmas traditions. We find our comfort, peace, and joy in the Christmas Gospel that is traditionally read in churches on Christmas Eve.
Christmas traditions are wonderful. But make no mistake about it, Christmas is all about change. The Son of God came to change our world by becoming part of the world. Because we are part of the world, that means the Christmas Gospel changes us, too.
This Christmas Eve we see how Christ and Christmas changes us.
When we have to change plans, we make a phone call, send a text, email, or snapchat. When it was time to change the world – from Before Christ (B.C.) to Anno Domini (A.D.), from prophecies to fulfillment, from promises made to promises kept – God sent angels. Those angels lit up the Bethlehem sky announcing change had entered the world. The angel told the shepherds, “Do not be afraid. For behold, I bring you good news of great joy, which will be for all people: Today in the town of David, a Savior was born for you. He is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”
The Savior was born to change our fears. We have lots of reasons to be afraid. We should be afraid of the devil’s temptations, the world’s pleasures, and our sinful nature’s insatiable appetite to be filled with temptations and pleasures. Because we feed our appetites for more and more sin, we should rightly be afraid of God’s righteous judgment upon that sin. As sinners living in a fallen, sinful world, we are afraid of violence, illness, the economy, and ultimately death.
Yet, the angel said, “Do not be afraid.” The Savior is entering our world to remove our fears. We don’t need to be afraid because our God is always by our side to guide and guard us with his righteous right hand. He shields us from harm as we are safe and secure in the refuge of his Christian Church. We don’t even need to be afraid of walking through the darkest valley of death because we are given this assurance in Scripture, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow death, I fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me” (Psalm 23:4).
Our society is a mess right now. I tell my daughters and the teens I each that they are growing up in a time when a Supreme Court appointee cannot define what a woman is; when no one can say “no” because it will hurt people’s fragile feelings; when Christmas costs 16.5% more this year than last year; when film critics claim that white actors playing blue aliens is racist or something; when film director James Cameron says that testosterone is “a toxin you have to slowly work out of your system”; and when Stanford University says that the term “she” is “harmful language.”
We need some good news! That good news comes in the person of the Son of God born of a virgin and laid in the manger in Bethlehem. It is good news that our God kept his promises. It’s good news that our God loves us enough to send his Son as our Savior. He doesn’t come to fix our problems with language, race relations, roles of the sexes. He comes to fix our problem with sin. His words that teach us about sin and the Savior, also have great advice on language, race relations, the roles of the sexes, … and everything else.
It is good news that the Son of God was born under law to rescue and redeem those who are under the law. It is good news that this Savior pleased his Father and appeased his Father’s anger so we might be saved from the eternal wrath of God in the fires of hell.
The angel says this child is the Savior. One of the hardest things to do right now is convince ourselves and others that we are all sinners. We like to think we can make up for doing bad things by doing more good things. Or we believe we can pay off our debt to God with prayers, donations, or good works. But our debt is too great. We believe we can somehow erase our guilt. But the guilt remains.
We need God to step into our world to save us from our sin, from this sinful world, and from the devil who leads us into sin. He pays for our sins with his innocence and righteousness. He erases our guilt with his divinely human blood. He takes the punishment we deserve and gives us the blessing of forgiveness, new life, and salvation we don’t deserve.
Jesus is born to us as our Savior. What does that mean? It means that God wants you - he wants you so much that he is willing to come into this world as a tiny baby lying in a manger. It means that God wants you personally, you yourself, just as you are - because this baby will grow up to suffer and die for you, you yourself. It means that God wants you forever, because this baby Jesus will one day rise from the dead, and for what? To share that everlasting life with you, you whom he loves, so that you can be his forever.
The angel says, “Today in the town of David, a Savior was born for you.” For you! For you, poor shepherd, smelly and ignored and uneducated as you are. For you, disabled or shut-in or aging or living with chronic pain. For you, you with the bad reputation, whether you earned it or not. For you, you with the outwardly wonderful life, but inside you still feel lonely and troubled and wonder if anyone would want you if they knew the full truth about you.
To give the shepherds directions of where to find this child, the angel directs, “You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” Every make-believe, false religion in the world is about people coming to their gods. But Christianity is the only and true religion that teaches that God comes to us. He comes to us not as a present wrapped in paper, but a present wrapped in swaddling clothes. He is not place under the tree but placed into a manger. He’s not given to us by our parents but given to us by our heavenly Father. This is a present that brings peace on earth and good will to mankind.
Traditions bring comfort with a sense of familiarity and peace in our reminiscing. But traditions change over time. That’s OK. It’s good to change and start new traditions.
The Son of God was born into this world to bring change with him. I pray that one tradition never changes for you. That is the tradition in the Christian Church of hearing the Christmas Gospel from Luke’s pen on Christmas Eve. It’s a time when we reflect on the angel’s message of the change the Christ Child brings with him. “Do not be afraid. For behold, I bring you good news of great joy, which will be for all people: Today in the town of David, a Savior was born for you. He is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”
May our response to this good news of great joy be the same as the Christmas angels praising God and singing, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward mankind.” Amen.