These Illustrations are based on Matthew 3:1-12
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Sermon Opener - Repent Your Way to a Merry Christmas - Matthew 3:1-12
A number of years ago a couple traveled to the offices of an Adoption Society in England to receive a baby. They had been on the waiting list a long time. They had been interviewed and carefully scrutinized. Now at last their dreams were to be fulfilled. But their day of happiness was another's pain.
Arriving at the offices of the Society they were led up a flight of stairs to a waiting room. After a few minutes they heard someone else climbing the stairs. It was the young student mother whose baby was to be adopted. She was met by the lady responsible for the adoption arrangements and taken into another room. Our friends heard a muffled conversation and a few minutes later footsteps on the stairs as the young mother left. They heard her convulsive sobbing until the front door of the office was closed. Then, there was silence.
The lady in charge then conducted them next door. In a little crib was a six week old baby boy. On a chair beside it was a brown paper bag containing a change of clothes and two letters. One of these, addressed to the new parents, thanked them for providing a home for her baby and acknowledged that under the terms of the adoption each would never know the other's identity. Then the young mother added one request. Would they allow her little son to read the other letter on his eighteenth birthday? She assured them that she had not included any information about her identity. The couple entrusted that letter to a lawyer and one day the young man will read the message which his mother wrote on the day, when with breaking heart, she parted with him.
I wonder what she wrote? If I had to condense all I feel about life and love into a few precious words what would I say? I would have no time for trivia. I would not be concerned about economics, politics, the weather, the size of house or the type of car. At such a time I would want to dwell on the profundities, on what life was all about and what things were absolutely essential.
John in the desert was in the great tradition of the Hebrew prophets. He was aware that time was running out. In his burning message he had no time for peripheral matters. He was not playing Trivial Pursuit nor was he prepared to splash about in the shallows. Soon the sword of Herod's guard would flash and his tongue would lie silent in the grave…
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Less Fear; More Fruit - Matthew 3:1-12
“Be afraid. Be very afraid.”
The year is 1986 and the movie is the remake of the classic horror film, “The Fly.”
Jeff Goldbum plays the eccentric scientist, Seth Brundle, who is working on a machine that will teleport people and things by disassembling their molecules at one point and reassembling them at another. Geena Davis plays Veronica Quaife, a reporter who is writing Brundle’s story.
Unfortunately, when Brundle tries to transport himself from one room to another, a housefly is inadvertently trapped in the device and its molecules get co-mingled with those of the scientist. Their DNA’s mix and as the movie progresses, we see Jeff Goldblum turning into a huge fly.
When an unsuspecting woman sees what is happening to Brundle he pleads with her, “Please, don’t be afraid.” Quaife, the reporter, knows better, however. She tells the woman, “No. Be afraid. Be very afraid.”
That line was one of three taglines that were recreated on posters and billboards and in trailers for the film but it was the one that stuck. In fact, after more than twenty years, that one line from a fairly pedestrian pop culture movie has become part of our cultural vocabulary, usually just shortened to, “Be afraid.”
Of course, David Cronenberg, the head writer for the movie knew what he was doing. Versions of that line or lines very like it had been used before by other writers aiming for high drama.
Shelley wrote, in his sonnet, Ozymandias:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Isaiah wrote in chapter 32:
Tremble, ye women that are at ease;
be troubled, ye careless ones...
Even Saint Paul was not above a little sensationalism when he wrote in Romans:
For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain...
See, fear sells. Fear is good for business.
This fear culture has been created from several sources…
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Are You Swapping Heaven?
The great old evangelist, Dwight L. Moody, used to tell a legend about a beautiful swan that alighted one day by the banks of the water in which a crane was wading about seeking snails. For a few moments the crane viewed the swan in stupid wonder and then inquired:
"Where do you come from?"
"I come from heaven!" replied the swan.
"And where is heaven?" asked the crane.
"Heaven!" said the swan, "Heaven! have you never heard of heaven?" And the beautiful bird went on to describe the grandeur of the Eternal City. She told of streets of gold, and the gates and walls made of precious stones; of the river of life, pure as crystal, upon whose banks is the tree whose leaves shall be for the healing of the nations. In eloquent terms the swan sought to describe the hosts who live in the other world, but without arousing the slightest interest on the part of the crane.
Finally the crane asked: "Are there any snails there?"
"Snails!" repeated the swan, "No! Of course there are not."
"Then," said the crane, as it continued its search along the slimy banks of the pool, "you can have your heaven. I want snails!"
"This fable," said Moody, "has a deep truth underlying it. How many a young person to whom God has granted the advantages of a Christian home, has turned his back upon it and searched for snails! How many a man will sacrifice his wife, his family, his all, for the snails of sin! How many a girl has deliberately turned from the love of parents and home to learn too late that heaven has been forfeited for snails!"
Moody spoke those words a century ago, but people are still swapping heaven for snails. How about you? John the Baptist's words are for each of us: Are there some changes that need to be made in your life?
Moody's Anecdotes, Page 125-126, adapted by King Duncan
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It Was a Dark and Stormy Night
Snoopy of Charlie Brown comic strip fame is typing a novel. He begins his story, "It was a dark and stormy night ..." Snoopy always starts his stories in this manner. Lucy looks at what Snoopy has written. She goes into a tirade, putting down Snoopy for such a silly beginning. Doesn't Snoopy know that any good story starts with the words, "Once upon a time ..."
The last frame of the comic strip has Snoopy starting his story again. Now he is ready. He types, "Once upon a time, it was a dark and stormy night." Do you feel like Snoopy sometimes? No matter how you begin your story you somehow revert to "a dark and stormy night." If you feel that way today you are not alone. Most of us are struggling in one way or another to overcome the dark side of our existence.
The Advent season leading to Christmas should be a time of joy, anticipation and hope. But, the very fact that it is supposed to be such an upbeat time only compounds the problem.
Richard A. Hasler, Empowered by the Light, CSS Publishing Company
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I Will Be There
In her wonderful children’s picture book “We Were There: A Nativity Story,” Eve Bunting (illustrator: Wendell Minor) turns Christmas upside down for us in ways that are revealing.
The simple story shows us first a slithering snake, then a warty toad, a scary scorpion, a shiny cockroach, a swooping bat, a hairy spider, and a furry rat all on a journey. Each creature introduces itself and then concludes with the words “I will be there.”
As the book ends we are shown more common nativity creatures: fuzzy lambs, doe-eyed donkeys, gentle cows. But as those traditional figures in the stable stand around the manger in which the Babe has been laid by his mother Mary, we see in the corner, unnoticed, that small gathering of the snake, toad, scorpion, cockroach, bat, spider, and rat.
Bunting has found a lyric way to remind us that the coming of the Christ is not all about the traditional and cozy trappings in which we have for too long ensconced the Christmas story but that this is a story for all creatures and that Jesus came to embrace and renew the good, the bad, the ugly; the expected and the unexpected.
A simple children’s story like this reminds us of the paradoxes and unexpected twists of the season, rather the way John the Baptist can shake things up for us if only we take time to listen to his message.
Scott Hoezee, Comments and Observations
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We Need John
When our children were small, a nice church lady named Chris made them a child-friendly crèche. All the actors in this stable drama are soft and squishy and durable - perfect to touch and rearrange - or toss across the living room in a fit of toddler frenzy. The Joseph character has always been my favorite because he looks a little wild - red yarn spiking out from his head, giving him an odd look of energy. In fact, I have renamed this character John the Baptist and in my mind substituted one of the innocuous shepherds for the more staid and solid Joseph. Why this invention? Because, over the years, I have decided that without the disconcerting presence of John lurking in the shadows of our manger scenes, the Jesus story is mush - nothing but child's play, lulling us into sleepy sentimentality.
Susan R. Andrews, Sermons for Sundays: In Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany: The Offense of Grace, CSS Publishing Company
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The King Is Coming
Can you imagine complete silence? It’s hard to in our culture today in which televisions, radios, etc. are constantly blaring. But in this morning’s text a silence of 400 years is broken. Don’t misunderstand me, not everyone was silent during this period. Women and men were talking.. Boys and girls were talking. But there was no prophet speaking the Word of the LORD. No one was truthfully saying, “Thus says the LORD…”
In reality two silences are broken in this morning’s text. For one, the 400 year period without a Word from God and for another, a gap of approximately 30 years in the life of Jesus. Matthew skips directly from his birth and infancy narrative to an event that occurs approximately 30 years later: the ministry of John the Baptist. Both of these silences are broken by the sound of a voice.
The voice which breaks the silence is the voice of John the Baptist, who may rightly be called the last of the Old Testament Prophets. He is functioning as a Herald by announcing the coming of the King. In the ancient world, a herald was one who went ahead of a king’s chariot to prepare the road. He would command a crew which would smooth out the usually rough roads of that day by filling potholes and removing boulders. The herald would also go before the king shouting, “Make way, the King is coming!” One commentator noted that such “efforts to make a road level and smooth were restricted to times when royalty was on its way” (Robert Mounce, Matthew NIBC, 23).
This was the function of John the Baptist.
Steve Weaver, The Herald of the King
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Time to Prepare
Christmas season. A time of preparation. Most Americans prepare for the holidays with lights and gifts, cards and good cheer. But the Church reminds us to prepare spiritually. What does that mean? In Matthew's gospel, John the Baptist gave us a direction. Matthew's gospel presented the Baptist in the context of prophecy about him, his arena and audience, his place in the religious pecking order, and his reason for preaching.
Larry Broding, Spiritual Preparation
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Taking the Fun Out of Christmas
We prepare for Christmas by repenting. Repenting in the Biblical sense is more than having a change of heart or a feeling of regret. It is more than a New Year’s Eve resolution. Repentance is a turning away and a turning back. A turning away from sin and a turning back to God.
Bishop Joe Pennel of the Virginia Conference of the United Methodist Church, once attended a Christmas worship service in Bethlehem at a place called Shepherd’s Field. As he heard the songs of the season, he thought to himself and later wrote: “I did not look to God and say: See how virtuous I am. I did not utter: God, pat me on the back for all of the good things I have done. I did not pretend by saying: God, look at all of my accomplishments, aren’t you proud of me? Indeed, I found myself asking God to forgive me of my sins. That is how it works. The more we turn away from Christ the more enslaved we become to the power of sin. The more we turn to Christ, the more free we become from the bondage of sin. Turning toward Christ enables us to repent.”
Someone once said half jokingly: If we are not careful, John the Baptist can take all of the fun out of Christmas. I disagree. I think that it is John’s message that puts the joy into Christmas. For it is his message that calls us not to the way that Christmas is, but that the way Christmas ought to be. Christmas ought to be free from guilt and self-absorption. For that to occur there must be repentance.
Staff, www.eSermons.com
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Recognizing our Need to Repent
One critic said he had gone to many churches and heard the preacher say, "Don't try to impress God with your works" or "Don't attempt to please God with your merits" or "Don't try to keep the rules and regulations and thus win your way." He looked around at nearly slumbering collections of utterly casual Christians and wondered, "Who's trying?"
Martin Marty
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Repent and Keep the Dream Alive!
African American poet Langston Hughes questions in one of his poems, “What happens to a dream deferred?…Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?…Or does it explode?” Dreams long squelched by injustice may well explode in anger and rage, but I suspect that, for most of us, the far greater danger is of our dreams drying up like raisins in the sun. Is there any greater tragedy than those whose lives have become little more than mere existence, their dreams long since petrified and forgotten?
John the Baptist was one who would not allow his dream to be shattered. It was a dream of a coming Messiah, the One who would set life aright, the One who would open the way to abundant joy and peace and hope and life. And to keep that dream alive, the Baptist shouted a message of repentance. Biblical repentance is not simply a matter of remorse for past sins and shortcomings; much more, it is a turning around, the taking on of a new set of values, a new perspective towards life, a new way of living. Even more, repentance is a matter of embracing a whole new identity as the people of God, recognizing that something radically new is unfolding and that you and I have significant roles to play as participants in the story.
Joel D. Kline, Taxing the Imagination
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Repentance
When a man undertakes to repent toward his fellowmen, it is repenting straight up a precipice; when he repents toward law, it is repenting into the crocodile's jaws; when he repents toward public sentiment, it is throwing himself into a thicket of brambles and thorns; but when he repents toward God, he repents toward all love and delicacy. God receives the soul as the sea the bather, to return it again, purer and whiter than he took it.
Henry Ward Beecher
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What the Future Holds
Have you seen ancient maps of unexplored portions of the world? Maps that portrayed the prevailing ideas of what lay beyond, the unexplored lands and the uncrossed seas? Maps from before the adventures of Marco Polo and Christopher Columbus and Ferdinand Magellan? How grotesquely inaccurate those maps were! How vastly they differed from what the explorer eventually found! How fantastic were the notions the ancients had about what was out there - a dropping-off-place, mammoth sea serpents to swallow up ships. But as things turned out, it wasn’t that way at all. You know, if Columbus had believed half the maps and legends of his time he would never have lifted an anchor!
Well, we are all traveling into the unexplored land, and we ought to be careful how we map it until we’ve traveled there. Certainly we shouldn’t let the future do things to us it never meant to do. It is my faith that the future means to be friendly; and I don’t think we ought to treat it as an enemy. If we do, and start in to do battle with it, I can tell you this: it’s a battle we can never win. Let’s not suspect it of standing over us with a club waiting for a chance to clobber us into the ground, or of lurking in the shadows to pounce upon us around the next dark corner.
And surely we shouldn’t be afraid of the future - not if we are Christians. I am hearing Jesus say, "I am the way." And he is talking about himself, and about you, and about your future, and about your journey into it. He is saying that he is the way all the way through, beyond whatever it is, even beyond death - and especially beyond it. Yes, some days will be darker than others - which means, of course, that the others will be brighter. Were this not so we couldn’t make the comparison in the first place, could we? In the conflict between our future-related hopes and fears, we must keep our hopes in control, and we can if we are walking into tomorrow hand in hand with one who is going on. He isn’t going to drop our hand out there somewhere and say, "So long; it was nice to have you walk with me; but this is as far as we go."
When I was calling on him in a hospital, a good man said to me, "I am not afraid of dying." And I said to him, "Why should you be? For, after all, if you are walking with your hand in our Lord’s hand, after you have died your hand will still be in his." Often in hospital rooms I have had occasion to say, "Every day is a good day when you are going in the right direction." And it is.
Leonard Mann, Stars You Never Saw Before, CSS Publishing Co., Inc.
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ADDITIONAL ILLUSTRATIONS NOT IN OUR EMAIL
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Romans 15:4-13 – The Oneness of Twoness
If anyone still doubts that we are living in a post-Christian, even anti-Christian culture, you have only to open your eyes to the fights going on about how to handle the “Christmas” season.
I can tell people stories from my own life and ministry about how things have changed and these stories don’t seem to register.
Here’s one story: It used to be that if you wanted to attract people to you, you’d carry a Bible on a plane. Nowadays, want to keep people away from you? Carry a Bible on a plane.
Here’s another: At a wedding rehearsal not too long ago, a 7-year old girl stood outside the church, crying hysterically at the top of her lungs: “I DON’T WANT TO GO IN THAT PLACE.”
If you would have told me at the beginning of my ministry that I would live to see the church as a scary place for a large portion of the population, I would have laughed in your face.
But those are just stories for most Christians who live bubble-wrapped lives inside their Christian bubble.
Christmas seems to bring the reality of this post-Christian culture close to home and to heart. Is our greeting “Merry Christmas” or is it, as at Wal-mart, “Happy Holidays.” Is it a “Christmas tree” or is it a “Holiday Tree?”
This year for the first time since our fourth grader has been in the public school system, the kids are putting on a “holiday concert” that includes actual Christmas carols. Yes, Rudolph and Jingle Bells are highlighted the most. But mixed in the program are traditional carols that ask “What Child is This?” or that describe the journey of those “Three Kings.” There are also a couple pieces being sung in Spanish that I don’t recognize but have the name “Jesus” in them.
Of course, the fourth-graders are also going to sing about Chanukah, and perform a “dreidle song.” But after many years of banning Christian customs and carols, the school district apparently decided that instead of pretending no one is celebrating anything in particular, they will let the kids sing a little bit about everyone’s festivals and festivities.
Who knows: maybe the thought here is that since they cannot possibly please everybody, they might as well offend everybody!
Who could have predicted: but in these dawning days of the 21st century, the favorite seasonal image, the most popular “pitchman” used by advertisers, and analysts, is NOT Santa. It is NOT Christmas trees or holiday hearths. It is NOT menorahs, starlights or candlelights.
It is . . . the Snowman.
The Snowman (not limited to “Frosty”) is used to sell everything from diamonds to dishes, sports cars to surfboards. The Snowman is the perfect, perky, yet bland image loved by everyone and offensive to no one. The politically correct “Snowman” can sell anything to anyone without crunching on any cultural toes.
The Christmas story is definitely not “a-cultural.” As disciples of Jesus enter the second week of Advent, we should take note of where and to whom this journey takes us. The miracle of Jesus’ birth is not just that “the Word became flesh.” It is also that Jesus “dwelt among us” in such a way that we “beheld God’s glory.”
1. The Twoness of the Christmas Story
2. Paul’s Call for Oneness
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The Irrational Season - Romans 15:4-13 by Leonard Sweet
One brief, sunny morning a woman looked out her living room window and was amazed to discover a dead mule on her lawn. Immediately she called the sanitation department and asked them to remove the carcass. But by the time the work-crew arrived, she had changed her mind. She gave the men $100.00 each, instructing them to carry the mule upstairs and to deposit it in the bathtub.
After they had dutifully followed her instructions, one of the workers asked why she wanted the dead mule in her bathtub.
She said, “Well, for 35 years my husband has been coming home at night, throwing his coat on the rack, grabbing the newspaper, plopping into the easy chair and asking, ‘What’s new?’ Tonight, I’m going to tell him.”
What’s new this Christmas?
Every year we plop ourselves down in the Christmas calendar and ask:
What’s “hottest?”
Who’s got the most popular gift?
What’s the best of the best?
What toy/gizmo requires a five-hour wait in line?
Every Christmas season there is some new sound, or flavor, or decoration, or game, or cell-phone “app” that defines the cutting edge of “cool.” And probably the memory of waiting in line, clawing through a crowd, falling into debt, will linger longer than the “new,” “cool,” “hot” thing you suffered for.
But wait a minute? Isn’t the exact opposite equally true?
It’s the “old” stuff that we hanker after and hunger for. We hang the ratty old homemade ornaments on the tree. We crave the same old cookie recipes. We want to hear the old arrangements of the familiar carols we heard as kids. The candle wax spotted tablecloth is reinstated. That strange cheeseball thing reappears.
So which is it? Sameness or Newness?
The truth is Christmas finds us caught between our quest for the new and our yearning for the old. We are starved for new stories about the same old thing.
The “Hallmark” channel is showing repeats of every schmaltzy Christmas movie ever made 24-7 from Thanksgiving Eve through Christmas Day. But the sappy sentimentality of those shows doesn’t fill the hole in our soul. Ernest Hemingway called sentimentality “an emotion you don’t have to pay for.”
The real emotions of a real Advent season are genuinely costly and consistently creative—that means they engage creation. In this week’s epistle text Paul is “engaging” a real community of first generation Christians…
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Take the Garbage Out
The poet Shel Silverstein wrote a rather humorous poem called: Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout Would Not Take The Garbage Out! Let me share it with you.
Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout
Would not take the garbage out!
She'd scour the pots and scrape the pans,
Candy the yams and spice the hams,
And though her Daddy would scream and shout
She simply would not take the garbage out.
And so it piled up to the ceilings:
Coffee grounds, potato peelings,
Brown bananas, rotten peas,
Chunks of sour cottage cheese.
It filled the can, it covered the floor,
It cracked the window and blocked the door
With bacon rinds and chicken bones,
Drippy ends of ice cream cones,
Prune pits, peach pits, orange peel,
Gloppy glumps of cold oatmeal,
Pizza crusts and withered greens,
Soggy beans and tangerines,
Crusts of black burned buttered toast,
Gristly bits of beefy roasts . . .
The garbage can rolled on down the hall,
It raised the roof, it broke the wall . . .
Greasy napkins, cookie crumbs,
Globs of gooey bubble gum,
Cellophane from green baloney,
Rubbery blubbery macaroni,
Peanut butter, caked and dry,
Curdled milk and crusts of pie,
Moldy melons, dried up mustard,
Eggshells mixed with lemon custard,
Cold french fries and rancid meat,
Yellow lumps of cream of wheat.
At last the garbage reached so high
That finally it touched the sky.
And all the neighbors moved away,
And none of her friends would come to play.
And finally Sarah Cynthia Stout
Said, "OK, I'll take the garbage out!"
But then, of course, it was too late . . .
The garbage reached across the state,
From New York to the Golden Gate.
And there, in the garbage she did hate,
Poor Sarah met an awful fate,
That I cannot right now relate
Because the hour is too late.
But children, remember Sarah Stout
And always take the garbage out!
We are all like Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout. We have not taken the garbage out. We keep our sins, as wretched as they may be, we will not get them out. The garbage of our sins, stinks up our lives. John the Baptist is our reminder: Repent and let Christ take the trash out of your life. Be baptised! Make straight paths for Him! Flee from the wrath to come! Produce fruit! This is Advent and this is its message.
Brett Blair, www.Sermons.com
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Sermon Ender - Forgiveness
Carl Michalson, a brilliant young theologian who died in a plane crash some years ago, once told about playing with his young son one afternoon. They were tussling playfully on their front lawn when Michalson accidentally hit the young boy in the face with his elbow. It was a sharp blow full to his son's face. The little boy was stunned by the impact of the elbow. It hurt, and he was just about to burst into tears. But then he looked into his father's eyes. Instead of anger and hostility, he saw there his father's sympathy and concern; he saw there his father's love and compassion. Instead of exploding into tears, the little boy suddenly burst into laughter. What he saw in his father's eyes made all the difference!
The sharp blow of God's message to us is: Repentance. But, look into your father's eyes. What he offers you is forgiveness and that makes all the difference. Repent and you will be forgiven.
James W. Moore, Some Things Are too Good Not to Be True, Nashville: Dimensions, 1994, p. 43. Adapted.
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True repentance is to cease from sin.
Ambrose of Milan
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John’s Warning
Of course, like all preachers, John didn't get through to everybody. Some who came to the Jordan with no intention of getting taken in by this man stuck to that determination pretty fiercely. The religious leaders provided John the opportunity to cut loose with his strongest language. "Sneaky snakes!" John fairly howled! "Somebody set the field on fire and out slithered you all! Well, I'm here to tell you that the days of resting on your laurels are over. Don't whip out your Members Only temple gold card--your theological credentials cut no ice with me! Don't tell me about your spiritual lineage or that you are Abraham's children because if God wanted more children of Abraham, he'd turn the stones into a whole bunch of them. But that's just the problem, isn't it? Your hearts are as dead as stone already. God wants living trees producing juicy spiritual fruit. If I were you, I'd get serious about that because I'm here to lay the groundwork and clear a path for Somebody big and strong who is coming any minute now. He's coming with a very sharp axe in his hand and he will chop down and burn to ashes dead trees like you all!"
Scott Hoezee, Comments and Observations
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Authentic Christianity
William Faulkner, the novelist, toiled for years as an unknown, disrespected writer in rural Mississippi before he finally gained recognition. When he won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1950, his acclaim grew. When approached later about the literary people and authors he associated with, Faulkner shrugged his shoulders and said, “I don’t know any literary people. The people I know are other farmers and horse people and hunters and we talk about dogs and guns and what to do about the hay crop or this cotton crop, not about literature.”
You see Faulkner befriended real people, unpretentious people. He befriended people honest about their lives and about living. He chose to surround himself with those who populated his stories and actually lived his intensely human fiction, rather than those who simply talked about the South, or wrote about the South.
Authenticity!! It is the ingredient that will make your Christian life convincing. And repentance is the first step to getting there.
Adapted from an unknown source.
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Repentance
The Romans sometimes compelled a captive to be joined face-to-face with a dead body, and to bear it about until the horrible emanating smell destroyed the life of the living victim. Virgil describes this cruel punishment:
'The living and the dead at his command
Were coupled face to face, and hand to hand;
Till choked with stench, in loathed embraces tied,
The lingering wretches pined away and died.
Without Christ, we are shackled to a dead corpse -- our sinfulness. Only repentance frees us from certain death, for life and death cannot coexist indefinitely.
Paul Lee Tan, Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations.
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Who Is That with John?
This is an old standard but it seems to fit well with this text:
Larry was sick and tired of his friend Stan's constant name-dropping and boasting of how famous he was. The day finally came when Larry could take it no more. He told Stan, "If you're so famous and know so many important people phone the White House and get the President on the line."
Stan shrugged and walked to the phone. He punched in a number and handed the phone to Larry. The familiar voice greeted him with the words, "Hello, this is the President of the United States. How may I help you?"
Larry was convinced that it was either an accident or a put on. He said, "Well, that was impressive. But if you are really important, call Buckingham Palace and let me talk to the queen."
With a bored sigh, Stan took the phone, punched in a number, and again gave Larry the receiver. "Hello," came a distinctive voice, "This is the Queen of England speaking."
Larry was very impressed but still suspicious. He said, "All right, you happen to know the President and the Queen of England. But if you're really a big shot, get the Pope on the phone."
Stan promised to do better than that. He took Larry to the airport and both men boarded a plane for Rome. When they arrived in Rome they took a taxi cab to the Vatican. They came into St. Peter's Square. Upon arriving there, Stan walked away, leaving Larry to mill about in the large crowd waiting for the Pope's afternoon greeting from the balcony.
Suddenly a reverent hush fell over the crowd. Larry looked up at the balcony where Stan and the Pope stood side by side. Larry almost fell over in shock. Before he could recover from his amazement, a man standing beside him poked him in the ribs and asked, "Hey, who's that standing up there with Stan?"
People often have the same problem with John the Baptist; they don't exactly know who he is and what his relation to Jesus is. They become confused and mistake him and his purpose with that of the Messiah.
As told by Rev. Jim Kerner, Pastor of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Suffield, Connecticut.
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If Your Face Is Towards Me
Do you feel insecure as we enter this Advent season? You do if your marriage is less than solid. You do if your job is at risk. You might if you have medical problems. If you have lost a loved-one in the last year, insecurity could be part of your grief.
Pastor James Moore of Houston Texas tells a story about a young man whose wife had died, leaving him with a small son. Back home from the cemetery, they went to bed early because there was nothing else he could bear to do.
As he lay there in the darkness--grief-stricken and heartbroken, the little boy broke the stillness from his little bed with a disturbing question, “Daddy, where is mommy?”
The father got up and brought the little boy to bed with him, but the child was still disturbed and restless, occasionally asking questions like “Why isn’t she here?” and When is she coming back?”
Finally the little boy said, “Daddy, if your face is toward me, I think I can go to sleep now. And in a little while he was quiet.
The father lay there in the darkness, and then in childlike faith, prayed this prayer: "O God, I don’t see how I can survive this. The future looks so miserable. But if your face is toward me, somehow I think I can make it.”
That’s what the Messiah came to teach us: that God’s face is always towards us. Therefore, let the Messiah replace your insecurity this Advent with the following bedrock conviction: God and you are in this together. Nothing can happen that God and you together cannot manage. Nothing will ever be able to separate you from his love. Now, that’s real security.
Brett Blair and James W. Moore, www.Sermons.com
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God’s Opportunity
On Hampton Plantation in coastal South Carolina there used to live an elderly sharecropper, illiterate but very wise. One of his favorite sayings was this: If you ain’t in trouble, your prayers ain’t got no suction.”
The Bible declares that our extremity is God’s opportunity. God is most likely to be found at your wit’s end, just when you need Him most, when you have run out of answers and almost out of hope.
Bill Bouknight, Collected Sermons,www.Sermons.com
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Repentance
True repentance hates the sin, and not merely the penalty; and it hates the sin most of all because it has discovered and felt God's love.
W.M. Taylor
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Advent Love
Let me tell you a story about a family whose house burned down. Their little girl in that family was named Victoria. A couple years ago during Thanksgiving their home burned to the ground. Fortunately they were not home, but everything was lost.
Their next-door neighbors have an 8-year-old son named Ian who is a good friend of Victoria. A few days after the fire, Victoria’s father returned to the burned house to see if he could find anything useful in the wreckage. He looked up and saw Ian coming in his direction carrying a round Styrofoam cooler. Ian opened the top of the cooler proudly, displaying thousands of pennies that his family had been saving since he was two-years-old. He handed the cooler to Victoria’s dad and said, “I want you to use this to buy a Christmas present for Victoria.”
At first he thought he must decline the gift, but something in Ian’s eyes just wouldn’t let him. The boy’s expression was so full of love. So he hugged him and said, “Thank you very much.”
Thankfully, most of us have not experienced the horror of burned-down houses, but many of us have very definite hurts and longings this Advent season. The Messiah comes to us in the spirit of Ian, offering himself as our gift. How strange it is that when we accept the gift of the Messiah, it matches exactly our hurt and need. When we tie our destiny to this Messiah-King, we can face whatever the future brings, knowing that we are more than conquerors through Christ who loves us.
Bill Bouknight, Collected Sermons,www.Sermons.com
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I’m with Him
A friend tells of the Saturdays he spent going to football games with his father. The boy and his dad sat in sunshine and rain, wind and snow, and cheered for their favorite team. There was nothing like it. On the way home from the ball games, prior to the era of drive-through windows, they often stopped to get a bite to eat. The boy would stand at the counter and listen to his father give the order for their food. Sometimes the restaurant person would turn to the boy and ask, "And what for you today?"
It was very comforting for the boy to point to his father and say, "I'm with him." Those were the days. The boy's father took care of everything and all the boy had to do was stand there and wait on his food. If anybody happened to ask, he could always say, "I'm with him."
At some point, we start answering for ourselves. It is frightening at first, and sometimes it is still frightening years later, but the call to repent is a call each person must answer for him or herself. The fact that we answered that call once doesn't answer for us today. It is not a matter of having to prove ourselves over and over, but a matter of daily confessing that we stand in constant need of the strength and grace of God.
William B. Kincaid, III, And Then Came the Angel, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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Cross-culture Misunderstandings
The dangers of being culturally insensitive are related in an article by Mike Metzger:
• Now-defunct Braniff Airlines was embarrassed to learn that their slogan celebrating the smart leather seats on all their planes ("Fly in leather") was understood in another country to mean "Fly naked."
• Coors Light had to backtrack when their ad campaign "Turn it loose!" was understood in another culture to mean "Suffer from diarrhea!"
• A mangled translation of "Coca Cola" on thousands of signs in China read "Bite the wax tadpole."
• Taiwanese residents probably did a double take when Pepsi's "Come alive with the Pepsi generation" literally meant "Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead."
Mike Metzger, “Open Forums for Postmoderns”; http://www.leaderu.com/cl-institute/openforum/chap01.html
John demonstrates this in the very way he looked and what he ate.
Ben S. Sharpe, Jr., Prepare the Way of the Lord
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Messages
Messages. We receive a lot of them these days. Many come in the commercials of businesses. Buy this item. Show someone that you care. This year we’re being encouraged to spend freely in order to revive the economy. We see reminders of how many shopping days are left before Christmas. Solicitations come to give to charities, with reminders of tax advantages as the year draws to a close. We receive invitations to parties and gatherings of the family or neighborhood. Messages from friends and relatives come with greeting cards. Some draw on the message of the angels and urge us to work for peace on earth and good will among men. We may get a message from an inner voice that we have all sorts of tasks that must be done before the holiday gets here.
Amid all those encouragements, don’t miss the key part. John the Baptist draws attention to it.
REPENT, FOR THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN IS NEAR
Johnny Dean
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An Introduction to John the Baptist
I am going to let Tom Long introduce the main character in our passage from his commentary on Matthew:
“As the door to a new era swings open, John the Baptist is the ideal hinge. He is dressed like the old age, but he points to the new. His preaching style is vintage Old Israel; his message paves the way for New Israel. He appears to have wandered out of some retirement home for old prophets, but he announces the arrival of one who is even greater than the prophets. He baptizes with the water of the ancient Jordan River; he promises the coming of one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. Everything is about to change. The old is passing away; the new presses in. The long, lost night of hopelessness is coming to an end, and John the Baptist is the rooster who awakens the sleeping world with dawn’s excited cry.”
Thomas Long
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A Story that Taxes the Imagination
It is a story that taxes the imagination—this story of God taking human flesh, of God becoming one with us. Who but God would choose to enter human life in an insignificant village in an out-of-the-way corner of occupied Palestine, born to a humble mother who, in the eyes of the world, displays questionable virtue? The birth is heralded, not to the movers and shakers of the day, but to a lowly group of shepherds. It’s a story that demands eyes of faith, a story that prods us to see what most do not see, a story that challenges us to envision what few would envision. And that is what repentance enables us to do, to see life with fresh eyes, to notice what others ignore. Henri Nouwen has something similar in mind when writing some years ago in Gracias!, a journal of his experiences in Latin America. Asserts Nouwen,
The small child of Bethlehem, the unknown young man of Nazareth, the rejected preacher, the naked man on the cross, HE asks for my full attention. The work of our salvation takes place in the midst of a world that continues to shout, scream, and overwhelm us with its claims and promises. But the promise is hidden in the shoot that sprouts from the stump, a shoot that hardly anyone notices.
Joel D. Kline, Taxing the Imagination
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Reconciliation and Communication
A husband and wife were having some problems at home. They had argued and now they were giving each other the silent treatment. It lasted all weekend long, it was miserable. On Monday, the husband had an important appointment and had to be at the airport on time to catch a flight. However, he didn't want to be the first to break the silence. He was just too stubborn to do that. But he needed his wife's help. So, he finally wrote on a piece of paper, "Please wake me up at 5.00 a.m." The next morning the man woke up, looked at the clock and discovered it was 9.00 a.m. He completely missed his flight. He was furious. And he was about the hunt his wife down and read her the riot act for not waking him up. But then he noticed a piece of paper on the bed. There, in his wife's handwriting was written: "It is 5.00 A.M., wake up!"
What can you say? This couple had some serious problems, didn't they? They needed help. But what they needed most was reconciliation. And that is exactly what we all need.
Billy D. Strayhorn, God and Sinners Reconciled
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Living in the Past
On the television show M*A*S*H, Dr. Charles Emerson Winchester III made it clear what separated him from everybody else. "I'm a Winchester," he was heard to say more than once. For him, it was his family name that made him superior to everyone else. Other people carry other burdens. One woman received her education at Harvard and found a way to work Harvard into every conversation. Congregations fall victim to the same problem. Churches become satisfied with their pasts to the point that they do not make the changes necessary to live in the present with the same degree of faithfulness shown in prior years. It's one thing to be proud of certain things, but it is possible to lean too heavily on a good past and live too scantily in the precious present.
That's what John the Baptist was dealing with in this lesson. In scripture's continuing assault on the religious people of the day, John the Baptist was completely unimpressed with the very thing that the Jewish people had built their lives upon. They were the "children of Abraham." That was their birthright and, they felt, it would never be taken from them.
Then comes John the Baptist. He tells them that just because they are children of Abraham doesn't mean that the requirements have been eased or that they can slack off. We hate to hear John the Baptist say that because we know how it translates to our situation. We can hear him now. "Just because you are members of the church, just because you give your weekly offerings, just because your great-grandparents were in this church, just because you are an officer, just because you are the minister, doesn't mean it is time to relax and take it easy and give in to this temptation of thinking this matter of being Christian is under control." In other words, don't presume your past has taken care of your present.
William B. Kincaid, III, And Then Came the Angel, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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Above the Noise
There is so much noise in the world today. There are so many voices competing for our attention. If you want to be heard, you almost have to shout.
I have read that during a typical lunch hour at the University of California at Berkeley, spokesmen for a dozen different causes can be found on the plaza, trying to outshoot one another. One day a lone figure sat down defiantly in the middle of the crowd and held up a sign which said, "SILENT PROTEST." Someone tapped him on the shoulder and asked, "What are you protesting?" The defiant figure held up another sign which said simply, "NOISE."
That experience reminds me of the Salvation Army lassie who was informed by a policeman that a local ordinance would prevent her from ringing her bells to invite contributions. But such a crude law could not stop such an inventive woman. The next day she did a brisker business than ever as she waved one sign and then another in the air. The signs said "ding" and "dong."
There is so much noise in the world, especially in these days that lead up to Christmas - music blaring out of every store: impatient customers raising their voices to get the attention of overworked store clerks; the sound of horns and traffic jams. If you really want to be heard in the midst of all this noise, you are probably going to have to shout.
I am not trying to say that John the Baptizer had to contend with all the noise that characterizes our preparation for Christmas in the 1980's. But noise is nothing new. There has always been noise when the spokesmen for diverse causes were competing for the attention of an audience. At least this is why I believe that one of the reasons John shouted was simply to be heard.
John Thomas Randolph, The Best Gift: Sermons for the Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany Seasons, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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It Is Not What You Give
One of my favorite Christmas stories is O'Henry's short story The Gift of The Magi. You are all familiar with it. It is a story about a desperately poor young couple living in New York around the turn of the century. Neither had money sufficient to buy a gift for the other so they each secretly went out and sold something of worth. He sold his prized pocket watch to get her a braid for her long hair. When he presented it to her she removed her scarf to reveal that she had had her hair clipped and sold to purchase a chain for his pocket watch. The thrust of the story is obvious. It is not what you give that is important, but the sharing spirit of love in which it is given.
Brett Blair and Staff, www.Sermons.com
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Repent!
In John Steinbeck's story "The Wayward Bus" a dilapidated old bus takes a cross country shortcut on its journey to Los Angeles, and gets stuck in the mud. While the drivers go for assistance, the passengers take refuge in a cave. It is a curious company of people and it is obvious that the author is attempting to get across the point that these people are lost spiritually as well as literally. As they enter into this cave, the author calls the readers’ attention to the fact that as they enter they must pass a word that has been scrawled with paint over the entrance. The word is repent. Although Steinbeck calls that to the reader’s attention it is interesting that none of the passengers pay any attention to it whatsoever.
Brett Blair and Staff, www.Sermons.com
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An Eyes Wide Open Dream
This morning’s Old Testament lesson speaks of the prophet’s vision and dream of the peace and harmony that will follow the coming of a new ruler from the stump of Jesse:
The wolf shall lie down with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy on all my mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea (Isaiah 11:6-9).
The prophet dreams repeatedly an eyes-wide-open dream of that day when God’s realm, God’s kingdom shall completely unfold among us, and indeed, among all creation. Such dreams, thank God, are not easily put aside; they are not easily shaken.
In the aftermath of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s leadership of that 1963 March on Washington, Time magazine chose him as its Man of the Year. Asked later whether he was satisfied with the progress being made in the movement toward racial justice and concern for the poor, King responded that we can never be satisfied until the entire dream becomes reality. And is that not the very nature of dreams? As people of faith, we dare never rest content with business as usual, for the dream of life in the kingdom of God is ever before us. We dare never make too easy a peace with the existence of injustice and brokenness, of selfishness and sin, of racism and greed.
Joel D. Kline, Taxing the Imagination
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Possibilities of Grace
The story is told of a youngster learning to play the piano whose mother, to encourage a love for music in him, took him to a Paderewski concert. Soon after the mother and son were seated, the mother spotted a friend a little distance away and walked down the aisle to greet her. The time got a little too long for the youngster, and he wandered off, exploring the wonders of the concert hall, eventually making his way through a door clearly marked NO ADMITTANCE.
When the house lights dimmed, the mother returned to her seat, only to find her son missing. At that moment the curtains on the stage parted, and to her shock, there was her son seated at the keyboard of the impressive Steinway. Oblivious to the crowd, he began to pick out the notes to “Twinkle, twinkle, little star.” Just then Paderewski came on stage, quickly moved to the piano and whispered in the boy’s ear, “Don’t quit. Keep playing.” Leaning over the boy, the concert pianist reached down with his left hand and began filling in a bass part. Soon his right arm reached around the other side of the boy and added another part. Together the old master and the young novice transformed a frightening situation into a wonderfully creative moment. The audience was captivated.
Just so, is not God able to work through our sometimes-feeble efforts, wrapping arms around us, urging us on, transforming our work into something beautiful? Indeed, God equips us to dream new dreams; God taxes our imaginations, prodding us to envision far more than we ever thought possible. Is this not the power of the Advent season, that we set aside time to consider anew God’s gracious gifts, time for wonder and amazement, time for mystery and growth, time to dream with eyes-wide-open. And the promise is that God is with us, encouraging, upholding, challenging, renewing, recreating us, that we might dream new dreams and imagine new possibilities. Possibilities of peace, possibilities of compassionate love and servanthood, possibilities of new life.
Joel D. Kline, Taxing the Imagination
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Is Peace Possible?
Do you even believe peace is possible? I don’t think most of us do. Peace makes a lovely image to think about, but isn’t very grounded in the reality of the world, right? Since 9/11, our world has changed significantly, and the relative peace we once experienced in the United States – or at least the relative sense of security, seems like another lifetime, doesn't it? Fear, anxiety, stress, worry over the unknown, worry over our safety, worry over the future has replaced the calm. We're worried as travelers, worried as vacationers. We're worried on public transportation and in crowded public spaces. We're worried at special events where many people gather together. Then, we look around our world, and we see war and death and fighting. We struggle as men and women are sent across the world, separated from loved ones, to serve in the military. We struggle as we see images of destruction, and hear reports of chaos and instability.
And our worries aren't just about what's going on over there. Here, at home, in our country, we face a kind of unrest and division that I've not known before, not in my own lifetime at least. And in our own families, within the walls of our own homes, and within the confines of our own minds, we are not at peace with ourselves, with our neighbors, or with God. We are full of fear and anxiety. We are depressed, we are worried. We are making ourselves literally and figuratively sick with stress. Peace? Is it possible?
Beth Quick, Prince of Peace: Comfort and Challenge
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In the Quiet of the Wilderness
The wilderness is silence and quiet. It is the elimination of the sounds of television, the radio, the stereo, the iPod, the cell phone. It is the elimination of the voices of mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, friends. It is the elimination of the racing tape of your own mind that absorbs your thoughts. The wilderness is quiet. It is utter stillness. It is being alone with God. It is for a moment, for a minute, for a month, being still - absolutely still - …and listening. God speaks in the wilderness of silence. The city is so noisy; so busy; so crowded. The wilderness is silence and God speaks to us through the silence.
In the wilderness, you actually hear the voice of God speaking, “Be washed. Be cleansed of the pollution of resentment, anger, fear, and vengeance. Be washed of whatever is hurting your life and the lives of those around you." Hear the voice that says, “Your sins are forgiven; go and sin no more.” Hear the voice that says, “Love one another as I have loved you.” Hear the voice that says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all that is in you, all your heart, all your mind, all your soul and all your strength…and love your neighbor as you love yourself.”
Be quiet. Be still. In the wilderness, you finally can see the stars and hear the sounds of the wind that are blocked out by the cacophonous noise of the city. In the quietness of the wilderness. Be still and you will hear the voice of God.
Edward F. Markquart, A Parable: The City and the Wilderness
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Lay Down Your Entitlements
Our greatest Advent challenge seems to be the need to face the truth about ourselves. Both Isaiah and John tell us some very unflattering things about who we are and what we are capable of doing. Truth be told, all of us some of the time and some of us all of the time are in radical denial about the situation of our planet, our nation, and our lives. For example, like the people who heard John, we can claim an entitlement that keeps us from becoming the prepared and faithful people God calls us to be. The folks in John’s crowd were tempted to say, “We have Abraham as our father.” Meaning what? Meaning we can coast through life as the entitled ones refusing to face the demands that being Abraham’s children require of us.
We do the same thing. Put your own entitlement in the blank. “We are Americans.” Or, “We are Baptists.” Or, “We have a rich worship tradition in our Church,” Or, “We have _______.” For God to prepare us for God’s coming in Jesus Christ, we must lay down our entitlements, our selfish “rights,” anything that may indicate a sense of ownership, and confess that God has the gift of God’s Kingdom, and we cannot receive the gift until we first admit we deeply and honestly need it. Justice, righteousness, peace, and dozens of other gifts all come into our needy lives, not from our own bankrupt professions or clichéd confessions. Advent is about receiving God’s judgment on all our self-protecting behaviors so we can finally, at last, receive God’s gift of uncommon grace.
Timothy Owings, Advent at the Edge
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God’s Gift Comes in Quiet Moments
On Christmas Day a small manger scene sat on a table just inside the doorway to a neatly kept home. People hurried past it all day, barely noticing the tiny figures gathered around the infant tucked into golden straw. In the morning children raced by it on their way to the Christmas tree. At noon, arriving guests pushed past it, one accidentally knocking over a shepherd as he took off his winter coat.
Later in the afternoon the well-fed assembly of adults and children moved somewhat slowly by the manger again as they drifted from the dining room back into the living room. Almost none of them stopped to look at the manger. In fact, none of them even noticed it - well, none except two.
An older woman, walking with a cane, paused in front of the scene. Gently she put the shepherd back in the upright position. Then she looked at the child in the middle of the figures. Presently, she became aware of a small grandson by her side. As voices drifted in from the living room, the two continued to look deeply on the scene. At length a smile spread across the woman's face. The child smiled back at her as he took her hand. In the midst of a day filled with much busyness, the two of them quietly received God's gift.
That's how Christmas enters our lives. Not in great leaps but in quiet moments that we can miss if we're not prepared. In Mark Jesus tells us "Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come...And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake."
Billy D. Strayhorn, From the Pulpit, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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Grounded in Faith
St. Paul's letters to the Corinthian church are written to a church torn by political and theological battles, a church unsure of its foundations and faith, a church struggling with issues of sexual morality and social pressure. So he reminds them:
Now I would remind you, brothers and sisters, in what terms I preached the Gospel, which you received and in which you stand. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: That Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day, in accordance to the scriptures. (I Corinthians 15:1)
It's the reminder of the central message of the Gospel, a reminder of the word we have to proclaim. And today, just as in the Corinthian church, there is a desperate need for disciples of Christ to be grounded in the faith, to grow together in our spiritual journey, to nurture one another in the life and spirit of Jesus Christ.
John E. Harnish, Collected Sermons, ChristianGlobe Networks, Inc.
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John Had an Outlook
In the story of Adam Bede, George Eliot describes a certain conceited person as being "like the cock who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow." I've known, as you probably have, a few persons along the way who were just about as vain as this. Remember that line by Tennyson: "One far-off divine event to which the whole creation moves?" I knew one fellow once who apparently believed himself to be that divine event. He seemed to have the idea that all of time and circumstance, up to then, had conspired to accomplish only one purpose, and that was just to get him into the world. He saw himself as creation's ultimate achievement, the apex toward which all else had forever been aimed, and beyond which nothing of any notable quality would ever appear again. There isn't much future in that.
This man John was a different type; beyond himself he saw something else, something better, something to be cherished and looked forward to. "He who is coming after me is mightier than I," says he. It is he, not I, who will do the wonderful things the world needs to have done, he says. "His winnowing fork is in his hand," and he will put everything where it belongs; he will set things right. John had a hope, an expectation. He had an outlook. In other words, he could see out. And the view was forward. He could see beyond himself, and beyond his day; and what he saw was good.
Leonard W. Mann, Stars You Never Saw Before, CSS Publishing Co., Inc.
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Fear for the Future
A story is told about a man who was a successful bill collector. He could collect old debts from people upon whom all the other collectors had given up years before. Someone asked him how he did it. He replied, "O, it's quite simple really. I just write them one letter, and in that letter I tell them just one thing, and that one thing is this: if you don't pay this bill immediately, that thing which you are afraid will happen will happen." He was, of course, gambling on the rather safe bet that most people have some fear of something in the future.
Then there is the story of the fellow on shipboard who was miserably seasick. One of his friends found him hanging over the ship's rail and said, "Cheer up, buddy; nobody ever died from being seasick." "Don't tell me that," said the poor, pallid victim with a groan, "it's only my hope of dying that's kept me alive so far." These two amusing stories have one thing in common: an anxiety concerning the future. And I strongly suspect that if you could add up all the anxiety which today indwells the minds and spirits of the human family, it would come to an imponderable total.
Leonard W. Mann, Stars You Never Saw Before, CSS Publishing Co., Inc.
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The Benediction
A well-to-do woman who is a member of Bryn Mawr Presbyterian church in Pennsylvania was asked why she came to church. She said, "I come to worship to pray and to sing and to listen. But most of all, I come for the benediction. Because that is the moment that I am reminded who I am. That is the moment when, one more time, I am pushed by God out into the world to be the very presence of Christ." This is the benediction which is used every week at the Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church:
Go out into the world in peace;
have courage;
hold onto what is good;
return no one evil for evil;
strengthen the fainthearted;
support the weak, and help the suffering;
honor all people;
love and serve the Lord,
rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit.
This, of course, is just an elegant way of echoing John's very tough, very good news: "Repent! for the kingdom of God is at hand."
Susan R. Andrews, Sermons For Sundays: In Advent, Christmas, And Epiphany: The Offense Of Grace, CSS Publishing Company, Inc.
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Peace and Goodwill: Changing Our Attitudes
It was 11 days before Christmas. Peace and good will were far from the thoughts of 200,000 Union and Confederate soldiers facing each other across the broad, blood-spattered arena of Fredericksburg, Virginia, on December 14, 1862. The past few days had been gruesome with more than 12,000 soldiers killed. Nineteen-year-old Sergeant Richard Kirkland, Company E of Kershaw's Second South Carolina Brigade, had seen enough. Kirkland went to see Confederate General Joseph Kershaw. "General," he said, "I can't stand this!" He startled his commanding officer. "All night and all day I hear those poor Federal people calling for water," he said, "and I can't stand it any longer. I ask permission to go and give them water."
Kershaw shook his head sympathetically. "Sergeant," he replied, "you'd get a bullet through your head the moment you stepped over the stone wall onto the plain." "Yes, sir," answered Kirkland, "I know that, but if you let me, I'm willing to try it." The General responded, "The sentiment which prompts you is so noble that I will not refuse your request. God protect you. You may go."
Quickly the South Carolinian hurdled the wall and immediately exposed himself to the fire of every Yankee sharpshooter in that sector. Kirkland walked calmly toward the Union lines until he reached the nearest wounded soldier. Kneeling, he took off his canteen and gently lifted the enemy soldier's head to give him a long, deep drink of refreshing cold water. Then he placed a knapsack under the head of his enemy and moved on to the next. Racing against the lengthening shadows of a short, somber December afternoon, he returned again and again to the lines where comrades handed him full canteens. "Troops on both sides who had watched this unselfish act paid young Kirkland the supreme tribute - not a standing ovation, but respectful awed silence."
To repent means to change our attitudes toward other people from one of suspicion or hatred to one of love. The message of John the Baptist is to repent, to change our ways because Jesus will soon be on the scene.
King Duncan, Collected Sermons, www.Sermons.com