It is a scene burned into my memory; I remember the death of the Cambodian child as though it had just happened. My granddaughter and I had just finished watching Cookie Monster do his stuff on Sesame Street, and the national news came on. My granddaughter immediately left, but another took her place, not on my lap, but on the television screen. I was whisked off to a refugee camp in Cambodia and, right before my eyes, a refugee mother began to mourn the death of her baby, who had just died. She invaded my den, wailed and wept in my presence, and I felt that the child had just died in the den.17 Indeed, as we have been it seeing it happen all over the world, "Rachel is weeping for her children and will not be comforted."
It might have been Mary weeping for her son, Jesus, if Herod had been successful in his attempt to kill the baby. But Jesus was delivered from death by two dreams - one was the dream the wise men from the East had after they had seen and worshiped the Christ child; the other was Joseph’s. Joseph seems to have been directed and guided by dreams more than anything else in the crucial decisions he had to make about Mary and Jesus. In this, he was a bit like Radar O’Reilly in M*A *S*H, who had the ability to hear helicopters before anyone else could hear them; he had a kind of sixth sense, a special type of intuition. When Colonel Potter took over command of M*A*S*H 4077, one of the first things he asked of Radar, as they were decorating the walls of the office, was "Why (are you called) Radar?" The corporal/company clerk answered, "Sometimes I can tell what’s gonna happen before it happens." Almost immediately, he lifted his head, tilted it back, and looked up toward the ceiling. "What is it?" Colonel Potter asked him. "Choppers, sir," he answered. "I don’t hear anything," said the colonel. In a moment, he heard what Radar had sensed many seconds before the noise was within the range of human hearing. That’s why he was called Radar. Perhaps Joseph should have been called "Dreamer," or something akin to that, because he seems to have had a similar gift. And, since he took his dreams seriously, Jesus’ life was saved when Joseph acted upon that dream and took Mary and Jesus to Egypt.
By this time, Joseph must have been on rather intimate terms with the angel, who came to him in his dreams. There’s a significant difference between Radar’s intuition and Joseph’s dreams; God made the dreams happen and used them to get his messages to Joseph. There could be no mistaking the fact that the dream and the visit of the angel came from God the Father. God would not allow Jesus to be killed in the manner which Herod had prescribed for the boys under two years of age who were living in Bethlehem. Jesus had been born to die as a young man on a cross, not as an infant by a despot’s sword; God’s plan would not be thwarted by any Jewish king. So, God dispatched the angel in a dream sequence and Joseph got the meaning of the dream and did what God asked of him.
Another Joseph, hundreds of years after the first Joseph was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers, goes to Egypt. Isn’t it odd that Egypt was both a refuge and a place of torment for the Israelites? The Jews and the Egyptians seem to be fighting much of the time, but when they aren’t fighting, they appear to be the best of friends. The peace treaty signed by the Egyptians and the Israelites at Camp David a few years ago was a long time coming. But it was completely logical, and maybe that’s why President Jimmie Carter pushed it so hard. The two nations owe each other a lot, and they should be the best of friends. God has always had a hand in bringing them together. Through the angel in the dream, God gave Joseph a specific warning that Christ was in danger and, later, visited him again and told him it was time to return to Israel.
Surely, if Joseph and Mary didn’t realize how special a child had been placed in their care, they knew it now. God himself protects Jesus and he needs only one angel, not a legion of them, to do it. He is not only loving and kind, but God is powerful, too. All life is sacred to him; every child is precious and, just as he wanted the baby Jesus to live, he wants all children protected. Our newspaper carried a story about the cancellation of a Boy Scout camp-out because a man had threatened the lives of some of the boys. The spokesman, who made the announcement, said: "We cancelled everything (several troops were to have programs at this particular camp). We don’t want to be held ransom forever, but we felt we didn’t have complete control in this case. We could have put out thousands of volunteers to help us patrol the area, but if one kid got hurt, it wouldn’t be worth it." He explained that a man named John had written a letter threatening to kill three scouts and take three others captive; he had also called the home of one of the scouts and threatened to kill the boy if he went to the camp-out.18 Instead of a newspaper and a phone call, God used a dream and an angel to warn Joseph that an attempt would be made upon Jesus’ life; whatever plans he may have had to return to Nazareth were immediately scrapped and, as directed, Joseph bundled up Mary and the baby and left for Egypt.
The odd thing about this incident is God allowed Herod to go through with his terrible plan to kill all of the boys in Bethlehem who were under two years of age. And Herod did just that. There was weeping and wailing "in Ramah" - Bethlehem, in this case:
A voice was heard in Ramah,
wailing and loud lamentation,
Rachel weeping for her children;
she refused to be consoled,
because they were no more.
One wonders, at times, if God does hear the mourning for the innocent children who are slaughtered unmercifully in the wars of humanity. The complaint of the atheist, who says, "I can’t believe in a God who allows little children to suffer and die," seems to be valid, sometimes. Why didn’t God step in and stop Herod from murdering the baby boys of Bethlehem? Find the answer to that question and we will be able to comprehend why he doesn’t intervene in all of those awful situations in which little children are made to suffer, to die, or are left to starve to death.
Today is not only the First Sunday after Christmas, when we are supposed to remember the flight to Egypt, but it is also Holy Innocents Day. We are asked to remember that slaughter in Bethlehem after Christ was born, no matter how much it intrudes on our lovely Christmas celebrations. As we give God thanks for the Christ child and for protecting him when his life might have been snuffed out, we need to remember we can and must do something to protect and help all of the children of the world. We must continually pray and work for peace throughout the world, so what we sing at Christmas time will become reality:
Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among men
with whom he is pleased.
Israel, Egypt and all nations must become friends who honestly respect one another. God wants us to promote peace all over the world, not simply talk about it or yearn for it. Christians are peacemakers by nature and by God’s design.
We Christians need to be engaged in activities which will alter the life-styles of people in refugee camps, who desperately need relief and assistance. Someone has said Americans react generously when a physical crisis occurs, such as the recent famine in Ethiopia (and other parts of Africa, as well as the rest of the world), but we soon forget the need and go on to something else. Perhaps one function of Holy Innocents Day is to keep us alert to the crises that remain with us. Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota recently reminded us we need to be alert: "CRISIS ALERT - DON’T ABANDON THE CHILDREN OF CAMBODIA’S KILLING FIELDS. Since 1978, the U.S. has resettled over 100,000 Cambodian refugees who had fled the horrors of the Bol Pot regime and, more recently, the Vietnamese occupation of their country. The Cambodian exodus has not stopped. Today, there are close to 40,000 refugees in Khao I Dang, a camp under the protection of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. An additional 230,000 Cambodians are on or near the ... border ..."19 Food, clothing, medicine, and resettlement efforts are needed in the light of this and other crises.
But Christians have to use their imaginations and ingenuity to work for more permanent solutions to the various problems that plague the people, especially the babies and children, of the world. Dr. Arthur Rouner, pastor of the Colonial Church of Edina, Minnesota, has become involved in one such project. He has raised five million dollars that will be spent to drill wells, build dams, and construct irrigation ditches in the Ansokia Valley of Ethiopia. He plans to take the money to Ethiopia and see that the project is properly begun. He said: "I’m excited because I think this is the most important thing I or our people could be doing in the world at this time. I don’t see anything more important to be doing than trying to save those lives ... I feel that I’ve been given a chance to be about the most significant enterprise that I could have (been involved in) ... I’m scared (because) ... there’s a lot of risk involved in terms of what you can accomplish, but I believe it’s worth the try." There’s no question in my mind that’s the sort of thing God wants done in this world, in order to save the little children, and you and I are the ones he wants to do it.
Where was God, the God who warned Joseph in a dream to get out of Bethlehem and take refuge in Egypt, when the baby boys were slain by Herod? One thing is sure and certain: he was weeping with the parents of those children, just as he does when innocent children die today. He couldn’t step in and intervene then, anymore than he can right now, but he does expect us to act, on his behalf, to save the children of the world. Jesus was delivered by a dream. Children and babies today will have to be saved by courageous, imaginative, and forthright action by those who are able to help. He has given us a direct command, not a dream, to get busy and do what has to be done.