One cold Sunday afternoon in December, the congregation of a little Baptist church went over to the nearby river where they did their baptizing. They had several persons who were to be baptized that afternoon. There was one man who had some reservations about all this, as he faced the icy-cold water. He was a new convert and all this was foreign to him. He was, therefore, last in line. He noticed that when the first person came up out of the water, she quoted a Bible verse: “Bless the Lord, O my soul.” Then a man was baptized, and he said, “The Lord is my shepherd.” Then another man said, “I can do all things through Christ.” Suddenly, it was his turn. He went under the water and came back up gasping for air. He did not know any verse to quote, so he looked around and simply announced to the crowd joyfully, “Merry Christmas, everyone!”
Here we are on the Sunday before Christmas. We have come most all the way through Advent. On these Sundays, we have been thinking together about the theme: The light of Bethlehem still shines. Today, I want us to focus our attention on this: In the darkness of fear, there is the light of joy.
From the earliest time, human beings have known fear, have experienced fear, have had to overcome fear. Far from being negative, fear can be a positive force in our lives because it can cause us to prepare, to get ready, to be on guard. But fear can also overwhelm us. It can immobilize us and paralyze us.
We need something that will enable us to face our fears, for still in our world today, in spite of all the advances that have been made, we are a people who are afraid.
I want to remind you that the light of Bethlehem still shines on us. As that great hymn tells us, “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”1
This is why Christmas is always such good news for us. It has a great message for us, “Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people.”
The words from the Gospel according to Saint Luke, chapter 2, are some of the most beautiful words ever written. This is a story of such simple beauty and joy. It is a great human story into which the divine boldly comes.
Alan Culpepper, in The New Interpreter’s Bible, says that after a long first chapter of Luke, we have in chapter 2 the birth of Jesus being related in just two verses, with only five setting the stage. In chapter 1, there are eighty verses, and we have this long account of the annunciation of the births of Jesus and John, with 23 verses being devoted to John’s birth and his future role as a prophet and forerunner of the Messiah.2
What Saint Luke has given us, is the brief, plain, striking story of a young couple going on a journey and having a child late in the night.
A decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all people should take part in the world’s first census. The purpose for that was the first systematic taxation. Everyone went back to their own hometowns to be registered.
Joseph and Mary went from Nazareth down south to Bethlehem, just a few miles below Jerusalem. Joseph was from that town, the city of David, and he was a descendant of Israel’s greatest king.
While they were there, right after they got there, Mary had her baby. It must have been a time of fear for them, and yet, it was a time of joy as well.
The darkest time of the year,
The poorest place in town,
Cold, and a taste of fear,
Man and woman alone.
What can we hope for here?
More light than we can learn,
More wealth than we can treasure
More love than we can earn,
More peace than we can measure,
Because one child is born.3
Because this one child was born, we can face all our fears. We all have fears, in one form or another, at one time or another, in one way or another.
Even in the darkness of fear, the light of joy still shines.
Would you be willing to face these fears this morning and in this joyous season of the year?
I
Let this light of joy shine on you and let it be a surprise.
You can do that.
Saint Luke tells us there were shepherds out in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks. There, they had the surprise of a lifetime. Saint Luke writes, “An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear.”
I have been to that place where the shepherds were. It is a vast pasture area still today, where the winter rains cause grass to grow. Shepherds still take their sheep there to feed. You can stand down there in those fields and see Bethlehem on a distant hill.
In that place, the shepherds were surprised as “the glory of the Lord shone around them.”
Most all of us here today —I dare say all of us — need this light of joy to shine on us — and we need to be surprised by it.
When our children were small, they would have a long list of things they wanted for Christmas. Down at the bottom of the list, they would write, “Lots of surprises.”
That needs to be at the top of the list for all of us. That is one of our problems. How can we plan to be surprised?
A preacher went to see one of the families in his church. He was met at the door by a six-year-old boy who said, “Preacher, am I glad to see you. I have some good news. Daddy and I are taking mama to the hospital to get a baby. But don’t tell her about it. We want it to be a surprise.”
It is difficult to plan a surprise for yourself.
It is the kind of thing about which Yogi Berra would probably say, “Most surprises are unexpected.”
Sometimes, the things we plan with the greatest detail, however, turn out to be a surprise.
At a little church, the pastor helped plan the Christmas pageant. They had several good rehearsals, and he talked to the children about their costumes. On the night of the performance, he was greeting the children as they arrived. He checked out each of them. He was surprised by three brothers, who were playing the Wise Men. They arrived, wearing raincoats, helmets, and pulling a water hose. The pastor said, “Hey, you are supposed to be wise men, not firemen.” The brothers said, “We are wise men. Our dad told us the Wise Men came from afar.”
I suppose our problem is we think we have to plan it all; even life’s surprises. Maybe what we must do is stand back, catch our breath for a moment and let the glory of the Lord shine on us. Maybe we could dare to do that —open our lives up to some surprise by God and let God shine his light of joy on us, especially in those times when, like the shepherds, we are terrified.
That is when we need to be surprised most of all. In the darkness of fear, let the light of joy shine on you.
C. S. Lewis wrote a book titled Surprised By Joy. What a gift!
II
Let this light of joy give you courage.
You can do that also, if you will. Let this light of joy give you courage.
This was the message of the angel for the shepherds, “Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will come to all the people.”
Did you get that? Do not be afraid. Why? Because of this good news of great joy.
It does not read, “Be not afraid ... be courageous instead, be brave instead, be strong instead.” None of these human qualities are the antidote of fear. The opposite of fear, the antidote of fear, the cure of fear, is joy. The joy of Christmas will keep you from being afraid.
Armed with the joy of Christmas, this light of joy shining around you, you can stand against anything and everything which would threaten you.
One of this century’s greatest theologians was Paul Tillich. He wrote a book titled The Courage To Be. He said in that book, “The courage to be is the ethical act in which man affirms his own being in spite of those elements of his experience that conflict with his essential self-affirmation.”4
Courage means we know who we are in spite of everything we face, and we can face even those things which threaten to destroy us.
In December 1944, during the Battle of the Bulge, the German army surrounded some Americans in the village of Bastonge. The German commander sent a message telling the Americans to surrender. The American commander sent back a one-word message, “Nuts!” It was one of the greatest responses of military history.
That is the message of Christmas for every Herod and every heartache and every hatred and every hardship and everything which would destroy you — Nuts! Or, as the angel put it, “Be not afraid; for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will come to all people.”
A long time ago, on a little farm on a cold, dark night, a man asked his son to go out to the well and get a bucket of water. The boy was afraid of the dark. The man said, “Here, son, you take this lamp with you. You won’t see the well at first, but you will have enough light for each step you take, and you will make it there a step at a time.”
Let the light of Christmas give you courage.
III
Let this light enable you to accept the gift.
And this last thing you can do as well.
The angel told the shepherds, “To you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
Here is the key: the Savior is for you. That is why this light of joy gives us courage. It is because the source of our joy is Jesus Christ himself. It is because of the one who is the light of joy.
One of the great hymns we sing is “Joy to the world, the Lord is come! Let earth receive her King.”5
Harry Emerson Fosdick was one of the greatest preachers in American history. One Christmas, at his Riverside Church in New York, he preached a sermon titled, “Christ Himself Is Christianity.”6
He is the light of the world, and he is the light of joy.
This is your best gift at Christmas. He has come to save the world and he has come to save you.
This is why in the darkness of fear, the light of joy still smiles on us. It is a joy which casts out all fear.
Would you accept this gift this Christmas?
Sometimes, we do not know how to accept a gift.
A little boy was offered a gift of money from his uncle, who placed before the boy a penny, a nickel, a dime, a quarter, and a $1 bill. It was a difficult choice. The boy looked at that shiny penny and said, “I’ll take that one and wrap it up in that one.” He knew how to accept a gift.
Sometimes, it is easy for us to give, but not as easy to accept, a gift from someone else. We are gracious givers, but sometimes we are not gracious receivers.
Is it because we know we do not deserve what anyone else would do for us? Of course not. And that is just the point. A gift comes to us out of the love of the other person, and not because we deserve it or earn it. That is why it is a gift.
Christmas is a gift. The light of joy is a gift. Our Savior, Christ the Lord, is a gift.
Because of this gift, we can stand against, above, and even in the midst of, the darkness of fear.
Alex, The Life Of A Child, written by Frank Deford, tells the story of his daughter and her fight with cystic fibrosis. She died at the age of eight. During their last Christmas together, they go to church. The minister invites the children to come forward and place the figures in the manger scene. Alex felt she had missed Sunday school too much and did not want to go up, but she was called up to put the angel in place. In telling of this event, in that service, Frank Deford writes, “She beamed, popped right up, marched smartly to the crèche, took the angel, and tenderly placed it so it could look down protectively over the whole scene.” Then she came back and they knew it was her last Christmas, but they talked later of her being their angel.7 May we all have such faith.
Would you accept the gift of Christmas joy, the gift of Christ the Lord, the gift of a Savior? If you would, you would then be able to face all that life brings your way.
In the darkness of fear, the light of joy still shines.
1.Phillips Brooks, “O Little Town Of Bethlehem,” The United Methodist Hymnal (Nashville: The United Methodist Publishing House, 1989), p. 230.
2.R. Alan Culpepper, “The Gospel Of Luke,” The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. IX (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), p. 62.
3.Christopher Fry, McCall’s magazine, December 1968, quoted by David A. MacLennan, Sermons Of Faith And Hope (Valley Forge, Pennsylvania: Judson Press, 1971), p. 10.
4.Paul Tillich, The Courage To Be (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1952), p. 3.
5.Isaac Watts, “Joy To The World,” The United Methodist Hymnal (Nashville: The United Methodist Publishing House, 1989), p. 246.
6.Harry Emerson Fosdick, On Being Fit To Live With (New York and London: Harper And Brothers, 1946), p. 185.
7.Frank Deford, Alex, The Life Of A Child, for The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (Washington, D.C.: Viking Press, 1983), p. 120.