Sermon on December 19
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, our strength and our redeemer. Amen
Have you ever been speechless? I mean like in front of a crowd. As a youth and pretty much through high school, I could never speak before a crowd. Call it stage fright or whatever I had a very difficult time speaking in front of a class or any group larger than 8 or 10 people. But I guess the Army changed that. My last duty station was assisting in a radio repair school at Ft. Sill OK. It was there that I had to get in front of 20 to 30 recruits to instruct some electronic basics. I got used to it and soon enjoyed it. Afterwards, I when I went back to school, I took a course in public speaking that didn’t hurt.
Like Abraham and Sarah, Zechariah and Elizabeth were old and childless. But one day when Zechariah, a priest, was in the temple minding his own business doing priestly things, he was informed that he had been chosen by lot to go into the Holy of Holies to burn fresh incense. It was a high honor for a priest to perform this duty and apparently not many priest were called on to perform this task.
While he was in the Holy of Holies, an angel appeared. And as angels do, he said, “Do not be afraid, your prayers have been answered. Your wife will have a son and you will name him John. He will be great in the sight of the Lord.” Zechariah was almost like Arnold on TV: “Wachu talk’n about, Willis?” Zechariah had his doubts. He was old and his wife Elizabeth was old. And he’s arguing with an angel about something that just doesn’t seem possible.
The angel was not amused and bristled. “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and tell you the good news. And because you do not believe me, you shall live in silence until the day it happens. So, Zechariah went home to his wife, unable to speak. She soon became pregnant, but he was unable to say anything about what the angel had told him that day.
Well, about 6 months later, the same angel visits a young woman named Mary. He tells her she will bear a son. How can this be? I don’t understand what’s going on. The angel says that it’s true and that for proof she should visit her elderly cousin Elizabeth. She does; she goes into the hill country and when she gets there, and no sooner than Elizabeth greets her, the baby leaps in Elizabeth’s womb. When she feels it, she is filled with the Holy Spirit and tells Mary how blessed she is among women. This without Mary telling her about her pregnancy. Elizabeth goes on ask why she should be so favored, that the mother of her Lord come to see her?
It was then Mary broke into what we now call the Magnificat, which means “glorifies.” It’s a poem used as a psalm (as we could have used today) and a song, being put to music, as Bach did. It is all amount God rescuing the poor, the lonely, and downtrodden.
Mary stayed with Elizabeth about 3 months, until about the time the baby was born. When he was born, the kinfolk wanted to name him Zechariah, after his father, but Elizabeth insisted that his name be John. (Now remember, she did not know this was what the angel had told Zechariah.) They turned to Zechariah, and he wrote on a tablet that his name would be John. At that moment, Zechariah began to speak, praising God. He, too, burst into a song of prophecy and joy.
If these people ever had a problem speaking out, it sure wasn’t a problem now. God took these everyday people and used them to not only proclaim God’s majesty and their own joy, but allowed God to accomplish God’s plan—his plan of salvation though them. Ordinary people going about doing ordinary things, and, all of a sudden, they are thrust center stage into the limelight of God’s plan for the salvation of his children.
It’s no wonder that Christmas is filled with music and singing. We can no longer keep our silence. It is now, especially it seems this year, that we are full of hope. And when we are full of hope, we are naturally full of joy and praise. We know that God is with us, and when we give ourselves over to the miracle of God’s love, as shown in the birth of his Son, we find our tongues are loosened and we are ready to tell the story, and maybe even to sing a song or two.
About 3 BC (that stands for before Covid) I became an instrument of God and of this congregation in providing monthly worship services and Bible studies at Generations Assisted Living in Irmo. One December I was conducting a Christmas service with Holy Communion with the residents there. In the worship services, I always provided a short sermon. At this one service, I was in the middle of my message when I was interrupted by a lady. And this is what I absolutely love about the men and women there. It being an informal service and they certainly don’t mind speaking up or asking something during the sermon. It was Ms. Mable, a retired schoolteacher and administrator—one of the kindest and sweetest people you would ever want to meet. She made the statement that Christmas made her sad because Jesus had to come down and live among us and then had to die for our sins, but that Easter made her happy because of Jesus’ resurrection. My immediate reaction was that we had to have the birth of Jesus before we had the death and resurrection. But she had a very valid point. Because of our sinful nature, we need a savior and God provides one for us. He had to come to us.
The fact that God did this causes us to loosen our tongues and celebrate. And we’ll be doing a lot of that in the next few days and weeks. First, we’ll have the children’s pageant and covered dish supper this afternoon and then on Friday we will celebrate with a candlelight service and continue to celebrate the second day of Christmas next Sunday.
And so we celebrate. We as humans have reason to celebrate. God has given us a Savior! All we need for Christmas. Don’t be afraid. Loosen your tongues! Shout the Good News! Christ is born! Amen.