Is It
Positive?
Christmas Eve Candlelight Service
Rev.
Mark Stringer
First
Unitarian Church of Des Moines
12/24/04
Meditation
“Christmas
Eve Night” by UU minister Mary Wellemeyer:
Like those shepherds who were on the hillsides
with their flocks,
like those wise ones in their observatories
with their telescopes and astronomical charts,
we find our daily work interrupted by these
holidays.
Like them, we can’t keep on working,
we have to listen to singing angels,
we have to deal with the call of that special
star.
The
little town of Bethlehem is thronged
with people who have come to be taxed,
crowding streets and shops,
and we have to find our way to an unknown place
where a wonderful new beginning awaits.
What precious new beginning are you seeking this
night?
For what do you push through crowds?
What have the angels told you?
What is the call of the star?
Reading
It’s
hard not to laugh.
What
a picture it makes—the dumbfounded shepherds,
and the stricken sheep,
The
cacophony of bleating
and the barking of sheepdogs
dashing and nipping
in a vain attempt at order,
and over it all the angels
trying to make their
shimmery voices heard.
“A who? Wrapped in what?”
the shepherds holler back.
“Where
are we supposed to go?”
Poor guys. They wanted directions,
a purpose, some sense of how
the story might end.
And all they got,
all any of us ever get,
was the sound of angels,
somewhere beyond the din,
singing “Glory, Hosanna”
across the improbable night.
Sermon
Now
that I’ve been at this minister job for a few
years, I’m starting to get used to some of my
predictable patterns of behavior. One
pattern I’ve noticed is that when I prepare
for this Christmas Eve service, I inevitability
grapple with some conflicting emotions and
expectations, both my own and the ones I assume
you carry. When I begin to consider the
sermon for this night, I can’t help but think
back to the days when I would be sitting where
you are, in the pews of the churches of my past,
and recall the things I wanted from the
Christmas Eve message.
When
I was a child, I just wanted it to be over as
soon as possible. After all, there were
presents to open and fun to be had…church was
the necessary hurdle to get to the good
stuff.
When
I was a teenager, I wanted it to be over as soon
as possible so that we could get to the candle
lighting and my siblings and I could play with
the hot candle wax…and then go home to play
Atari games.
When
I was in college, I didn’t care how long the
sermon lasted because I wasn’t in church at
all…in fact, like many of my peers, I didn’t
want anything to do with the church.
When
I was a young adult, spending the Christmas Eve
service each year with my wife’s family in
their Catholic church, I wanted it to be over as
soon as possible so that we could get back home
and enjoy dinner together.
So
when I think about this Christmas Eve message, I
know that most of you are here tonight with lots
on your mind and most of you probably want it to
be over as soon as possible. Maybe you
have other events planned for tonight or you are
thinking about getting home to wrap the last few
remaining presents. Perhaps you are
mulling over some things a family member said to
you…things that made you mad… and you are
busy strategizing how you will deal with
it. Could it be that you are
thinking about something you said or did that
you regret and you’re wondering how to seek
forgiveness? Maybe you are here tonight hoping
that this service doesn’t bring up too many
unpleasant memories because the last thing you
need tonight is another reason to go mucking
around in the grief you carry, grief that has
been plaguing you all month long. And
there are probably a few of you here tonight
wondering why on earth you are celebrating
Christmas Eve in this church…why, on this holy
night in the Christian calendar, you find
yourselves with Unitarian Universalists, people
who don’t necessarily believe that Jesus was
anything more than a great moral teacher…people
who are devoted to translating the Christmas
story into a metaphor for the holiness of every
child…the holiness of every life.
And
yet, here you are…here we are…improbably
together on this improbable night…together
with different needs…expectations…fears,
even. And here I am, standing before you,
sensing from my own experience that you probably
want me to keep my comments brief and cheery and
to the point. And yet, once again
this year, in my preparation for this night, I
have struggled with my impulse to dive down into
the darkness of the season and stir things up a
bit.
It’s
not that I don’t try to hold myself
back. In fact, upon returning home after
my first Christmas Eve sermon a few years ago, I
gave my wife Susan an assignment. I told
her to be sure every year to remind me to keep
the Christmas Eve sermon happy and brief.
So, every year, when she asks me what I am going
to talk about on Christmas Eve and I respond
with some rambling about darkness, pain, hope
and forgiveness, she shakes her head and says,
“Mark, you told me to remind you not to do
that.”
“I
know, I know,” I tell her, “but Christmas is
not necessarily a happy time…I have to talk
about the tough stuff, don’t I?”
Then
she rolls her eyes, with love of course, and
probably wonders for the umpteenth time why in
the world she married a minister…especially a
minister who ignores his own advice.
Well,
this year, I am going to keep it brief…and I’ll
do my best to be cheery.
It’s
tough, though, you know. It’s tough in
this world where we can so easily be overwhelmed
with bad news. Just the other night, I was
bouncing around between different television
stations and every news channel had some awful
story. An oil spill in Alaska, a pregnant
young woman murdered for her child, rising death
tolls in Iraq, and our president bestowing
medals of honor upon the architects of the
poorly planned U.S. invasion and
occupation. When any of us see this stuff,
rapid fire, blanketing our airwaves, our
newspapers, our lives, we just have to wonder
what is it with this world? And what can
any of us possibly do to make things better?
National
and world events aside, it’s tough to be
cheery this time of year when we have to grapple
with our own losses, disappointments, and unmet
expectations. Illness, addiction, regret,
loneliness may be dragging us down.
And then, of course, there is the abundant
evidence that countless others are working
through their own challenges and despair.
It’s tough to be cheery and celebrate life, as
this season asks us to do, when, if life teaches
us anything at all, it’s that we will all be
touched by grief.
And
yet…and yet…
Here
we are…even the most despairing among us…here
we are, much like the shepherds of the Christmas
story, tending to the various fields of our
lives, trying our best to keep our flocks in
order, waiting for our glimpse of something
worth following…the angel voice of a kind word
or deed, the shimmery song of new love or new
opportunity, unexpected and beautiful, the shiny
gift of forgiveness bestowed upon us as though
sent on the ray of a star. We cannot know
where this angel voice, this distant melody,
this star-shine once discovered will lead us for
sure. All we have are our instincts…our
instincts so easily led astray and betrayed,
often by things out of our control.
And yet, life asks us to follow, even when we
can’t be sure where we are headed. Even
when we aren’t sure why we should bother.
“Where
are we supposed to go?” we ask.
Poor travelers…we want directions,
a purpose, some sense of how
our story might end.
And all we get,
all any of us ever get,
is the sound of angels,
somewhere beyond the din,
singing “Glory, Hosanna”
across the improbable night.
Do
you hear the angels…the angels of your better
nature…the angels of possibility…the angels
singing Glory Hosanna despite all the reasons
not to…singing across the improbable night.
The
improbable night…the night that we cannot wish
away…the night that is sure to return no
matter what we might do. The night that
enables us to see…even when we think there is
nothing left to see. The night that offers
us starshine that we couldn’t see otherwise…starshine
if we will only look closely enough.
So
what star might you be following this night…and
is it bright enough to lead you home?
Home, once again, to your family, the odd
assortment of fallible people, present and past,
to whom you owe not only some of your psychoses
and your success, but also your very existence?
Home to your faith, the construction of belief
and disbelief that keeps you going even when
there doesn’t seem to be a reason to?
Home to your life, your complicated, imperfect
life and all its blessings and possibilities…the
only life you’ve got?
What
star is shining for you…calling out for you to
follow?
You
may find it interesting to know that halfway
into the writing of this sermon, Susan entered
the room where I was typing away and said, “How’s
it coming?” “Good,” I said.
“It won’t be long now.”
Then,
as if on cue, she posed the annual,
all-important Christmas Eve sermon question: “Is
it positive?”
“Thank
you for asking,” I responded with a
smile. “May I quote you?”
After
all, her question is an appropriate way to end
this sermon and to begin the night that follows.
Is
the star we are following one of hope or of
resignation?
Is
it a star of limitation or of possibility?
Is
it positive?
So
much depends on our answers…this night and all
the nights to come.