IN THE MIDST OF LIFE

Fourth Sunday of Advent

Matthew 1: 18-25

December 23, 2001

Last September Kathy and I loaded Danny and his euphonium and a couple of large bags of his belongings and headed for Federal Way. We spent the night at my mother’s home and we were excited – and fearful - about seeing Danny off to Manchester, England for a year’s study the next morning. What an exciting time for him. That is a long way from home. As we were stirring early the next morning, my brother called to tell us to turn on the television. We couldn’t believe our eyes as we saw the reports of the planes being flown into the World Trade Center towers in New York City. To say the least, Danny didn’t fly out that day; it was a week later. His leaving, and the frustrating time he had getting flight arrangements to Manchester, were all mixed up in the tragedy of that day. What was to have been an exciting farewell at the airport got all mixed up in the unexpected events of that day. And we were not alone.

Life is filled with all kinds of events and happenings – some expected and planned and others are a total surprise. September 11 was an unusual case. Some are exciting, some uneventful, some painful. We make trips to the grocery store to get food and household supplies. We have car problems and have to get that worked into our schedule, hoping it is not going to cost too much. There is the vacuuming and cleaning around the house. One of the kids calls from school sick and needing to go home. We pay the bills, write letters, go to concerts and attend weddings and funerals. We celebrate birthdays with our family members and rejoice at graduations and accomplishments of our children. The lab reports from the last doctor’s visit look suspicious and they want to do more tests; that makes us anxious and so we begin to worry until we find out more. Grandma falls and breaks her hip; our child gets a special award at school and is recognized by the principal in front of the entire school. Se was totally embarrassed but loved it. This is the ordinary day stuff of life.

I was attending a meeting in Sunnyside last January shortly after the new year. When I arrived there was a message to call my sister-in-law in Federal Way. That’s never happened before. I quickly made the call; my father had suffered a heart attack. Figuring he would be fine, I anxiously sat through the meeting and hurried home (I was riding with another person) only to discover that he had died. It didn’t dawn on me that he could die. This was suppose to be another day like any other day, the regular routine of every day life of meetings, visits, work in the office, but it wasn’t. My life was changed. In the midst of every day life the unexpected happened.

We have all had those phone calls, those letters, those unwanted and unexpected interruptions to how we want life to go. Some are the kind we don’t want to hear and some are ones that fill us with joy and happiness to overflowing. That’s life.

The story of the birth of Jesus in Matthew’s Gospel gives us some information; yet, there is a lot of the story that we don’t know about. Luke tells us that an angel appeared out of nowhere and was told that she was going to have a baby. Now that changes your life; imagine what was going through her mind. What would the town say? How could she explain it so people would understand? Would her parents understand? What would Joseph say? Matthew tells us Joseph’s reaction. Mary turns up pregnant and Joseph knows it is not his child. They were betrothed (engaged) but not living together. The Torah instructed that in such circumstances she could be stoned to death, at the least divorced and disgraced in the community. The shame upon Joseph; the shame upon Mary’s family. No righteous male would ever marry a woman who had a child out of wedlock. They couldn’t hold their head up in the community any more. Joseph was a righteous person – he observed the Torah – yet, what was he to do? His whole life plans and dreams were out the window. His integrity as a respected male of the community was on the line. Think of the anxious nights; the worry, the wondering; the anger, the arguments, the trying to explain, the hurt, the tossing and turning. He thought he knew Mary. A woman doesn’t just turn up pregnant out of the blue. Sure, convince me it was divine; nice story! (Sleepless in Bethlehem!)

Joseph agonized over what to do. The Torah said one thing, but he loved her. He was a person who lived by the law; yet, what was the right thing to do? He finally made a decision – to divorce her quietly and not expose her to public disgrace – a very gracious act. As one commentator remarked, Joseph was actually living out what Jesus taught later in life – the command to love, to do to others what you would want done to you. But only after Joseph had agonized over the decision did an angel tell him the rest of the story. Wouldn’t it have been easier if the angel had appeared first? Bud God doesn’t always work that way; we sometimes spend sleepless nights wondering and praying. He took her as his wife and he took Jesus as his own son, establishing the line of David.

The coming of the Messiah into the world, changes lives, changes people. Mary and Joseph’s lives were forever changed and it wasn’t their plan. King Herod heard about it through some astrologers from Persia. Being paranoid to the extreme, he wanted to eliminate any possible threat to him, so he had all the babies in Bethlehem under the age of 2 killed. Think of all those families and their grief and pain; "why would God let something like this happen?" Even the Good News of God coming into the world is met with fear and the every day lives of people forever changed. Good News is not always good news to some. Evil is threatened and responds.

Joseph, Mary and Jesus fled to Egypt by divine command as refugees, hiding out in a foreign country until it was safe to return. And when it was safe, they moved to Nazareth in Galilee and didn’t return home to Bethlehem. They couldn’t go back home. Do we know what it is like to move away from home, escaping persecution, trying to find employment to get food, clothing and shelter? Starting a new life?

It is in the midst of every-day life that God comes to us. Mary and Joseph sure didn’t expect it. King Herod didn’t expect it. The families in Bethlehem didn’t expect it. Yet, God came as a human baby and their lives, and the world, were changed.

Three points I want to say to summarize for us. First, God enters – even interrupts - our lives in the midst of the every day activities of life. God will probably not come at our convenience or planning, but at God’s timing. Will we recognize it when it happens? Second, God’s action in our life changes us and could bring tension and conflict. What changes us changes those around us and responses may not always be positive. History bears this out. Third, as in the case of Joseph, God’s coming calls us to think about our response, how God lives in our lives and changes our agenda. We have to respond. Our decisions reflect our faith. But the promise of Christmas is Emmanuel: God is with us. And that is the Good News of Christmas. It is in the midst of the every day events of life – the good and the bad – that Christ breaks in and touches us. We see life differently.

Tuesday before Thanksgiving our son Michael, and his wife, Michelle, took Kathy and me out to a nice restaurant for dinner. They were to have done that in September to celebrate Kathy’s birthday, but it didn’t fit into our schedules for some reason. So, we celebrated a little late. As we were waiting for our food, Michael handed Kathy a pretty bag. I assumed it was a belated birthday present. It wasn’t a birthday present – it was a gift for both of us telling us that we were going to be grandparents. Wow! I wasn’t ready for that one; I was taken totally by surprise. What I thought was going to be a nice dinner out to celebrate a birthday became a life changing moment for us.

You never know when God will encounter your life and change you. In the midst of the every day events of life God comes as a child and changes our world. I wonder when that will happen again.