Grace, mercy and peace be to you
from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Our sermon
text today was inspired by the Holy Spirit by the apostle St Matthew. And we read
from his gospel where it says:
Then was
fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah: “A voice was heard in Ramah,
weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to
be comforted, because they are no more.
Prayer: Dear Lord Jesus, send to
all of us today your Holy Spirit, to me that I may preach well, and to all of
us that we may hear well. Amen.
Our Gospel
reading today has two parts: the first part is where we read about Joseph, Mary
and Jesus flee to Egypt, and the second part is where we read about King Herod
ordering that all the baby boys in Bethlehem should be killed.
We read: Now
when [the wise men] had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to
Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to
Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the
child, to destroy him.”
I don’t know
if you realise that in the bible we don’t read about Joseph actually saying
anything. He’s a very quiet man in the bible. We do read that when he woke up
from his sleep, he took Mary to be his wife, and called the child’s name Jesus.
Also, when Mary and Joseph went to the temple to present the baby Jesus to God
and were met by Simeon and Anna, we read that Joseph together with Mary marvelled
at what was said about him.
But nowhere
in the bible does it say, Joseph said this or said that. He’s a very quiet man.
Joseph is a very quiet man, who thinks things over in his mind. And also in the
first chapter of Matthew, we read about four times where an angel comes and
speaks to him in a dream. When the angel Gabriel comes to Mary, he speaks to
her while she is awake. But when the angel speaks to Joseph, he is always
asleep.
It’s almost
as if God wants to show us that the most important things that happen to Joseph
is what ticks over in his mind. There are many Christians too that are like
that. In our church, we often make judgments about people based on what kind of
fruit we can see growing on the trees. But when a plant or a tree grows, the
fruit will come in its time—the first thing that has to happen is that the tree
has to send down roots and grow a proper root system. We should realise that
for many of us here, week after week, there is the quiet work of the Holy
Spirit that goes on without any of us noticing it—we listen to God’s word, we
think about it, and God shapes us through it, even while we are asleep. In
fact, sometimes, sleep is the best time when God does his work on us.
Sometimes, we might say: “I’ll sleep on it.” I also remember someone saying to
me, that when you need to write someone a difficult letter, you should write it
and then sleep on it. There’s a certain wisdom in this, especially since it
says in Psalm 16: I bless the Lord who gives me counsel; in the night also
my heart instructs me. And so here we see in the person of Joseph so many
occasions where God works on him when he is asleep. This should be an encouragement
to us, not to be lazy people in our faith, but to realise that God does his
best work on us, when we stop working.
And so we
read in our Gospel reading today: An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in
a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and
remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to
destroy him.” And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and
departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to
fulfil what the Lord has spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”
Could you
imagine if you were Mary and Joseph and you had witnessed for yourself all the
wonderful things that had happened at Christmas time? The shepherds had come to
see the baby because they had been witnessed a wonderful multitude of angels
when they were in their fields, and also we read about the wise men coming from
the East to bring the baby Jesus precious gifts of gold, frankincense and
myrrh. This family had witnesses some amazing things happening.
But now,
they enter into a time of hardship. They have to up and leave their home and go
to another country, to Egypt. And here, we see a wonderful great mystery—we see
Jesus as not just any baby, but now as a migrant baby and as a refugee baby.
Now the
journey from Israel to Egypt is not a long way by Australian standards: less
than 200kms. If Mt Barker were Bethlehem, we might like to think of Jesus and
his family travelling to somewhere like Keith or Loxton. It’s not that far for
us. But still, the difference between Bethlehem and Egypt is the difference
between their home and a foreign land.
It’s
amazing, especially today, when it’s so easy to travel, how God makes us all of
our different congregations up out of people that come from all kinds of
places. In older times, people didn’t travel so much, but if we did a survey of
our congregation, it would be a pretty amazing thing to consider just how many
of us did not grow up in Mount Barker. But not only that, there are many of us
that were born or grew up on the other side of the world, and yet, here we all
are, together, in one congregation.
And what’s
the reason why people have moved? Perhaps there were not the opportunities for
work and for building a home in their home town. Maybe people got married and
moved somewhere else. Maybe people came from overseas, because things were so
bad in their home country because of a war or something like that.
But here in
our gospel reading—we see Jesus and his family as refugees, as homeless people
forced to flee from their own home. And through this very fact, Jesus blesses
all of us who are without a home. For all of us, as Christians, there is a
sense in which the whole world is our home, since we could travel just about
anywhere in the world and meet fellow Christians. The gospel is for all
nations. But also, there is nowhere in the whole world which is our home
either, because the kingdom of Jesus is not of this world.
The book of
Hebrews says: For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is
to come. Just like Abraham, we are pilgrims in a foreign land. The world
around us is apathetic to God’s word, and ignorant of spiritual realities. The
world around us doesn’t value Holy Baptism, and doesn’t value the Lord’s
Supper, things which are so precious to Christians. The world doesn’t value Jesus,
even though Jesus values the world so highly that he enters into it himself and
lives upon it.
But what
does the future hold for us? Especially for those of us who are younger, we
never know what God might have in store for us in our lives. We never know
where God might send us and use us for his glory. And also as a church, we
never know who God might send to us, people who have gone through hard times,
and have been moved around. When Jesus speaks of the final judgment, he speaks
a special blessing on people who move around: I was a stranger, and you
welcomed me.
Whatever the
case, the thing we must realise is that the more we learn and read the
Scripture, and hear God’s word, the more we come to feel an alien within the
world around us. The more we seek our home in heaven, the more we become
homeless on this earth. And there is a real and genuine sorrow that comes with
this. But if and when you feel like this, then be strengthened with the words
from our gospel today: And Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by
night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. Christian
homelessness is something that is shared by Jesus and his whole family. Here he
shares it with his parents, and throughout the rest of history he will also
share it with the church, who are also his family, through baptism. The more we
are alienated from the world, then the more we seek the living words of Jesus,
and the company of fellow Christians and of fellow homeless travellers! And
yet, we are never without a home. Jesus says: In my Father’s house are many
rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place
for you?
Also, in our
reading, it also says: This was to fulfil what the Lord had spoken by the
prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.” This is a prophecy that comes from
the book of Hosea. And if we were reading the book of Hosea, we would probably
think that this passage is talking about God rescuing the people of Israel out
of Egypt at the time of Moses. But here this passage is applied to Jesus. All
kinds of people in the bible—Abraham, Joseph and his brothers, and others—had
to flee to Egypt. And just as the people of Israel were rescued from Egypt, now
Jesus is going to come out of Egypt. The night before the people of Israel
leave Egypt, they have to kill a lamb and paint it on their doorposts, and eat
flat bread. But now, Jesus is also going to come out of Egypt, and shows us
that He himself is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. His
blood is going to be painted on doorposts all over the world. And just as the
Israelites ate the bread of the Passover, Jesus is also going to the bread of
life that feeds hungry souls continually all throughout history.
But in the
second part of the reading, we read: Then Herod, when he saw that he had
been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the
male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or
under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men.
This was
such a terrible thing. You might remember that Herod had said to the wise men
that they should come back to him after they had found Jesus and tell him where
to find him, so that, as he says, “I too may come and worship him”. But
we read: And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed
to their own country by another way.
And so Herod
gets so angry, that he decides to kill every baby boy in Bethlehem, two years
and under. Often people think the reason for this is that Herod was simply a
tyrant. And yet—he was a tyrant! But there’s more to it than that—we have to
realise that he was descended from the Edomites. And the Edomites were
descended from Esau. In the Old Testament, we read about Jacob and Esau who
were twin brothers, the children of Isaac and Rebecca.
Esau was the
oldest, but he sold his birthright to Jacob for a bowl of lentil soup. And then
later, Isaac gave his blessing to Jacob instead of Esau. Jacob later was given
the name Israel and it was his descendants that received God’s promises. But
Esau’s descendants all throughout history always had a jealous streak, angry
that they had been left out.
And so, this
is the jealousy that is also at work in King Herod. He knows that he is not the
true king of Israel, even though he rules over that area. And so we read, when
he finds out that the wise men are looking for the king of the Jews: When
Herod the king hear this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. He
is so intimated by this, that eventually, to make sure the job is done
properly, he orders that every baby boy, not just in Bethlehem, but in all that
region, should be killed. Now big the area in which this was to carried out, we
don’t know—but of course, we know that it was so bad that he family had to
flee, not just to the neighbouring town, or to Nazareth, but all the way to
Egypt in order to escape.
And so in
the first part of our reading, we read about the family being homeless and
refugees. They live in a country which doesn’t know them and doesn’t value
them. But in the second part of our reading, we read about their home country
which is hostile to them. It is dangerous for them. And so, we also should take
notice of the fact that all throughout history there is going to be a constant
stream of people which hates Jesus and seeks to destroy the church. And
sometimes, we hear about Christians even being killed for their faith.
Here in our
reading today, we read about a whole group of baby boys who are killed, purely
because they could be Jesus.
We read in
our reading: Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah: A
voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her
children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.
Now what’s
this all about? Rachel was the wife of Jacob, and we read in the Old Testament
that she had trouble having children of her own, and that this was a great pain
and sadness for her. Eventually, she became the mother of Joseph and Benjamin.
But when Benjamin was born, she died in childbirth. And do you know where she
was buried? In Bethlehem. So when these children die in Bethlehem, it’s almost
as if Rachel is weeping for the children in her own town. The tragedy is so
great, that even the dead join in with the grief. Now, Bethlehem is about 10
kms south of Jerusalem. But it says: A voice is heard in Ramah. But
Ramah is north of Jerusalem. The weeping and the lamentation and the anguish
and the bitterness and the wailing is so great, that the crying is even heard
many miles away in Ramah. A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and loud
lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted,
because they are no more.
And yet, if
we continue reading from the book of Jeremiah, it says: Thus says the Lord:
Keep your eyes from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward
for your work, declares the Lord, and they shall come back from the land of the
enemy.
If it
weren’t for this passage in the gospel of Matthew, we would probably read
Jeremiah as if this passage is talking about Rachel’s descendants being carried
off into exile, into Babylon, when many years before, Jerusalem was attacked.
But here we read about a whole group of children lead not just into exile, but
into death. But just like the Israelites were lead back to Jerusalem from
exile, so also Jesus himself will lead these children into life.
You see, the
bible doesn’t know anything of senseless tragedy, of senseless killing. Here we
learn that Jesus fills his kingdom not as an earthly kingdom but as an eternal
kingdom. Here, even children fill the kingdom of heaven, and even though they
die, Jesus is protected and he later dies himself for the sin of the world, and
even for these children who die in our reading today.
I remember
reading a letter by an old pastor to a younger one who had lost his child and
wife in childbirth. He bring to mind the passage where Jacob sends his children
and wife ahead of him on a journey across the River Jabok. In the letter, he
says, that this younger pastor has now sent his wife and child across the river
of death to meet Jesus ahead of time. It is not senseless and meaningless, but
Jesus fills the kingdom of heaven, not so that we would lonely here, but later
would be filled with joy, not just the joy of meeting our relatives and friends
who have died in the faith, not perhaps our own children who might have even
died, but Jesus himself. Sometimes, for many people, Christmas is a time which
awakens great sadness, because they remember the people who they used to share
this happy time with who are no longer here anymore to share it. But all the
more so that we yearn for that unending joy in eternity, where the angels sing
day and night before God’s throne.
And so
there’s a beautiful passage in 1 Thessalonians, which I’d like to finish with,
where it says: We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those
who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For
since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God
will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by
a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of
the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself
will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel,
and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise
first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with
them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with
the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.
Amen.
Dear Lord
Jesus, strengthen us and all your people all throughout the world who are
pilgrims in a foreign land. Comfort those who mourn with the joy of your word,
your presence and of your Holy Spirit. Bless us at this Christmas as we
remember the great joy that you bring to our troubled world. Amen.
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