Christmas is near, although it seems a lot less like
Christmas this year than I think it should be. It’s not that the external trappings
aren’t familiar. The national Christmas tree has been lit. In Kansas City, the
Plaza lighting ceremony has taken place. Here in Emporia, we’ve recently had
our Christmas parade.
The trappings say peace, but events in our streets,
in our neighborhoods, and on the international stage are telling us that violence
is becoming the norm rather than the exception.
The trappings say good will, but the air is filled
with unease and longing. People are looking for someone who will bring them
peace and fill the longing in their souls. As it has always been, false
messiahs of one sort or another have stepped into the gap. They seem
omnipresent these days. They declare
that they are society’s wise and anointed. They claim, by virtue of their education
or pedigree, that they, and they alone, are capable of knowing what is good for
the uneducated, unenlightened masses. Some even believe they have a duty to
deceive us¸ because we’re too ignorant or stupid to understand the “truth” they
peddle. They promise us peace and liberation, but no matter what they do or
say, they cannot deliver us peace, nor can they satisfy the longing in our
souls for liberation. All they can give us a lethal dose of oppression.
The refrain is oh so tragically familiar, so appropriate
for this season.
Two thousand years ago, Israel’s dreams and longings,
which had been so long dormant, were beginning to stir. For nearly four hundred
years, the once proud nation had been ravaged by one conqueror after another –
the Babylonians, the Persians, the Greeks, and the Romans. Hope had been all
but extinguished. The warnings of Israel’s prophets had gone unheeded and
hopelessness was now the people’s lot. As conquered people, their dreams and
aspirations had to give way to the dreams and aspirations of their conquerors. No
matter how enlightened the conquerors deemed themselves to be, the people of
Israel felt oppressed. The Babylonian legal system couldn’t fill the people’s
longing, nor could the efficiency of the Persian governmental system. Greek
culture was no substitute for the glory days of David and Solomon. The Romans
may have brought the Pax Romana with them, but it could not bring peace to the
people’s souls.
The situation must have seemed hopeless, but,
miraculously, hope persisted. It sprang up in the most unlikely places and it
was revealed to the most unlikely people.
If someone had told most people back in those days
that
Bethlehem would host history’s most amazing event, they probably wouldn’t have
believed their ears. The prophets may have presaged it all, but their words had
been hidden by the years of silence. Bethlehem? It would have been like telling
people that something amazing was going to happen in Lebo or Americus or
Tonganoxie. After all, we know good and well that the important things only happen
in Washington, D.C. or New York City. The event itself seemed to be by
invitation only. Obscure players like Anna and Simeon were waiting in the wings
for
their glorious moment on stage. Out in the fields surrounding Bethlehem¸ angels
proclaimed the good news to shepherds who were “tending their flocks” rather
than to the connected and powerful of that time. It was like inviting long haul
truckers rather than city commissioners, congressmen, senators, presidents,
ambassadors, or policy experts of one stripe or another. The angels, by Divine
appointment, knew the score. They knew the shepherds would rejoice. I suspect
they also knew the powerful and connected would have felt threatened, as they
probably would today.
A few dignitaries did manage to attend this
wonderful event. We know them as the “Magi from the east.” How did these
foreigners know where to go to find this new-born king? It’s written that they
were guided by “his star.” And, how had the priests and teachers of the law
missed what was happening? Could they have been too close to temporal power to
see what was going on?
The Magi worshipped the child when they found him.
King Herod, fearing for his throne, had children murdered in a failed attempt
to eliminate him. About thirty years after his birth, the priests and teachers
of the law had him crucified.
I doubt that things would change much if Jesus were
to be born in our time. Long haul truckers and “foreigners” would worship him.
The powerful and connected would try to do away with him.
In a week’s time many of us will be celebrating
Jesus’ birth, remembering that he came to bring the world peace in a time that
was every bit as chaotic as ours. We’ll be considering his humble advent and
we’ll be looking forward to his second advent, the time when oppression will
cease, peace will prevail, and the mouths of the so-called wise and powerful
will be silenced.
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