The Uncommonness of the
Common
Reflections on the Nativity
Christmas Eve
24 December 2017
Saint Faith’s Anglican Church
Luke 2.1-20
2.1 In those days a decree went out from
Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration
and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 All went to their own towns to be
registered. 4 Joseph also
went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called
Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with
Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time
came for her to deliver her child. 7
And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and
laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
8 In that region there were shepherds living
in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 Then an angel of the Lord stood
before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were
terrified. 10 But the angel
said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see — I am bringing you good news of great
joy for all the people: 11 to
you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah, the
Lord. 12 This will be a sign
for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a
manger.” 13 And suddenly
there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and
saying, 14 “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace
among those whom he favours!”
15 When the angels had left them and gone into
heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see
this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” 16 So they went with haste and
found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17 When they saw this, they made
known what had been told them about this child; 18 and all who heard
it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary treasured all these
words and pondered them in her heart. 20
The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and
seen, as it had been told them.
A word from the present
Almost every day I begin my morning by reading the on-line
international edition of The Guardian. On Saturday morning one article caught my
eye: ‘Mary had a baby. So did I.
Neither of us needed wise men.’
The author, Nell Frizzell, was reflecting on her recent experience of
childbirth in the light of the coming celebration of the birth of Jesus. Let me share with you the opening paragraph
of her op-ed piece.
The tale of the
nativity changes after you’ve had a baby.
No longer is this the seasonal story of a prophecy-made-man on a
hillside in Galilee. It is not the
visitations of angels or shining stars or even the [virgin birth] that strikes
you as miraculous. Rather, what amazes
you now is how, in the name of all that’s holy, Mary did it. This is the story of a young woman wading
through insane government admin while hobbling more than 70 miles to her
in-laws’, in the final stages of her first pregnancy, before facing an
accommodation crisis and the prospect of childbirth without a health service. [1]
What I liked about Frizzell’s often funny but completely serious
take on her own experience and Mary’s is that she cut through the layers of
history to invite us to look at this familiar story with new eyes. In Mary and Joseph’s story we are reminded
that the ‘uncommonness’ of God comes to us in the ‘commonness’ of human
experience.
The Commonness of the
Nativity
For just a moment let’s look at the story of the Nativity
from as detached a point a view as possible.
A young woman, probably in her teens, becomes pregnant even
though she is engaged to a young craftsman.
This young man is faced with a difficult choice. He can reject her and let her suffer the
consequences of giving birth to a child out of wedlock or he can marry her,
adopt the child as his own and endure the raised eyebrows of his
neighbours.
If this situation isn’t difficult enough, the Roman imperial
authorities decide to undertake a census and require that every citizen of
Judea return to their ancestral towns to be registered for tax purposes. And so the young man and his very pregnant
wife travel the seventy miles to Bethlehem and arrive in the midst of a crowd
of people all seeking lodging. Mary and
Joseph are lucky; they find a stable, relatively warm with the body heat of the
animals. And there the child is born,
born into a world of political tensions, born into a religious society in
upheaval, born into a family with memories of greatness but with only prospects
of hard work and social strife.
If, for just a moment, we replace the names of Mary and
Joseph with the names of Rohingyas fleeing Myanmar or Syrians refugees in
Lebanon and Turkey or the names of Yemenis trying to find safety in the midst
of a civil war, then this story is no longer ‘uncommon’ but ‘common’. At the heart of the Christian story is a
story that resonates with human experience over the millennia since Caesar
Augustus ordered a census when Quirinius was governor of Syria.
The Uncommonness of the
Nativity
But we cannot deny that there is also something ‘uncommon’
about the event we celebrate tonight. It
is in the ‘commonness’ of the birth of a child to a young couple trying to make
their way in an uncertain and dangerous world that God reveals God’s very self
to us. In this event God extends an
invitation to all ‘poor folk and humble’, all the common folk who sometimes
wonder what their lives mean, and asks us to allow our lives to be the vehicles
for God’s ‘uncommonness’ to make itself known wherever we are, whatever we do
and with whomever we find ourselves.
Mary could have refused to be the bearer of the Christ-child
by pleading the stigma of having a child whose father was unknown --- little
alone the Creator of the stars of night.
But she did not. And a young
woman becomes the mother of the Word.
Joseph could have exercised his rights and ended his
betrothal to Mary, leaving his honour intact and her ‘dishonour’ visible to
all. But he did not. And a young man becomes the guardian of the
Beloved of God.
If we were to sit down tonight and read the whole Bible,
whether the Hebrew scriptures or the apostolic writings of the first
generations of Jesus’ followers, we would discover a constant thread throughout
them all. When God wants something done,
God rarely turns to the ‘great and good’.
Abraham and Sarah abandon a settled life in order to seek the fulfilment
of a promise to be the forebears of descendants more numerous than there are
grains of sand. Moses runs away from
Egypt to escape punishment only to be brought back to lead the people into
freedom. Peter and the other apostles
leave their familiar lives behind them to become witnesses to the new life
offered to all through Jesus of Nazareth.
These common people with common lives said ‘yes’ to God when
their moment came. Just like Mary and
Joseph, they had no clear vision of where their ‘yes’ would lead them. And their ‘commonness’ became the vehicle for
God’s ‘uncommonness’.
O come, all ye faithful
For many people, perhaps even for some of us gathered here
tonight, the ‘commonness’ of this Christmas celebration obscures what God is
doing, right now, right here. God
invites each one of us to offer our ‘commonness’, our souls and bodies, our
gifts and flaws, our hopes and fears, our faith and our doubt, to become the
means by which the promise of this night, the ‘uncommonness’ of the good news
of God in Christ, becomes flesh.
The incarnation we celebrate this night is two-fold. We celebrate the Word made flesh in the
Christ-child, the son of Mary, the ward of Joseph. But let us not forget the other incarnation
we celebrate, not only tonight but every night and day throughout the year,
throughout our lives. This incarnation
is Christ made flesh in us, not only those who follow Jesus but the Christ made
flesh in every human being, far and near, friend and stranger, young and not so
young.
When we sing of peace, we are saying to God, ‘Here we
are. Make us channels of your peace.’ When we speak of hope, we are saying to God, ‘Here
we are. Help realize that hope in our
times and in our places.’ When we think
of ‘comfort and joy’, we are saying to God, ‘Here we are. Show us the comfortless and the sorrowful
that we might serve them.’ We, we common
folk, are the stuff of God’s ‘uncommon’ generosity and compassion.
Just as I began with Nell Frizzell’s first paragraph, I
shall end with her last.
There are young
women right now travelling across borders, pregnant and scared, preparing to
give birth in camps and sheds, without support or medical care, who are
vilified by innkeepers and landlords and all those other heartless gits in pubs
who moan about migration and scroungers and the undeserving poor. There are Marys everywhere, always have
been. And it is our duty to look after
them --- because the future is in their loins. [2]
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