When Christ Moved into the Neighborhood
~ John 1:1-9
“You Better Watch Out” – Misplaced Hope vs. Advent Hope
Do you remember this song?
“You better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout, I’m tellin’ you why…”
It’s a simple song. But if you think about it, it’s how our culture tells kids to prepare for Christmas.
I remember, as little boy, how much I thought about Santa coming!
I remember watching… right through Christmas Eve…I was watching. I’d fall asleep on Dec. 24th…still listening for reindeer hooves on the roof. I wanted to get a glimpse! But I also didn’t want to get on the naughty list, and miss my presents…so I’d lay in my bed, and every year I fell asleep.
As a culture, we teach a lot of lessons about Christmas. Even if you eventually learn not to believe in Santa Claus, the cultural story shapes what we value. And even though, we know the season is really all about Jesus, but I’m afraid that a lot of people (even adults) blend ideas about Santa Calus with what we believe about God.
So, I think this is a perfect ADVENT theme…to focus on some of our misunderstandings about God and how they may affect our lives.
The season of Advent is not even in the Bible, but some time during the Middle Ages, Advent was created to help the church teach and prepare – not for Santa, but to prepare new Christians to be baptized.
New converts to Christianity were encouraged to fast, pray, and study for a few weeks before Christmas, in order to understand more about God and a life of faith that God invites us to live.
So let’s take a look at some fundamentals today…and how these might affect us. In fact, I think how we prepare for Christmas may reveal a lot about what we value the most.
In today’s reading from the gospel of John, we read that “in the beginning”… this takes us all the way back to Genesis – to the beginning of the world.
Then we hear this odd but awe inspiring phrase, “the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Only a few verses later – we read that this Word (in other words, God) became flesh and blood and dwelt among us! All this is a way of introducing Jesus.
No Naughty List
So, Advent is meant to focus us on Jesus. And one thing that Jesus shows us is that God does not keep a naughty or nice list. Look at those first disciples, they didn’t fall into a naughty or nice group. Jesus included Mattthew, for example. He was a tax collector, known for cheating the poor to make himself rich – but Jesus embraced him anyway and Matthew’s life was transformed!
I’m sad to say that many Christians act like God’s main goal is to keep a Naughty List. If you or I are judging people, quickly placing them on a Naughty or Nice List in our hearts – it shows! It also hurts.
Jesus revealed that this is not God’s way. Jesus shows us the heart of God. A heart is ready to befriend a woman lost in prostitution, or a leper rejected by society. Jesus reveals that every human being is valued and loved by God. There is no one too naughty. Jesus still loves each and every one.
I remember a man that I knew that struggled to believe that. He had grown elderly, and had an uncontrolled addiction to alcohol. He couldn’t stop drinking and it was literally killing him. In fact, I visited him many times before ultimately sitting beside him as he died. He felt so ashamed of his life, yet I could speak the truth to him. God loves you, no matter what.
I remember another young boy, he must have been 14, in my Confirmation Class. He had lots of challenges in life – his mom was in jail, his dad treated him really rough. He was on everybody’s naught list and striving for attention any way he could get it. He was acting out one night at Confirmation, cursing at me, ultimately kicked me really hard, he hit me, and wanted to run away. I ended up just giving him a big hug – holding onto Christopher until he calmed down. We finished Confirmation that night, but there were many other outbursts and I never knew what he thought. But God had taught us to keep giving love. I went back to visit that church over ten years later…and Christopher showed up. He came to me and said, I wanted to be here. You were the only one that loved me, and never stopped. His life was changed by God – not by being on the naughty list, but by being loved.
In Advent, we are reminded to open our hearts – to love those who may be hard to love. We are reminded, not to worry that we may be on some naughty list, but to realize that God loves you and nothing will ever separate you from God’s love.
Moved into the Neighborhood
Another thing we learn about God in Jesus is that God doesn’t live somewhere far away – like the North Pole, and only visit once a year through the chimney! I love the translation of the Gospel of John, which reads: the Word became flesh and blood and “moved into the neighborhood”.
Jesus moved into the neighborhood to give all people the chance to know the unknowable God
I remember meeting a woman named Maria Esperanza in El Salvador. She never had more than a 3rd grade education. But in the year 2008, a hurricane destroyed her village and injured so many people. But something else she saw was a group of volunteers from her local church. They were health promoters, trained in first-aid, and all sorts of practical skills to help people restore their lives. Maria decided to volunteer too, and get trained.
Along with more than 200 others across the country of El Salvador, Maria saw that God is present and calling all of us to be present too, with compassion. Maria’s family name is Esperanza, the Spanish word for “hope.” Because she see’s God in her neighborhood bringing hope, she felt called to do the same. She reflects God’s love in her neighborhood, and has been doing that for over 17 years now.
The Gift in Giving - True Christmas Hope
In Jesus, all people get to recognize themselves as children of God! Loved by God, empowered for living, and empowered to share abundant life and love with our neighbors. That is the real gift of Christmas. It’s captured in a wonderful way by NT Wright:
“Christianity is about something that happened…through Jesus…God’s rescue operation has been put into place once and for all. A great door has swung open in the cosmos that can never again be shut. It’s the door to the prison where we’ve been kept chained up. We are offered freedom:
Freedom to experience God’s rescue for ourselves,
To go through the open door and explore the new world to which we have access.”
Jesus offers us so many gifts. Sometimes the hardest gift to unwrap is the gift of grace. The gift of knowing we are loved, that we can trust in Jesus. We are saved by grace and faith in Christ. We also become more like Him by that same radical strategy – by trusting in Him and looking to His leadership.
We are invited to pray this Advent, not for a list of toys or comforts – we are invited to lay all our hopes and all our fears before Jesus – who will free and work through us even today.
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Pastor Doug Cox