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Sermon - December 24th, 2006
God's Daring Plan
Rev. Gwen Drake
Scripture: Luke 2: 1-20
Once upon a time before time, before clocks and calendars and palm pilots, before Christmas trees and stockings and candles even, there was God, and God was all there was. No one knows anything about that time because no one was there. Somewhere in the middle of that time before time, God decided to create a world. Maybe God was bored or lonely or just liked to make things, or thought it was time to try something new and big.
Whatever the reason, God created a world--our world--and filled it with astonishing things: with humpback whales that sing and white striped skunks that stink, and birds with more colors on them than a big box of crayons. The list is way too long to mention on a night like this. And when God was finished God stood back and looked at it all and was pleased. The world and all that was in it was good.
Except something was missing. God couldn’t think of it at first, but slowly it dawned on God. Everything was interesting and gorgeous and it all fit together really well. But there wasn’t anything in the world that was anything like God. It was as if God had painted a masterpiece and forgot to sign it. So, God started making the signature piece, something made in God’s image, so that anyone who looked at the world would know who the artist was.
God had a single thing in mind at first, but as the work of creating went on, God realized that one thing all by itself was not good. God knew what it was like to be alone. Company was better. So God made two things instead of one, which were alike but different, and both would be reflections of God--a man ad a woman who could keep God and each other company.
Flesh and blood was what God made them out of--a wonderful medium, extremely flexible and warm to the touch. And since God, strictly speaking, was not made out of anything at all, but was pure mind, pure spirit, God was very taken with flesh and blood. Watching the two creatures stretch and yawn, laugh and run, God was surprised by them, they were both fragile and tough. God was touched by them. And before long God fell in love with them.
It almost broke God’s heart when they got together behind God’s back and did the one thing that God had asked them not to do. Then they hid--from God--while God searched and called their names over and over again. Things were different after that. God still loved the human creatures, but the attraction was not mutual. Birds were crazy about God, especially ruby-throated hummingbirds. Dolphins and raccoons could not get enough of God, but human beings had other things on their minds. They were busy learning how to make things, grow things, buy things, sell things, and the more they learned to do for themselves, the less they depended on God. Night after night God threw pebbles at their windows, inviting them to go for a walk, but they said they were too busy.
It was not long before most human beings forgot all about God. They called themselves “self-made” men and women, as if that were a plus and not a minus. They honestly believed they had created themselves, and they liked the result so much that they divided themselves into groups of people who looked, thought, and talked alike. Those who still believed in God drew pictures of God that looked just like them, and that made it easier for them to turn away form the people who were different. You would not believe the trouble this got them into: everything from armed warfare to cities split right down the middle, with one kind of people living on one side of the line and another kind on the other.
God would have put a stop to it all right there, except for one thing. When God made human beings, God gave them free will. That was built into them just like their hearts and brains were, and even God could not take it back without killing them. So God left them free, and it almost killed God to see what they were doing to each other.
God shouted from the sidelines, using every means thought of, including floods, famines, messengers, and manna. God got inside people’s dreams, and if that did not work God woke them up in the middle of the night with whispering. No matter what God tried the barrier of flesh and blood was between them. They were made of it and God was not, which made the translation difficult. God would say, “Please stop before you destroy yourselves!” But all they could hear was thunder. God would say, “I love you as much now as the day I made you.” But all they could hear was a sea gull calling on the beach.
There was one exception to this sad state of affairs--babies. While their parents were all but deaf to God’s messages, babies did not have any trouble hearing God at all. They were all the time laughing at God’s jokes or crying when God cried, which went right over their parent’s heads. “Colic,” the grown-ups would say, or “Isn’t she cute? She’s laughing at the dust mites glistening in the sunlight.” Only she wasn’t, of course. She was laughing because God had just told her it was cleaning day in heaven, and that what she saw were fallen stars the angels were shaking from their feather dusters.
Babies did not go to war. They never gave hate speeches or littered or refused to play with each other because they belonged to different political parties. They depended on other people for everything necessary to their lives and a phrase like “self-made babies” would have made them laugh until their bellies hurt. While no one asked their opinions about anything that mattered (which would have been a smart thing to do ), almost everyone seemed to love them, and that gave God an idea.
Why not become one of those delightful creatures?
So God tried the idea out on heaven’s cabinet of archangels. At first they were all very quiet. Finally the senior archangel stepped forward to speak for all of them. He told God how much they would worry. God would be at the mercy of the human creatures, the angel said. People could do anything they wanted. And if God was serious about this idea to be one of them there would be no escape if things turned sour. What about a little compromise? Why not become some kind of magical baby with special powers. It would not take much--just the power to become invisible, maybe, or the power to hurl bolts of lightning if the need arose. The baby idea was a stroke of genius, it really was, said the archangel, but it lacked adequate safety measures.
God thanked the archangels for their concern but said, no, a regular baby would have to do. How else would God gain the trust of the human creatures? How else could they be persuaded that God knew their lives inside out, unless God lived a life just like theirs? There was a risk. God knew that Okay, there was a HIGH risk, but that was part of what God wanted the creatures to know, that God was willing to risk everything to get close to them, in hopes that they might love God again.
It was a daring plan, but once the angels saw that God was dead set on it, they broke into applause--not the uproarious kind but the steady kind that goes on and on when you have witnessed something you know you will never see again.
While they were still clapping, God turned around and left the cabinet chamber, shedding the heavenly robes on the way out. The angels watched as the midnight blue mantel fell to the floor, so that all the stars on it collapsed in a heap. Then a strange thing happened. Where the robes had fallen, the floor melted and opened up to reveal a scrubby brown pasture speckled with sheep and--right in the middle of them--a bunch of shepherds sitting around a campfire drinking wine out of a skin. It was hard to say who was more startled the shepherds or the angels, but as the shepherds looked up, the angels pushed their senior member to the edge of the hole. Looking down at the human beings who were all trying to hide behind each other (poor things, no wings), the angel said in as gentle a voice as he could muster, “Do not be afraid; for see--I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
And away up the hill, from the direction of town, came the sound of a newborn baby’s cry.
Amen.