It’s Still Christmas!

 Scripture:      Psalm 148

1 Praise the Lord!

Praise the Lord from the heavens;

    praise him in the heights!

2 Praise him, all his angels;

    praise him, all his host!

3 Praise him, sun and moon;

    praise him, all you shining stars!

4 Praise him, you highest heavens,

    and you waters above the heavens!

5 Let them praise the name of the Lord,

    for he commanded and they were created.

6 He established them forever and ever;

    he fixed their bounds, which cannot be passed.[a]

7 Praise the Lord from the earth,

    you sea monsters and all deeps,

8 fire and hail, snow and frost,

    stormy wind fulfilling his command!

9 Mountains and all hills,

    fruit trees and all cedars!

10 Wild animals and all cattle,

    creeping things and flying birds!

11 Kings of the earth and all peoples,

    princes and all rulers of the earth!

12 Young men and women alike,

    old and young together!

13 Let them praise the name of the Lord,

    for his name alone is exalted;

    his glory is above earth and heaven.

14 He has raised up a horn for his people,

    praise for all his faithful,

    for the people of Israel who are close to him.

Praise the Lord!

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Message It’s still Christmas!

Merry Christmas! Yes, it is still Christmas.  It is still time to celebrate the birth of the Child and sing Christmas Carols.  Not everyone gets that.  On my first Christmas as the pastor of a congregation I walked into the church that first Sunday after Christmas, all ready to continue the Christmas celebration - and all the decorations were gone!  The lights, the candles, the tree, the wreaths, the Chrismons, the banners... everything!  So I asked the guy in charge of property stuff what happened and he said, “Christmas is over. I put it away.”  No.  No it isn’t over.  We don’t put Christmas away right after the gifts are opened. There is still lots of time to celebrate and praise God and bask in the light of the Star.  Because Christmas isn’t a Day. It’s a season, a season that begins on Christmas Day.  

When I was growing up we visited family on Christmas.  We would leave our house after church, drive an hour or so into Philadelphia, and stop at the homes of several relatives on both sides of the family, all dressed in our Christmas best, carrying gifts for Grandmother and aunts and uncles and cousins.  Everyone’s home looked a lot like ours, with discarded wrapping paper off to one side, opened gifts displayed under a great smelling tree, and sparkly lights and yummy Christmas snacks and boisterousness.  So much noise and laughter.  It was wonderful to go visiting on Christmas. Our last stop was at Aunt Mary Catherine’s house for dinner and when we walked in  . . . It was nothing like all the other houses, or our house.  All the gifts were put away, the tree was artificial and perfectly decorated, the whole house was totally neat and clean with nothing out of place.  Dinner was always delicious.  But it was so tidy. and quiet.  and proper.

To paraphrase Tina Turner, Christmas is never ever tidy.  or quiet. or proper.  Christmas is kind of messy.  There’s a stable ... have ya been in a stable?  Even if the stalls are freshly mucked out, there is straw underfoot, and there’s an odor that’s nothing like a Christmas tree.  And there are animals - not housebroken.  In that stable, with the animals and the straw and the odor - Mary had a baby - another thing that is kind of messy.  There’s pain and blood.  And once the labor is over and the baby is all wrapped up in cloths, who shows up to see this special child?  Shepherds.  Messy, dirty, smelly shepherds.  Not exactly the cream of society.  

But what those shepherds found in that stable was wondrous.  A baby - and there is  nothing more wonderful than a newborn.  The parents gasp in amazement - look, he has toes. Such tiny perfect toes.  And teeny fingernails. Every infant is a precious gift from God.  But this baby was special even beyond that.  This baby was born into this messy world to bring healing, salvation, to all God’s children.  This baby was heralded by angels, lauded by a heavenly choir.  And his mother would hear all these things that the shepherds told her, about the angels and the heavenly choir,  and tuck them away in her heart, treasuring their words, saving them against the day when his mission and ministry would take her baby son away from her.  

The shepherds stayed for a while and left, went back to their flocks glorifying God and telling everyone they met about the amazing things they had experienced.  Mary and Joseph didn’t get to clean up and leave right away.  The baby had to be circumcised when he was eight days old. Mary had to be purified forty days after giving birth with a ritual bath and a sacrifice at the Temple.   And there was the whole registering for the census thing that brought them to Bethlehem in the first place. No one ever mentions that after it’s given as the reason for their trip, but I’m sure there must have been some sort of process for him to deal with.  Roman bureaucrats had paperwork, too, just like ours do.  No, Mary and Joseph didn’t get to skip over the messiness that lay ahead. They stayed in that stable, I suppose (that’s another thing no one ever mentions - whether they found a better place to stay for the next forty days or two years or how ever long they stayed in Bethlehem.). They dealt with the things that came up as they came up.  They had to stay in the moment and not rush off to the next important event in Jesus’ life, the way we do. They didn’t put Christmas in a box and store it away, to be taken out next year.  For Mary and Joseph and their new precious son, Christmas was a day they would remember and celebrate and praise God for every day.

I think it was probably the same for the shepherds. I mean, it is not likely that they would go back to their flocks and then be all, “Well, that happened.”. I suspect that for years to come they would be telling that story, and praising God for sending the angels to them.  I think that for them, Christmas kept being part of their lives all the time, every day.  And maybe, just maybe, they were part of the preparation . . . you know, when God told Isaiah “prepare the way of the Lord”.  We tend to think that John the Baptist was it, THE one preparing the way in the wilderness, getting people ready for Jesus.  But I imagine John had some help. I imagine that people had heard the stories the shepherds had told and shared them, and later, when John came and then when Jesus started preaching, they remembered what they had heard about that night in the hills above Bethlehem.  I think that the shepherds and all the people they told about the angels and the heavenly choir and the baby in the manger probably raised their voices like the psalmist did when he wrote the psalm we heard read this morning - not just on the morning of the birth of the Child, but every day for some time to come.  I think for those  shepherds, Christmas was a day they would remember and celebrate and praise God for every day.  Even on the cold stormy days when they had no shelter.  Even when there wasn’t enough to eat. Even when a lamb died, or its mother did.  Even on the bad days, those shepherds could look back and remember the night when the angels came to them and they would praise God.

You might have a day like that in your life.  A day when your life changed, when something happened that you know God had a hand in.  A day you remember every day and praise God for.  I do.  And I tell people about it at every opportunity.  So I think probably the shepherds did the same, praising God and telling their story.

We talk about praising God all the time. We sing God’s praises in hymns.  We use words of praise in our prayers.  We lift up our hands to the Lord when our hearts are moved.  If we hear of a bad accident in which no one was seriously injured, we say “Praise God.”   And we mean it.   But rarely do we call for God to be praised the way the psalmist did.  He did not just praise God himself, but called every part of creation to praise God as well - Praise the Lord all of you, in the heavens, in the heights. All you angels and heavenly host, praise him!  Sun and moon and stars - praise him! Earth and sea and all the creatures - praise him!  Rocks and mountains - praise him!  AND all the people of the earth - the kings and princes, men and women, young and old - Praise the Lord!  For his name alone is exalted!  And he is worthy of all praise

Praise the Lord, all you people,

as the heavenly host did above the hills of Bethlehem that night. 

Praise the Lord, all you people,

as the shepherds did when they saw the child.

Praise the Lord and celebrate Christmas, the birth of the child,

every day, not just December 25,

but on all the days thereafter all the year long.

This is not an easy thing.  It is challenging to praise God on the hard days.  

It is certainly challenging to celebrate the joy of Christmas all year long.

Nevertheless, as Disciples of Christ we are called to carry the Good News.

We are called to bring the light of Christ into every heart we touch.

That light came into this messy world with the babe,

born in a stable, placed in a manger, proclaimed by angels, worshipped by shepherds.

Let each person strive to meet that challenge, 

that discipleship challenge, 

to praise the Lord, every day, in every situation.

Even when life doesn’t seem to be going right,

even in the midst of a pandemic,

even when we are worried and fearful.

Praise the Lord, you who are Christ’s disciples,

Remember Christmas and carry its light with you every day,

and proclaim Joy to the World