Covenant
United Methodist Church
Sunday School 9:45 Worship 8:30 & 10:45 am
Christmas Eve Luke 2-1-20 The Gift
You know I really enjoy Christmas. As your pastor over the years I have received some wonderful gifts. This robe I am wearing tonight was a gift. It has been with me now for over 30 years.
I have also been given some gifts that were a little less useful. Food has always been a treat. As you know my appetite is pretty good and there are very few foods I don’t eat. Some people have given me other gifts though… for instance how about this shirt… as you can see it doesn’t really go with a tie. It is a western shirt… I have found that most gifts given to me are more about the giver than the receiver… how about this tie, or this tie… you may have seen the ties before. Periodically I have an ugly tie contest… these always do well in those competitions. One of the favorite stories I have about a gift I was given one Christmas was when I was out in Bagwell Texas. At that time Bagwell was one of the drug capitals of Texas. Periodically there would be a drug raid out there and the next Sunday my congregation would be in jail! Well, one Christmas I got a jar of moonshine! To tell you the truth I thought about drinking a little of it… you know curiosity and all that… then the giver of the gift told me to only drink a little at a time, because he had several of his customers go blind for a short period of time after drinking it too fast… so I gave it away to my uncle. He’s Episcopalian…. I have always accepted the gift graciously and then stored it away somewhere if it didn’t seem appropriate for my job… I always thought that was the best way to handle it. The truth is that often times the gifts people give us tell us more about the person who gave them to us than about ourselves. It tells us about how those people perceive us, or about their expectations of us.
On Christmas we who are Christian celebrate the greatest gift of all. “ For unto us a child is born unto us a son is given.” Still the Bible lets us know that the child was not seen as the perfect gift by every one. Scripture tells us that Joseph had some problems with the birth of the child. He was ready to divorce Mary over it. Don’t you think Mary had some problems with it. All those people who looked at her knowing this wasn’t Joseph’s child… The first thing the angels say to Mary and Joseph is “fear not.” There is a reason they say “fear not.” This is not an easy gift they are given.
For many of the Jewish people at that time Jesus didn’t seem like a perfect gift either. They were expecting a military leader. One who would come and run off the Romans.
Jesus came, but as the scriptures say, he came as the “Prince of Peace.” Garrison Keillor says the best gift is the gift we give ourselves because we know best what we want… but God instead gives us exactly what we need. I don’t always give myself perfect gifts…
It had been snowing all day & it was beginning to snow harder as the man’s family rode-off without him to church. And he pulled up a chair & started to read the newspaper. A few minutes later there was a thudding sound at the kitchen window. When he went to see what it was he found a flock of birds out in the back yard. They had been caught in the storm and in a desperate search for shelter were trying to fly through the kitchen window. Well he was a good man; a kind man; so he tried to think of something he could do so the birds wouldn’t freeze. So he put on his overcoat & boots & stomped out thru the deep snow thinking to himself; "The barn, that will give them a nice shelter". So he opened the barn door & turned on the lights; but the birds wouldn’t go in. So then he thought food will bring them in. So he tromped back to the house; got some bread crumbs & sprinkled a trail with them on into the barn. But the birds ignored the bread crumbs & went right on flopping around helplessly in the snow.
So he started walking around & waving his arms, trying to shoo them into the barn, but they scattered in every direction except into the warm, lit barn. So the man thought to himself; "they find me a strange & terrifying creature & I can’t seem to think of anyway to let them know that they can trust me". And so puzzled & out done he thought about that fact for a little. Then he thought, "If only I could be a bird myself for a few minutes I could lead them to safety".
If only I could be a bird myself.....
Just then the church bells began to ring sending out the glad tidings of Christmas. That man stood silently for a minute & then sank down on his knees in the snow. And he looked toward the sky & he whispered "now I understand! Now I see why you had to become man...to show us the way...to save us from the storm.
God comes into the world on Christmas and gives us the greatest gift of all… he gives us himself…