Social Networking Christmas

I pray that worship at Christmas time has been meaningful for you.
Like me, you may enjoy a look at what the first Christmas may have looked like through Social Networking.  Here's a link to the video we used on the 23rd and 24th.  Merry Christmas, friends.  And on Earth, Peace and Goodwill.

Piercing the Darkness

The light shines in the darkness, 

and the darkness has not overcome it.

With many of you I continue to shed tears of disbelief, of grief, of dismay for our sisters and brothers in Newtown, Connecticut.  How do we even begin to extend compassion to those whom we may never meet, and on whom we would never imagine such a profound grief?  What words do we offer to our friends, our families, our children who try to fathom the events at Sandy Hook Elementary School?

Let us begin by admitting that the irrational acts of fallen and broken people cannot be rationally explained.

Sin, by its very nature and practice, is self-destructive and destructive to all those around.  It defies all logical explanation.  But that provides little solace to the parents of 20 children who lost their lives on what was to be an otherwise “normal” morning, 10 days before Christmas.  Nor does it comfort those families of the adults who loved those children and died while doing all they could to protect them.

So where do we begin to engage in such a dialogue?  2,000 years ago, something similar happened.  Matthew 2 records the slaughter of the innocents:  All the boys under 2 years of age in and around Bethlehem were killed by Herod’s soldiers.  The Magi told Herod that they heard the King of the Jews had been born.  This paranoid, demented leader wanted to take no chances in losing power and had all the Hebrew male children killed.   Blood filled the streets of Bethlehem and the surrounding villages.  The cries of the mother’s weeping must have been haunting.  Matthew recalls the words of the prophet Isaiah:

“A voice was heard in Ramah,
    weeping and loud lamentation,
Rachel weeping for her children;
    she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.”

The prophet was recalling a time when the children of Israel were taken away by their Babylonian captors.  Mothers had lost their children at the hands of the cruel and inhumane.

Our sisters and brothers are weeping again at the hands of the irrational and inhumane.

But what are we going to do about it?  That’s a question many seem to now ask.  Let us not rush off to beat the drum of certain piece of legislation, regulation, or policy that will, seemingly, make things right overnight.  The answer is not that simple nor made of human hands.   The heart of the matter is a matter of the human heart.  The lasting change that must come will be a matter not just of the outside.  Outside changes will not change the inside.  Only a change on the inside will bring a change on both the inside AND the outside.  The answer begins when the Church rises up to do her part. 

We must take the time to mourn with the families of the children and adults in this most grievous of times.  Losing someone in such a manner in terrible enough.  But no parent should have to bury a child.  So grieve with these families.  And grieve deeply.  But grieve as a people with hope.

Such hope is the message of the coming of God in the person Jesus Christ, a baby born in a manger.  The story does not end in darkness.  The Light was born into the darkness and the darkness has not, and cannot, overcome it.  It is the message of Christmas.  It is the Gospel message.  And it is a message worth telling.  

In a small community in Connecticut now sits 20 little bedrooms filled with the toys of innocence: dolls, trucks, crayons, and the like.  Now robbed of their innocence, the bedrooms sit empty and parents long for one more chance to hold the little ones to them, just one more time.  How will things ever be right again?  The families of the teachers, administrators and others who gave their lives struggle with the pangs of loss.  An entire school and community huddles together looking for solace.

Where can anyone find peace in such a world?  When the Bible speaks of Peace, it does so not in the sense of a mere cessation of hostilities.  It means instead that, despite the circumstances, there a sense of God’s presence, of His comfort, of His assurance.

Many of us have seen the pictures from Connecticut of men, women, and children holding candles in vigil.  The soft glow the flame shining a piercing light into an otherwise dark night.  How appropriate.  A deep darkness fell over Newtown, and the entire country.  But the darkness never prevails against the light.  The Light always overcomes.  The people of the Church, Christians everywhere, are again called to shine a light of hope into the darkness.

So what do we do now?  Hug those near to you a little tighter.  Give our teachers and school officials and extra measure of support.  Show your appreciation to our first responders.  And rise up and be the Church.  Please join me as we pray earnestly for those affected.  For the people of Newtown.  For teachers everywhere who look at a classroom of beautiful faces everyday.  For the leaders of our schools and our communities.  Pray for a new movement in the Church, a movement of Christians who will rise up and be the light, the peace to a dark and distraught World.  A world that longs and cries for what, it knows not.  And only Christ is the answer.  May He be your Peace now and forever more.  May He pierce our darkness anew this Christmas time.

“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”  --Jesus.  John 16:33