December 22, 2024
Like many of you, I love Christmas! One reason I’ll be happy on Christmas Day is my family gathering is not complicated. Hopefully you have a family that isn’t complicated. When my parents were living, Kevin, I and our kids often went to Ohio to celebrate Christmas with family. My parents, brother and his wife lived in Ohio. It was nice to be with them during the holidays. But there was a thing had happened many years back. My brother and his wife bought a house. They said we could stay there with them while visiting Ohio, which was very nice of them. So, we stayed with them. While we were there, we noticed the washer didn’t drain right. The hose from the washer ended above a drain in the floor. When the washer ran, there was too much water to go down the drain, so some water flowed out to the kitchen. I told my brother about this. He said they knew. They’d do something. Later I told my mom. Then my mom said to my brother, she heard his laundry machine wasn’t draining right. What happened then was, Kevin and I were never invited to their house again.
It was absolutely their right not to invite us into their house. We would still get together with them. But there was this unspoken tension. I knew they weren’t happy I told Mom there was something wrong at their house. And I never apologized to them. I was pretty certain that my sister-in-law was upset by what I said, but I never said I was sorry. When it’s family, that hurt I didn’t apologize for, that tension, that complicated situation, goes on for decades. Why didn’t I apologize? That would be uncomfortable. It seemed unnecessary.
Do you have anything uncomfortable in your family? It’s not good, but you can’t find your way around it.
Christmas is a reminder of problems we can’t solve, or that would be uncomfortable to try to solve. Christmas with the family reminds us that there are people we can’t control. I realize I can’t control anybody, but there are people I want to manage so they don’t say or do certain things. And there are expectations we can’t meet. No matter how hard you work on holiday food, or on getting the right present, or trying to get the kids to behave, you just feel like you’re being watched and judged. But if I’m honest, I’m also a problem I can’t solve, I’m a person I can’t control and I’m the person laying expectations on other people without even knowing it.
On Christmas we celebrate an event that, if we take it to heart, will close the distance between us and the people we love. If we take seriously what happened on the first Christmas, it could move us all to get past complicated and uncomfortable relationships. Because it removes the excuses we have, that keep us from moving toward the people we’re at odds with.
At Christmas, sometimes we remind ourselves, Jesus is the reason for the season. But really, Jesus isn’t the reason for the season. We are the reason for the season. Jesus came to earth as a baby, because of us. If we all weren’t such a mess, if all of us loved like Jesus does, he wouldn’t have to come to earth.
We’re in the end of our sermon series on Why Christmas. The first Sunday we talked about how Jesus came in order to bless the world. He didn’t come just to save us. God blessed us, in part for us to bless others, and to bless the world. One of the reasons Jesus came is for us to pay it forward.
The second Sunday we talked about how sometimes we wonder what God is like. Jesus told his followers, look at me. See what I do and say. That’s how you know what God is like, and that he loves you. Jesus said God wants you to know him, that’s why he sent me. If you know me, you know God.
Today we’re talking about a third reason Jesus came: to close the distance between us and other people. At Christmas time we talk about how God came in Jesus, who is Emmanuel, God with us. If Jesus came to be with us, in spite of us, in spite of the fact that we aren’t perfect people, then we lose our excuse to keep our distance from other people, simply because it’s complicated.
Think about it, the way we are. You get so amped up about other people’s sin! But not about your own. Think about it, have you ever got as passionate about your own sin, how awful your sin is, as you do about other people’s sin?
Myself, I had a different brother come visit recently and stay with us. The first night he was here, we didn’t have a toilet in our bathroom. Actually, there was a toilet in the room he was staying in, but it was just stored there, it didn’t work. And if he had to get up at night and use the toilet, he would have to go two floors down to our basement, then up two floors.
But I have a really good reason for that. I have an excellent excuse. You see, my situation is totally different than my other brother’s laundry machine situation was! Right?
The more aware I am of God’s mercy and forgiveness, coming to earth to show mercy to me, the more I should be inclined to show grace and mercy to others.
There are some dangerous relationships we should stay out of, and some people we have no business ever being in a relationship with. But most of the time, the problem is we feel people are different from us, and we’re uncomfortable trying to bridge the difference.
Christmas is a reminder that uncomfortable is not a reason to withdraw. This is the perfect season to do for someone in spite of that someone. To do for them what God in Christ has done for you.
The Scripture, 1 John 4:19 says, “We love because he first loved us.” And 1 John 4:11 says, “Since God so loved us, we ought to love one another.” What if that was what all Christians did? Those early Christians, by living out the love of Jesus changed the world. We could do it again!
If it weren’t for you and me there would be no Christmas! We’re a mess, and we’re the reason for the season. So, when you see that person on Christmas, who you think is a mess. And you can’t wait to leave or for them to leave, remember what you have in common with that person. You’re both the reason God came in Jesus. For God so loved the messy world that he showed up and lived among us, taking away all our excuses for not loving the people around us.
My homework for you is to ask yourself, about that person you can’t stand. Ask yourself, what makes me think I’m better than them?
There’s a reason for the season. It’s us! Jesus came because we needed to learn to love, how to reach out and say we’re sorry, to talk to that relative we’ve given the silent treatment to or avoided. Since God so love us, we ought to love one another. Amen.
Maureen Duffy-Guy's blog 