There is a joke going around on Facebook
about gifts for the Christ-Child… specifically gifts brought
by the 3 Wise Men. As the joke goes, if
it was 3 wise women instead of three wise men… Three wise
woman would have asked directions, arrived on time, helped deliver the baby,
cleaned the stable, made a casserole, and brought practical gifts, rather than
frankincense and myrrh. You know, like
maybe a crib.
Practical gifts. Ugh, who wants ‘em?
‘Tis is the season of
gift-giving. And it’s not always easy
to find the right gift. (Teenage
daughters seem particularly difficult to buy for, from what I hear.) Did you ever give a very well-intentioned
gift, only to find out it was not at all what was wanted?
Maybe you bought something that you
thought, ‘of course my brother or mother or friend will want this, because I
would. Who wouldn’t?’ Only to find out
you were quite unique in your taste?
Last year I discovered a machine that makes soft serve ice cream out of
frozen bananas. It’s amazing. It is an
ice cream substitute that’s cold and sweet and completely healthy! So I gave one to every household in my family… and I never heard another word about it. I imagine they are all collecting dust in
their basements or taking up space in their cupboards.
Maybe you were thinking about
someone’s own good, but which doesn’t fare well in the light of day… many years
ago I was working for someone running for Congress, and I had some anxiety about
my manners – or lack thereof – and that my social instincts were no match for
the fancy fundraisers, elected officials and wealthy people we rubbed elbows
with. That year for Christmas, under our
tree my friend and roommate gave me a book on etiquette, so I could learn what
I did wrong. It was well-intentioned… but it
certainly didn’t feel much like a gift!
And then there are those super
practical gifts, like tires or a vacuum cleaner. Your loved one knows it is really important
and helpful and maybe even expensive, but still looks at you with a bit of
disbelief when they open it on Christmas morning…
Today in our reading, God was about
to get a misguided gift from King David in the Old Testament. 1st Samuel feels like an odd
scripture, to be sure, to be included in our Advent season. What does King David building a house for God
have anything to do with the Christ-child that we are eagerly awaiting? I mean, come on… I don’t
remember any Christmas songs in this season of music that relate that story!
What is it doing here in Advent?
The story in Samuel brings together
the threads that hold our history together – it’s the linchpin between the old
stories in the Old Testament and the coming of the Christ child. It is both reflecting on the promises of God
from Abraham and also pointing to the arrival of the anointed one, God’s son,
who will come from the line of David. It
reaches way back into our history, in the very beginning, when God made a
covenant with Abraham. In return for
Abraham’s faithful service, God would lead him to a promised land and make sure
his descendants numbered like the stars.
But it doesn’t happen within one or even several generations… we have
Exodus, and Leviticus, and Deuteronomy, and several prophets and the 12 tribes
become 2 kingdoms and, eventually, David is called to be King. And after years of war, and roaming through
the desert with the tabernacle – that is, the tent where God resides - and
finally settling in a land, winning peace and crafting stability – Here we
are. God’s people have been faithful,
more or less, and have multiplied and completed their journey and settled
comfortably in their land. Their time of
struggle appears to be over and David breathes a sigh of relief.
And then King David does a classic
gift blunder. In his gratitude, determines
he would like to do something nice for God.
Having finally come into his own and having a minute to breath a sigh of
relief, David feels that it’s only appropriate to build something beautiful to
honor God, who has been with them through all this struggle. And it is probably with this sense of
gratitude that David imagines a comfortable residence with the most prized
building materials – cedar – probably something appropriately beautiful and
majestic to honor such an amazing God.
Why should such a God reside in a tent when God deserves a mansion?
Except, King David forgot to inquire
whether God wished for a home. God had
other ideas. “Are YOU to build me a
house? Have I not shepherded YOU and
protected YOU for all these years just fine with out a house?? Did I ask for a house? I have not lived in a house since I brought
YOU, Israel, from Egypt and I was plenty HAPPY to be moving in a tent!”
It’s like trying to tell your mother
what’s best for her… You can imagine her saying, “YOU
are going to try to pamper ME? Did I not
carry you 9 months and go through 20 hours of labor and suckle you and wipe
your tears and bandage your knees and keep a roof over your head and food on
the table and whip your butt when you needed it? And now, you are going to put me in a house
in the backyard like a decoration?” I
can almost hear the sarcasm through the scripture when God says, “wherever I
have moved about among all the people of Israel, did I ever speak a word with
anyone saying, 'Why have you NOT built me a house of cedar?’”
Oops.
God is God and God will walk where
God wishes to walk. God is the one who
gives gifts, not David. However good his intentions, David does not have the
stature or the vision or the power to house
God. God will not be domesticated.
But God’s gifts are also… not always
what we would expect or hope for. God
does not adhere to our human expectations of what life should be. And truly, that is the surprise of
Christmas. King David presents God with
the plan to build God a home designed to the height of human aspirations - but
God says no. Instead, God makes a home
dwelling in humanity, in human form, not as a king or a child to royalty, but
as an infant born to a vulnerable couple, out of wedlock, in the animal’s quarters.
God gives Mary quite the impractical and unexpected gift. God’s
commitment to enter into humanity, to see through our eyes and feel through our
skin and see humanity as no one else would is not what was expected from a
powerful God. Rather than be boxed in
and framed up and defined as humans tend to do, God comes to surprise us with the
miracle of our fate, the fate of this child, and God’s fate for us. And this God child continues to be unexpected,
and show us the unexpected, for the rest of his life and death and
resurrection.
How did Mary feel about the gift God
gave her? Do you ever wonder that? Did
she say, “I’m sorry, you are going to….what?” Were
there moments of doubt, or dread, or feelings like “take this gift back”? Was there disbelief, or agitation? We know
from Mary’s song, from the Magnificat, that Mary comes to be astonished with
joy at God’ favor. Was there an evolution
of acceptance, a few moments of bewilderment, in this gift-giving from God, in this
experience that elevates her above all others?
How long did it take to sink in? How long did acceptance take?
On the scale of gifts, the gift of
child to Mary was not at all what she expected, nor was it practical. And certainly not that easy to manage. Surely, there had to be moments of misgiving
during her motherhood of Jesus. Perhaps,
the first time she told Joseph…?
Or, when they couldn’t find a place to stay when she was heavy with
child? What did she think of God’s gift
when the people in her town started to talk about his miracles and his
teachings? Or when she followed him as
he carried the cross?
She may have had misgivings. But, if at any point, she gave into her
doubt, surely it was only because, in that moment – she forgot the Angel
Gabriel’s message for just a second, or had trouble imagining the value he
would be to the world.
It would be nice if we could always
get what we wanted. It would be nice if
God’s gifts to us were as expected, and God answered every prayer as hoped
for. In the twists and turns of life,
gifts may be disguised as burdens.
Important experiences feel like detours.
Our casual encounters may hide a redeeming reconciliation for someone
else. Offhand advice may provide a
perfect resolution to someone else’s chronic problem. There are many moments in each of our lives
where we may wonder what, if any, purpose lies behind our journey and our fate
– but we are looking at our gifts through the windows of the house we try to
build for God, forgetting that God works beyond our sight and beyond our
vision, and most often in unexpected ways.
God doesn’t always give us
what we want…But the key is, we have no idea what value we will be
to others. The gifts we receive may not
be the gifts we choose, the gifts we wish for. You may feel like you have
nothing to offer. But our gifts impact
people in ways we never expect. That is
part of God’s intended kingdom. When we
reach out and offer our love, our gifts, ourselves to others, we offer to be
open to the unexpected ways God is using us to touch the world.
When Mary launches into song,
the beauty of this song is not just that she recognizes the incredible impact
this birth will have on her life. It is also that she sees her role as
meaningful for others in the world, and that gives her life extra value. Sometimes our fate is not entirely what we
want for ourselves, but the role we play in other peoples’ lives; that which is
hidden from our own vision, but viewable in God’s sight.
To be of meaning to others,
very often in unexpected ways, is the real meaning of Christmas, and the real
gift God gives us. May we all come to be
servants to each other and trust in God’s gift.
Amen.
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