NEW YEAR’S REVOLUTION

Matthew 2:1-12

January 4, 2009 – Rev. Jerry Duggins

I am neither an advocate nor an opponent of the practice of making New Year’s resolutions. I recognize the importance of regularly rededicating oneself to happier and healthier living and yet I also understand the cynicism of those who have given up the practice, knowing that for themselves “resolve” lasts all of one day… maybe. People are basically creatures of habit. We live by our routines and as important as it is for us to change some of them, it is by no means an easy task.

This seems true whether we are talking about the traditional resolutions that focus on self-improvement (eat healthier food, lose weight, exercise more, be more involved with the family) or the more altruistic struggle to improve the world (write my legislator, give more to charity, become more engaged in the struggle for justice). New Year’s resolutions reflect our desires for a better life and a better world but are up against years of inertia doing things just the same way. Resolutions are a call to take charge of life, but unfortunately we are more often carried this way and that than we are in setting our own course. Change in life usually requires a bigger wake-up call than the turning of the calendar to a new year.

I’ve nothing against resolutions. In fact most years I make some myself, but I’m wondering if we’re not in need of something a little more drastic. I’m thinking 2009 needs to be the year of revolution, a year when we don’t settle for tinkering with our lives but consider turning them upside down and thinking about them in an entirely different way. Often progress can be made with a little tinkering, but sometimes you hit a wall and there’s no way to move forward without a wholesale change to the approach.

For centuries scientists tinkered with the formulas that explained the movements of the stars and planets in the night sky and they got pretty good at predicting where things should be, but there were the anomalies, the nagging inaccuracies, and the formulas were becoming exceedingly complicated. And then along came Kepler and Copernicus who asked the question: “What if we place the sun at the center instead of the earth?” A scientific revolution took place and if you think that’s too strong a word, read about Galileo’s struggle with the church over this shift in thinking. Thomas Kuhn calls it a paradigm shift and links several major advances in science to other paradigm shifts. He describes it as the very stuff of scientific process. Little by little science advances its knowledge of the world until it can go no further without a major shift in its way of thinking.

That’s what I think the church is in need of and in fact is in the middle of right now. We’ve been plugging away at a number of changes these past few years at Westminster, but I think we continue to struggle with the basic paradigm shifts. Dr. Arn’s visit was helpful, I think in trying to get a handle on the basic shifts: moving from a program primarily at nurturing our members to a more open structure and process that invites others into our community of faith and moving from a church structure organized around departments to one organized around processes that draw people into connection with one another. These are paradigm shifts, revolutions if you will, in our congregational culture. It’s not how we’re used to doing things and it is sometimes painful, but also can be very exciting. A friend of mine calls them growth experiences.

I know, in a year with an uncertain economy, rising unemployment, and continued conflict in the Middle East, Iraq and Afghanistan, change at church may be the last thing you want to hear about; but in this kind of world, it becomes vitally important that the church change to address its needs. If we cannot become a church where outsiders matter as much, if not more than insiders and where genuine relationships take precedence over appearances, then we may miss the birth of Christ for us today.

The year the magi found the Christ child was a revolutionary year, not a year of tinkering, but a year of great change. News of their arrival in Jerusalem must have reached Herod before their audience with him. Herod must have been exceedingly anxious when he learned that they were not there to visit him, but the new king, the King of the Jews. The people trembled for fear at what their unpredictable ruler might do. But the magi are bold in their endeavor to find this child. They do not give up their search when the new king is not where they expected to find him. They go back to following the star until it rests in an unlikely place. Herod is caught unaware in this revolutionary time and his efforts to hold on to the past, though painful to many, fail to hold the changes at bay. He missed the birth. The magi did not.

William Arnold, a pastor at the Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church in Pennsylvania suggests that the Magi present a model for us in our journey to find the Christchild today. He suggests six stages which I present in three principles this morning. You might think of this as a method for revolutionary thinking or as a way of understanding spiritual practice or as Arnold suggests a model by which we are open to “epiphanies.” They are observations about the magi which we might incorporate into our way of living today.

First, the magi are students of the Word and of the world. Though they are not Christian or Jewish for that matter, they have studied the stars and presumably their sacred texts. Without this study, the appearance of the star would have been meaningless to them as it was to Herod and his advisors. Somehow they knew that this star meant the birth of a new king.

They did not just have their heads in their books though. They knew this was about events in the world and so they took off in the world and they went where they presumed the new king would have been born. At first mistaken, they still find the new king; rejoicing in the confirmation in the real world of what they had only before seen in the stars and their books. In bowing before Jesus, they bring word and world together.

This is what we do as we read scripture. We read not a book with mere tales of the past, but one that cuts into our present, that speaks to us and our world. It is not a recipe book by which we learn seven easy steps to the perfect turkey dinner. The purpose of our reading scripture is to gain insight for living in the world and that requires a keen observation of the world as well. Student of word and world. Karl Barth talked about it in terms of the preacher planning the sermon with Bible in one hand and newspaper in the other.

Please don’t misunderstand this. The Bible is not a science or a history book, neither is it a book of predictions. It doesn’t tell us what’s going to happen in the world. There may be a rapture, I suppose; but those who say the Bible predicts one abuse its message. The Bible helps us understand our way in the world, but it is also true that observations about the world influence our understanding of the scripture. It is a mutual interaction. Those on a journey to discover God’s presence in our lives are students of word and world.

Second, the magi are both generous and receptive. Upon finding Jesus, they open their treasure chests and worship him. They are gracious and thankful. Their generosity is complemented by a continuing openness to God’s leading. The are warned in a dream and go home by another way. It raises the question for us: “When we see Jesus, does it open our hearts to worship and giving? And does it make us receptive to God’s further leading?” Generosity and receptivity: the one an expression flowing from hopes made reality and the other an openness to the dreaming of new dreams. Generosity and receptivity, much more could be said, but both belong in the spiritual life, in all of life really.

Third, the magi become activists in uncharted territory. The study leads them to the knowledge that a new king is born, a king of a very different sort, but they are not content in the knowledge. They go after the experience. They want to see it and so they move. They take a long journey, some say as much as two years. But when has anyone done such a thing before? When has such a king been born? So uncharted is their action that we have one of the few instances recorded in history where men actually stop to ask directions. They ask at the wrong place of course and as the joke goes, arrive quite late for the party; but they get there.

Give them some credit. Who do you know who puts their life on hold to go in search of the Christ child? It is a revolutionary undertaking; and yet at the same time, the very core of everyday spirituality? Could we but make our central task each day to discover Christ anew, what a revolution must take place in our own lives! Always the disciple of Christ travels in uncharted territory, students of word and world, generous as well as receptive.

God has abandoned neither the world nor the church, but I think the Christ is to be found only in some previously unlooked for places. WE will need to change our expectations, let go of old paradigms. Yes, difficult, hard, maybe painful; but what a great joy to be present at the birth of Christ today. May God grant us ears to hear, eyes to see and hearts to attend the new work being done in the church and in our world today. Amen.

“Matthew 1:1-12, Pastoral Perspective” by William Arnold, In Feasting on the Word, Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year B, vol. 1 Advent through Transfiguration. Edited by Bartlett, David and Taylor, Barbara Brown. Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville KY, 2008.