She Left Him There for
the Lord The Rev. Fred G. Garry - December 1, 2002
Texts: 1 Samuel 1 and Luke 1 Well, the turkey is gone and the Christmas
lights are up and except for the yet to be heard Sinatra Christmas
album all systems are go. Yet, I knew things were getting serious
when Kathy came to me this weekend and said, "you know its
time for the Christmas letter." This was a sign to me that
I better focus as the days are numbered.
Given all the demands of a pastor at
Christmas and the rather diffuse procrastination I call a management
style, Kathy is good about letting me off the hook most things
this time of year. This is our official policy. Actually, my
"observer-only" status could be in part because I tend
to spend too much if ever I am put in charge of presents or I
put things in the wrong place if I decorate or that I consider
less is more where Christmas lights are concerned (sometimes
stopping in mid-span arguing that people only look at the house
from one direction anyway). So maybe it's just that I type real
fast that the Christmas letter falls to me.
Writing a good Christmas letter is a
kind navigation of Charybdis and Scylla. There are dangers all
around. Now for the uninitiated such a task might seem simple,
but alas. A good Christmas letter is a kind tricky navigational
feet. On the one hand it needs to be positive. No matter how
bad the year no one wants to get a tear jerking, terrible note
at Christmas. Those should be saved for New Years beginning with
the words, "well I am glad [insert the year] is behind me."
The greatest example of a sad Christmas
letter came from Kathys Minnesota cousin, Dwayne. Dwayne sent
out a rambling three-page tome that got worse with each line.
An astute reader would have seen the signs when he started by
describing how his truck doesn't work after it ran into the barn.
Dwayne was just warming up there. By the end of the note you
learned about his financial problems, his wife's health condition,
his daughter leaving town, and how bad his teeth had become.
Oh, and you folks have a Merry Christmas.
Whenever I find myself drifting into
confession and complaint in a Christmas letter, I have Dwayne
to thank for bringing me back. For the other extreme I have Dear
Abby to thank, or one of her readers really. One year, and this
must be a number of years ago now, Abby published a note from
a woman who just had it with the Christmas letters that come
across as a recommendation for sainthood or the Nobel peace prize
for family harmony. (That's not really a category.) But you would
think there was some domestic academy award acceptance speech
going on. The Dear Abby reader had enough of this.
No more listing, she complained, of how
many of your children will be in Europe for the holidays as the
Rhode Scholarship program was just too much fin to come back
to "the States." No more big promotions and PhD's;
no more grandchildren who should be bronzed. A banner year she
suggested for most families would be a healthy stretch without
hearing the words: dropped out, kicked out, broke up, arraignment,
settled out of court, and yet another interview.
So you can see how writing Christmas
letters is a dicey voyage. On the one hand you have to avoid
the dregs and yet on the other you have to keep your feet on
the ground. Even in a ho-hum year this can be quite a challenge.
Yet, when something really spectacular happens (and by spectacular
I also include the notion of spectacle, as in making a spectacle
of yourself), the Christmas letter becomes an effort of Herculean
proportions. Some things are too good to omit (a new heart, a
new child, a new life) and some things are too painful to leave
tacit (a broken heart, a lost child, a divorce).
In the two passages we read today we
have very similar stories, stories I have always wondered about,
wondered what they would look like in a Christmas letter. Each
one has a basic frame: a woman who lived her life without the
blessing of a child gives birth. Although separated by a 1,000
years, although somewhat different in terms of the focus of the
story (Samuel's birth is about his mother's shame; John's is
about his father's unbelief), the basic story is interchangeable:
an unexpected child arrives, a child of promise, a child dedicated
to live a life of Nazarite chastity. At this point, we are really
talking about a birth, something most Christmas letters can handle
with ease.
As we look deeper though we can see some
challenges and some more parallels. Both Samuel and John would
be brought up with a Nazarite vow, which is a kind of strict
holiness code (don't drink, chew, or go with girls that do taken
up a series of notches). Both Samuel and John would be known
as the "the last." Samuel was to be the last judge
of Israel and John the last prophet. So again their stories run
in a kind of parallel line. Each one would prepare the way for
great transition, each one would be known as great. Here the
Christmas letter question becomes a little dicey. Hannah or Elizabeth
could have described the bright future that seemed in store for
theft respective sons and thus fall to the too positive side.
Now, up to this point, I think I could
spin these and still keep the balance. But then the stories take
twists that go far beyond my meager letter writing skills. Let's
start with John's birth. An angel comes and tells Zechariah John
would be a great prophet. It's the angel that trips me up every
time. I mean how do you put that in a Christmas letter? Well,
I was out in the backyard and an angelic messenger came. It always
rings just a bit over the top. Well, maybe people could discount
it because Zechariah was a priest, and he was in the holy of
holies, and you know those pastor types are funny that way.
Okay, maybe we could just squeak by on
Zechariah in a Christmas letter, although I think there would
certainly be some stirring in family circles about how the notion
of Elizabeth was pregnant was enough of a miracle, the angel
bit was just not needed. Hey, families talk this way! Yet, I
am just stuck with Hannah. I am stuck with the claim: she left
him there for the Lord. How do you account for this in a Christmas
letter? The child of promise, the child taking away her shame,
the child she must have treasured more than life, and she left
him there for the Lord?
Oh, Hannah! Oh blessed saint of good
intentions have mercy. Have mercy on this woman and bring her
back, call her and say, like Moses' mother, look after him a
little while longer. Yet, she left him there for the Lord. How
do you describe this in real life? "Well this was an interesting
year. The crops came in, Lamach did well in school, and Hannah
took her son, Samuel, at the tender age of two and left him at
Shiloh with the priests, she left him there for the Lord."
I am sorry, but how do you work this into polite conversation
let alone the balance of a good Christmas letter?
We do such violence to Hannah and Samuel
when we think, oh people in olden days just did this sort of
thing. This was not a big deal back then. Yes it was; this was
so bittersweet, so undoing, so painful. Oh, Hannah. I mean, what
do say? What do you say to the neighbors, to the other children?
What do you say to the children?
I think Joshua was about four and Laura
was two when Kathy asked me to do something that was way out
of my comfort zone. I mean I just wasn't raised this way. It
was bedtime and for some reason I was in charge. I've evolved
into such responsibilities as I often make them, how does the
saying go, "more work than it's worth." Something like
that. She said, "make sure before you leave, make sure you
pray with them." I can remember just being shocked by her
request. I'd prayed before thousands of people, but the idea
of praying with my children was just way out of the box.
But I did it. And I found that prayer
for children still seems normal and not a moment of shame or
embarrassment that it often becomes for adults. So over the years
it became a rather natural thing. Yet then it happened. One night
as we were praying, I prayed for the Christians in the Sudan
and the missionaries in China. Afterward Joshua asked, why? Why
did I ask God to keep them safe? Then came a long conversation
with many long pauses and challenging parts. Why would someone
kill another for his or her faith? Why would someone hate a Christian?
Why would missionaries go where it wasn't safe? Why would they
die for their faith?
I found myself reliving this transforming
moment this week when I read an op-ed piece in the New York Times.
A journalist was describing the ongoing persecution Christians
face in China; he transcribed the tales of woe of a Christian
woman. She recounted being beaten so her child could see, hoping
this would prompt her to renounce her faith. I found myself with
the same bewilderment, the same moment of longing for the world
to be without such moments, moments like Hannah leaving Samuel
at Shiloh. I found myself glad that while our family suffered
loss this year as is the case in most years, although there were
good parts and bad, I found myself a bit relieved that my Christmas
letter had no such part. She left him there for the Lord.
A good Christmas letter avoids the dregs
and keeps both feet on the ground. So it's fair to say, as ironic
as this may sound, Scripture is not a very good Christmas letter.
It is true that both Samuel and John's birth were a kind of foreshadow
of Jesus, each one of them in their life would continue this
kind of minor. Samuel would be rejected just as Jesus was rejected;
John would baptize with water as a kind of prefiguring of Jesus'
gift of the Holy Spirit, he will baptize you with fire, John
said. Their lives would be so extreme, so tragic, so brilliant.
Yet, we don't have to look to their lives,
all we have to do is look at their birth. With John we have angels,
a definite challenge for a good Christmas letter, and with Samuel
we have the words, she left him there for the Lord. Scripture
is just too extreme to fit within the decorum of good conversation.
This is the first Sunday of Advent. Perhaps
some of you have already cut the tree, begun the decorating,
or purchased the first few items on the list. (Fair warning if
have completed your shopping it is still too early to tell anyone.
At this point they are well within the bounds of decorum to heap
scorn upon you.) I've always wondered why these stories come
at the beginning of Advent. In the past I have always figured
it was the birth connection. Christmas it about birth, there
are only so many birth stories in Scripture, so these are likely
choices.
This year though I think I have a new
perspective. Maybe it is good to remember Samuel and Hannah,
Elizabeth and Zechariah with John as they form the boundaries
of the season. On the one hand we have the hard words, she left
him there for the Lord. These words cannot be explained away,
they cannot be simply put aside. Yet, neither can we forget that
the child, Jesus, came to bear the sins of Israel, to give his
life, to die for others. On the other hand we have Zechariah
not believing because it was too good to be true. Christmas is
also about the unbelievably good news shepherds would hear, the
savior of the world has come to us.
With these stories Advent becomes like
a stretched canvas for a profound painting, a painting of Christ
bringing joy, a painting with Jesus on the cross. With these
stories we have the extremes, pulling us like cords to be played.
And we have to have both. If we just have Hannah leaving Samuel
we are like cousin Dwayne and his teeth, and if we just remember
John's birth the glory becomes glitter not grace.
Let's be honest, Advent is about shopping,
baking, and wearing green and red together. Yet, it is also a
time where we get stretched. Maybe our stretch is to be in the
midst of joy when we have sorrow. Advent is tough when we have
experienced a loss, when we are separated from loved ones, when
our health is falling apart. Advent brings the edges into sharp
clarity and we can lose sight of what we have for what we don't
have.
Advent is also a stretch in terms of
sacrifice. It seems like we give and give this time of year.
Fruitcakes fill the mail, trees are swamped with presents, and
we show up to every Christmas play and sit in the dark for Johnnie's
three seconds of Christmas fame. Yet in this we so often lose
sight of love of truly caring for others. Maybe instead of the
perfect meal we could enjoy the perfection of God's grace.
These things don't fit well into Christmas
letters. Yet neither does scripture. What is most important though
is not what fits into the letter, but that we are deeply fit
within the love of God and we make room for others. So with that,
let your Advent be blessed, be stretched by grace, and write
a good Christmas letter. Amen.
|