Text: Isaiah 7:1-16
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Some folks will tell you it doesn’t matter what you believe. What’s important is to be a good person. That’s what Christmas is about. Give some presents, put up with your family, donate to charity. Let me make this as dead simple as I possibly can. Christmas is not about being a good person. Kindergarten is about being a good person.
Is that all Christmas is? Kindergarten for big people? With lights and songs to help the medicine go down? If that’s his birthday present, I think Jesus would like that. Get together with family, give to charity, and try not to be a jerk. Jesus would love that!
But not for us. Of course we do those things. Everybody does those things! But while everyone else is out there doing Christmas, Christmas, Christmas, we’re doing Advent. Advent is the time Christians take to remind ourselves that something fundamental happened that first Christmas day. His name is Emmanuel, and the name means, God is with us.
This week, we got hit with some pretty heavy Love Fund requests. This is not our Sunday School kids buying water buffaloes for some family half a planet away. This is us. Our people. Our towns. The supposed greatest-nation-in-the-world and we have people in this congregation who are food insecure, making choices between food, shelter, and medicine. Pick two.
And to those people, Christmas says, “Emanuel”. God is with us. How do we know? Because on Christmas Eve, one of the biggest attendance days of the year, we’re not taking a collection for ourselves. We’re putting that money in the Love Fund. We’re following the rule first spoken by Jesus himself, that those who have two coats share with the one who has none. We may not be able to fix the world’s problems, but we can take care of each other. When we give, we are the hand of God to someone in need. When we receive, we are the face of God to the one who gives. When we take care of each other, God is with us.
But suppose we have all we need. Does that mean we’re happy? No. We’re worried about tomorrow. You have no job, so you drop five hundred resumes, get fifty interviews, five call-backs, and if you’re lucky land one job. Are you done? Of course not. We’re not just looking for a job. We want steady work. And once we find steady work, we want better pay. And once we get decent pay, we want benefits. And once we get benefits, we want a 401K. And once we get the 401K, we want to max that baby out. Suppose we get all that. Are we satisfied? We’re like those greyhounds at the race track chasing a fake rabbit we are never, ever going to catch.
In Advent, God slows us down long enough to say, “Emmanuel.” To us, it means Jesus, but the first time it was spoken, it meant something else. Isaiah said it about 700 years before Jesus. His nation was called Judah, his king was called Ahaz, they were in trouble.
This is a little geopolitical, so stick with me. I promise there’s a point. Judah was one of a number of small kingdoms, and the 500 pound gorilla in the room was called Assyria. So two of the little, local kings came up with a plan. “If we all band together, we can fight off Assyria, and stay free!” Which means Isaiah’s king, has a choice. But instead of standing by his neighbors, or negotiating a peace, Ahaz chooses the most gutless option of all. He delays, and makes plans to turn on his neighbors. If he stabs them in the back, maybe Assyria will be grateful enough that they’ll let him be their lackey.
Surprise, surprise, his neighbors are not so excited about this plan. So their plan is to terrorize his people. Not attack the army. They need the army. They’re going to terrorize his people into overthrowing their own king. Then they’ll install someone a little more “reasonable”, and isn’t it great that nations don’t treat each other like that anymore.
Isaiah steps into that situation and says, “Emmanuel.” He looks his coward king in the eye and says, “My young wife just conceived a baby. When he is born, I will name him Emmanuel, and before that baby is eating solid food, these two petty kings you fear so much? They will be ash. If you won’t stand firm in your faith, you won’t stand at all.”
Then, 700 years later, it all happens again. Only this time, the 500 pound gorilla is Rome, and the powerless ones terrorizing the people are Zealots. The Romans called them dagger-men, because they would go into markets or arenas and in the press of the crowd they would stab-stab-stab, drop the knife and vanish. Sound familiar?
The same God that inspired Isaiah’s prophecy said the name again. Emmanuel. Or, to put it in the words of Jesus, “Take heart. I am. Don’t be afraid.” Yesterday, today, and forever, God is with us.
So, when the news anchor says, “Is something in your refrigerator poisoning your kids? Find out at 11.” You say “Emmanuel,” and turn that garbage off. When you pick up a magazine and see some impossibly photoshopped model staring back at you, you say, “Emmanuel,” and you put that garbage down. When someone places a burden of guilt or shame on your shoulders, or uses fear to manipulate you, let Emmanuel give you the strength to see past all the emotion to the reality and the possibility of your situation. Let me say that again. Let Emmanuel give you the strength to see past all the emotion, to the reality and possibility of your situation.
The reality of Isaiah’s situation is that those petty kings were going to lose. If they were smart, they could come to terms. If they were dumb, they could die. Either way, if King Ahaz and his people could just stand firm in their faith for a little, little while, they would survive.
The other reality of Isaiah’s situation is that the Assyrians had other things to do besides kill people. They don’t want a war. Wars are expensive. They want money. They want someone to keep the peace and collect the cash. The Assyrians could care less about some Jewish God. They could have kept their culture and their religion, if they’d had the courage to seek a peace.
The reality of Mary and Joseph’s situation wasn’t much different. Herod was a petty king living in a nest of vipers. Sooner or later, someone was going to off him. Rome takes over, and what does some Roman prefect care about Jewish prophecies of a someday messiah? He wasn’t going to hunt anyone down. All they had to do is run, and wait.
The hard part is resting in the not knowing long enough to let reality shine through. It’s easier to let fear rule you. That’s where Emmanuel comes in. If God is with us, we can sit in the unknowing. We can withstand pressure. We can push past the fear and the doubt, drop the guilt and the shame, and look for reality.
Most people don’t. It hurts too much. Seeing truth hurts, because it means we have to change. Changing the world hurts because it means we can’t predict the outcome. That’s why most people stick with the devil they know, guaranteeing things will never, ever improve. Not you. Not us. Not here. We will do the hard thing because, Emmanuel. Being nice is good. Experiencing a real Christmas, is better. Go in peace.
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