Parish Of Opawa St Martins Blog

The story of Christmas contains at least two journeys. On Christmas midnight we heard St Luke telling us that the shepherds, those regarded as an unpleasant underclass that most people avoided, were the first to hear the gospel. In response, they make their journey with haste to Bethlehem to see this wondrous thing that had come to pass and worship the Christ child lying in the manger. God’s message is first proclaimed to outsiders.

St Matthew tells us of a second journey made by the Magi. Because the Magi came first to Jerusalem to make inquiry of the scriptures from King Herod and the scribes, it is assumed that they did not know the ancient tradition of the Hebrew people, and that therefore they were Gentiles. So a second group of outsiders, Gentiles from afar, make their journey under the guidance of a star, to pay homage to the new born King of the Jews. One of the main themes of today’s celebration is that the Magi prefigure the acceptance of the Gentiles into the community of faith. No longer would this community be restricted those of the Jewish race. The arrival of Christ signals a shattering of old boundaries, a rapid expansion of the tent of Abraham to accommodate the whole human race. The arrival of the Magi points to the universal character of the Good News Christ was born to bring. They signal that the Gospel is for everyone and is to be shared with all peoples, and that the kingdom of God is a wide open door for all people. In the Nicene Creed, which we proclaim Sunday by Sunday, we say that we believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic church. Some Anglicans express surprise that the word catholic is there. When we say that we are catholic, it means that the Good News given us by God has a universal character. God’s Good News is for all people in every time and in every place. The arrival of the Magi indicates the catholicity of Kingdom the Christ child will inaugurate. It will be a kingdom open to all and it will require us to be a church with wide open doors. Today we will be baptising Isabella Mary. The gospel is for her and for her family as much as it is for you and for me. God is inviting everyone to come to the child in the manger to bear their gifts of love and gratitude. In the arrival of Jesus, God is issuing an invitation to all people everywhere to be his disciples.

Discipleship is for everyone. Yet God has several goes at inviting Herod and all Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the city of David. It was the place where God’s house was situated, where the glory of God dwelt in the temple. Herod loved building projects and he had just completed the rebuild of the Jerusalem temple to make it into something truly splendid. Often when people build wonderful buildings they regard them with a certain proprietorial attitude. I suspect that Herod regarded God as his tenant in the temple. This was the place considered by Jews to be the centre of the world, and Herod had made unprecedented sacrifices to build the most splendid of buildings. King Herod’s official title conferred by Rome was “King of the Jews” and he controlled the very focal point of the Jewish kingdom. So when these mysterious strangers arrive, saying they had been guided by a star to find the birth place of one called “King of the Jews”, and that they wanted to pay this child homage, Herod was not amused. Herod sense of control and power was threatened. He represents the part of us that wants to keep God boxed up in the familiar, who want to keep the Kingdom within our expectations; small manageable complete with walls that keep out those who make us feel uncomfortable. Herod knew God’s word all along. When the Herod summoned his court theologians to ask “Where is the Messiah to be born?” they took out their scrolls, juggled their texts and came up with an answer in seconds: Bethlehem of Judah. While the Magi had access to nothing but a star, Herod had access to God’s word itself. But he did not hear it. He did not make the journey to Bethlehem. The centre of his life was his throne, his power, his possession of God’s house. He could not abandon that centre. Thus he was troubled and all Jerusalem with him. Herod could not imagine that the world had a new centre; and that that centre was a child lying in the manger. Herod could not hear God’s word. He does not make the journey.

The Magi, by contrast, search diligently and respond joyfully. Notice how carefully Matthew has chosen his words. They entered the house. The house in Bethlehem is God’s house, not the temple in Jerusalem. This house is sheltering the Christ child. It is the place where the fullness of God is dwelling. It houses the one who will be the true shepherd of his people in contrast to Herod’s violence. It is here, in the presence of baby Jesus, that they offer their gifts.

See how the incarnation turns the world upside down? Those on the periphery, the shepherds and the Magi, turn out to be the ones who are first to hear and respond to God’s Good News. They appear to us to be the ones on the edge, but they are first catch on and to journey toward the centre. They go to a place that looks peripheral, Bethlehem, to find the new centre of the world, Jesus Christ.

No longer can the church be a closed group for the elect few. The gospel requires us to enlarge our hearts to make room for those who are different. It requires that we be a church with wide open doors and that we listen to the experiences of those quite different from us. Brothers and sisters, this sounds obvious but it is not easy. Every time someone new comes into our midst, we all have to move over a little. If we are comfortable with the way things are, moving over to make room and listening to outsiders might be inconvenient at best, or threatening at worst. What if these folk don’t value what we value? Will the things we value be safe? Will they follow our rules and accept the standards we know to be right? There is a Herod figure in all of us that has a natural instinct to protect our patch from outsiders we don’t know and who we think will misunderstand. If we listen to that part of us, we risk failing to hear the gospel and missing the coming of God’s grace, not because God is being mean minded, but because we allow ourselves to be blinded by our need to protect the known and familiar and by our refusal to see God coming to us from places beyond our own experience and our expectations.

The fullness of God comes to us in Jesus. He is lying in a most unexpected place; not the glory of Jerusalem but in a manger in a house in Bethlehem, the town everyone knows is a dump. God comes to us because longs for us to be loved, forgiven and restored and because he longs to unite the whole human family to himself and to enable all people everywhere to know his love and peace. God invites us all to receive him. He will satisfy the deepest need of those who accept him. Make the journey to the One who is the centre of the world. But if that journey looks risky because it takes us out to the periphery, beyond the edge of our comfort zone, do not be afraid, for in the Incarnation, the world is turned upside down and the periphery is in fact, the centre.