Returning to the Post-Christmas Normal Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23 January 2, 2005, 2nd Sunday after Christmas The Rev. William V. Livingston, Rector Church of the Resurrection, Starkville, Mississippi As a child, like most children, I loved the Christmas season - well what we call the Christmas or holiday season in the secular world - in actuality what the Christian year calls Advent. That period between Thanksgiving and Christmas was by far my favorite time of year. It was a time everyone seemed excited about life: decorations, shopping, a general sense of sharing and generosity, families gathering, festive meals, strangers welcomed with seasonal greetings. On the other hand, I must admit that Christmas Day was one of my low points of the year. Yes, there was the highlight of waking to see what grandeur awaited under the tree and opening gifts. However, as the years passed, the joy of playing with new toys seemed to end quicker, and the awareness that we'd return to normal seemed to sink in as the final gift was opened. Ironically, our lectionary readings for the Sundays during the 12 days of Christmas seem to just as quickly end the infant stories. No mention today of a manger, a star, host of angels or shepherds. Even the wise men aren't named, but only acknowledged that - just as it seemed Christmas was over when the last package was unwrapped - after they had left, life went on for Joseph, Mary and the newborn Jesus, but not an easy life. Once again we are reminded to be ever so careful when we use Christian as an adjective - as in Christian person, Christian community, Christian nation - because Christian does not refer to a set of beliefs or a specific orthodoxy. It means to be Christ-like, and Jesus came to identify not with the wealthy, the powerful or those in authority. Jesus came among us, not to become comfortable among the mundane or powerful among the elite of this earth--but instead to become vulnerable among the humiliated. Even at his birth, those in power and authority sought to kill him. We are spared in the missing verses of today's Gospel from Matthew the horrendous account of Herod's slaughtering the infants of Bethlehem in hopes of killing the Messiah. There is no rest for the Holy family. Barely do we catch our breath from the birth account, and they must flee to Egypt, where they will be aliens. Even after Herod's death, they cannot return but must relocate to Nazareth: the most hated cities among the Jews because of its lack of racial and religious purity and also among its conquerors because it is where all the trouble of the region seemed to breed. All of these experiences would go into forming the consciousness of Jesus. He would grow up vulnerable; persecuted religiously and politically and ostracized by his own neighbors over his birthright. Thus, when we use Christian as an adjective, we must be prepared to ask with whom does Jesus identify. Second, Christmas once again confronts us with radical obedience: no, not radical obedience to a list of rules, but radical obedience to the voice of God, as it speaks to us in the times and places we find ourselves. Joseph, the God smuggler, gives us insight into what this radical obedience looks like. Radical obedience looks like a man who when he hears God tell him to do so, does not follow the societal rules of his time or the religious teachings that instructed him to divorce Mary - to put her away or to death. Scripture remains silent on the subject, but his decision to accept the pregnant Mary would have put both of them in jeopardy, caused him constant and profound embarrassment, probably ruined his career. Having weathered that, despite common sense, cultural norms or what would have seemed the easy thing to do, radical obedience looks like smuggling his young wife and new born child to an unfamiliar land. Then, once he's establish a comfortable life, radical obedience looks like moving, again, to the unfamiliar, to the area most despised by societal values. Yes, another Christmas has come and gone. We are living in the dawning moments of another year. The "holiday season" is quickly drawing to a close. The rush of preparation has culminated in a few hours of "quality time" spent with friends and family. The gifts have been opened, the food has been devoured; and for some, the house has been returned to order. However, another Christmas invites us to hear the reminder of Howard Thurmond's poem "The Works of Christmas". When the song of the angels is stilled,When the star in the sky is gone,When the kings and princes are home, When the shepherds are back with their flock,The work of Christmas begins:To find the lost,To heal the broken,To feed the hungry,To release the prisoner,To rebuild the nations,To bring peace among brothers,To make music in the heart. Another "holiday season" has come and gone, but Christmas calls us to radical obedience also - to be a God smuggler, to get up and carry the child and his mother to Egypt. Yes, the liturgy we use week in and week out, the grandeur of Anglican hymnody, the care we provide to one another, and the friendships we establish through our parish life are all bring us pleasure. However, Christmas reminds us the number one purpose of the church is not to create our comfort zone or enforce a list of rules but to accept radical obedience to carry the Christ child wherever we go, but most importantly to where there is pain and suffering and where our society is least likely to go. It calls us to radical obedience to be called a 'Nazorean'. The true wonder of Christmas is it what it was and is what it is in all its awesomeness and all of its humbleness, always to be remembered, always to be celebrated, never to be repeated. Whether our post-Christmas normal means returning to a content and comfortable life, returning to the grief of missing a loved one or avoiding those things which seek to kill our emotional and spiritual well-being, once again, the Christmas stories reveal to us that God loved us enough to take on our human form to show us how to live and how to die, even walking with us down to the valley of death itself. Today's story tells us that even from the beginning it was not easy to be the special light of the world. Jesus was under threat all his life. The threats would finally catch up with him as they catch up with all of us. But from Christmas we learn that finally the darkness can never put out the light.