A Sermon

This is the sermon I preached a month and a bit ago. When I wrote it, I thought it was one of the worst things I'd ever written, thrown together at the last minute. But when I presented it to the congregation... Everything came together. All the songs, the scripture readings, the congregational readings... It was an amazing service, and something I never would have expected as I sat at the computer at 4 AM Saturday "night".

-------------------------------------------
Every year, during the holiday season, my family has a movie night, where we watch a couple movies together. Wednesday night, this past week, we had this years movie night, and we watched Back to the Future and it’s sequel. In Back to the Future, the main character Marty McFly gets thrown back in time, and has to figure out how to get back to the present, while making sure he doesn’t’ change history to the point where he no longer exists. As I was thinking about the focus for this week – The magi’s visit – it got me wondering. What would it be like to go back in time – to the Magi’s visit? For one thing, to finally answer questions about the Christmas story’s accuracy, but assuming it did happen the way Matthew told it and eventually wrote it down… What would it have been like? I’d love to find a camel, and ride with the magi and pick their brains. Why did wise men from a far, far country come to worship the prophecied King of the Jews?
What would it have been like to see the looks on Mary and Joseph’s faces as they were presented these rich treasures by men the likes they’d probably never seen before in their provincial lives. Sure, with all the angels and dreams and the miraculous birth, I’m sure Mary and Joseph would be a bit desensitized to strange happenings by now, but still… I think it would have been fun to be there.
Other than thinking about what it would have been like if I went back then, I like to think, well…. What if I brought them back here? What if those wise men saw Bethlehem today? For one thing, they’d see a big honking wall, made out of cement, worming it’s way around the city. Once the wise men found it, they would be quickly led through the checkpoint. Foreigners are never given a great deal of hassle… (Unless they happen to look as Arabic as I do.) The wise men would see the Palestinians not as lucky as them standing around, though… waiting for ages to get through, being told to remove item after item of clothing, trying desperately to find a way to get the cursed detecter to stop beeping and let them go home.

There’s a wall around Bethlehem. I could go into politics and explain the various viewpoints about why it should be there, or why it shouldn’t be there, and all it’s effects and such… but for now… the fact that it’s there, I think, is enough. Bethlehem, where the lowly shepherds heard the angel’s hymn ‘Peace on earth, good will to all.’ Bethlehem, that the Magi followed the stars to. Bethlehem where Jesus was born, has a wall around it. Has undergone sieges, has become a place… not of hope, but of desperation, and violence and hate.

So what is the story that we’re telling, of Jesus early years? How do we interpret the Magi’s visit? Is it a story of kings giving obeisance to the ‘King of All’ heralding in a new sovereign leader to conquer and to rule in the name of his people? Is it a story of walls being built? … Or of walls being torn down? Of gentile meeting Jew, of wise rich men kneeling next to a poor carpenter.

We have enough walls in this world, I think. Walls across the globe in the west bank. Walls across the Mexican/American border. There are the less physical walls we put up, that are still very real, to make it easier to walk past the street people asking for money. Walls at my workplace, declaring who it’s okay to be friends with, and who isn’t.
What is this obsession with walls? With being separate? I understand different people function in different ways, and some people are more… wanting to be independent than me… but at the same time… in my own experience, if I do things alone… they rarely get done well, if it all. When I do things as a part of a group, I thrive. I don’t always want to be a part of a group. Sometimes I want to be alone. But the track record is clear for me. When I let down my own walls, that’s when good things happen in my life.

When I take the time to sit with a homeless person and chat for a while, not just toss some change and run. (If I do even that.) When I spend some extra time with my family, when I’m a part of a team at work, when I become a part of a team with CPT, going to Palestine, or even at Ontario meetings… I can feel the richness of that togetherness. Me without walls is better than me with walls. That’s part of why I want to move into the MVS house, which, if I can finally get down to it, will happen in the next couple days. I want to live together with people –as a conscious choice. I love my family, very dearly, but I was born into them. I grew up with them. I want now to choose community.

Which comes first: I’m closer to God, so my walls come down, or when my walls come down, I’m closer to God?

Things in Palestine are a lot more complicated than my personal experience… and it’s going to take a miracle to knock those walls down, and I don’t mean just the concrete one. There are so many walls there. Walls of miseducation, of stereotypes and racism, of conflicting histories, of misunderstandings. Of war, violence, terror. Of manipulated religion. I have a piece of the wall here in my wallet. (show piece) I was able to work it off with my bare hands.

There are people there using their bare hands to work away at all the walls. It’s just little pieces at a time… but I have hope. I have hope when I hear of an Israeli soldier saying to a Christian Peacemaker Team member ‘Until there is peace, you have to be here, and I have to be here.’ I have hope when I see Israeli activists working side by side with Palestinians, picking olives. And I feel great joy having been right there alongside them, picking olives too. I have hope hearing of organizations bringing the idea of human rights into schools throughout Israel. The walls over there are being chipped away at. I just don’t know if they’ll end up being knocked down faster than they’re being built.

I have hope hearing the incredible similarities between stories told by Israeli settlers and Palestinian villagers, and I wonder… would they be able to hear each others stories? Or is the hate too entrenched. The status quo too much of a reality… It will take a miracle. It will take answered prayer. It will take… forgiveness. It doesn’t seem like there’s a lot of it over there in Palestine. . I think of the church of the Holy Sepulchre, on the site where traditionally, Jesus was crucified. The place is divided into denominations that all have to agree for any repairs to be made. A ladder is sitting near the top of the outside of the church. It’s been there for at least two hundred years. The denominations can’t agree to even move the ladder. The divisions of the Christian church are never more clear than in Jerusalem. If this is the Christian church in Palestine – the religion that holds forgiveness at it’s very core… they’re really setting a great example, eh?

It’s January now. We’re done waiting for Christmas. Advent is officially over. The shepherds, the angels, the stable, and now, the magi. It’s come and gone… but… we’re still waiting. For peace on earth. For the kingdom that little baby grew up to proclaim.

I like that tension I’ve found… that for me is very true for every aspect of my faith. The ‘already there, but not yet.’ The kingdom is already here, but not yet. I am who God created me to be, but not yet fully. To me, it means it’s alright to keep waiting, keep hoping, keep praying, but at the same time, keep doing. Keep searching, keep looking, keep trying. It’s easy to say nothing will happen. No one wants peace, and on and on… in Palestine, but, anywhere too. But, see… I believe in a God who likes to play with impossibilities. Sometimes he just takes a very long time, and makes you wait. That wait could be thousands of years.

The magi, they spent a long time trekking after that star. They journeyed, and eventually, they found what they were looking for, under that star.

I’m following that star. I think we all are. We’re not there yet, but we’re on that journey. I don’t know exactly what I’ll find under it… but I think it will be worth everything, once it’s all said and done.

So, let’s go try and knock down some walls. And let’s do it… together. We may not see results, it may not look like we’re making a difference, but we may as well do *something* while we’re waiting, right?

If I saw the Wise Men in Bethlehem today, I think I’d give them my piece of the wall to take home with them. To help them remember it. I’d probably try and recruit them to be a part of CPT. Speaking of which… if anyone would be interested in going on a delegation, let me or Murray know, and we’ll hook you up with what you need to know.

Anyway, I would ask them, “What now? You’ve seen the Messiah. You avoided Herod. You’re probably feeling really freaked out about all the babies dying. What are you waiting for now? And what will you do while you’re waiting?