It was just a few days before Christmas, when they came to the church door. Joseph and Diane. A couple down on their luck. To prove he was worthy of our church’s support, Joseph told me their story. He had been a carpenter but was between jobs. They had just been told to leave the boarding house where they were staying, and because Joseph and Diane’s father were odds with one another, they couldn’t return home to Falmouth. They’d struggled with addiction and were now living sober one day at a time.
Those days before Christmas are hectic for pastors, and I really didn’t need one more thing to do, but his name was Joseph and it was Christmas! And Diane was pregnant!
We all love Christmas stories – the expectant parents, the angelic choir, the magi- the wise ones – from the East, the star in the sky, and the soft cry of a new born. This is the stuff of Hallmark movies, creches, and carols.
And, yet, that first Christmas was anything but tranquil or serene. In fact, it was messy and chaotic. Have you ever been in a stable? Not very romantic – smelly, lots of particulates in the air, and watch where you step.
And, Mary and Joseph were a bit like Joseph and Diane, working people, who couldn’t find a room, traveling to Bethlehem not because they wanted to – but because they had to – Caesar, the king whose forces occupied the land with spear and sword needed taxes to support his building projects and the troops that occupied Judea. Taxation without representation, and Joseph and the caravan of pilgrims to Bethlehem were not happy travelers.
Joseph and Diane, and Mary and Joseph – like countless persons experiencing homelessness – just wanted a safe and warm place to sleep, and then the labor pains came.
The baby comes, angels sing, and shepherds, coming from the graveyard shift, working at minimum wage, here to worship, filled with hope that this baby will change their lives for the better. On that midnight clear, hope was in the air – a baby, a child who will usher in a new world, the child of God.
Then, the scene shifts, foreigners from the East, magi – astronomers and astrologers from another religion – come with gifts. But Mary and Joseph’s joy is short-lived. Joseph has a dream, an angel says “Run for your life. The baby is in danger. Go to Egypt till you receive a sign that everything’s safe.” And, so family, with little more than their clothes and a few morsels of food join a pilgrim caravan, asylum seekers, fleeing the dangers of their homeland. Uncertain of the future, like the 70 million refugees in Africa, from Syria, in Bangladesh, Yemen, and at our nation’s borderlands – Mary and Joseph are just trying find safety and a better life for their child.
And, yet, in the darkness, the light shines. The everlasting light that guides all of our journeys.
On Christmas this year, we hear the still, still, songs of the angels. We see the light of a distant star, guiding our steps toward a better world, where we are better people. We look in the faces of Joseph and Diane, Maria and Jose, and their wee babies and see in each face the Christ-child.
Tonight, listen for the angels…tonight let the better angels guide your steps…the Christ-child is being born in us, in the child hidden in every adult, and Jesus looks at us through eyes of every infant.
O Holy Child of Bethlehem, descend on us we pray
Cast out our sin and enter in, be born in us today
We hear the Christmas angels, their great glad tidings tell
Oh come to us, abide with us, Our Lord Emmanuel.
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