We
are people of the clock. Hence when we tell time, we contract the phrase "of
the Clock" into o'clock. Nevertheless, our age of the clock may be ending.
Digits are replacing hand and faces. Time is now beginning to be measured in nanoseconds.
Megahertz are more relevant to gauge speed than seconds or miles per hour.
In the age of the Roman Empire, days were measured
by the sun and years by the reigns of emperors and their royal governors. That
is why Luke begins his beautiful story of the nativity, "in those days a
decree went out from Caesar Augustus to all the world, while Quirinius was his
governor of Syria.
In what we call the sixth
century, Western Europe adapted measuring years in AD and BC. A Roman mathematician
named Dionysius recomputed the years beginning from the founding of the Roman
Empire up to Jesus birth, making Jesus birth year one, and numbering the years
in descending order back from Jesus' birth as BC and the years following Jesus
birth in consecutive order as AD. Dionysius miscounted twice four years of one
emperor’s reign and by the time the mistake was discovered it was too late.
Hence according to our calendar, Jesus was likely born about 4BC.
Biblical
people and the writers of the Bible of course knew nothing of AD or BC. What mattered
the most to Mary and Joseph wasn't how the Roman Empire imposed time or how other
generations would count the years. They knew that when God entered their lives,
their own times and schedules were thrown completely off. Jesus was born according
to God's time, no matter how later generations want to pin it down. To be sure
both Mary and Joseph seemed to have been given the option to decline or protest.
Undoubtedly, both Mary and Joseph went through a lot of self-doubt and recrimination.
They struggled with accepting the angels’ messages, for to them, God's timing
was way off. Yet, in the end they said yes to God's request, they put their future
in God's hands.
Saying yes did not make things
any easier for them. Because of a whim of a distant foreign ruler, they were compelled
to trudge to Bethlehem about the time their child was expected. They experienced
a desperate search to find shelter. When the actual birth occurred, messengers,
strangers, and disconcerting cosmic signs appeared which made no sense at all.
Finally after shepherds, sheep, dogs, magi, attendants, and camels left, instead
of being able to stay in one place and rest, they had to escape foreboding terror
and flee to a foreign country. The point of the story, is that like Mary and Joseph,
those who pay attention and say yes to what God may be saying to them, inevitably
find their days not merely inconvienced, but totally rearranged. God seems to
give them whole new calendars, but instead of one with twelve months, one with
all of their future, still open.
Next year,
as the children come up to bring lambs and shepherds I plan to have them wrap
construction warning-tape all around the crèche. For if we are willing
to cross the threshold of the stable and go inside, we are saying that we are
willing to have God rebuild us. We are willing to be under construction, for the
stable is a symbol of God's construction zone.
Celebrating
Christmas is tantamount to recognizing that new birth causes profound transformation.
The consequence of letting the birth of Jesus Christ into our hearts is that ever
after God will be challenging us to rearrange our lives. If you and your children
want surety and comfortable pat answers don’t venture out to look at signs
in the sky leading to a far off place like Bethlehem. Scientific laboratories
are a lot safer than what this stable represents. Being an apprentice with Donald
Trump promises a far more predictable future than being a serious disciple of
Jesus.
People of faith live in dangerous times,
because God comes to live among us. We live in dangerous times because if we accept
God’s invitation, the boundaries of our minds will be forever challenged.
We live in dangerous times because all the Caesars, Herods, and Quirinius’
of the world understand God’s new birth on this earth inevitably threatens
their power, stability and their definition of reality. We live in dangerous times,
but the angels’ message says to people of goodwill “do not fear.”
According to the clock it is now 15 minutes
past 4. My time is pretty accurate. This is a 21 jewel Illinois Bunn Special,
one of the best railroad watches ever made. But if you want to enter the stable,
BC, AD, the reigns of kings, the terms of Presidents, or even the markings of
atomic time, won’t be of paramount importance and never will be a barrier.
God is not a person of the clock, any of our clocks. That is why God does not
measure human worth in megahertz or humanity’s dignity in any units devised
in high tech laboratories. God cuts thru them all.
Every
Christmas invites us in some way to put our future in God’s hands. Every
Christmas in some sense calls for a suspension of our own calendar. Every Christmas
is the celebration of the fullness of the grace of God’s time. May the blessings
of this Holy Season which go beyond our time, continue to be reveled to us all.
