Some Kind of New Year

1-1-2017 (Christmas 1A)

Isaiah 63:7-9; Matthew 2:13-23

Some Kind of New Year

Over the last week, I’ve seen a lot of folks saying that this would be the first time in a long time that they’d actually stay up to watch the ball drop.  Strangely enough, it hasn’t been because of anything special like the turn of the century, the change of a millennium, or a fear of some kind of Y2K computer dating glitch or anything - these folks have been saying they plan to stay up just so that they can watch 2016 finally be over, finally be behind them.  This last year has been one filled with challenges, disappointments, and heartaches for a lot of people, particularly from a pop culture standpoint.  We’ve been surprised and saddened on too many mornings to wake up and discover that yet one more beloved cultural icon has passed away, and we’ve gone to blame and curse the year as if it’s somehow been 2016’s fault that people have come to the end of their life.  I’ve heard the suggestion that we should gather various people into bunkers and put them in plastic bubbles to help preserve them - and I mean, I think we’re all agreed that national treasures like Betty White should be preserved at all costs, don’t you?

When you look back, it’s hard to disagree that 2016 has been a pretty challenging and dark year.  Even looking beyond the slew of celebrity deaths, we’ve worried about the spread of the Zika virus; been completely surprised by the “Brexit” as the UK voted to leave the European Union; been shocked by the footage of the gorilla Harambe dragging the little boy even as we debated between ourselves over whether the ape should have been shot or not; we got up in arms about a football player taking a knee during the national anthem… and then, of course, there’s the rat race of the election we somehow managed to survive - emails, locker-room banter, Russia, and all the other three-ring circus that happened leading up to November 8th.

I’ll freely admit: I’ve been swept up in the conversation, the desire to make it to the end of the year without seeing one more headline about which major figure has passed away this time.  I’ve been eager to see the end of a year that seems to have been written like a Game of Thrones book.  But as I went through the week and prepared to write a sermon, as I thought about the past year in our own church and community, and as I put all these things in the context of the events of Matthew’s Gospel… I realized that things could have been a lot worse.

We come into Matthew’s Gospel right on the heels of the events of Christmas.  The baby Jesus has been born, the Wise Men have just barely left - if you look, you can just maybe see the silhouette of a camel riding off past the horizon.  And it seems that, before Mary can even finish pondering all these things in her heart, Joseph has had another dream.  He comes rushing in, grabbing what few belongings they’ve brought with them in the first place, and telling Mary that they’ve got to go and now.  And in a moment of true suspense in Matthew’s Gospel, just moments after Joseph and Mary flee to Egypt, the soldiers come marching into Bethlehem, leaving behind them the mournful wails of all those who just witnessed the brutal murder of their newborn baby boys.

Jesus and his family find themselves fleeing their home, hiding from their government, seeking refuge in a foreign country where they know no one and had next to nothing.  The people of Bethlehem are faced with unimaginable horrors as their leader commits genocide out of his own political and ideological fears.  It was a time that I’m sure many were more than ready to see come to an end, a series of tragedies that wouldn’t be soon forgotten by the people of Bethlehem.  And yet it passes in a brief instant - Herod stays in power, but his reign is little more than a brief remark.  The angel comes to Joseph in a dream once again and tells him that it’s safe to come home, and so Jesus and his family make a new life for themselves once more, this time in Nazareth.

And so the story goes on - these horrific moments of tragedy are swept away in the passage of time and we are reminded that there is a bigger story being told, a bigger picture being painted.  We hear the words of praise from Isaiah, the reminder of the gracious deeds of God; we remember that God becomes our Savior in our times of distress - that “It was no messenger or angel but his presence that saved them; in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; he lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.”  And we move forward in the story, realizing that God did not set God’s self apart from the tragedy and pain of God’s people, but that God inserted God’s self into that tragedy and pain, that God even took that tragedy and pain to its fullest extent, even to the point of dying on the cross.

And we remember that, even as Mary wept and grieved over the death of her son, on that third day God’s promises were still fulfilled and not even death itself could thwart God’s love for humanity.  And in the fulfillment of those promises, we can and do continue to find out hope.

So as we ring in this new year together, as we look back on 2016 with all its ups and downs, it’s OK for us to recognize the heartache, the frustration, the times of darkness and grief.  It’s even necessary for us to recognize these things, to realize and remember that there are mothers who today fill the streets of Aleppo with wailing and tears shed for children murdered in acts of genocide and political fear and extremism, that there are families who still today are fleeing from persecution, running from their homes in the hopes of finding some place of refuge, some shelter from the storms of this world.  And it’s even OK for us to continue to hope and pray for those whom we care about, whether they be members of our own family or among those who are larger-than-life parts of our popular culture together.

But as an old camp friend of mine said earlier this week, “2017 isn't going to stop death, folks. So, what if it DOES take Betty White? What are we going to do about it? There's nothing we can do, but take comfort in a God who CAN do something about it, and did, by conquering the grave.”

I pray that this new year is full of blessings for each of us; that we continue to find hope and comfort in the promises of our God who has conquered the grave, and that we look to reach out together to those who mourn, to be a source of comfort and encouragement to them in this new year as well.  May we enter this new year with the praises of Isaiah fresh on our tongues - may we recount God’s gracious deeds in our lives, in this year and in each year yet to come.  And may we always, this day and each day yet to come, give all glory to God.  In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.