NPMC
Vern Ratzlaff
Matthew 2:13-23
30/12/07
Back to Normal?
My name is Herod. Those who think as I do call me “Herod the Great”. To be
called great, to be powerful – this does not happen easily, is not maintained
without constant vigilance. Death is my constant companion – fear of my own
death, death of those who threaten my position. Even babies smell like death,
for one of them will one day supplant me.
Christmas is over. The cards have been read, the tree is on its way out. We have
heard the carols and the Christmas story often, so we can relax; we feel so
good; the anticipation of a coming birth realized. Now we can get back to
normal.
That’s not the gospel, The child is born, and instead of returning to the
delights of a quiet idyllic home life, there comes a murderous decree and a
precipitate flight into Egypt.
The first Christmas pageant did not end with a tinsel winged angel spreading
goodwill, with grinning shepherds kibitzing offstage, but with Rachel weeping
for her children and a young family fleeing into exile.
We find Christmas so wonderful: family nearby, the security of a religious
culture that reinforces our traditions, love from everyone, a community that for
a few weeks has the welfare of the marginalized well in mind. The first
Christmas was not like this: a family on the run, religion that has no interest
in the activities, loneliness and hatred the companions on a long journey.
Back to normal for them after the birth? It's a fast-paced story, this Matthew 1
and 2. Joseph is told about the coming birth; magi come to Jerusalem seeking a
king and are sent to Bethlehem – they leave surreptitiously – their comings and
their goings equally shrouded in mystery; Joseph is told to take his family to
Egypt; the slaughter by Herod of children (probably about 20); Joseph is told to
return to his country, but not to his hometown in Judea but to go to the north,
to Galilee.
They go to Egypt – exotic place for tourists today. And today you can go on
tours in Egypt, retracing the route taken by the Holy Family – if they were in
all the places they are said to have been, they must have had a good travel
agent: into the Nile delta, to Mataraya (as proof that they were here, the huge
olive tree they found refuge under still stands there), to where an ancient
church (Kinneset Abu Serga) stands on the place they rested (and you can still
see the indentation in the stone where Jesus put his head); to Deir El Maharraq,
a monastery built on the site of their southernmost journey.
But Christmas is not just a story about a baby. A friend of mine was skeptical
about all the foofera made by churches at Christmas, but after attending a
Christmas Eve service, he said, “Now I get it – it's all about a baby, and
babies have hold of all our emotions.”
NO, it's not about a baby – it's a story about the clash of kingdoms, about the
clash of power (in fact, that's Matthew’s theme in his gospel – watch for it in
these coming months).
Where the magi saw a baby and the fulfilment of universal longings, Herod saw a
threat, and joined Hitler and Pol Pot and Stalin and Mao and Hussein in strikes
against Bethlehem and Beirut and Bosnia and Beijing and Baghdad.
We don't like this. We want quiet streets and silent nights and twinkling stars
and no crying (not even From a baby). But any G-d who is unwilling to come to
our Bethlehem (regardless of how we spell it) won't do us much good. If our G-d
is going to save us, G-d will have to come to where we are. As Hebrews (one of
our lections for today) puts it, “he did not come to help angels, but the
descendants of Abraham” – 2:16)
G-d did not come to angels; G-d came to Bethlehem. To Bethlehem. Oh, we like
that, even sing a song about that: how still we see thee lie.
Although that's not what it was in our story.
If we wrote a song about the Bethlehem as people experienced it in Matthew ch 2,
it would say something about, 0 Little Town of Bethlehem, made miserable by the
presence of Jesus; streets ringing with soldiers’ boots, the cries of the
frightened, the wailing of the bereaved.
G-d did not come to angels; G-d came to Bethlehem.
To Bethlehem. And here a baby goes head to head with a king. Later, a crucified
carpenter head to head with an empire.
And that’s normal. That’s what the Story of G-d’s people keeps telling us. It's
a story about a clash of empires, a clash of dreams, this story from Matthew.
(Note the five dreams in this Matthew passage – four to Joseph, one to the
magi.)
It’s a clash of dreams.
Herod dreamed
• of building temples and palaces and fortresses
• of building firm relationships with Caesars and kings and potentates
• of securing his throne against all pretenders, even if it meant killing his
sons and his wife
Magi dreamed about escaping the delusions of a mad king's paranoia.
A carpenter from Nazareth dreamed about protecting his wife and son.
A carpenter's son dreamed: of enemies reconciled, of love becoming the highest
civic virtue, of forgiveness opening all fists clenched in anger.
A clash of kingdoms.
Jesus unsettled – those who met him – those who were aware of him.
Christ is always with us, Dorothy Day said; “I often meet Jesus”, she said: “in
the faces and voices of those in need, in those seeking shelter, in those who
are refugees, in those who are tortured
Back to normal after celebrating the coming of G-d among us. After finding
Jesus. And I wonder if we found the real Jesus? The magi thought they would find
him in the political powerbrokers’ offices; thought they would find him in the
insights of the religious experts.
Some year I wish we would do a Stations of the Manger walk in Saskatoon. In the
Stations of the Cross we reflect on the political and social and cultural
dynamics that took Jesus to the cross. A Stations of the Manger would remind us
to seek to discover where that first family would have felt most at home.
For if the normalcy of Matthew 1 and 2 suggest anything, we’ll find him more
likely in Friendship Inn at table than in a suburban church fundraising dinner;
more likely in a lineup at the Food Bank than in a Teachers Credit Union queue;
more likely sleeping in the Salvation Army’s shelter than snug in a bed while
visions of sugarplums dance in his head.
For what is normal is not what the predominant culture sees and hears:
• a litre of Hennesey cognac selling at $48,000
• a $500,000 furcoat for your dog
• a $1.2M be-jewelled mobile phone
But of a Joseph, who dreams not of military conquest but of escape routes from
murderous political forces who think nothing about the pain caused by collateral
damage; of a dependable, plodding Joseph who leads his family to safety, even if
it means being refugees, and who leads his family to back, but when they dare
not return to their home village, they become part of the great displaced even
in their own country (a story known only too well by those displaced in their
own country – Darfur, Palestine, Iraq, Congo, Rwanda). It's a story that is
shared by far too many today, victims of insecure rulers misusing power, victims
of persecutions and assassinations, parents mourning their lost children.
But it's a story, too, in the ordinary
• how a young couple shares love
• how a community pools meager resources
• how the refusal to accede to political bullies’ demands become a hope, and
lights the path to a new way that still grips us.
My name is Joseph – you’ve probably never heard of me. Just a carpenter from up
in the Galilee – east of Left Armpit. I don’t get my name in the papers. I’ve
been on the run from more kings than you can shake a camel's bridle at – it's
the kings who make things happen – I just try to keep out of the way. That’s why
you've probably never heard of me – I live a very ordinary life – a very noma1
life.