"GIFTED"

A Sermon Based Upon Isaiah 9: 2-7

By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin

Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership

Advent B,  Wednesday, December  21, 2014

“For a child has been born for us, a son given to us….” (Isa 9:6 NRS)

'Twas the night before Christmas....

Is this any way to begin a sermon?      In elementary school, just before Christmas break, we were taken to the auditorium to watch two movies back-to-back.   The first film was called “The Spirit of Christmas”, based on Luke’s version of the birth of Christ.   The second was based on Clement Moore’s poem,  “A Visit from Saint Nicolaus.”  

Both versions of Christmas have a lot more in common than you think.    These movies were both acted out by Mabel des Beaton’s Marionettes.   Both stories are about astonishing visitors.  Both stories are about unexpected gifts.   Both stories included family and animals.   But most important of all, both stories take place in the dark.

I.

Christmas always begins in the dark.  Listen to how Isaiah's prophecy begins.   "The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.  Those who have lived in deep darkness---on them the light has shined."

The ‘deep’ darkness Isaiah speaks of is not an ordinary darkness, but it is the dark shadow that comes upon a person threatened with death.  For Israel this ‘deep darkness’ was the looming attack of the Assyrian army, who threatened Jerusalem.   It is this kind of looming, gloomy darkness that serves as the backdrop against the light that is promised.

The promise of ‘light’ shining into darkness is unforgettable, because it speaks to our reality as well.   The vastness of the universe is made up mostly of darkness, not light.  If it were not for the light of our own sun, we would all be living in the dark.   Without light, darkness covers and dominates everything.   Without a promise of the power of continued light, our greatest hopes would be swallowed up by the a coming unending night.  Certainly, we've all starred into that big black hole we know as death.  With this promise of light---light at the end of our own tunnel of trouble, we’d have nothing to see and nothing to say against this dark. 

I recall my mother talking about the day electricity came to their family farm.  It was such an unforgettable experience she never called it “paying the electricity bill”, but it was “paying the light bill”.  I too came to realize how precious is the promise of continuous power and light when an ice storm hit Greensboro in the winter of 1998.  We went 2 weeks without power or light.  All we had was one small fire place, where we huddled around the flickering light, night after night, in a constant life or death war, a war against the cold and the night.  

We are all at war against the cold and the dark.  The other day I heard about a young woman who was “Breaking Up….”.  She claimed this was a ‘love story’, but this one was in reverse.  The young woman had grown up in church, desperately claimed to have wanted a relationship with God, but now she was breaking up, not with her husband, but with God---and she was breaking up for good, she said.   She decided to take a walk straight into the night.  Others called her brave and inspiring.  That is the darkness of our times--- Don’t look back.  Don’t look ahead.  Go bravely and courageously into that dark night and go alone—go without God.  

II.

But the prophecy of Isaiah still speaks against the darkness.  Isaiah says you shouldn’t keep walking in darkness because you now have a new baby on your hands.   Do you notice how he says it,  “For to Us a Child is Born” (vs. 6).   The Baby has been born, not just ‘to us” but “For Us”. 

“What an incredible thing to say,” Martin Luther once remarked way back in 1531.  “Oh, a baby What is it?  And the answer comes,  “He’s ours!”.   How proud and honored we are that as His surrogate parents He now belongs to us.  But it is not even enough to say that he is “born” to us or for us,  but the text also says, Luther reminds us, that “He is given to us”.   This baby is a pure gift, a present, for which there is nothing we can give in return---except that His life depends upon our life lived for him.

Could we walk away from new life, when we have held the baby in our arms?    Would you walk away from a baby?  What I’m asking is: What can a baby do to help you and me get through the night that we face?  Does the fact that this child has been born “for us” and has been a ‘given’ to us make any difference for how we view the world, how we live our lives, or look toward the future and our own war with the night?

Who in their right mind would simply walk away this baby or any baby, because we all know that when the baby comes everything changes, including us?   A baby changes everything.

Last year I attended a Christmas party and heard youth minister Andy Lambert, tell a story.  I emailed Andy and asked him about the story, which he said was based upon western writer Bret Harte’s “The Luck of Roaring Camp”.   I did a little research and found a short version of that story as it has been told on the Radio Program, the voice of American, by Harry Monore. 

The story goes:  “Roaring Camp was the noisiest gold mining town in California.  More than one-hundred men from every part of the United States had come to that little camp – stopping there for a short time on their way to getting rich.   Many of these gold miners were criminals.  All of them were violent.  They filled the peaceful mountain air with shouting and gun shots.  The noise of their continual fighting finally gave the camp its strange name.

On a sunny morning in eighteen fifty, however, the men of Roaring Camp were quiet.  A crowd was gathered in front of a small wooden house by the river.  Inside that cabin was "Cherokee Sal," the only woman in camp.  She was all alone and in terrible pain.  Cherokee Sal was having a baby.   

Deaths were not unusual in Roaring Camp.  But a birth was big news. 

One of the men turned to another and ordered: "Go in there, Stumpy, and see what you can do."  Stumpy opened the cabin door, and disappeared inside.  The rest of the men built a campfire outside and gathered around it to wait.     Suddenly, a sharp cry broke the air…the cry of a new-born baby.  All the men jumped to their feet as Stumpy appeared at the cabin door.  Cherokee Sal was dead.  But her baby, a boy, was alive.

The men formed a long line.  One by one they entered the tiny cabin.  On the bed, under a blanket, they could see the body of the unlucky mother.  On a pine table, near that bed, was a small wooden box.  Inside lay Roaring Camp's newest citizen, wrapped in a piece of bright red cloth.

Someone had put a large hat near the baby's box.  And as the men slowly marched past, they dropped gifts into the hat.  A gold tobacco box.  A silver gun.  A diamond ring.  A lace handkerchief.  And about two hundred dollars in gold and silver. 

Only one incident broke the flow of the men through the cabin.  As a gambler named Kentucky leaned over the box, the baby reached up and held one of the man's fingers.  Kentucky looked embarrassed.   "That funny little fellow," he said, as he gently pulled his hand out of the box.  He held up his finger and stared at it.  "He grabbed my finger," he told the men.  "That funny little fellow."

The next morning, the men of Roaring Camp buried Cherokee Sal.  Afterwards, they held a formal meeting to discuss what to do with the baby.  Everyone in the camp voted to keep the child.  But nobody could agree on the best way to take care of it.  Tom Ryder suggested bringing a woman into the camp to care for the baby.  But the men believed no good woman would accept Roaring Camp as her home.  And they decided that they didn't want any more of the other kind.

Stumpy didn't say a word during these long discussions.  But when the others finally asked his opinion, he admitted that he wanted to continue taking care of the baby himself.  He had been feeding it milk from a donkey, and he believed he could raise the baby just fine.  There was something original, independent, even heroic about Stumpy's plan that pleased the men of Roaring Camp.  Stumpy was hired. 

All the men gave him some gold to send for baby things from the city of Sacramento.  They wanted the best that money could buy.   By the time the baby was a month old, the men decided he needed a name.  All of them had noticed that since the baby's birth, they were finding more gold than ever before.  One day Oakhurst declared that the baby had brought "The Luck" to Roaring Camp. 

So "Luck" was the name they chose for him, adding before it, the first name "Tommy."    A name day was set for him.  The ceremony was held under the pine trees with Stumpy saying the simple works: "I proclaim you Thomas Luck, according to the laws of the United States and the state of California, so help me God."

Soon after the ceremony, Roaring Camp began to change.  The first improvements were made in the cabin of Tommy or "The Luck" as he was usually called.  The men painted it white, planted flowers around it and kept it clean.   Tuttle's store, where the men used to meet to talk and play cards, also changed.  The owner imported a carpet and some mirrors.  The men – seeing themselves in Tuttle's mirrors – began to take more care about their hair, beards and clothing.   Stumpy made a new law for the camp.  Anyone who wanted the honor of holding The Luck would have to wash daily.  Kentuck appeared at the cabin every afternoon in a clean shirt, his face still shining from the washing he'd given it.

The shouting and yelling that had given the camp its name also stopped.  Tommy needed his sleep, and the men walked around speaking in whispers.  Instead of angry shouts, the music of gentle songs filled the air.  Strange new feelings of peace and happiness came into the hearts of the miners of Roaring Camp.   During those long summer days, The Luck was carried up the mountain to the place where the men were digging for gold.  He would lie on a soft blanket decorated with wild flowers the men would bring.    Nature was his nurse and playmate.  Birds flew around his blanket.  And little animals would play nearby.  Golden sunshine and soft breezes would stroke him to sleep.

During that golden summer The Luck was with them, the men of Roaring Camp all became rich.  With the gold they found in the mountains came a desire for further improvement.  The men voted to build a hotel the following spring.  They hoped some good families with children would come to live in Roaring Camp.    But some of the men were against this plan.  They hoped something would happen to prevent it.  And something did.

The following winter, the winter of eighteen fifty-one, is still remembered for the heavy snows in the mountains.  When the snow melted that spring, every stream became an angry river that raced down the mountains tearing up trees and bringing destruction.   One of those terrible streams was the North Fork River.  Late one night, it leaped over its banks and raced into the valley of Roaring Camp.

The sleeping men had no chance to escape the rushing water, the crashing trees and the darkness.  When morning came, Stumpy's cabin near the river was gone.  Further down in the valley they found the body of its unlucky owner.   But the pride, the hope, the joy, The Luck of Roaring Camp had disappeared.  

Suddenly, a boat appeared from around a bend in the river.  The men in it said they had picked up a man and a baby.  Did anyone know them?  Did they belong here?  Lying on the bottom of the rescue boat was Kentuck.  He was seriously injured, but still holding The Luck of Roaring Camp in his arms.  As they bent over the two, the men saw the child was pale and cold.

"He's dead," said one of them.   Kentuck opened his eyes.  "Dead?" he whispered.  "Yes, Kentuck.  And you are dying, too."    Kentuck smiled.  "Dying!" he repeated.  "He is taking me with him.  Tell the boys I've got The Luck with me."

And the strong man, still holding the small child, drifted away on the shadowy river that flows forever to the unknown sea.”

III.

“The Luck of Roaring Camp” is not just another story----it’s a story that mimics THE STORY of child who has been born “for us.”   Our child was also born to strangers, and he died, but his life and his death can change everything. 

What does this baby change?  How is he our Light?    Yes, we still die.  Yes we still face floods of darkness, and yes, we still live in a dangerous, threatening world,  but as Kentuck said, “He’s taking me with him.  Tell the boys I’ve got “THE LUCK” with me.”

But it’s not just “LUCK” is it?    Look how Isaiah ends this prophecy.   He says that this ‘child born for us’ is not just any baby, but this child  “is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” (Isa 9:6 NRS).   Is this any kind of name to give a baby?   It is, if you are going to put the weight of the world  “on his shoulders.”   

This baby is a royal baby, but he is not just any ruler or king, but again, as Martin Luther once said,   This baby is “a genuine Lord”.   The rule of this baby differs than the kingdoms of this world.   He does not wear his authority around his neck, and he does not force you under his feet, but he “bears” the burdens of the world ‘to rest’ upon his own shoulders.   Can you envision a baby like that?   Can you imagine this baby changing and carrying your burdens in a way that he also carries YOU? 

As we think about such a baby,  I want us to think about  the parents of such a baby.  We don’t have to imagine it, because it is also part of the story.  At the birth of that child, Jesus, God needed a mother and a father ?   That may be the most surprising part of the story of Christmas.   It’s also the part that makes Christmas real.

We know how Joseph was engaged to Mary when she turned up pregnant.   Knowing that he was not the father, according to the Bible and the laws of the land, Joseph had some options.  He could follow the law and follow his Bible and he could have put Mary away privately.  Joseph is a good man, a righteous man, and such a scandal could have hurt his reputation. 

What do you do when something difficult, different and threatening comes close to you?  What do you do when you know something is really not right, and you need to try to save yourself?   Go to other people---go to the coffee shop, to the sewing circles, to the internet, or just google it and see what somebody else would do?   Or, “Just do what the Bible says!”   But what if it’s what is happening to you is not in the Bible and what if the Bible says you should get rid of that person, or and that you, being in the right, don’t need to worry with such problems or such people?    What would we have done, if we were in Joseph’s shoes?

Amazingly, no miraculously, this man who could still control his own destiny and determine his own outcome---didn’t.   It’s was a man’s world and he could have put her away privately, or he could have exposed her for what had happened, and he could have been done with it all.   But what does Joseph do?   “Joseph is the first person in the New Testament who learned how to read the Bible” (Fred Craddock).  Here, Joseph learned to read the Bible through the lenses of grace and the love of God.   For you see, the answer is not always in the Bible, but the answers in the Bible are always in the Baby.

How did the baby give Joseph the answer?    The baby was not yet born.  Mary is not yet in labor, and she was not even showing.  and this baby is already having an impact. Through an dream, an angel instructs Joseph  “I want you to marry her….I want you to marry Mary.   I want you to take her in, take care of her and to raise her boy.   I want you to feed that baby, learn to care for and learn to love that baby, and I want you to let the baby love you.  “For unto you...”  this baby is born, Joseph.   It’s not just Mary’s baby, this baby will also be YOURS.  To Joseph a Son is born….and a Son is given….”   If you will care for this baby, this baby will do more than return the favor, this baby will become the light of your world.   But you must receive Him Joseph.  You must take this baby home with you and you must make this baby your own.  Will you do it Joseph? 

On this night, once again, we are all Joseph.   This is how we know Christmas has come, when we take the baby home and make Him our baby.  Even before Christmas comes, Joseph decided to parent this child,  he takes Jesus home, he cares for him, he raises him, he teaches him, and he shows him how to be a good man.  Joseph does what is right---because he listens, not just to a law----or what has read about in his Bible, but because he is listening and following the voice of a living God who comes to him.   Christmas always comes, when there is one person, or one people who will listen to God, do what is right, and take the baby home with them.

IF you will take THIS BABY home with you, I promised,  HE will change everything.   Babies always change things.   Babies always shine.  But with this baby, there is no darkness that can ever overcome his LIGHT.   For, you will not just carry this baby, but this baby will carry you.   There is no other ‘gift’ ever given to us like Him.   As the angel informed Joseph: "The child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit…She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins….”  (Matt. 1.20-21).      

Tonight we are all Joseph.  We are instructed to take this baby home and it will be a night like no other.   
Merry Christmas!