Sunday Homily - December 22, 2019 - How to Write a Christmas Letter

The Apostle Paul Icon

I.

Ever since I can remember,
 one of the essential things that my family did every Christmas season
  was send Christmas cards.

And not just any Christmas cards.
 No, they were homemade Christmas cards.
  Cards that had a little paragraph about how our family was doing
   and what all we had been up to in the previous year.

Mom always headed up the effort to make sure that all of our extended family
 stayed up to date on what all the Harris's were up to.
  And when I moved off to college,
   I became responsible for writing my little paragraph of my life
    and what all I did that previous year.

And, you know, it was an exercise that some years was easy
 and some years was much harder.

Because, you know, when you write a Christmas card
 you only have a certain amount of space on the card,
  and so you have to pick and choose what kinds of things you share.

Often the easiest things to share with family and friends
 are the big events of the year,
  such as when I taught horsemanship at an Oklahoma ranch during my college summers
  or when I graduated college,
   or when I, you know, got married,
    or when our family grew when Brynn and Asher came bouncing into our lives.

But there are some things about the years
 that are much harder to share, aren't there?
  There are happenings in our lives throughout the year
   that we often won't put in our Christmas cards at this time of year.

Like the year when I was miserable at Christmas
 because I had just gone to college and I realized that I wasn't enjoying my major
  in Engineering as much as I had hoped.
   My miserable Christmas spirit wouldn't do great in the Christmas card, right?

Or the year that my Grandma Harris, my dad's mom, died at the age of 97.
 Its so hard to admit loss in the midst of a season that demands you be jolly,
  even if that jolliness is a facade hiding our pain and sorrow over a lost loved one.

Or maybe the year that I said I was going to seminary
 and, God willing, be ordained in the Episcopal Church as a priest
  of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church,
   and have to describe and explain to lifelong friends
    that God was calling in a different way than my Baptist upbringing.
     It made visiting my home church very awkward and weird.
      Awkward and weird stuff doesn't get put into Christmas cards, right?

So, the question persists:
 how do you write a Christmas card
  that faithfully describes where you are
   without being untruthful for the sake of "jolliness"
    or the oppressive demand to pretend
     that Christmas is the "most wonderful time of the year?"

Well, the answer may actually lie in what you might think
 is the "least Christmas-y" reading from our Advent IV readings this morning:
  Paul's letter to the Romans.

II.

You may have seen in our reading
 from Paul's letter to the Roman Church this morning
  that we actually read the opening salutation,
   quite literally the opening sentence,
    to this ancient and holy letter.

Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit,
 pens his magnum opus of a letter to the Church in Rome,
  a church that is and continued to be sorely oppressed by forces
   both outside of the congregation and inside of it.

Outside the Church in Rome,
 the Caesar's have been waging war and conquest in the North and East,
  and the oppressed Jews of the Diaspora
  (Jews who lived outside of Judea)
   were thrown out of the city of Rome.
    Several years later,
     the Jews were allowed back in the city of Rome.
      [Oxford Commentary on the Bible - Romans]

This outside force highlighted an internal rift within the Roman Church:
 Jews were the rightful inheritors of the Covenant of Abraham,
  and the Messiah of the prophecy being Jesus Christ, a Jew,
   seemed to indicate that the rules for Gentile converts in the Law of Moses
    still held to be the commanded and proper practice.
     Gentiles had to undergo circumcision as part of the Covenant,
      they had to abstain from food sacrificed to foreign gods.
       Gentiles were still held at arms length, even though they themselves
        had been THE CHURCH in Rome when the Jews were thrown out by the Caesar.
         There were internal rifts growing in the faithful,
          and they needed guidance.

So, the unique situation in the Church of Rome
 is that the Jewish followers of Jesus were thrown out of the city,
  and the Gentile followers of Jesus were the only Christians left.
   But then, when the Jews were allowed back in the city,
    they faced an interesting dilemma:
     they were integrating back into the Church
      that probably looked and operated differently than before,
       and the Jews whom Jesus proclaimed the Gospel to along with the first Apostles
        all of a sudden became the outsiders to the Gentile congregation there.
        [Craig Keener New Testament Commentary; Oxford Commentary on the Bible]

And the absolutely perfect person to write to the Church in Rome for instruction
 is non other than one of the most Jewish Jews by pedigree
  who had been called by Jesus to be his apostle to the Gentiles:
   St. Paul the Apostle.

In penning this letter,
 we have to remember that Paul is writing a proclamation of the Gospel
  to all nations, people, tongues, and ethnicities,
   the Gospel of Jesus Christ that is good news to all.

But how do you write a letter of hope
 to a congregation torn apart by the forces we have seen.

What do you choose to put in your letter,
 a Christmas letter written to a Church that didn't need to be told to be jolly and festive and that everything is okay,
  but who desperately needed the deep, hard, eternal joy
   found in the Gospel of Jesus?

Paul, by the Spirit,
 opens the letter in the best way that he can:
  he painstakingly, carefully, and perhaps masterfully,
   encompasses the entirety of the Gospel in just his opening sentence
    of his letter.

Let's listen to it again, friends in Christ
 and pay close attention to the contents and the words:

"Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
  called to be an apostle, set apart for the Gospel of God,
   which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures,
    the Gospel concerning His Son, who was descended from David,
     according to the flesh, and was declared Son of God with power
      according to the Spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead
       Jesus Christ our Lord..."
       [cite]

Notice how in the first section of Paul's introduction,
 he tells of where he is in life
  and encompasses the entirety of the life and witness of Jesus, the Son of God.

Paul knows of his call by God on the Damascus Road by Jesus Christ
 to be the Apostle, a proclaimer of the Gospel of God.
  But not just that, but Paul let the Church know what that Gospel is:
   the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God,
    who became human like us, born of the Virgin Mary,
     suffered death, but was raised with power in the resurrection of the dead.
      There is the Gospel right there.

But Paul goes on:
 "...Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship
  to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles
   for the sake of His name, including yourselves
    who are called to belong to Jesus Christ;
   
To all God's beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints;
 grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."
  [cite]

Notice how Paul now proclaims what Jesus's resurrection means
 for those whom he is writing:
  both Paul and the Church in Rome have received that same grace and apostleship
   to proclaim the Gospel to the nations!
    And that all who gather in the name of Jesus Christ
     are called to be saints!

And then the best part of Paul's Christmas letter,
 which is good enough to be read on it's own:
  "To all God's beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints:
   Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

This may seem like a nice opening to the letter to the Romans,
 but it is when you understand the cost of writing this letter
  you may realize the depth of the Gospel that Paul carries.

When Paul writes this letter,
 he has suffered greatly for the Gospel already.
  He has been whipped and lashed by his own people in the synagogues he traveled to,
   he has gotten stoned and left to die,
    he has been imprisoned on account of Jesus.

He has been rejected and has been opposed by many people,
 and has worked as a tent maker to make a living.

And maybe the most sobering fact:
 in a few short year later,
  Paul will meet his martyrdom in the very city
   that he writes this letter of hope and Gospel.

You see, friends, Paul's Gospel,
 the eternal hope that he proclaimed in the beginning of this letter
  is not a Christmas letter of platitude:
   it is a Christmas letter that actually cost Paul his life.

But that same hope is where Paul also placed his most sure and holy hope:
 Paul's hope was in Jesus Christ,
  in whom and through whom Paul is made more alive today
   than he was when he wrote his Christmas letter a long time ago.

Because, as Paul would say,
 "I am crucified with Christ, and nevertheless I live;
  yet it is not I that live,
  but Christ who lives within me."

III. 

Christmas letters, friends,
 as well as the Christmas season,
  is about a Gospel that is so much deeper
   than the exterior lights, wreaths, pageantry, and artificial mirth
    that we may deck our halls with this time of year.

Instead, friends, it is about the deep, hard, abiding love of God
 shown to us in God's Only Son,
  Jesus Christ,
   taking upon himself our humanity
    and coming to us as a helpless baby long ago,
     and who suffered, died, and rose again in great power
      so that we who stiff suffer and die
       now have ultimate hope that Jesus Christ will raise us up, too.

Undoubtedly, you who have gathered here,
 have had great moments of joy that comes through Jesus Christ in 2019.
  And we wish all the more for the same in 2020.

But it is undeniably the case for a lot of us,
 that 2019 was also a very hard year,
  filled with our own personal sorrows and sadness
   perhaps spilling over into the Christmas season as well.

If you take nothing away from Paul's letter, friends,
 please take this:
  Christmas is not about pretending to be happy when you are not.
    Christmas is not about being jolly, when things in your life are falling apart.
     And Christmas is not about the lights, music, or pageantry
      that can smother and snuff you out like a candle barely keeping its flame.

Rather, friends,
 please remember what Christmas is really about:
  it is about when God descended to us,
   the Eternal Word made Flesh,
    Jesus Christ,
     those many years ago
      to be born of the Virgin Mary
       and to save the entire world from their sins
        by the power of his resurrection from the dead.

In the same Holy Spirit that spoke through St. Paul,
 so also friends, in the Christmas letters that you either send through the mail,
  or the Christmas letters that you live out in your everyday lives,
   remember to write such a letter
    that your hope in Jesus Christ that overcomes all forces in the world
     shines so brightly,
      that all may see it
       and give glory to Our Father in Heaven.

Write such a letter, by hand or by how you live,
 that even though you may carry sorrow with you,
  remember that Jesus Christ chooses to dwell with you in your sorrow.

Even though there may be strife within our families,
 with rifts that have come up by outside and inside forces,
  write such a letter, friends,
   that although strife may come,
    the ultimate hope that we have is not of our own making,
     but of the blessed hope that we all have in Jesus Christ,
      who has overcome the world.

And write such a letter, dear friends,
 that the world may know the name that truly saves the world
  is none other than the name of Christ Jesus,
   who loves you more than you can ever know.

In the name of the +Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.