Mary, Joseph, And the Fragile Thread of God's Salvation

Matthew 2.13 18

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You all can read the newspapers. And you listen to Television. You see the world as it is. And often you confront it in your places of employment. You know about the crime and the conflict; the drugs and the disasters; the homelessness and the hopelessness; the wounds and the worries that plague our lives and our world. It is a world as spiritually lost as the world into which the Christ Child was born. There is still no room in the inn. And great danger still threatens the innocent.

Aware of the extent of the danger, how much do we think what we are doing here matters? How important is it that you and I and our church discover how we can make a difference in this world for God? What difference would it make in the Divine scheme of things if you and I refused to follow God's call? After all, the trouble of the world is so immense and we are so small. How much does what we are doing here matter?

How often we have been tempted to quit! How often we have felt completely inadequate for the work of God! How often we have thought that God had better choose a greater people than us if something really important needs to be done.

How often we may have experienced the obstacles in our way as greater than the resources to help us on our way!

We sense the possibility that God has in mind for us a great and noble purpose:

A task/A mission
A ministry/An act of service
A vocation/A purpose or vision to live

But then, sensing both external obstacle and internal weakness, we begin to question:

How can I, we, serve God?
God must be foolish indeed if God is counting on me!
You, I, we feel like a very fragile thread. If God's plan depends on our strength and resiliency then God's plan is indeed in grave danger!

The Christmas Story provides an astounding picture of the fragile human thread by which the salvation plan of God hangs. In large measure Mary and Joseph are that fragile thread. Talk about important people, from the strength and resiliency of their characters the salvation of the human family seems to hang. As we move forward together towards our future in the next millennium, as we look out upon the needs of the world and as we look within and see how hard it is to really trust and follow God, I feel a great need to allow the Christmas story to deeply impact the stories of our lives. And so I invite you to go with me to Bethlehem not just to hear the story but to enter the story to experience God working in the lives of fragile folk like Mary and Joseph.

We enter Bethlehem after a long journey. The city is dark, but overhead the stars are bright. There is a stillness in the air, but also an occasional raucous shout from a building. The inns are inviting. But there is no room for us. The air is cold and clear, but we catch occasional whiffs of animals and stables.

And all around us, as we walk through the narrow streets of Bethlehem, we see far more evidence of:

Suffering/Destruction
Sickness/Violence

Than we see evidence of:

Peace/Wholeness
Hope/Joy

Roman soldiers patrol the streets, their heavy boots clomping upon the cobblestones, each rhythmic beat reminding us of the oppression and despair brought by these captors.

And we silently pray, "God, make haste to save us!"

The streets are crowded with beggars and vagrants, homeless wanderers whose ranks are swelled this evening by weary travelers from all over Palestine. We can hear the crackling of small fires as they attempt futilely to stave off the evening's chill. We hear the grumbling of tired and hungry souls and see the huddled forms of countless human beings who have no place to lay their heads. And we silently pray, "God make haste to save us!" We turn a corner beside an inn. The darkness within us is brightened only by a promise. And the darkness surrounding us is broken only by the light of an unusually bright star that seems to strangely guide our footsteps. Step by slow step we make our way behind the inn. We see a cave filled with animals. The smell of manure fills our nostrils and almost forces us to turn away. But we are drawn forward by...

That promise.

That star.

We push past three donkeys huddled together against the cold and find ourselves in the entrance to a cave where the darkness is even blacker than in the street. But through cracks in the ceiling of the cave soft rays of starlight are filtering through and standing there for a few minutes our eyes begin to make out figures gathered together in the darkness.

(Parts of the following story, enclosed in quotes, are adapted from an unprinted sermon by Thomas Troeger titled Joseph's Dream In Bethlehem)

"First we see a woman, a round faced peasant woman leaning up against a feeding trough for the cattle. Maybe she is just tired, we think. But a soft cry alerts us to the fact that lying upon hay in that manger is a baby. We sense, from shadows on her face and the posture of her body, that this is a new mother whose energy is sapped by immediate demands and future fears. Her left arm is slouched around the child on the hay. The rest of her body aches for a good night's sleep.

"And a man sits a few feet to the side. A walking stick props up his drooping head. If a wind blows through the stable and topples him over he is so tired that he will go on sleeping in the same posture on his side on the floor of the cave."

But suddenly the picture changes, as a pale and then dazzling light grows in the center of the cave. Arching wings emerge from the light. It is an angel! "The angel places a hand on Joseph's shoulder and leans over to whisper a message:

"Concerned about their exhaustion we say to the angel, "Shhh! Can't you see they need their rest?"

"But the angel does not listen to us. Heaven is too realistic about earth's brutality to keep quiet.

"Rise", the angel cries, "take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there till we tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him."

Herod! How well we know that name! Herod is all the darkness that surrounds us, threatening to extinguish every brightly shining star. Herod is all the forces that desire to see the promise of God broken. Focused through his evil human will are all the fears and the lies and the violence that would snuff out God's salvation plan for the world; God's salvation plan for the nations; for you; for me.

Herod is like a pair of giant scissors even now beginning to rapidly close to sever the fragile human thread of God's salvation. But, in the voice and the warning of the angel the winds of the spirit are blowing and that wind may be able to blow the fragile thread out of the way. But, nothing can stop the scissors from doing their work of doom:

A voice shall be heard in Ramah, "wailing and loud lamentation. Rachel weeping for her children."

"But maybe the baby Jesus can yet be saved. We look again into the sleepy stable. "Wake up Joseph! Wake up!" God's own child won't live long enough to cut his baby teeth if Joseph and Mary don't wake up and act. We cry out again:

"Joseph, Mary, Wake up! For God's sake, wake up before it is too late!"

"Didn't you hear the angel? We know you are tired. You have every reason to be. But the salvation of the world is depending on you. If you don't act, God's new born love won't have a chance. Rise! Take the child, NOW!

"Then we become still, shocked by our own words, "the salvation of the world is depending on you."

"Our salvation depends on this sleepy couple?" Would God be foolish enough to let heaven's purpose hang on such a fragile human thread???

as fragile as Mary slouched around the manger
as fragile as Joseph with his head propped on his hand
as fragile as you and me with:

our fractured egos
and wounds of body, mind and soul
and fragmented purposes
and partial commitments
and imperfect churches

Does God trust such fragile human threads as Mary and Joseph, and you and me and us, with the salvation of the world?

YES! God is that foolish! And daring, trusting and above all loving!

Wherever God's truth, wherever God's justice, wherever God's love is being born, that truth, justice and love always hang from a fragile human thread.

Like Mary and Joseph we will struggle with this fact, but the fact remains, we are the fragile human thread of God’s salvation.

So be it. Amen