Saint James UCC of Hamburg, NY

Isaiah 7:10-16, Matthew 1:18-25

Preached by Rev. Dr. Robert Matlack
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There is a beautiful but simple story that is told about a young child who was very busy one day out at a table in the living room. After a while her mother approached her. The daughter was totally engrossed in drawing a picture with her crayons. "What are you drawing?" her mother asked. "Oh," said the child, "I'm drawing a picture of God." Her mother responded with all of her adult wisdom, "How can you draw a picture of God? No one has ever seen God, and no one knows what God looks like." "That might be true," said her daughter, "But they'll know what God looks like when I finish."

That's really the same message that we find in our text from the gospel of Matthew - no longer do we have to wonder what God is like, for in this tiny child, God has come to be with us, to shape and to reshape our lives, as we live knowing that God is with us.

Think about that with me for a few moments. God is with us, and because God is with us, everything is changed. That was the message that Isaiah tried to deliver to King Ahaz. Now Ahaz was the King of Judah during some very troubled times. His nation was constantly being threatened by others, by nations who were much more powerful than Israel. In the midst of this, Ahaz had cut himself off from his most important source of strength, for he had turned away from God. But God had not given up on Ahaz, so Isaiah was sent to deliver a message of hope.

Ahaz of course was not ready to believe any prophet of God, so God sent Isaiah with a second message. Ahaz was to ask God for a sign - whatever sign he wanted, whether it be from the world of the dead or from high up in heaven. Ahaz could name the sign that would convince him. But Ahaz was afraid, after all, that if he named a sign and God was really able to produce, then he would have to believe. He would have no other choice. So Ahaz said, "I refuse to put the Lord to the test." What he was really saying was - "I am afraid. I refuse to put myself to the test, for I might end up having to believe."

Isaiah is undeterred, and goes on to say that God will give him a sign anyway - a young woman will bear a son and his name will be Immanuel, which is Hebrew for God with us. With this miraculous event, no longer will we need signs, no longer will we be able to say that we won't put God to the test and flee in fear, for God is with us. We might say that the little girl's picture is finished.

At it's heart, this is the Christmas message, a message that says that we are never alone, and that our lives have never really been the same since God came to be with us. It is a message, as our advent candles remind us, of hope, of peace, of love, and a message of joy - a joy which comes from the fact that God is with us. Let me repeat that - it is a joy which comes from the fact that God is with us.

I want to stress that because most of the time we look for our joy in other places and events. We like to think of joy as that happy feeling which comes when something works out the way that we wanted it to or perhaps in a way that feels even better than what we'd hoped for. Joy is a feeling which comes in a surge of excitement and happiness - a feeling that comes and then goes just as quickly as it came. We hear that Christmas is a season of joy, and so we expect that we ought to have that surge of excitement, that surge of happiness that we associate with joy. In our efforts to look for it we buy a lot of presents, bake a lot of good things to eat, and we put out a lot of cheerful decorations, all the while hoping that we will feel the joy that we're supposed to feel at this time of the year.

But, the joy of Christmas is not meant to be a fleeting feeling - rather it is the joy that comes from the knowledge that God is with us. The presence of God in our lives is not something that comes and goes. In Jesus Christ God has come to be with us, and God is always there with us. We know that in the midst of whatever we face - whether it be difficult or easy, good or bad, painful or happy - GOD IS WITH US! The joy of Christmas does not depend upon things going right in our lives, for in the birth of the Christ child, the biggest thing possible has gone right. God is with us through all that we face. We are not alone. Our lives are not hopeless, for God is there.

When we expect that everything should turn out the way that we want, we are only setting ourselves up for disappointment. Just remember the story of that first Christmas. There was Joseph, betrothed to Mary, the love of his life, and all of a sudden she's pregnant, and all that he really knows for sure is that he is not the father. This child is not/cannot be his. Imagine with me the disappointment, the loneliness, the anger and the frustration that he must have felt. It had to be an incredibly painful moment for him, perhaps even the most painful moment that he had ever experienced. And then, suddenly and totally unexpectedly, the angel came with the message that he should not be afraid, for God was indeed with him.

This is the message that comes to us this Christmas season - in the midst of the unexpected as well as the routine, in the midst of our disappointments, our fears, our loneliness and our frustrations - as well as in the midst of our gladness, God is there. God is with us through all that we face, so let us rejoice! Let us rejoice that God is with us. Let us rejoice with a joy that no one and nothing can ever take away from us.

Amen