January 1, 2006
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Begin Anew: New Year’s Day January 1st is always a day to begin again. The resolutions we have make give us a sense that we are starting brand new, even if they are the same year after year. This year, we believe that things will be different – the weight will be lost, the books will be read, the movies will be seen, we will increase our involvement in church and community. We resolve that in 2006, relationships will be strengthened, family time will be increased, the money for that wonderful worry-free vacation will be saved. We start the year with good intentions, this year we can prove the saying wrong and show that the road to hell is not really paved with our good intentions. It is instead that our good intentions lay a foundation for success as we travel the road to peace and growth, in our personal lives and in church. All it takes is dedication. We dedicate people and things by setting them apart. A marriage that begins in a church is a service of worship, dedicated to God in which promises are made before God and witnesses. Think of a pledge of financial support, here or in other groups to which we belong. Circumstances can and will change, we may find ourselves able to do more or less than we planned; but the promise of our time, talent, treasure is an act of dedication. We can dedicate things for special use such as when the church’s good china was used to serve over 700 homeless guests at First Congregational Church when over 700 homeless guests were served dinner at Bethlehem on Broad Street on Christmas Day. And we can commit ourselves to naming and completing some important tasks such as an athlete prepping for the big game, or a worker on a vital project, or a student pursuing the education that will serve them all their lives. All it takes is dedication. This New Year’s Day finds us still in the Christmas season, and so the Christmas story of Jesus being brought to the Temple for dedication provides us with some examples of how we can set aside our own lives for the glory of God. We have the example of Mary and Joseph. He would have been about six weeks old because Luke speaks of his and Mary’s time of purification. The law required a 40 day period of purification for a mother after the birth of a male child; the period of purification was 80 days following the birth of a female child (Leviticus 12. 1-8).“During that time, the mother is prohibited from going to the temple or handling holy objects. The proper offering for the cleansing ceremony is a lamb and a pigeon, but the law provides an exception for the poor, who are allowed to bring two pigeons (or turtle doves). Their offering of two pigeons tells us that Joseph and Mary are poor. Jesus begins his life as one of the poor whose cause he will champion throughout his ministry. “The law also required a consecration and redemption of the firstborn son (Exodus13.1-2, 11-16) signifying that the child is ‘holy to the Lord’ (v.23). The redemption commemorates the deliverance of the people of Israel who while they were slaves in Egypt, were brought through the final plague – the death of the firstborn children. According to the book of Exodus, the purpose of the ceremony is to remind the people that it was not their doing, rather it was God who brought them out of Egypt’ (Exodus 3.16). The people have been bought back from slavery, they are redeemed. However, Luke does not mention the redemption of Jesus here. Jesus is not redeemed, he is never ‘bought back’ from anything, but he belongs wholly to the Lord” (www.lectionary.org/English/luke p.2).It must have been a great day for Mary and Joseph as they did what the law required and brought Jesus for dedication. So many of you remember when your own children were brought forward for dedication to God, it was your way of giving your children into the church’s care. We receive them here and as parents promise to raise them in a faith-filled Christian home, we promise in this spiritual house to help to nurture and support them. We promise to help their children through word and deed know how loved and beloved they are. You remember their dedications and you recall their baptisms when, as four of our young people did a few weeks ago, they make their own promises to continue to grow up into Christ. Mary and Joseph are models of dedication as they present their child to God in the Temple. Then Simeon and Anna present another model of dedication for us. We see them as two people of faith who had the patience and wisdom to wait on God. Touched by the Holy Spirit, devoted to prayer, they believed that their prayers would be answered. They dedicated themselves to God and when they saw the infant Jesus, they knew they had seen God’s Messiah and they praised God. One writer sets the scene with Simeon and Anna this way: “Picture the old man with the baby in his arms. He stands chuckling with giddy joy, or perhaps he gazes with streaming tears on his cheeks, or is lost in transfixed wonder; in whatever way, he is so very happy. Then he says that this is enough now, he is ready to die. He has seen salvation and he can depart in peace. “Simeon stands there in grateful wonder. It is the future he holds in his hands. He has seen and touched it. He is satisfied. It is, as he said, enough. And then Anna, also old and approaching the end of her days, adds her own joy and praise to the moment. She’ll be telling everybody about this baby whom she saw for just a few minutes” (from John Stendahl in Christian Century online www.christiancentury.org Living by the Word – “Holding Promise”).The singer Steven Curtis Chapman tells us what Simeon and Anna could have said about the infant Jesus: “but this boy made the angels sing, And this boy made a new star shine in the sky. This boy had come to change the world. This boy was God’s own son, this boy was like no other one. This boy was God with us. This boy became a man, and love made him laugh and death made him cry. With the life that he lived and the death that he died, He showed us heaven with his hands and his heart, ‘cause this man was God’s own son…holy and human from the start this baby was God with us” (from “This Baby” written by Steven Curtis Chapman).Simeon’s prayer as he holds the infant Jesus thanks God for keeping the promise that he would see the Messiah. But his praise is tempered by the reality that Jesus will be received and he will be rejected. The acceptance and rejection of Jesus Simeon describes begins early. The second chapter of Matthew’s gospel tells us that when he was about two years old, wise men from the East came to worship him and that in order to preserve his life and probably their own; they went home by a route different than they had arrived so they wouldn’t have to let a jealous Herod know where this new King was. His life and ministry will be cause for celebration and his death will be heartbreaking. Simeon leaves Mary with much to think about and he knows that God will have the last word. Third, we have the dedication of God who comes to us in Jesus. He is an infant in this second chapter of Luke, but he will grow up in wisdom as he grows physically, he will be fully human and fully God, and he will change the world. He is the Messiah the one dedicated by God in heaven and by his parents on earth and by his followers in this present day and in his name and by his grace, we tell his story. God is dedicated too. It is God who so loved the world that God sent us Jesus to be the symbol of love and salvation. God is dedicated to us, to humanity, to the world God created. We are dedicated too. We are dedicated enough to offer ourselves to the child Jesus who will grow into manhood, who will die and be raised. We dedicate ourselves to doing the ministry given to us in the name of Jesus Christ. “When the song of the angels is stilled, When the star in the sky is gone, when the Magi And shepherds have found their way home, The work of Christmas has begun” (“I Am The Light of the World” words by Jim Strathdee in response to a Christmas poem by Howard Thurman; #469, Chalice Hymnal. St. Louis, Christian Board of Publication, 1995). In 2006, we can resolve to begin anew and dedicate ourselves to the work of Christmas. That work is to tell the world that Jesus Christ is born, that he still teaches, still heals, still provokes, still emboldens, still redeems and frees, still loves, still guides, still is Savior of you and of me, and still has room in his church for more. We can show by our ministry in his name that this year we will begin anew with a plan and a sense of dedication. Join me in this year of dedication and renewal as we say yes to the model of Mary and Joseph and bring the children we love to this church we love so that they can be nurtured and guided and encouraged here. Let’s be like Anna and Simeon and pray day and night for God’s promises to be fulfilled in our sight. Let’s commit ourselves once more with passion and purpose to dedicate ourselves to knowing God more faithfully; to supporting this church as well as we are able; to giving ourselves to this special place by doing all we can to make it all it can be. As we do God will be pleased, we will be blessed, and Jesus Christ will be praised. Amen. Dr.
LaTaunya M. Bynum |
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Broad
Street Christian Church
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