What Are We To Do With 2010–Matthew 2:1-12

              

                      The Christian new year began five weeks ago with the dawning of Advent, but I imagine that many of you this weekend are dreaming new dreams, making new goals, and hoping in new promises.  2011 is here and it is exciting!  The calendar is wide open, the Christmas credit card bill still has weeks to process, the fruit of new ministries are waiting to be planted, the sky is the limit.  Except, what are we to do with 2010?  How are we to remember this past year?  How do we archive what God has accomplished?  How do we record the times we failed to carry out God’s will?  If we forget our past we may be doomed to repeat our failures, yet if our hearts and minds remain in the past we will miss God’s calling today and in the future.  What are we to do with 2010?

                What are we to do with our text this morning?  Matthew’s story of Magi from the east is a curious inclusion.  Matthew is arguably the most “Jewish” of the four Gospels, so recording a story concerning men outside of Israel paying homage to this new heir to the throne is at best embarrassing and at worst blasphemous. 

                “In the time of King Herod,” our story begins, and this is a story we know well.  “In the time of King Herod,” signifies to us that time revolves around human achievement and earthly power.  Yes, we are living in the year of our Lord 2011, which is certainly hopeful, but we are also living in the month of January, a name derived from the Roman God Janus.  The Greatest Generation is passing the mantle to the Baby Boomers who are helping Generation X and Yers raise the OMG generation.  We are living in the post modern era, or is it the post-post modern era or is it the information age?  We know what it’s like to live “In the time of Herod.”

                Wise men from the east have followed a star in the heavens, and because it is “In the time of Herod,” they go to the palace to find him.  I’m not sure how wise these men were to announce to a sitting king that a new king of the Jews had been born, nevertheless, their announcement troubled Herod greatly.  He too wanted to find the child.  He called together the chief priests and scribes, and asked them where the child was born.  “Bethlehem,” they announce.  So, Herod calls the wise men together and asked them to find the child so that he could also pay him homage.  The men follow the star until it stopped over the place where the child was and there they knelt down and paid him homage, offering him gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.

                These are awkward gifts to offer a child, but being on this side of Christmas, I’m sure that we have seen an awkward gift or two.  My favorite awkward gift I have received came from Chad, whom I mentored through the confirmation process many years ago in Baton Rouge.  During the confirmation brunch at University Methodist, the confirmands would give their mentor a gift to say thank you for sojourning with them through the history and doctrine of the faith.  I sat down at the brunch table and Chad handed me an old, beat up, red Igloo cooler adorned with classic rock radio station stickers.  Not knowing exactly what to do with it, I smiled and politely placed it on the floor beside my chair.  “No, Mr. Matt, you have to open it to see what’s inside,” Chad said with excitement.  I opened the Igloo and inside, packed in ice, was a quarter-used jar of Newman’s Own Spaghetti Sauce and a pack of dried shrimp.  I assumed that it was homemade spaghetti sauce, until his mother leaned over and said, “Do you know that Paul Newman actually makes this!?”  I was intrigued, confused and bewildered.  So, what am I to do with a quarter-used jar of Newman’s Own Spaghetti Sauce and a pack of dried shrimp?  “Thank you, Chad,” I said with a sincere smile. 

                What are we to do with awkward gifts, except to receive them?  What should the Christ child do with these awkward gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, but to accept them, whether they be precious or not.  Not all gifts are good or precious or helpful, but they are gifts and we are called to receive them and make a place for them in the story of God.  Now, there are exceptions to this rule, but that is for another sermon, for you see, the true gift the Magi offer is not found in a treasure chest.  They first kneel and offer themselves to Christ.

                Understand the narrative that is unfolding, the picture that is being revealed.  These men from the east are not from Judea or Galilee, or even Samaria.  “Men from the East,” likely refers to men from Babylon, those who brought Judea into exile, and now these men are kneeling at Jesus’ feet.  What should Jesus do with such a gift?  “In the time of Herod,” you might imagine a future king of the Jews to reject their homage and vow to crush their empire in order to atone for Israel’s past suffering.  “In the time of Herod,” you might also imagine a future king to dismiss these men and their gifts as insignificant.  But Jesus is ushering in a new time.  Jesus accepts their praise and their gifts and by doing so, redeems and heals Israel’s past.  Israel’s exile is finally over at the feet of a toddler.

                What are we to do with the gifts that have been offered?  What are we to do with the gift which was 2010?  We celebrate the good.  We weep with those who mourn.  For those for whom this past year has been devastating, we carry and sit and lament and listen.  With shouts of Hallelujah and tears of sorrow and pain, we offer this past year at the feet of Christ so that we can embrace the new, unscripted reality before us.  After the wise men offered their gifts, they left for their own country by another road, and that is what Christ offers us, another road, another way, a way which leads to life, a way which is not defined by the time of Herod, but a time offered as a gift from an abundant and loving God who is mysteriously present with us at the table.  Stanley Hauerwas said it this way: 

That [the wise men] are able to see the worthiness of this [child] who alone can be worshiped was surely a gift from the Father.  The same gift gives hope to all, for through this child we have been called to participate in the alternative world signaled by his birth.  Moreover, like the wise men, it turns out that God has given us gifts of bread and wine to be offered so that the world may know that there is an alternative to Herod. 

Let us now gather around the table offering our bread and wine and hope and fear, so that God may redeem our gift with the presence and grace of Christ our Lord.  Amen.