Advent 2009
A Christmas Carol
Part 2: Christmas Past
Today we are going to light our Second Advent candle,
known as the Candle of the Way.
We’ll be considering Joseph and Mary’s journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem,
And how we too must make a difficult journey to discover the joy of
Christmas.
Then we will pick up where we left off in our tale of Ebenezer
Scrooge, in order to illustrate one aspect of that difficult journey to discover that we must confront our past
in order to live fully in the present.
Finally I am going to encourage you to begin your own journey of discovery
And suggest a way that you can deal with the relational wounds of
your past.
That you can be prepared for Christ’s Mass.
The Candle of the Way is the second candle to be lit in the Advent Wreath.
People are lost in sin and Christ is the Light sent into the world to show
them the way out of darkness.
We must prepare ourselves to receive Him and the light He
brings.
Mark 1:1-8 (NIV)
The beginning
of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
It is written in Isaiah the prophet:
"I will send my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way" --
"a voice of one calling in the desert,
'Prepare the way for the Lord,
make straight paths for him.'"
And so John came, baptizing in the desert region and preaching a baptism of
repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The whole Judean countryside and all the
people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized
by him in the Jordan River. John wore clothing made of camel's hair, with a
leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. And this was
his message: "After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose
sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I baptize you with water, but
he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."
We light the candle of the way, to remind us of how the way was prepared for Jesus' coming in hope that as Advent light increases, our own readiness may also increase that we might prepare the way to Jesus for others.
Would you believe I have suffered from the Christmas blues?
I would have an annual holiday sadness just lying under the surface,
Ready to bubble up and remind me that Christmas is just another
disappointment.
That the love and warmth and joy were just Norman
Rockwell paintings on Christmas Cards.
My discontent eventually forced me on a journey I didn’t want to go on.
But it was a journey that prepared me to be able to truly celebrate Christmas.
A journey was forced upon Joseph and Mary ,
The journey was difficult.
But it ended in great joy.
Let’s walk with them and see how a difficult journey can be the
prelude for incredible blessings.
Luke 2:1-5 (MSG)
About that time Caesar Augustus ordered a census to be taken throughout the Empire. This was the first census when Quirinius was governor of Syria.
Everyone had to travel to his own ancestral hometown to be accounted for. So Joseph went from the Galilean town of Nazareth up to Bethlehem in Judah, David's town, for the census. As a descendant of David, he had to go there. He went with Mary, his fiancé, who was pregnant.
The journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem is about 80 miles.
The exact route that Joseph took is not known.
One possible way is for Joseph and Mary to have left Nazareth traveling
east into modern day Jordan and then traveling south down eastern
side of the Jordan River, before crossing back into Judea.
This is not flat ground.
Nazareth is 1,200 feet above see level,
the Jordan River is about 700 feet below see level,
the path would have lead them to Jericho 1,300 feet below sea level
The hike from Jericho to Bethlehem is 20 miles uphill,
an ascent of some 3,500 feet.
And in between Jericho and Bethlehem is Mount
Olivet so this trip is one of ups and downs.
[Bethelhem is currently under the control of the Palestinian Authority located in the area referred to as the West Bank]
The weather above sea level would have been chilly if not cold.
The weather below sea level would have been mild.
In Luke’s account of the journey there is no mention of Mary riding a donkey.
How long would it take a woman 9 months pregnant to walk 80 miles?
The experts put it somewhere between 4 to 7 days.
Accommodations along the way are going to be primitive,
if not just open air camping.
I am of the opinion that this is an arduous and wearying trip for
Mary;
obviously doable, but difficult and exhausting for
someone in their last trimester.
A week on the open road Joseph and Mary arrive in Bethlehem.
Luke 2:6-7 (MSG)
While they were there, the time came for her to give birth. She gave birth to a son, her firstborn. She wrapped him in a blanket and laid him in a manger, because there was no room in the hostel.
A difficult journey traveling on foot from Nazareth to Bethlehem.
A journey both Joseph and Mary would have preferred taking at another
time.
But forced by Roman decree, they travel the road,
And at journey’s end the ordeal becomes joy at the birth
of their baby.
Difficult journey can be the prelude to great blessings,
Ebenezer Scrooge must also make a difficult journey if he is ever to experience the
joy of Christmas.
Scrooge will be visited by the ghost of his former partner Marley.
Listen closely to Marley’s explanation of his chains,
And recall that what we sow, we reap,
Both in this world and the next.
Marley’s fate and chains symbolize a life spent fulfilling the desires of egoism.
Then the Spirit of Christmas past will arrive.
And take Scrooge on a trip down memory lane.
But this isn’t going to be a pleasant journey for him,
It’s a journey into the wounds of the past.
A journey full of ups and downs.
A difficult journey that has the potential to en in great blessings.
Pay close attention to Scrooges reactions to both the arrival and departure of
Christmas Past.
The scenes portray the behavior of one who has unfinished
business with the past.
Our story continues on Christmas Eve,
Scrooge has finished his days work and is headed home.
Notice the images of dark and cold and meagerness,
these are the signs of Scrooges inner life,
the state of his a soul,
a soul as we shall see trapped by the wounds of the
past.
Video:
A Christmas Carol (1999) Starring: Patrick Stewart,
http://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Carol-Patrick-Stewart/dp/0780623746
also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfuK12XmNpU
Did you notice that the spirit of Christmas past –Scrooge’s past, complains that
Scrooge has formed a cap that it must wear that dims the light he would
bring to Scrooge?
I believe forgetting the past is a survival mechanism.
We take the painful unpleasant memories of the past and bury them.
We say my childhood wasn’t so bad,
We forget the choices that led us down the road we are on now.
We run from the unresolved issues of our past by
choosing forgetfulness.
People who say I don’t have any issues—
I don’t believe them.
If you’re one of those folks, sorry I don’t believe you.
You live in a world where sin abounds,
It deters, damages and destroys relationships.
It shatters your expectations of love.
Matthew 9:12-13 (NIV)
Jesus said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."
We all have problems of past relational pain that need to be looked at and
understood, in order to be healed.
Jesus is the only one who has the resources to bring this about in your
life.
He is the soul doctor.
No one gets through this journey without being wounded.
For some its horrendous hurt.
The loose of a parent, rejection, abuse, privation;
Seeing things that should not be seen by old eyes,
let alone young eyes;
Some have survived living in unsafe environments,
They grew up with violence, or chaos, or uncertainty
As children we internalize our circumstances and begin to
believe that we are the cause of them.
Things are bad because I am bad.
I’ve heard people say “I had a normal childhood.”
May I ask what normal was for you?
A kid has nothing to compare normal to.
I’ve heard people say, “I didn’t know we were poor, but we
were.”
You didn’t have a normal childhood, you had your childhood.
We try to bury the pain of old wounds in a sea of forgetfulness.
Not realizing that what we bury alive,
will resurface in all our relationships as it tries to resolve itself.
Scrooge had forgotten the wound of being left alone at Christmas time.
All his friends had carriages whisking them away for holiday with
their families.
But not Scrooge, his father doesn’t want him,
Reminds him too much of his deceased wife.
No one is willing to take young Ebenezer home with them for the
holiday.
So he is left alone. Doubly Rejected.
Those who are supposed to love him, don’t.
Merry Christmas indeed.
No wonder he hated Christmas.
Christmas hurt.
Those kinds of experiences scar a soul.
If your father rejects you because you remind him of your
mother’s love, how horrible must love really be?
How horrible you must be?
No wonder he has a poor view of marriage.
Alone, oh you made the best of it.
But the wound is still there, hidden in the forgotten memories
but ever exerting an influence on your life.
Maybe you were neglected, left alone, left to fend for yourself.
Now you are a controller, or a perfectionist, or a braggart.
Maybe you had to care for your parents instead of your parents caring for you.
Now you define yourself by caring for others,
But refusing care yourself
Maybe you were yelled at, beaten, grew up in a harsh environment,
As others took their pain out on you.
It wasn’t your fault but you became the whiper child.
And the injustice made you angry.
The anger burns in your life today,
You’ve got a temper but you don’t know why.
You bully people or avoid them.
Could it be that you are like Scrooge and have forgotten your past.
“I don’t remember much of my childhood”---
That is a dead give away of a relational wounds in your past.
We can even forget the good times.
They get clouded over and lost by our desire to forget the painful memories.
If you refuse to remember the bad,
you forget the Fizzywigs.
You don’t remember the joy that was there for you.
No wonder you are anxious or depressed.
Then there are the regrets of the past.
The stupid choices that you made and the missed opportunities.
Like Ebenezer turning his back on love to chase after wealth.
And when did he make this choice?
I think it was during Christmas.
We all have regrets.
Our “what ifs” can wound us without our recognizing them.
We all wish for do “overs” with one thing or another.
WE think: “If I could only go back and change this one thing my life
would be so much better today.”
But reality dictates we can’t undo the past ,
So forget it and get on with our life.
Let sleeping dogs lie.
Time heals all wounds.
The pain of these memories is so great that Ebenezer accuses the Spirit of torturing
him.
Powerful things memories.
They don’t stay in the past, they don’t lie quiet, they don’t heal over time.
Especially when forgotten they exert an influence on your choices
today.
Ever react to something and after think:
"Where did that come from?"
Why did I feel that way?
Or like me, Why don’t I enjoy Christmas more?
Relational wounds forgotten can paralyze your potential,
Destroy your dreams,
ruin your relationships,
sabotage your Christian service.
Matthew 7:16-18 (NIV)
By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.
If we keep producing bad fruit,
Its because of a bad root.
Roots are underground. You don’t see them.
Often the seeds of today’s conflicts germinated in the soil of
Yesterday’s unresolved relational wounds.
Yet like Scrooge we try to slam the door on our past.
We don’t want to remember,
We are afraid of hurting again.
Of opening the old wound.
A wound that never healed.
But in order to produce a good crop, we must return to the scene of the crime.
We must embark on a journey of
Discovering what your issues are
Remembering the relational wounds,
The root of the problem,
Grieve our losses and
Reconcile our relationships.
Like the trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem,
Your journey will be difficult, full of ups and downs,
and is best traveled with others for mutual support.
An inconvenient journey, this one not decreed by a governor,
Rather one motivated by finding answers to your issues.
The track is a tough one.
But I can assure you that with the help of Jesus there will be joy at the end of
he journey.
Christ Jesus is the Light sent into your life to show
you the way out of your darkness
Here’s what I did, and still do from time to time.
1. Identify your issues
What behaviors are causing relational fallout in your life?
If you don’t know ask the people you live with,
The people you work with,
The people you hang out with—
They know your issues probably better than you
do.
Your own emotional reactions, or lack of emotional response can help you
identify your issues.
What do you avoid;
what makes you sad;
what makes you angry;
what worries you;
what do you resent;
What is it that you are
convinced you can’t ever
do?
Identify your issues.
2. Discover the wounds of your past.
I think that every issue in your life is a result of a relational wound.
This is the most difficult part of the journey.
It requires you to remember.
You must recall how you were injured.
And that always is a painful experience.
You revisit the wounding event.
Remember Scrooges reaction to Christmas Past,
he tries to squash the Spirit out of his life again.
You’ll be tempted to do the same.
That’s way its good to bring a trusted companion with you on
this journey, some one to encourage you along the way.
The root of your issue is a wound in your past, find it.
3. Acknowledge your wounds.
This involves bringing your emotions over what happened out in the open.
To heal it you have to feel it.
That stops most people on there journey.
They don’t want to feel the wound.
But you have to explain to another person what happened.
You have to get how you feel about what happened out into the light.
The secret has to be revealed.
The wound has to be examined before it can be healed.
4. Grieve and Forgive
A wound needs to be grieved.
It is a loss.
Something was taken from you and it requires a proper time of
grief before you can start to create a new normal for
yourself, a way of living whole and healthy
without what was taken.
After you grieved your loss you need to forgive the offender.
To forgive means you cancel the debt that is owed you.
This releases you from the offending party,
Forgiving liberates you.
5. Don’t forget, instead let go.
Forgetting is what got you into your issues in the first place.
So I say never forget, it cheapens the price of the forgiveness,
Don’t forget but instead let go.
Letting go is saying goodbye and moving on.
This may sound simply like 5 steps, but it’s a journey.
A journey form darkness to light,
wound to healing,
Nazareth to Bethlehem.
A trip of ups and downs.
Arduous and tiring.
A difficult journey that can lead to great
blessings.
It may be a long way for you,
But that’s why we lit the Candle of the Way today,
To give light to our journey.
It can be a difficult trip,
Like the one Joseph and Mary made in preparing for that first Christmas.
It can be a frightening trip, maybe a painful trip,
Like the one Scrooge has to go on in order to be reclaimed,
To be healed.
But it is a trip that helps you live your life to the full.