Rev. David Holwick ZR
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
December 30, 2012
Matthew 2:16-18
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I. Christmas is supposed to be a happy time.
A. Families and friends gather together.
1) Gifts are exchanged, special meals and treats are prepared.
2) There may be some tension, but for most of us it is a joyous
event.
B. Sometimes Christmas can be very hard.
1) Many have been thinking about the massacre in Connecticut.
a) Popular magazines have pages of their pictures.
1> All of them are so young.
2> Most of their presents were already bought.
b) We cannot imagine how tragic this Christmas has been for
these families.
2) The first Christmas had tragedy, too.
a) Herod's slaughter of innocents in Bethlehem.
b) Little ones were pawns in the hands of madmen.
c) Although with Herod there was a rational, if absolutely
sinister, motive of retaining his power.
C. A larger question haunts us - why did God allow it?
1) Ron's son - question seems to be his biggest stumbling block.
2) Others have also asked it.
a) Agnostic Bart Ehrman I referenced last week - he claims
the issue of the suffering of the innocent brought
him to losing his faith.
b) Years later, a Christmas Eve service he attended for his
wife's sake brought the issue into sharp focus:
When I was young I always found the Christmas Eve service to
be the most meaningful worship experience of the year.
The sacred hymns and carols, the prayers and praises, the
solemn readings from Scripture, the silent reflections on
this most powerful of nights, when the divine Christ
came into the world as a human infant....
What moved me most, however, was the congregational prayer,
which ... was spoken loudly and clearly by a layperson
standing in the aisle.
His voice [filled] the vast space of the cavernous church
around us.
"You came into the darkness and made a difference," he said.
"Come into the darkness again."
This was the refrain of the prayer, repeated several times, in
a deep and sonorous voice.
And it brought tears to my eyes as I sat with bowed head,
listening and thinking.
But these were not tears of joy.
They were tears of frustration.
If God had come into the darkness with the advent of the Christ
child, bringing salvation to the world, why is the world in
such a state?
Why doesn't he enter into the darkness again?
Where is the presence of God in this world of pain and misery?
Why is the darkness so overwhelming? ...
"You came into the darkness and you made a difference.
Come into the darkness again."
Yes, I wanted to affirm this prayer, believe this prayer,
commit myself to this prayer. But I couldn't.
The darkness is too deep, the suffering too intense, the divine
absence too palpable.
During the time that it took for this Christmas Eve service to
conclude, more than 700 children in the world would have
died of hunger; 250 others from drinking unsafe water;
and nearly 300 other people from malaria. ...
And where is God? #63822
c) Ehrman's conclusion echoes that of other philosophers:
1> God is not all-powerful, or he is not good.
2> Probably he does not exist at all.
D. There are no easy answers.
1) It is one thing to address it philosophically.
2) Another to think of it in terms of flesh and blood.
a) Our world has seen so much blood.
II. There is blood in the land.
A. Mass murder has had a consistent rate in America.
1) Over the past 30 years, there have been 62 mass murders
(4 or more victims).
a) That averages to two per year.
b) They are fairly evenly spread out across America.
1> Connecticut has had three.
2> New Jersey, with our Mafia reputation, has had none.
2) What they have in common.
a) Lone killers (all but two).
1> Paranoia and depression are common.
2> A crisis often triggers them.
The son of one of my parents' best friends
walked into his former place of employment
and shot 5 people to death, then himself.
b) Guns, usually semi-automatic, and most legally bought.
B. America loves guns.
1) We have more than anyone else: 300 million.
a) Highest rate of gun ownership in world.
b) 40% higher than number 2, Yemen.
2) Guns are part of the heritage of America.
a) Pioneers fought off Indians and each other.
b) In the Wild West, one decent man with a revolver was
often the only law available.
3) Our heritage is enshrined in the Second Amendment.
a) There are different interpretations about it, but the
Supreme Court has viewed it as an individual right.
1> The individual citizen is the ultimate defense
against tyranny.
b) Government should never have all the power.
C. Guns are dangerous.
1) Results of study in Seattle: a gun in your home is 43 times
more likely to kill a family member than an intruder.
a) One detail - suicide accounts for most of it.
b) But think about that - owning a gun could put your own
life in danger, by your own hand.
2) Even though you have a right to own one, is it worth the
risk?
III. Jesus opposed violence.
A. He taught non-violence. Matthew 5:39,44
1) Love your enemy, turn other cheek.
Matthew 5:39
"...Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you
on the right cheek, turn to him the other also."
Matthew 5:44
"... Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you."
2) He rebuked his disciple's use of swords at his arrest, and
he did not defend himself from evil men, though he had
the supernatural power to do so.
B. It is not a guarantee world will have less violence.
1) His teaching actually caused much conflict, even in families.
2) But Christians should not be the ones guilty of violence.
C. Paul - our weapons are not weapons of world. 2 Cor 10:3-4
1) The gospel is our most powerful weapon.
2 Corinthians 10:3-4
"For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as
the world does.
The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world.
On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish
strongholds."
2) Our security is not a gun, but Jesus.
IV. Is it guns or us?
A. Even societies that don't have guns have violence.
1) Consider Norway's mass killing. (Their laws are very strict)
2) Japan has almost no gun ownership, but their suicide rate
is twice what ours is.
B. The problem is inside us. James 4:1-2
1) Christianity says that sin and violence come from the heart.
a) A weapon may make it easier to express, but the feeling
of violence is inside us.
b) Every heart is bad. Your heart is bad.
2) James 4:1-2 says:
"What causes fights and quarrels among you?
Don't they come from your desires that battle within you?
You want something but don't get it.
You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want.
You quarrel and fight.
You do not have, because you do not ask God."
a) Unfulfilled desires and selfishness produce conflict.
b) A close relationship with God can control it.
V. What is a Christian to do?
A. It is hard to explain why God allows violence to exist.
1) One view is that he must allow us to follow our nature,
so that when we choose him, it is from our free will.
a) Otherwise, our love would be a forced love.
b) We must be free to love him, or reject him.
2) We are free to love, or to be violent.
a) Many people choose the second path.
b) As a matter of fact, the Bible says all humans are in
rebellion against God until they surrender to him.
3) Christmas was God's blow against the world's violence.
a) Someday - when? - all violence will cease.
B. Christians are called to be peacemakers now.
1) If we have chosen to love God, we must also choose to love
other people.
2) People may not love us back - they may attack us.
a) Love them anyway, and forgive.
3) Be peaceable people.
a) Give back good for evil.
b) Example of Amish in Pennsylvania school massacre.
Back in 2006, Charles Roberts walked into the one-room
Nickel Mines school and shot 10 Amish girls.
Five of them died.
He then killed himself.
The reaction of the Amish community was astounding.
They publicly forgave the killer.
His widow was invited to the funerals of four of the girls.
The Amish set up a trust fund for the killer's own children.
Many Americans couldn't comprehend this.
Bruce Kluger in USA Today said if anything needs explaining,
it's why other communities of faith find it so hard to
practice the compassion their religions preach.
Other commentators thought their actions were wrong, a form
of self-delusion or blind fatalism.
I guess you could say the same thing about Jesus Christ....
#31749
C. When peace is broken, we must bind up the brokenhearted.
1) Paul tells us to grieve with those who grieve.
2) We cannot undo the effects of violence, but we can offer
love in a dark world.
VI. Do you believe Jesus really makes a difference?
Christian scholar N.T. Wright has written:
For many, Christianity is just a beautiful dream.
It's a world in which everyday reality goes a bit blurred.
It's nostalgic, cozy and comforting.
But real Christianity isn't like that at all.
Take Christmas, for instance: a season of nostalgia, of carols
and candles and firelight and happy children.
But that misses the point completely.
Christmas is not a reminder that the world is really quite a
nice old place.
It reminds us that the world is a shockingly bad old place,
where wickedness flourishes unchecked, where children are
murdered...
Christmas is God lighting a candle; and you don't light a
candle in a room that's already full of sunlight.
You light a candle in a room that's so murky that the candle,
when lit, reveals just how bad things really are.
The light shines in the darkness, says St. John, and the
darkness has not overcome it.
Christmas, then, is not a dream, a moment of escapism.
Christmas is the reality, which shows up the rest of reality.
And for Christmas, here, read Christianity.
Either Jesus is the Lord of the world, and all reality makes
sense in His light,
Or He is dangerously irrelevant to the problems and
possibilities of today's world.
There is no middle ground.
Either Jesus was, and is, the Word of God, or He, and the
stories Christians tell about Him, are lies.
#63821
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
#31749 “The Amish: A Lesson In Faith?” from The Week magazine, page 17,
October 20, 2006.
#63821 “Christmas Is For Our Dark World,” N. T. Wright, Preaching Now,
www.preaching.com, December 27, 2012. From his book For All
God’s Worth: True Worship and the Calling of the Church.
#63822 “Why Doesn't God Come Into The Darkness Today?” adapted from
Dr. Bart Ehrman’s God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer
Our Most Important Question — Why We Suffer, pages 4-6. 2008.
These and 35,000 others are part of the Kerux database that can be
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