Rev. David Holwick ZO Advent #4
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
December 26, 2004
Luke 2:8-14
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I. The most dangerous place on Planet Earth - New Jersey.
At 8:00 p.m. October 30, 1938, a radio program was interrupted
with news of an unusual event.
A strange meteor had impacted violently on a farm near Grovers
Mill, New Jersey.
Reporters were sent to the scene.
The events around the meteor crater rapidly escalated from the
merely strange to the positively ominous.
It turned out that the meteor was not a meteor.
It was, in fact, some kind of spaceship from which a tentacled
creature, presumably a Martian, soon emerged and blasted the
on-lookers with a deadly heat-ray and toxic black gas.
Other creatures emerged and quickly disposed of 7,000 armed
soldiers surrounding the crater.
The battle for New Jersey was on.
76-year-old Bill Dock, a New Jersey farmer, took out his rabbit
gun and started hunting Martians.
Apparently some of his friends saw a Martian and fired away.
In the morning, they didn't find any dead aliens but the local
water tower was peppered with buck shot.
Panic struck the youth choir rehearsing within the Plainsboro
Presbyterian Church when they heard the message of doom.
Grovers Mill was only a few miles south, and, if you believed
the bulletins, the Martians had already incinerated the place
and were advancing north at a spectacular clip.
But Lolly Dey, a 16-year-old girl playing the piano, kept calm.
"I bowed my head and prayed and thought to myself, 'If it has to
be the end of the world, I couldn't be in a better place.
I'm in the house of the Lord.'"
Up to 2 million people from coast to coast were terrified that
night.
Orson Welles' radio dramatization of "War of the Worlds" put
the fear of God in a lot of people.
It was all fiction.
But perhaps we ARE at the center of a vast galactic war.
One that is more dangerous than being in Iraq or Afghanistan.
It is a battle that targets everyone and there is only one way
to survive. #15364
II. The proclamation of peace on earth.
A. It has become a motto for the season.
1) Christmas reports from embattled Bethlehem.
2) Pastor Jack Crabtree writes:
If we read the clues in our culture -- Hollywood Christmas stories,
Christmas cards, even some sermons -- it becomes apparent what
the "true meaning of Christmas" is supposed to be.
Christmas is the celebration of love, generosity, benevolence,
kindness, brotherhood, and family bonding.
The true meaning of Christmas -- according to this way of thinking
-- is a kind of Hallmark sentimentality.
It portrays a world where there is no strife, no anger, no hatred,
and no criticism.
It is a world in which there is no warfare in any of its forms.
Is that, in fact, the true meaning of Christmas?
No, it is not.
The true meaning of Christmas is not about humans loving humans.
The true meaning of Christmas is about God loving man.
It is about God giving the most amazing and spectacular gift to a
certain chosen few.
#28875
B. Peace is not promised to all men.
1) New translations like the NIV give the correct meaning:
"on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests." Lk 2:14
2) Christmas peace is a gift from God to believers.
a) It is an inner, spiritual peace.
b) Those who surrender to God will receive a "peace that
passes understanding."
III. War continues.
A. Peace between men? Jesus did not come to bring that.
1) Jesus was not a pacifist.
The White House Press Briefing Room seldom allows for
theological debate, but sometimes it happens.
As Press Secretary Ari Fleischer finished his work on
February 6, 2003, he was asked a final question.
A reporter quoted a letter sent to President Bush from the
National Council of Churches saying they were uneasy
about Bush's "moral justification for war on Iraq."
Fleischer responded that the president was a "deeply
religious man" and would act to protect the nation as
commander-in-chief.
The reporter answered with a sermon:
"You just said the president is a deeply religious man.
Jesus Christ was an absolute pacifist.
How does the president square his militarism with Jesus'
pacifism?"
Several of his colleagues erupted in protest, arguing that
Jesus was NOT a pacifist.
The episode of Jesus whipping the moneychangers in the
temple was quoted.
The Bible teaches that Jesus did not ultimately seek to
bring about a better version of a fallen world.
He came to set up a new kingdom where the present earth
would be re-made with no trace of sin at the end of time.
#12513
2) Jesus was a revolutionary.
Jesus achieved his goal through unconventional war.
He came not to battle the visible pawns of power -- the
governmental leaders and tyrants of his time or ours --
but the invisible principalities and powers of the world as
presided over by Satan.
In the proper light, Jesus is seen as a mighty warrior who
stopped at nothing to conquer evil.
Jesus is revolutionary.
The very idea that Jesus was not a pacifist goes against
the grain of prevailing liberal myths.
He did instruct his followers to live peacefully with one
another without vengeance.
But he did not promise we could stop all war.
War, a remnant of the fall, will remain constant in human
existence until the end. #12513
As a matter of fact, Jesus said his coming would bring a
sword rather than peace.
Many human relationships would be torn up over Jesus.
B. Christmas does not mean peace; it means victory.
Christmas does not mean the cessation of strife; it means
the encouragement to continue the strife.
The day will come when we can lay down our arms -- when the
war is over finally and permanently.
But that day lies ahead -- when Jesus returns.
It is not now.
In the meantime, the true meaning of Christmas is that our
general has come to us in the midst of the world's
greatest battle and he has given us orders.
That is the true meaning of Christmas. #28875
IV. The battle against evil continues.
A. An appeal to "human goodness" is not enough.
1) Liberals like to think we can negotiate our way to world
peace.
2) It won't happen.
B. Human nature is still corrupted. #28861
1) Good and evil runs through every human heart.
2) When it erupts in violence, it must be fought.
3) Policemen are armed for a reason!
C. You are still corrupted.
1) The only cure is the lordship of Jesus Christ.
2) We must accept Jesus as our personal savior.
V. World peace is coming.
A. Christmas is not the end, but the beginning of the end.
1) The baby in the manger accomplished his mission.
2) Soon, he will tie up the loose ends.
B. Jesus is coming back.
1) It will be an invasion we can welcome.
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
#12513 "Jesus -- A Pacifist?" Douglas Baker, Baptist Press,
http://www.baptistpress.org/, February 13, 2003.
#15364 "An Alien Invasion," Daryl Dash, http://www.dashhouse.com/sermons/~
998/am/981206.html. Illustration also borrows material from
http://www.capitalcentury.com/1938.html
#28861 "Regaining 'Hard-Nosed Teachings': The Doctrine of Human Sin,"
Mark Earley, BreakPoint Commentary, December 22, 2004.
#28875 "A Christmas Message," Rev. Jack Crabtree,
http://www.mckenziestudycenter.org/theology/articles/xmas.html,
December 1993.
These and 25,000 others are part of a database that can be downloaded,
absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/database.html
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