Trust Verified

Sermon for Dec. 24, 2021

Luke 2:1-14

Here’s a question to ponder as you sit around your table tomorrow, sharing your Christmas feast and trying to talk about anything but politics or pandemics.  A big part of Christmas is the message to trust, even when things seem completely unbelievable.  So … which character in the Christmas story do you think went furthest with that?  Who in the Christmas story do you think had to exercise the greatest trust?

You could certainly make a case for Mary.  Here’s a 14-year-old girl asked by an angel to bear the Son of God out of wedlock.  Saying “yes” could well have meant losing her husband-to-be, being ostracized, and ending up desperately poor and at risk of all kinds of abuse.  Mary is a great candidate for the one who had to trust the most.

From the guys’ perspective, you could make a case for Joseph, too.  An angel visits him in a dream, saying that his fiancée is pregnant with the Son of God.  He knows for a fact it’s not his, but can he trust a voice in a dream?  Yeah, Joseph’s trust sets a pretty high bar.

What about the shepherds?  There they are, at work, and an angel tells them they should leave to go find God’s newborn king, who’s lying in a feed trough.  And no need to worry; the wolves and the bandits will leave their sheep alone while they’re gone, right?  The shepherds are being asked to trust visions in the night sky over their years of experience.

But maybe the character in the Christmas story who has to work hardest to trust is … you.  I’m not sure trust has ever been as hard to come by as it is in our culture today, as we attribute disagreement not to different perspectives but to the other side’s selfishness or hate.  Today, trusting is a downright countercultural act.  And trusting in God – that’s about as countercultural as it gets. 

As Luke tells it, the Christmas story challenges those who hear it to think hard about where to invest their trust.  I think Luke’s question comes down to this: Who’s really in charge?  Mary and Joseph are God’s faithful servants, but the power driving their action seems to be the power of the emperor.  Mary and Joseph make their way from Galilee to Bethlehem because the government tells them to.  The empire is demanding that its subjects go to their family’s towns and villages for a census to determine the taxes to be levied there.  It was all about tightening the empire’s control over its subject peoples.  But the empire didn’t stop there; it even wanted to convince its subjects that their ruler had divine power.  Caesar was called “Lord” and “Savior,” the one whose power supposedly brought peace and well-being to “all the world” (Luke 2:1). 

Well, the Christmas story sets up a direct challenge to the Roman narrative.  When the powers of the world tell us to trust in them, Luke’s Christmas story tells us to take a huge leap and trust in God instead, because God acts directly in the world to accomplish divine purposes.  The empire might seem to be in charge right now, Luke says, but true power and authority belong to the God who comes to be born as one of the peasants, starting this project to change the world as a newborn crying in a filthy feedbox.  The angels proclaim this good news first to the folks at the bottom of the ladder, the essential workers just getting by.  The angels tell the shepherds, “Your true Lord and Savior has arrived and in the last place you’d expect – in your own world.  So, you can trust that God’s got your back.”    

I don’t think God asks for that trust in order to check a box on our divine scorecard.  I think God asks for that trust because we need to offer it.  Trust is the balm that will heal us, and healing is what the baby in the manger is there to bring – salvation, which at its root means healing.  If we trust that God is actually at work in our own lives, not just sitting back and wishing us well but bringing healing to our brokenness and light to our darkness – when we offer that trust, that’s when God heals our hearts by letting us see our trust verified. 

I met a man with that kind of trust last Saturday.  Dozens of St. Andrew’s members and friends were serving at the Free Store downtown, providing a bountiful lunch and cold-weather clothing, but also just hanging out and being with the folks who came.  One of the guests was a man named Leland.  He was sitting in the cathedral waiting for lunch, and I asked him how he was doing.  Leland gave me a look that asked whether I wanted a polite response or the truth, and I said, “Really, how are you doing?”  He’d just been discharged from St. Luke’s, though he had no memory of how he’d gotten there.  But one thing he knew for sure: When he was taken to the hospital, all his stuff had been stolen from the camp where he’d been living.  He had literally nothing but what he was carrying when he was taken to St. Luke’s. 

Now, if you knew Leland’s background, you might be surprised at how things had panned out for him.  He grew up in Kansas City, went to a good school, served six years in the Navy, earned a college degree in business.  But over time, things fell apart; and he became alienated from his family and friends.  As we were talking, it was clear that Leland was hungry after wandering around all night, and angry that someone had stolen his stuff, and worried about where he’d stay once the sun went down.  But he also knew where to place his trust.  He said, “God brought me to the hospital to get me healed, and God brought me here today to find something to eat and replace some of the stuff I lost.  I know God’s here,” he said.  “I know God’s got me.  I know that because I’m still going.”

I don’t know where Leland’s story will go from here.  He does not have an easy life, and one day at the Free Store won’t solve his problems.  But Leland knows he’s not alone.  He knows Jesus Christ is walking alongside him, even when he’s not sure where he’s going or how he’ll live once he gets there.  Leland trusts that the true Lord and Savior has got his back, and he’s willing to take that trust on the road.

That’s our part in the Christmas story, too.  Like Mary, like Joseph, like the shepherds, like Leland, we have the opportunity on this night to choose where to place our trust and then act on it.  The world promises it’ll save us.  Consumer culture promises it’ll save us.  Political leaders and talking heads promise they’ll save us.  And amid the noise of empty promises, a still small voice rises from a filthy feedbox in Bethlehem.  It’s asking you to put your trust in the true Lord and Savior, and then watch what happens.  Believe that the one we call God With Us actually is right there with you – walking alongside you to guide your steps, working healing in your broken moments, and equipping you to partner with God to pass the peace and bring love to life.  When we trust, it opens doors between heaven and earth.  When we trust, it opens our hearts so God can heal them.  And with your heart healed, you become an instrument of healing, an outward and visible sign that God still comes into our world, in all things working for good for those who trust in the Lord.

Most of us want to change the world, and God wants us to do that, too.  But first, we have to learn the humble mystery of this night.  Just as Caesar isn’t the Lord and Savior, neither are we.  We’ve got to open that door between heaven and earth, open our hearts so God can heal them.  For when we do, it’s not just our lives that are saved.  When we claim that healing power, we take God With Us into the world Christ came to save.  And that has the power to change everything.  As the song says, let every heart prepare him room, and even heaven and nature will sing.