Christmas Astonishment

Luke 1 & 2

We are focusing this Advent on four words in the Christmas story. The first Sunday I preached on fear, last week Kelly preached on Joy and next Sunday I will be preaching on Peace. Today I was supposed to talk about Doubt, but as I looked at the text, I became aware that this was not the right word. The word I was looking at in the Christmas story is more appropriately Astonishment.

I originally looked at two stories, both involving the angel Gabriel. Gabriel first appeared to Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist and then to Mary, the mother of Jesus. In both cases, Gabriel came with shocking news and Zechariah and Mary struggled to comprehend how something so far out of the ordinary could happen.

When Gabriel told Zechariah his wife would bear a son, he asked,”How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.” Gabriel rebuked him for asking for a sign, some evidence that this would be so and informed him he would not be able to speak until his son was born.

When Gabriel came to Mary to inform her she would bear a son, she asked, “How will this be since I am a virgin?” Gabriel did not rebuke Mary and instead patiently spoke to her about what was to happen.

I was attracted to these two stories because of the different way Zechariah and Mary responded to Gabriel. Both of them asked questions. How can I be sure? How will this be? Both of them expressed astonishment at the news they received.

The Greek word translated as astonishment is used four times in Luke’s Christmas story. The word is translated as astonished, marveled and surprised in the NIV, but it is the same word.

Zechariah’s long delay in the temple, together with his loss of speech, caused the people surprise. They took it as an indication that something extraordinary had happened and that he had seen a vision.

A second time, the people were astonished when it came time to name the son of Elizabeth and Zechariah and Zechariah insisted his name be John.

When the angels appeared to the shepherds, they were astonished. And when Mary and Joseph took Jesus to the temple to be presented to the Lord, Simeon took Jesus in his arms and praised God. Mary and Joseph marveled at what Simeon said about their son.

In each case, something unexpected happened.

The temple was a place of mystery. Remember that no one was permitted to go in to the inner room of the temple. Only the priest was allowed to go in, and that only when it was time to offer a sacrifice. A priest could not go in any time he wanted but a priest was selected by lot to go in and make the sacrifice for the people of Israel. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity for a priest. There is record that a priest went in with a piece of rope tied around his leg so if he died while making the sacrifice, he could be pulled out without anyone having to enter the inner room of the temple.

So in this place of deep mystery, Zechariah spent more time offering the sacrifice than people were used to. People began to speculate about what was taking him so long and when he came out, unable to speak, they were sure he had seen a vision. They were surprised.

The mystery continued when shortly after that, his wife, Elizabeth, became pregnant. The two events were probably linked in people’s minds. What is going on with these two people?

Then Elizabeth gave birth. It was a time for a huge celebration. She had been barren for so long and now, in her old age, she had given birth to a son. The natural expectation was that the baby would be named after his father. One miracle to a family, was the thought, and they would never have the opportunity to name a second baby. But to the amazement of the people, Elizabeth and Zechariah insisted he be named John. And when Zechariah wrote down the name John, he regained his speech. The people were astonished!

The experience of the shepherds in the field doesn’t need much explanation. We easily understand their astonishment when angels appeared to give them good news of great joy.

On the eighth day of Jesus’ life, his parents had him circumcised, according to Jewish Law. A woman was considered ceremonially unclean for forty days after the birth of a son, so when forty days had passed, Mary and Joseph brought Jesus to the Temple to be presented to the Lord.

What did they expect? They had both been visited by angels. They were both aware of the miraculous manner in which Mary had become pregnant. They had both heard the story of the shepherds who had seen angels in the sky announcing Jesus’ birth. They had not yet seen the wise men, that visit was still a year in the future by which time they would be living in a house, no longer in the stable where Jesus was born. Mary and Joseph had reason to know Jesus was special, but Simeon’s words blew them away.
29 “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised,
you now dismiss your servant in peace.
30 For my eyes have seen your salvation,
31 which you have prepared in the sight of all people,
32 a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel.”

They had heard of but not seen the angels who had announced the birth of Jesus. But now they met a man in the temple who came up to them. Why did Simeon come up to them? They were not wealthy (they could not afford to offer a lamb for the burnt offering and had to substitute a second pigeon). They were not preceded by a throng of people to call attention to themselves. They were quite ordinary and doing what a number of others were doing on this day, offering their firstborn child to the Lord, when this old man came to them and prayed his prayer.

Mary and Joseph heard him say that in seeing their baby boy, he had seen his salvation and that this salvation would be not only for Jews but for Gentiles as well. No wonder they were amazed, astonished.

Astonishment is an entirely appropriate response to the events I’ve just described. Can you imagine what kind of person would experience any of those four events and be blase? Unaffected by what had happened?

How can I be sure? How will this be? I don’t blame either Zechariah or Mary for asking questions. I think I might have had a few more to ask, if it had been me.

Later in the life of Jesus, there was another person who asked a similar question: How can this be? The one who asked this was Nicodemus, a Pharisee who came to speak Jesus in the middle of the night.

Nicodemus asked how it was possible to be physically born again. How can a man be born when he is old? How can you possible crawl back into your mother’s womb?

Jesus went on to explain that he was talking of a spiritual rebirth. Nicodemus caught the incredulity of this and asked, “How can this be?”

Does it seem incredible to you that we can be born again spiritually? Does it seem incredible to you that God was born a man? That God died on the cross? Does it seem incredible to you that the God who created this world and the universe in which it sits also is aware of your existence, let alone that this Creator God also loves you, and works events for your eternal benefit?

When I was a pastor in Ohio and my youngest daughter Caitlin was about 4 years old, I was talking in a children’s message one Sunday in Advent about the Rapture and how the Bible says that Jesus will come back. There will be a loud trumpet blast and then we will rise up in the air to meet Jesus. Caitlin spoke out in a loud voice, “I think you’re fooling us.” Everyone burst into laughter. Caitlin continued, “I can see that look in your eyes, I think you’re fooling us.”

But you know, it is pretty preposterous that the Rapture would actually happen as we read it in the Bible. The Creator of the Universe is going to come to be born in the flesh, live among us, die and be raised to life and take us to be with him in heaven? What strange science fiction movie have you been watching?

Our problem is that the unbelievable has become ordinary news.

What do you think is amazing about a map of the world, a hand-held calculator, a CD diskman, or an airline flight from Paris to the US?

One of the games I play is to think of someone famous from the past and then consider what one thing I would show them from our modern world if they were to come back that would truly astound them.

How amazed do you think Ferdinand Magellan would be if I were to put in his hand a map of the world? Magellan was a 16th century Portuguese explorer who attempted to sail around the world. Can you imagine how amazed he would be with a modern set of maps that allowed him to know where he had been on his voyage?

A hand-held calculator does not seem like much, but consider this: In 1942, J. Presper Eckert, John W. Mauchly, and their associates at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering of the University of Pennsylvania decided to build a high-speed electronic computer. This machine became known as ENIAC, for Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (or Calculator). It could handle numbers up to ten digits long and occupied 167.3 m2 (1,800 ft2) of floor space and consumed about 180,000 watts of electrical power.

The calculator you hold in your hand is many times more powerful than this. Do you think these University of Pennsylvania professors would be astonished at a hand calculator?

If Mozart or Beethoven were to come back, I would pick up a portable CD player, put the earphones on their head and slip in one of their symphonies. Do you think they might be astonished? No need to gather forty or fifty musicians and convince them to come and play their instruments, just slip in a CD.

I’m reading a biography of John Adams who was the second president of the United States. He made several long voyages across the Atlantic to negotiate for the brand new United States of America with the European countries. If I were to take him on a Concorde flight that left New York in the morning, have lunch in Paris and then fly back in the afternoon in time for him to have supper with his family with whom he had shared that morning’s breakfast, do you think he might be just a bit astonished?

These things that we take for granted would totally stun men and women from the past. But the truth is that we quickly take for granted what is new and astonishing. So what are we to do?

How do we recapture the astonishment of what God has done for us?

A few years ago, Phil Yancy wrote a book titled, The Jesus I Never Knew. The book came out of a Sunday School class he was teaching in which he used films about Jesus to talk about the life of Jesus. He used a collection of fifteen films ranging from the 1927 silent classic by Cecil B. DeMille, King of Kings, to musicals such as Godspell and Cotton Patch Gospel to the modern French-Canadian Jesus of Montreal. In talking about the birth of Jesus, he took excerpts of the birth portion of these films and played them one after another. Only after this did he read the Scripture account of the birth of Jesus. He did this, he said, because we read the Scripture accounts of the life of Jesus already knowing how the story ended and he wanted he and his class to take a fresh look.

The book he wrote, takes the life of Jesus and attempts to tell the story from the perspective of those who witnessed the events in Jesus’ life. He tells the stories of the life of Jesus from the perspective of people who had no idea what would happen next. Angels appear to shepherds, Jesus is born and then what? How does one understand what had happened when the rest of the story is unknown?

Reading this book is an excellent way to capture the astonishment of the events in the life of Jesus. Read this book, then take time to contemplate and reflect. Don’t read the book all the way through in one or several sittings. Read one chapter at a time and allow some time to think about what you have read.

Another way to capture a bit of the astonishment of the Christmas story is to look at the story through the eyes of those who doubt that the story is true. We can tell someone so easily what we believe, but when you stop to listen to what is being said from the perspective of one who does not believe, the facts of what happened begin to be amazing truths. An unbelieving perspective helps us to see just how impossibly grand is the truth of what did happen. We begin to see that the stories of Jesus would be preposterous and nothing more than wishful thinking if they were not, in fact, true stories.

Don’t be addicted to one version of the Bible. When a new translation comes along, take advantage of it and read the Bible again with fresh new eyes. Eugene Peterson’s translation titled, The Message, is a translation that has helped me quite a bit. I read from that translation quite often in church because I want us to hear the truth of Scripture in a new way.

J.B. Phillips wrote a translation of the New Testament in the 60s that I was brought up on as a new Christian in the 70s. The Living Bible translation or the Good News are other versions to read. Read a new translation and you will stop and say, “Does the Bible really say that?”

Sit down some time and write a poem about some part of the life of Jesus. Poetry reaches into our soul and pulls out deep truth. Let God speak through your creativity and allow your heart and mind to be opened to new truth.

Sit down sometime with earphones and concentrate on a piece of music that will allow you to hear God’s truth presented. Music has a way of reaching past our mind and into our hearts. There are many fine Christian artists who have written songs that reach into our hearts and lift up our souls in wonder at what God has done.

The study of astronomy and physics is an excellent way of stretching our minds and can open us to the wonder of what God has done in creating this universe. It is easy to say that God created the world, but quite another thing to consider the world he created. The precision that is critical for the survival of this planet, our solar system and the universe itself is mind boggling. The rate at which the universe first expanded after the Big Bang and continues to expand is critically precise. Any more or any less and the universe would not exist. Steven Hawkings, A Brief History of Time is a difficult book to comprehend, but a wonderful examination of the intricacies of the universe. BBC has a weekly program using this book as a way to talk about continuing research in the search to understand our universe.

Read Isaac Asminov’s book on human anatomy. The more you learn about the human body, the more amazing it becomes. Phil Yancy wrote two books with Dr. Paul Brand: In His Image and Fearfully & Wonderfully Made. These books take the mysteries and wonders of the human body and make applications to our Christian life. They are wonderful books to read to stretch us and take into wonder and praise of our creator.

Take a walk in the woods and take time to closely examine the world of insects, birds, flowers and plants. Get down on your knees and watch ants at work taking a piece of food to the nest. Don’t just glance and go on. Spend five or ten minutes watching. If you see a bird in a nest, spend some time watching the behavior of the adult and baby birds. Go down to the Challah and spend a day watching the storks build their nests and care for the baby storks.

Read some books on animal behavior. Learn how it is that birds and fish can migrate such long distances without getting lost. Learn why it is that a mother bird rolls the eggs over in the nest so the egg is evenly incubated. Learn about the herding instincts of a border collie. When God wanted to impress Job with who he was, where did he point? To his creation, to meteorology, astronomy, zoology. The more you learn, the more praise and wonder can develop.

Pray for others and see God at work in your life and in the life of others. A woman came to Rabat last spring to work for a short period of time. She happened to be walking by the church one Sunday morning when she heard the French choir singing. She came in and they informed her that there was an English-speaking service earlier in the morning. She began to come to RPF and several weeks later, prayed to give her life to God, to accept God’s gift of salvation through Jesus. Amazing, isn’t it? How God works?

Another woman came to this country to study Arabic. She was brought up in a Christian family but had decided to convert to Islam. Her friend invited her to come to RPF and she reluctantly decided to come, telling her friend that this would be the last time she ever stepped into a church.

On the Sunday she came, there was an invitation given to make a deeper commitment to Jesus and she began to reconsider her decision to convert. Coming to a Muslim country seems like a great place to comme to convert to Islam. Who would expect that in this Muslim country, she would find an affirmation of what she had been brought up with as a child? Amazing, isn’t it? How God works?

It is good to work to be astonished, but I must end this sermon with a word of warning about astonishment. Do not allow astonishment to be the goal for your life. Astonishment is not good or bad, it is only a tool that can be used for good or bad. There are two fascinating scriptures that shed light on this. The first is found in Deuteronomy, part of Moses’ summary of the Law that had been given to Israel by God:

Deuteronomy 13
If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a miraculous sign or wonder,  2 and if the sign or wonder of which he has spoken takes place, and he says, “Let us follow other gods” (gods you have not known) “and let us worship them,”  3 you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer. The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul.

God warns that something truly miraculous may take place but lead away from God, not toward God. If we seek after miracles, if astonishment is the goal, how do we protect ourselves from being led away from God?

A similar warning comes in John’s Revelation, the last book in the Bible:

Revelation 13
And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. He had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on his horns, and on each head a blasphemous name.  2 The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority.  3 One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was astonished and followed the beast.

In this picture of the anti-Christ who is prophesied to come, a great miracle takes place and people are astonished and follow the one who will lead them away from God.

It is good to seek an emotional awakening in your faith. It is good to seek the experience of astonishment, but be discerning in your pursuit. Let these experiences lead you to God. Beware of such a lust for experience that you drift away from God. Let wonder and astonishment lead you to God.

This week, spend some time wondering about the mystery of God coming to earth. Pray that God will give you fresh eyes to see his creation. Pray that God will open you mind to the wonders of his world. See the Christmas story again through the eyes of a child and let that lead you to praise of God.