Year by year we faithfully return to these passages to consider this Christmas story. Most of you have heard the story from childhood on, that the Son of God was born, not in a palace but a stable.
So common in this story that we see portions of it painted is store windows, broadcast on TV shows and recorded in our Christmas songs and music. But does the power of this story seem to wear thin at times? Not that the story is less miraculous, but that the mystery is gone and we know the end from the beginning. We know that the people who should have been waiting to welcome the Christ were asleep in their warm beds, while Shepherds in the fields by night received the shock of their life when the angels appeared to them, declaring the Christ’s birth.
We know that the home town crowd in Palestine had become so jaded in their waiting for a Messiah, and had so pre-determined the sort of Messiah they would seek, that it was left to wise and wealthy men from the Barbaric lands to the East to be the first to worship the Son of God, bringing gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh. A foretelling of the Christ’s ultimate mission to live, die and rise again, not for the furtherance of Judaism, but for the salvation of the masses.
We know that the leaders of the Jews should have been the first to beat a path to Jesus’ door, but the only path that was beaten was the path King Herod’s men beat as they mercilessly killed a generation of children with the hope of securing a longer dynasty for their own king. And the leaders who should have turned their people’s eyes to God’s gracious gift instead plotted against him, to hand him over to the Roman’s as a traitor so that he might be crucified.
These are the things we know, but these are the very things that we need to be reminded of, for these are the foundation blocks upon which all spiritual reality rests. Jesus came, not as a warrior, but as a substitutionary sacrifice.
Will you consider this short passage again with me, to see if we can discover in it the power that has made it such a regular part of our spiritual tradition?
Imagine if rocks could talk? Jesus once stated that if the children of Jerusalem remained silent, the very rocks would have cried out. But what might they has said?
What if rocks could talk and think and feel; what would they say? What if we could go back in time and place to Bethlehem and listen to the rocks?
This is what they would tell you: The world is changing. It is darker and colder now. Gone are the happy golden hues that seemed to gild the evening sky in olden day, in their place a watery grayness with a washed out sun.
The age is different, the great powers of men that had been are no more. The rocks bear witness to the change. In the hill country of Judea they have watched as people come and go since creation. They were there before the people, before the village, before the homes. They were there before the road to Bethlehem was laid, they are there still, if you don’t believe me, go look for yourself.
They would tell you of the change they have seen. They could speak of the oldest powers, now long forgotten, of the Philistines, Canaanites and Jebusites, of the Nephilim – giants that once passed this way. Of primitive peoples and simple homes. But those people have passed out of memory now.
They would speak of better days, when these hills had rung with happy songs. When children had played freely, far from the watchful eye of parents, far from the need for protection. But there were no children playing here now, no happy songs.
They would remember a time when the grazing sheep blanketed the rills and ridges like drifts of snow. If rocks knew names they would recite for you a genealogy of shepherds who had tended these hills, and one of the shepherds who had been made a king, a great king. He was here once, among the hills and rocks of Bethlehem. Long days he would spend with his harp and staff, perfecting his praises with only the sheep and birds to hear.
Some of the rocks would even remember his skill with the sling. He used to find the young rocks (the humans call them stones, the rocks have a name for them that we can’t pronounce, basically it means ‘chip off the old block’) then he would hurl them at a tree, or a wild animal trying to make off with a sheep. Happier and easier days were those.
These rocks had seen the high times of Israel, the travelers singing their way to Jerusalem for feast or worship. The colorful Phoenician traders making their way inland with wagons burderened with wares to sell. Even the Queen of Sheba come with tribute for Solomon.
They could remember grain heads weighed down with the weight of wheat. A sign of God’s blessing on his holy people. The rocks remember – a time of peace in the mid-east.
But if they remember the high times, they also saw the fall. They saw the idols and high places, the forgetful nature of man, so un-rock like, so fickle. They saw the rebellion of this holy people and the fate that followed.
They watched as the hordes of Assyria led away the nation of Israel in great mourning processions, never to be seen again.
They felt the earth shake before the armies of Nebuchadnezzar, come to set siege to Jerusalem. The rocks watched as they carried off the brightest and best from Judah to the land of the East.
The rocks were waiting there when the Medes and Persians released the people, they saw the sad faces of old men who were children when they left. A people reduced, a people rebuked, a nation broken.
The rocks were there when Alexander’s armies blazed across the known world, conquering everything in their path.
But times have changed. The middle powers of men are faded and gone. Only the rocks know the final resting place of the fallen soldiers. The golden age of Babylon, the silver era of Persia, the bronze of Greece, all has faded.
A great and terrible power was growing in the West. More powerful than all that has come before it. The prophets of old spoke of it as the great beast with iron claws and teeth, crush, devouring and trampling all that stands in its way.
Where are the war chariots of Egypt? Where are the war elephants of Persia? Where are the stallions of Alexander? Where has the winged lion of Babylon gone. Every one of them ground to dust by the iron legions of Rome.
Under a rock lies a coin, fallen from some tax collectors wallet and hidden by the dust. Imprinted on it is the face of Octavius, the grand-nephew of Julius Caesar. Octavius has given himself the title Augustus – Caesar Augustus. He is sovereign over all the known world. On the coin are impressed the word, PAX ROMANA – the Peace of Rome. And indeed, there is peace.
But what a terrible peace it is. What a terrible price this peace has cost. For scarcely anyone in the Empire has escaped the cost of peace. It is a peace that has been purchased with blood and financed by taxes. The legions of Rome had beaten and battered the world into a sullen peace. Caesar was willing to sacrifice the innocent and guilty together on the altar of war, if the gods of Rome would bring him power.
So he soaked the world in blood until the hearts of the people could be wrung no more – until the mother’s eyes were emptied of tears; until the young man had no will to stand and fight and the old man no spirit to speak. With siege and sword he broke down every challenge to his power, and then he chose to call it peace: PAX ROMANA.
What a sullen somber peace it was. A peace without celebration, a peace without joy, a peace without hope. A peace that dared any to defy it, and answered those who dared, with word or war, with the hammer and cross of crucifixion. Along every highway they hung the bodies of those opposed to the peace Rome brings – a reminder that Augustus was the saviour of the world.
Drunk with his own power, Augustus marred every coin and monument with his own image. And it came to pass in those days that a degree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.
The iron finger of Rome asserts its power. With a simple pen stroke Augustus up-turns the world of his day, sending every man scurrying for the place of his birth to comply with the whim of the Emperor. The peace of Rome is expensive, and the people must pay to maintain it. If they are to pay, then they first must be counted, to ensure that every person living in the Roman Empire pays their share.
With the audacity of a world sovereign Augustus passes the order and his underlings seek to see it done. In Syria the work will be begun by Herod the Great, a terrible and feared king over Jerusalem, but a mere puppet of Rome, he twitches when Rome says twitch. So large is the area that must be counted and covered, and so contrary the Jewish people to Roman rule, that the census will take nearly a decade, and will not be returned to Rome until Herod is dead and Quirinius is governor of Syria.
The rocks would see them. Hundreds of people displaced from their homes, trudging their way back to wherever they had run from. Back to the homes they had left, back to the places where there family had once been. Back to the place where they hadn’t found work. Back to the place where last rash words were spoken before the door was slammed. Back for unwanted family reunions, all because Rome must have its tax.
Children walked along these roads, but they seemed like small adults, for no laughter came from them. Men and women, old and young, beating the dust of the ground with their sandals. No words, no songs, just dull eyes looking back at the rocks. The occasional grunt or command as men tried to keep their beasts of burden moving, the groan of cart wheels or the braying of an ass was all that the rocks heard.
There in the midst of the throng of humanity was the young man Joseph. I wonder if he worried about money as they traveled, he didn’t likely have a lot of it, but he’d worked hard in Nazareth to build a decent reputation working with the bits of wood that could be found.
Perhaps he had recently been asked to do some work on the scroll case at the synagogue, there wouldn’t be much money from the synagogue, but that was the sort of work that could get you noticed. If it didn’t go to someone else before he could get back.
There was that bit of suspicion that wasn’t good for business… the question of why his wife seemed so quickly pregnant, when they hadn’t had the marriage ceremony until recently. But what could he tell them? Talking about angelic messengers was a sure way to get attention, Joseph just wasn’t sure what sort of attention it would be. So Joseph did what he always did, he sat on it until he knew better what to do.
The girl that was with him was tired. 80 miles on foot one way. It was the longest journey she had ever been on, and she’d be happy to never take it again. But to do it at the end of the 3rd trimester… well if walking is supposed to induce labour like the old wives in Nazareth say, then this baby will be here any day… then 80 miles home again with a newborn – Mary tried not to think about it.
She stared for a long time out over the hills surrounding Bethlehem, nothing endeared this country to her. As far as she could see there were just hills, and rocks that must have been there since creation. Sheep dotted the valley and a few rough shepherds were keeping a close eye on the line of strangers that had poured non stop into Bethlehem since the decree of Rome had arrived a few weeks ago.
The slowness with which Mary and Joseph traveled meant that the little city of David was filled to the bursting point by the time they arrived. Not on the regular traveling route, the little guest house had been filled from day one, in fact the owner had quadrupled the price and still found a line of people that were willing to pay, but could not be accommodated.
Joseph must have made his way through town, knocking on various doors seeking a spare room for his wife to use. No room. No room. No room.
So it was that little Jesus was born in the stable of the inn. The Bible says that the days were completed for her to be delivered. The question has been asked before, but it can be asked again – why like this? Why in a stable, why the manger? Why not at home in Nazareth? Why would God allow Caesar Augustus to pass such a decree at such a time? Why would God send his only begotten son into such a treacherous time, to such a hopeless peace?
The answer is two-fold. The first answer should have been known, at least to a few of the scribes living within Bethlehem, a few who had read the prophecy in Micah 5:2 – But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, Yet out of you shall come forth to Me The One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, From everlasting.
It turns out that for all his dread and power Augustus was nothing more than a puppet emperor. Behind him stood the creator of all things, when God said twitch, Augustus twitched. The prophesy required that the child be born in Bethlehem, there were many ways this could be brought about, but God chose to up-turn then entire empire to ensure that everything would be in place.
Indeed the age of the middle kings had died, indeed the long forgotten kingdoms had crumbled to dust. But here and now in this little city in Judea is born a promised king, whose origins are from of old, a little baby who is older than all the world. God’s answer to Augustus’ claim to being the saviour of the world, was to send a true Saviour to the world. The promised Son of God.
The second answer came in the fields that night. I’m sure the rocks heard it, if they could they would echo it to this day. The angels blazed from the darkness to declare the message, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace, good-will toward men.’
To the bleak and hopeless peace of Rome that dared any to oppose it, came the answer from heaven, peace that would supercede every situation. Peace that could handle hardship, peace that could weather war, peace that could look on death and be unshaken. Peace, not bought with the blood of enemies, but bought by the willing sacrifice of the Son of God. Peace that is real – peace that passes understanding.
It is a message most relevant today, where so many live knowing only the PAX AMERICANA. A peace that is had at a price. A peace that requires ignorance, that forbids the mind to dwell on third world countries, or to think of what the stones of Bethlehem witness today. A peace that ignores world hunger and AIDS in Africa. A peace that ignores the pleas of the downtrodden. A peace that gags truth.
A peace that is fringed with fear, ever watchful of our children and who is watching them; watchful of the news; wary of our neighbours. A peace that brings little rest, often disturbed by mounting bills that cannot be paid and the marital strife that indebtedness brings. Restlessness that breaks in on peace about what retirement will bring, about whether I will have any significance after my life is over. Peace that waits for the darkest moments of life to ask the question, ‘Now what?’
Into this modern world the angels message breaks, the proclamation of the birth of the promised Saviour and the eternal peace that he offers. That little one in the manger grew up to challenge the empty peace of the world, Roman and otherwise. He offered a peace with God that superceded opened the door to eternal life – an escape from the demands of a temporal world. For his truth they crucified him, another peace disturber crucified to maintain the PAX ROMANA, but God had other plans. With his resurrection from the dead the Lord Jesus proclaimed once and for all that there is a spiritual peace available that nothing can conquer.
Are you hungry for real peace? The Bible speaks rightly of this world when it states that everywhere they will cry PEACE, PEACE, but there will be no peace. To those who will receive him Jesus comes, with this promise: ‘Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.’ Jn 14:27a.
