"Breaking the Chains of Christmas"
Sermon Transcript for December 1, 2002 By Rev. Mike Beck
Our Advent sermon series is based around Charles Dickens’ "A Christmas Carol"-- "From Humbug to Hallelujah". Let me urge you to do what I did last night. There are four or five movie versions of it. I rented one of them, watched it, and it was really helpful to me. So you may want to do that. You may want to grab the book and re-read it again. These messages will really come to heart if you will do that. Also, as Dan preached about a couple of weeks ago, you will never have a better time to invite a friend to worship with you than Advent. Many of you turned in a card of people that you are going to invite. Those are up here on the altar. Those are persons God loves dearly and you may be the door to God doing some great things in their life through your invitation.
We all know the holiday song that warns us that Santa is "making a list, checking it twice; he’s going to find out…" You know the words, "…who’s naughty and nice!" But on a more serious note, Santa’s list reminds us of another phrase we hear often at this time of the year. That it is time to do a "year-end inventory". Taking a year-end inventory is not only essential to business, it is also helpful to us individually. The end of the year is a good time for us to stop for a moment and ask, "How am I doing? What kind of person am I becoming? What changes need to take place in my life so when I reach the end of it I don’t have a lot of regrets?
Charles Dickens’ classic story, "A Christmas Carol", is the story of a man who is forced to take inventory of his life. When Ebenezer Scrooge returns home, if you remember, on that Christmas Eve he’s visited by the ghost of his partner in business, Jacob Marley, who had died seven years earlier. Let’s watch a few minutes of that now as you turn your attention to the screen.
VIDEO CLIP
Jacob Marley, if you remember the story, shared some profound and truthful words that you heard him quote. He said, "I wear the chain I forged in life. I made it link-by-link and yard-by-yard. I girdled it on my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it." Now we do not subscribe to Dickens’s speculations concerning the afterlife. We don’t believe that spirits return and roam the earth. But Dickens’ nevertheless presents us with a vivid picture of what we might call "the law of the harvest". But the writer of Galatians spoke about it in Galatians 6 when he said, "Do not be deceived. God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction. The one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life."
Scrooge was being confronted with the truth about his life. It’s a truth we all need to learn – that our actions have consequences. We may not be aware of those consequences immediately, but what you do today has a bearing down the road. If there is any point to be gained about Santa’s list or Marley’s chain, it’s the fact that "life’s decisions accumulate". Our naughtiness or niceness eventually catches up with us! Scrooge was given a vivid image of the consequences of his choices. We are going to be seeing that in the coming weeks as he visits Christmas past, Christmas present, Christmas to be. And as we reflect on Scrooge, you heard Marley say, "You don’t realize it Scrooge, but you’ve got a chain around you and you’ve labored upon it these past seven years since I left. The links of Scrooge’s chains were the love of money, a lack of compassion, a miserly spirit, bitterness, selfishness, pride. Scrooge didn’t necessarily realize it but those chains were closing tighter and tighter around him.
But what about us--do we, like Scrooge, have we sown seeds we now deeply regret? Do we, too, have some Christmas chains that keep us from experiencing the true meaning of the season? Let me suggest some of the chains that may be binding us:
Materialism: Many of us are bound by the chains of "materialism". We’ve already got more than we can keep up with. But we give in to society’s line, "We need more to be happy". In fact, I think this was in Friday’s paper here in Franklin that I cut out this headline, "Gadgets make happy couples", and I wanted to barf. But that’s what materialism tells us. If you just have this, you’ll be happy. And it becomes a chain.
Bitterness: Some of you have hammered links of bitterness onto your chain. The wounds were real. You didn’t deserve what happened. But you let yourself become bitter about it and you formed a link on the chain.
Unwillingness to forgive: The next one is usually a combined link with bitterness. Others are bound by chains hammered on the anvil of an unwillingness to forgive. When I talk with an unhappy person striving for wholeness, I’ll normally find some seeds of an unwillingness to forgive somebody holding them back and binding them.
Habits: Some of you are bound in the chains of habits to which you have become enslaved, which damage your life and also affect the lives of loved ones around you.
Guilt: Others are bound by chains of guilt--some of it real. But I often find so many people carry around the weights of false guilt.
Unrealistic Expectations of Harmony within your Family: Some of you in this Christmas season are bound by unrealistic expectations of harmony with your family, which causes you to experience disappointment and anxiety especially at this time of year. One of the paths that I have found to wholeness is to lower our expectations. You know that family member you are going to see at Christmas that always says awful things? Let me give you an advance clue. They’re going to say those things again this year so if you just lower your expectations a little bit, you’ll have a lot more chance of experiencing the joy of the season! I’ve learned that in the eleven-year struggle with voice problems. When I go every three months down to Vanderbilt to get my Botox injection to keep me reasonably functional, the girl will ask me to get out my diary and tell her how many weeks of normal voice I’ve had. To which I reply, "I’ve totally forgotten what normal voice is." I lowered the bar. I set the expectations lower. And when I did I found an emotional acceptance of something I don’t like. But it’s not going away. Quit aiming for harmony and realize this might just be as good as it gets.
These are not small matters. For the chains that bind us can cause us to lose the true meaning of the season. We fall under the "humbug spell’, living in ways that cause sadness rather than joy, frustration rather than freedom, and conflict rather than harmony. And the law of the harvest leaves us with little hope. There seems to be nothing we can do to change – unless we find a power greater than ourselves to set us free. And that’s why Reverend Dan and I have the greatest job in the world. Because we get to proclaim that there is a God who came to us in the person of Jesus Christ who offers us the hope and the power so that we are not doomed to forever wear the chains we have forged. Friends, your painful past does not lock you into a hopeless future! In fact, change is God’s main business. II Corinthians 5:17 is a verse you ought to have memorized. You’re getting Reverend Mike’s paraphrase today because I think it reflects the Greek tense. "If anyone is in Christ, they are becoming a new creation. The old is passing away, and something new is emerging."
It may not happen overnight. The process towards the chains being released may be a long and arduous journey, but one God will help you to make. Friends in that verse is the Gospel, which is why we call it the "good news". Hear these words of Jesus in his hometown of Nazareth as He began His ministry. These were the first words of His ministry. He said, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach GOOD NEWS to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim FREEDOM for the prisoners and RECOVER OF SIGHT for the blind, to RELEASE THE OPPRESSED, to proclaim the year of THE LORD’S FAVOR."
Note the words in bold printing. Isn’t that what we want and need today? Good News, recovery of sight, releasing the oppressed, knowing the Lord’s favor? Some of you are thinking now, "But Reverend Mike, you don’t know how desperately I need that good news!" And here’s the next question you’re asking, "How do I appropriate it? How do I find the keys to unlock the chains?" I want to suggest two principles straight out of God’s Word this morning that I think are meaning for that to happen.
The Value God Places Upon Our Life and of How Much God Loves Us: The first principle is this: We must realize the value God places upon our life and how much God loves us. I want to illustrate that with this story. A beautiful, young Polynesian slave girl was placed on the auction block in New Orleans during the Civil War. A wealthy plantation owner rode by and noticed the girl. He was filled with compassion for her, and he jumped out of his carriage and entered in to the bidding. The bidding soon reached in to the thousands of dollars. And the leaders of the prostitution syndicate were furious that the plantation owner continued to counter their bids. In the end, the plantation owner purchased the young girl. He finished the paperwork and received the keys to her chains. He approached her, and she immediately spat in his face! He wiped the spit away and continued to unlock her chains. Thinking that he surely meant her harm, the young girl cursed her new owner violently! But as the chains dropped away, to her amazement she heard him say, "Woman, you are free!" The plantation owner who had redeemed her climbed in to his carriage and began to drive away. Overwhelmed now, the girl chased after him shouting, "Sir, let me serve you. Let me be your slave." The man stopped his carriage and turned to her and said, "You cannot be my servant". And the young girl’s face dropped, and she turned to walk away. But the gentle hand of her new owner turned her around and he said, "But you can come home to live with me as my adopted daughter."
Friends, that’s where it begins. The chains aren’t going to fall off until we realize how much God loves us. Yes, we’ve spat in God’s face; we’ve cursed Him. But He still loves us. And when we realize that, which is the message of Christmas, we’re halfway home. Here’s the other half:
Freedom Comes in Getting Outside Ourselves and in Giving Ourselves to Others: The second principle is this: Freedom comes in getting outside of ourselves and in giving of ourselves to others. I want every one of you to repeat these words after me. It’s your time to participate. Here is what you are to say, "Christmas is not about me!" Say that. Say it again. "Christmas is not about me!" As God sent His Son to us at Christmas, Christmas reminds us of giving ourselves to others. So as you go through this hectic month of December, say to yourself often, "Christmas is not about me!" That thought can snap some of the toughest chains we have forged in our lives, like a blowtorch going after an icicle. For what I have discovered in working with people, is that some persons remain bound in their chains because their focus and attention is totally upon themselves. And because they are so wrapped up in themselves, they don’t see the God; they don’t see others who can help set them free. Like Scrooge, we lose perspective and think we are an end unto ourselves. The ghost of Jacob Marley put it well when Scrooge told him, he said, "Jacob, you were a good business man." But Jacob has now realized the error of his thinking and he replies, "Business? Scrooge, mankind was supposed to be my business! The common welfare was my business: charity, mercy, forbearance, benevolence—that was supposed to be my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"
Breaking your Christmas chains, friends, will take place only when you realize that Christmas is not about you – that your freedom will come when you get out of yourself and give yourself to others. That’s why Jesus said, "If we seek to save our life we will lose it, but if we lose our life in service to others, we will find the key to life abundant and eternal". Charles Wesley summarized these two simple points in his great hymn, "And Can it Be". Look at the words in closing. He begins by asking the question,
And can it be that I should gain?
An interest in the Savior’s blood?
Died He for me? Who caused His pain?
For me? Who him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be!
That thou my God, shouldn’t die for me?
That’s point one of the sermon! Point two, verse two, talks about Christmas.
He left His Father’s throne above.
So free, so infinite His grace!
Emptied Himself of all but love,
And bled for Adams helpless race.
Tis mercy all, immense and free.
For O my God, it found out me!
And then, the last verse we’re going to sing relates to the sermon today.
Long my imprisoned spirit lay.
Fast bound in sin and nature’s night.
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray.
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light.
My chains fell off, my heart was free!
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
And how do we follow that—in serving others! So let’s stand and sing these versus with new meaning today.
E-mail Comments to: Reverend Dan Sinkhorn