That clip from Christmas Vacation illustrates two realities, both related to today's Staycation topic -- "Stay in Love."
One is an observation I make for couples in pre-marital counseling. Marriage may test your love because you are not only getting a husband or wife, but an unstated part of the bargain is that you are marrying into the rest of the family--like eccentric Aunt Bethany & Uncle Lewis or even crazy cousin Eddie. The other reality is that the essence of love is giving. Clark Griswold is a lover and a giver--willing to be generous with cousin Eddie's children so they would have some gifts for Christmas as depicted in this scene. So here's Clark buying Eddie's gifts for his family and his dog & even a gift for Clark.
Love is also taking a weekend phone call from your son-in-law asking if you could be prepared to preach if he's not feeling 100% which he is not. It is also a patient, tolerant congregation who understands when a preacher says, "I have never preached this sermon before--with this title."
Jon did a great job last week in launching this series with the reminder that our quest for the perfect Christmas does not always mean that our days will be merry & bright and all our Christmases will be white. He suggested: Instead of Christmas Vacation, what if we were to talk about Christmas "Staycation." As Christians, we're apt to talk about deliverance, escape, rescue, victory, salvation. The gospel promises that ultimately, through faith in Jesus, we will receive all of these. But this isn't where we live. You know the Bible talks just as much about "remaining, abiding, and staying..." We don't always get to vacate. Sometimes we're forced to live in the tension of the now and not yet, between the promise and the fulfillment. Sometimes we have to stay in a posture of waiting, trusting, hoping, loving, persevering, and longing.
What if you learned to take a "staycation" this Christmas? In fact, we could sum up the season of Christmas with word "love" as stated in the familiar John 3:16: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." Or the less familiar 1 John 4:9-10, 14: 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. . . 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.
My "staycation" sermon in a sentence is this; In a world that seeks to overwhelm us in so many ways and with so many things, we should be overwhelmed by one thing--God's overwhelming love. The message of Christmas is we are loved/our world is loved--we are lavishly loved.
But once again this week we have witnessed the power of hate and experienced the effects of evil in the senseless murders in San Bernardino, CA. I can identify with the words of the Christmas carol, I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day, written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow during the Civil War: And in despair I bowed my head "There is no peace on earth," I said, "For hate is strong and mocks the song Of peace on earth, good will to men."
Perhaps you saw the headline this week in the The New York Daily News, a tabloid, that decided to use its cover to mock God for failing to "fix" the problem of sinful mankind doing sinful things. The headline declared "God Isn't Fixing This." In a culture where parents abandon a child out of hate, Christmas is about a Father who sends His son out of love to redeem all of His children. In a culture where people are intentionally, systematically discipled to hate, kill & destroy, Christmas is a wonderful time to disciple our children and grandchildren to love, care, and deliver. In a culture where terrorists are radicalized by a distortion of religion to do harm, Christmas is a call for Christians to be radicalized by a radical love to do good,
So where do we turn? How do we respond? To answer those questions let me turn our attention to two prayers--one written by Max Lucado, the other by Apostle Paul. 2 or 3 years ago this Christmas Prayer was published in Huffington Post:
"Dear Jesus, It's a good thing you were born at night. This world sure seems dark. I have a good eye for silver linings. But they seem dimmer lately. These killings, Lord. These children, Lord. Innocence violated. Raw evil demonstrated. The whole world seems on edge. Trigger-happy. Ticked off. We hear threats of chemical weapons and nuclear bombs. Are we one button-push away from annihilation? Your world seems a bit darker this Christmas. But you were born in the dark, right? You came at night. The shepherds were nightshift workers. The Wise Men followed a star. Your first cries were heard in the shadows. To see your face, Mary and Joseph needed a candle flame. It was dark. Dark with Herod's jealousy. Dark with Roman oppression. Dark with poverty. Dark with violence. Herod went on a rampage, killing babies. Joseph took you and your mom into Egypt. You were an immigrant before you were a Nazarene. Oh, Lord Jesus, you entered the dark world of your day. Won't you enter ours? We are weary of bloodshed. We, like the wise men, are looking for a star. We, like the shepherds, are kneeling at a manger. This Christmas, we ask you, heal us, help us, be born anew in us. Hopefully, Your Children"
Here is what Paul prays for in Ephesians 3:14-19: 14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:14-19)
This prayer that we would "be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being" shows me that God's stabilizing presence gives us staying power. It helps me understand how to stay in love. When the world is threatening us or tempting us to retreat, God is inviting us to stay in His love, to settle into His presence, to stand firm in His strength. It forces us to wrestle with the question "How can we describe this love?" Like faith (last week's topic) love is often treated as a trite, throwaway word. The reality is that it is beyond description. We may not be able to define it or have words to describe it, but can experience it. It is what Christians and our culture need to know?
25 years ago, a Universalist Unitarian minister Robert Fulghum published a simple book that became a #1 New York Times bestseller entitled All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten.
"I am an educator and although I appreciate some of the wit and wisdom of his book, I would contend that there are some things I learned after kindergarten and am still learning after graduate school. But I also concede that the two most important things I need to know I learned in pre-kindergarten. One lesson I call the "twin towers of my toddler theology". I learned it from my mother in a simple prayer we prayed at meal time--"God is great. God is good. And we thank Him for this food." Those twin truths shaped my theology as much as my theological training and seminary education. The other lesson, I call the greatest thought I ever had and the greatest truth I ever heard. I can sum it up in a single sentence from a simple song I learned from my mother "Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so." Knowing that truth is the most important thing we all need to know."
Paul reminds us that like a well-planted tree and a well-built house we have been "rooted and grounded in love" (v. 17)--for some of us we have grown up knowing of God's love from our childhood. Regardless of whether we have known Jesus' love for a lifetime or a short time, we have experienced it (that is the meaning of the word translated "know" throughout this text--to know by experience not merely an intellectual knowing) but there is more to experience, more than we can ever experience. We need to comprehend individually and corporately ("with all the saints") this love that is beyond comprehending and to know this love that is beyond knowing.
Frederick Lehman captured this limitless love of God in his classic hymn "The Love of God." He wrote:
"The love of God is greater far Than tongue or pen can ever tell; It goes beyond the highest star, And reaches to the lowest hell; Oh, love of God, how rich and pure! How measureless and strong! It shall forevermore endure-- The saints' and angels' song. Then he demonstrates how the limitless love of God could be so vast that it surpasses knowledge: Could we with ink the ocean fill, And were the skies of parchment made, Were every stalk on earth a quill, And every man a scribe by trade; To write the love of God above Would drain the ocean dry; Nor could the scroll contain the whole, Though stretched from sky to sky. Try to get your head around that or put your heart into that. Just how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ? As wide and long and high and deep as a cross with a horizontal cross bar wide enough to reach around the world and long enough to stretch into eternity; a cross with a vertical pole high enough to take us to heaven and deep enough to reach to the lowest pit. What a powerful image? Love gives; love sends; love sacrifices; love never retreats; love never gives up; love penetrates every predicament of the human heart."
Christmas illustrates that incarnational love requires a change of address. At Christmas God came near, He took on flesh and human form to dwell among us. This Christ of whom John said, "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us" (John 1:4) according to Paul desires to "dwell in our hearts through faith" (Eph. 3:17). What that means is that Christ wants to come into our hearts to settle down and stay as he takes up residence--not as a temporary resort but a permanent dwelling place; not as a renter but as the rightful owner of my heart/His home. For Christ to dwell in our hearts through faith has implications for Christian maturation and spiritual formation.
The picture Paul paints is that Christ does His indwelling work to change us from the inside out--that we "may be filled with all the fullness of God." Christmas tells us that in spite of the work of terrorists that get attention and an enemy that seeks to kill and destroy, God is on a mission to destroy hate and defeat evil. He has already "fixed this" and everything else that is wrong with our world. Our hope and peace and joy are not to be found in what He could do or should do but in what He has already done. At Christmas and in the person of His Son Jesus Christ He has done the great deed. He has delivered us. The answer for our world's ills are not found in others' hate or indifference or even in our love but in God's love. It is up to every man, woman and child of every nation and generation to accept God's fix. Let's get serious about Christmas and stay in love. Jesus said in John 15:9: As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.