“A Christmas Dog Story” written by Shel Silverstein.

Tonight's my first night as a watchdog and here it is Christmas Eve. The children are sleeping all cozy upstairs, While I'm guarding the stockings and tree.

What's that now? Footsteps on the rooftop? Could it be a cat or mouse? Who's this down the chimney? A thief with a beard and a big sack for robbing the house?

I'm barking, I'm growling, I'm biting his rear. He howls and jumps back in his sleigh. I scare his strange horses, they leap in the air. I've frightened the whole bunch away!

Now the house is all peaceful and quiet again. The stockings are safe as can be. Won't the kiddies be glad when they wake up tomorrow and see how I've guarded the tree?

I always feel a little bit like that watchdog on Christmas Eve. Only, instead of guarding a Christmas Tree, I’m guarding a manger. Lest we get too wrapped up in the magic of this night, I’m here to remind us all of the reality of the Christmas story. To bite the myth of the manger in the rear and chase away the sugar-coated story, so we can pay attention to what God is really doing here.

The focal point of the Christmas story is a newborn baby wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger. It’s an image of love. But the kind of love we see in the babe in the manger isn’t a mushy, sentimental love. It isn’t sweet. It isn’t mild. A manger was his bed, not because it created a quaint setting for the story, but because there was no room for him anyplace else. There was no baby shower for this child. No hospitality, no welcome. Instead, he experienced rejection as he filled his lungs with air for the first time in this world. Just as he would experience rejection when he filled his lungs with air for the last time in this world. From the very beginning, we can see that the love of God is a defiant love. God loved the world so much that he came to live among us even though the world didn’t want his love. “You don’t want my love?” he says. “Well, that’s too bad, because I’m going to love you anyway and there’s nothing you can do to stop me. So there!”

As we cut through the image of the sweet baby Jesus and see the defiant love of God, it changes the way we celebrate Christmas. It’s not just a tender birth story.

In Jesus, the line separating God from humanity becomes blurred. God has entered our world. We are deeply united with the divine. The way to honor the incarnation, the word made flesh in Jesus, is to embody the defiant love of God in our own lives.

A poem attributed to Mother Theresa describes what our lives look like when we connect with the defiant love of God.

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.

In a world that’s hostile to the ways of God... Where love is selectively parceled out to those we deem worthy...Where disagreements are resolved with weapons... Where we value power above people... Where people are judged by of the color of their skin, or the language they speak, or the gender of the people they love, or the way they worship God... Where hope is in short supply... Where we measure success by a salary, or a house, or a car... Where vengeance is acceptable and forgiveness is suspect... Where we find comfort in comparing ourselves to those who don’t meet our standards... Where we treasure commodities more than compassion... In a world like that, we don’t keep Christmas by flowing with the status quo. We keep Christmas by embracing the defiant love of God.

I’m reminded of that in a poem, written over a hundred years ago by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. It’s been set to music and we hear it sung as a Christmas carol.

I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Till ringing, singing on its way
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Then, the words to Longfellow’s original poem take an abrupt turn half-way through because this poem was written during the most desperate time of our nation’s history. You may be feeling like 2009 is the worst of times for Americans. But if you can get beyond being mired in the moment and if you consider the bigger picture, you can see that as bleak as things may seem right now for many of us, this doesn’t even come close to being the darkest time for our country. The darkest time for us came when Longfellow wrote this poem. It was written during the War Between the States. Can you imagine what it would have been like during those years to be celebrating Christmas while our country was being torn apart in a blood bath? Can you imagine the desperation and the grief and the hopelessness people must have been experiencing? And can you imagine how it would have felt to hear the words “Peace on earth” in a context like that? So, Longfellow wrote,

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.”

And then come the next two verses that are never included in the Christmas carol –

Then from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
And with the sound the carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
And made forlorn, the households born
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And yet, despite the brutal reality of the world around him, in the midst of his despair, the poet offers a defiant word, and proclaims the truth of God’s love.

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.”

What a wonderfully defiant Christmas Carol. I wish we had it in our Lutheran hymnal. Because Christmas is a time to reconnect us with the defiant love of God. But the fact is, all Christmas carols are songs of defiance. In a world of cynical desperation, we sing of hope. In a world of grief and pain, we sing of joy. In a world of turmoil and war, we sing of peace.

No matter what the circumstances of our lives, no matter how dark things may appear to be, God’s love defies the darkness. The light shines in the darkness of this world. It’s a light no amount of darkness will ever be able to overcome.

What we’re celebrating this night is not the Christmas we see portrayed in sappy, sentimental Hallmark cards. It’s not about offering a warm, fuzzy welcome to a sweet baby sleeping in a crib. It’s about reflecting the love of God incarnate in a hostile world. With every greeting of “Merry Christmas.” With every carol we sing. With every candle we light, we’re recognizing that God’s love is a love that defies the ways of the world. That’s the message of the newborn baby wrapped in swaddling clothes lying in a manger.

Pastor Nancy Kraft
Holy Trinity Lutheran Church
Charlotte NC
December 24, 2009