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Joy to the World!

Luke 2: 8 – 14

Rev. Peter R Green, Sunday morning, 10 Dec, 2006

SOMEONE RECENTLY sent me a PowerPoint presentation about contentment in the midst of life. It said that we don’t help ourselves by seeking happiness in some other place and situation, like an alcoholic who constantly moves on, making fresh starts that never go anywhere.

The angels had a message of great joy to all people. It was a message of joy, of peace, of hope, in the midst of an appallingly bad world.

This morning, let’s understand how bad things were for the shepherds in particular; then let’s see how they heard a message of joy, a message of peace, good news of hope.

A pastor in a church not far from here had a visit from one of the women, who was thinking about the book of Revelation. She was really upset. “Pastor, I’m scared. I mightn’t be able to resist accepting the mark of the beast. What if I accept the mark and Jesus doesn’t take me when he comes?”

“Are you a Calvinist?” my friend asked.

“Of course I am!” she said,

“What do Calvinists believe? Isn’t it, ‘once saved, always saved?’ So are you saved, or are you not saved?”

“I‘m saved,” she said, “But what if I accept the mark of the beast...?”

These truths were supposed to bring her hope, joy and peace. But Satan had so twisted them in her mind that she didn’t believe, she couldn't even see, that Jesus will win, no matter what Satan throws at him.

We must know the Bible’s great truths. We must fully believe those truths. That woman was using religion to feed her neurosis. But neurosis is often what people have when they don’t have any real problems to worry about.

THE TROUBLE WITH SHEPHERDS

Those shepherds had real problems.

King David had been a shepherd. The early Hebrews were mostly shepherds. Yet by Jesus’ time, shepherds were despised outcasts.

It took skill to be a shepherd, but shepherds were generally not the brightest tubes in the fitting. If they couldn’t build houses or make jewellery or brew wine, or write letters, they could still be shepherds. But who valued people like that? You know how people are.

Then again, shepherds were dirty. They lived in the dirt with their sheep, and, by dirt, I mean dirt. Don’t imagine green pastures. Don’t imagine our lush farming areas. Think of Hay in a drought, where there might just be a faint dusting of green on the red earth.

They did their best to wash, but often there was no chance. Shepherds didn’t even come indoors, if the weather was warm. When it was too cold outdoors for sheep, then it was too cold for shepherds to stay outside.

The problem was more than just dirt. Perhaps house-trained sheep exist. I’ve never seen one. Shepherds slept on a couple of sheepskins on the ground. In effect their bed was a sheep’s toilet.

I have a friend who worked at the fish markets when she was studying, and she often had a fishy smell even after she showered. Imagine how the shepherds were. You knew when the shepherds were coming. So people avoided them because they were offensive.

But the worst bit of all was that shepherds were considered to be irreligious.

Is that hard to understand? For a Jew of Jesus’ day, religious was as religious did.

A religious person fulfilled all the Temple sacrifices. A religious person attended the synagogue religiously on the Sabbath. A religious person kept all the food laws. Everything was done just right to ensure that it was fully kosher. A religious person tithed and gave generously. A religious person washed according to strict rituals.

Shepherds couldn’t leave their sheep to attend the synagogue or fulfill the temple sacrifices. Shepherds lived outdoors, so they couldn’t cook food a totally kosher way. They didn’t have all the specified baths for ritual purification. They didn’t have the money to give generously, and not too many of them bothered about tithes.

The religious Jews called them, am-ha‘aretz — people of the land. It was a bit like saying, “Well, they live here, but we don’t have to like it. They are the weeds that come up out of the earth when we want to have wheat growing.”

To religious Jews, shepherds, tax collectors, prostitutes, drunkards, gamblers and all those kinds of people were worse than useless. While they existed, it meant that observant Jews had to work that much harder to make up to God for these Jews who didn’t do the right thing. It’s like people today who hate the unemployed because other peope have to work harder to pay for welfare, only in the Jewish setting, it was religious works that counted.

So you can see that the shepherds were pretty much outsiders.

So what happens?

Angels arrive. They look around. They don’t go to see the king — he’s rich. He kills his rivals, He wouldn’t even hear news of hope.

They look at the priests. They are too religious to hear that God is doing a new thing.

They check the religious teachers. They have it all worked out. They have no room for angels.

So the angels go to the most outcast, and announce good news to them.

People despise the weak: God doesn’t.

JOY

And their message is first of all a message of great joy.

You wouldn’t expect to find great joy among such despised people. I have been where people don’t take me seriously, and I can tell you that that is pretty uncomfortable. It’s hard to smile when things are like that.

But the angel tells these despised, outcast shepherds

“Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.

Shepherds, don’t be scared. This is not an attack. This is an outbreak of joy: God is doing something good!

As I said, happiness is not something to pursue. It happens when you don’t expect it.

But you can grow your joy.

When I had my 60th birthday celebrations in July, everyone kept it from me so well that I didn’t have a clue that anything other than a quiet family dinner was happening.

When I saw everyone there, people I hadn’t even seen for years, I was very happy. But that won’t happen again in a hurry. Do I have to wait until I turn 70 for another happiness blast?

Perhaps I will have to wait. I can’t predict when things will happen to make me happy.

Joy is different. It can come in the midst of troubles.

Paul says,

^{ROM 5:1} Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, ² through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. ³ Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; ⁴ perseverance, character; and character, hope. ⁵ And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.

And he says about other churches,

² Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity.

James writes,

^{JAS 1:2} Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³ because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.

Joy is something that we can choose. It is a response to knowing the guarantees of God. All his promises are core promises. To rejoice is to put your joy into practice, to express what is in your heart and mind.

When you know where God is taking you, you can choose to rejoice. You can act joyful and you will be joyful. You can look at your hope and choose to be glad that it is sure and secure in Jesus our Lord. And it still works if everyone forgets your birthday and no one smiles at you all day.

And this joy comes about because of a Saviour, Christ the Lord.

God has acted. Where there was no hope, God has brought about hope, Things will change. Get excited about it!

This week, Kevin Rudd replaced Kim Beazley as leader of the Labor Party. Beazley was a good and well–meaning man. But he could not excite a cat to get off hot stove-top.

But there is excitement about Kevin Rudd, because he promises change. He promises fairness in the workplace, a new approach to Iraq, a managed economy and a sense of society. Even Liberal voters are writing to the papers saying that Rudd is making more sense than Howard is.

Imagine if that excitement were magnified thousands of times! The promise of hundreds of years has been fulfilled today! The Saviour guaranteed to Eve has finally arrived. Is there a better cause for joy?

PEACE

Joy can’t stand alone, though. Joy is always dependent on something else. That is why the angels spoke of peace on earth to men of goodwill.

The Bible often talks of peace, but the sad fact is that few Christians understand it in a Biblical sense. Even distinguished Christian leaders home in on feelings of peace, and many people are deluded. They assume that becoming a Christian will make them feel more peaceful. People from conflicted homes become churchgoers, hoping to find peace, when they will really only find it when the causes of conflict in the home are dealt with.

Paul says,

^{ROM 5:1} Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,

Real peace with God comes through entering the grace of God through Jesus Christ.

To be justified by faith means that you have no case to answer before God’s judgment seat,and having peace with God means that you and God are no longer enemies. It has nothing to do with a difficult husband or a wayward child. It has to do with God calling off the police hunt for you, the criminal.

You may well experience feelings of peace once you know you are no longer under God’s spotlight, but that’s not the main point. Being at peace with God, you may now be able to go on to look at relationships needing to be tuned up, but that was not what the angels offered. Being at peace with God, you may have good insights into what causes conflict and what makes for peace. Many of the world’s great peacemakers have been believers, who knew that we who believe must promote peace in the world.

But that is secondary. The central message of the angels is that people of goodwill, people who are willing to deal with God, to find his salvation, are people who will experience peace with God.

As soon as we come to God through faith in Jesus, the relationship with God changes.

Once we were sinners, now we are numbered with the saints. Once we were lost, now we are found. Once we were subject to God’s wrath and judgmental anger, now we are recipients of mercy and grace. The angels’ message is a message of peace.

HOPE

Finally, the message is about hope.

The angels never mention hope itself, but we know how Paul ties faith and grace and hope and joy together. The angel says,

^2:10 ...I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. ¹¹ Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. ¹² This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

And then the whole army of heavenly angels cries out,

^2:14 “Glory to God in the highest,

and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests.”

It’s a message of hope, because it tells of a good future. It says that God’s rule has come back to earth, because of a Saviour, Christ the Lord. It tells that peace is returned to all who desire it. This is good news for all people.

When revival came to Azusa Street in Chicago back around 1901, people laughed at the behaviour of the Christians. But people kept flocking there, because that was where they found hope. One historian says that the fundamentalists of that era looked back and thought the church should become like they imagined it used to be a century earlier. But the Pentecostalists looked forward and said, “We are catching a glimpse of heaven, because we are seeing good news coming to all the people. Black and white, rich and poor, Catholic and Protestant — they are all one in Christ our Saviour.”

The angels’ news was a message of hope.

CONCLUSION

We live in troubled days. When I was a kid, there were a few serious anti–Christian books, like the writings of R G Ingersoll or some of what Bernard Shaw or H G Wells wrote.

Today they are pouring from the presses. I was looking at all the copies of Dawkins’ The God Delusion in the ABC shop on Friday, and thinking how much I am reading from anti–Christian perspectives lately – bookshops, magazines, letters in newspapers. There is unrestrained anti-Christian propaganda.

At the same time, Islam is pushing harder than ever. It so often promotes unrestrained violence against any critics, yet also presents itself as a misunderstood victim, and people are buying the whole story. Don’t forget that Jesus warned against false teachers!

Throughout the Western world, injustice and unrighteousness is rampant. Governments are driven by economic ideas and forget about the needs of society. They manipulate the churches and they exploit people of good will. Our Government puts asylum seekers in prison camps on prison islands, it sends away Australian citizens and refuses to help David Hicks, who has never been found guilty. Well, the news just emerged this morning that, after being held for 5 years without charge, they are finally going to charge Hicks soon.

And, yet, Australia is still the lucky country! Look at what goes on in other places!

How are we to react?

It doesn’t matter how far down the pole we might be, we can still be joyful. If we know the Lord, we can choose joy.

If we are feeling insecure about how we might stand in coming troubled days, we can live with peace, a peace which comes from knowing that Jesus died for us and that God accepts us because of that sacrifice.

And if we feel that it will all never end, that there is nothing to look forward to, the angels promise hope, because God has invaded through his Son, and is building a people of faith, and the Kingdom will never end.

The early Christians cried, Marana-tha! Come, Lord! We join them. Marana-tha: Jesus, come back quickly! Amen.

© Peter R. Green 2006. Permission is granted for quotation in full for non-commercial purposes provided that authorship is acknowledged and this copyright notice is displayed with the text. Portions also copyright The Bible, NIV (Zondervan Ltd.)