Here's where I'm headed for Christmas Eve. My topic is "THE GREATNESS OF THE
SMALL" (I think I've heard that title somewhere before, possibly in a sermon
by George MacLeod, but if so, I'm shamelessly stealing it).

"So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the
manger." — Luke 2:16

At Christmas, God demonstrates the greatness of the small...
A carpenter's love life becomes the stuff of angelic proclamation...
A peasant girl becomes the "most favored one"...
Her child becomes King of Kings...
Shepherds become his courtiers...
Travelers outwit a tyrant.

In our world, it's the large and the loud that so often command attention.
Armies arm themselves, politicians posture, money-men manipulate, terrorists
terrorize. Donald Trump announces that, in all modesty, he figures he'd make
a good president. Fidel Castro buses in demonstrators to parade before CNN's
cameras, demanding a young refugee's return. Bill Gates wears down government
anti-trust lawyers with months of delaying tactics, then minimizes his bad PR
with multi-million-dollar charitable gifts that would be the envy of many
third-world countries. The latest toy craze ignites the nation's desire, and
becomes this Christmas' must-have gizmo (This year it's Pokemon, but does
anyone remember how swiftly "Tickle Me Elmo" fell from grace?). Fortune
heralds the 500 richest, while People touts the "25 most intriguing."
Investors scramble for an insider track on the latest high-tech IPO. Large is
impressive, bigger is better, and richest is best.

In Rome, the legions of Augustus are on the march. The emperor himself
stands, clothed in purple, reviewing the ranks as they pass by. "Hail,
Caesar!" each line of soldiers shouts in turn. Trumpets blare, banners wave,
paving-stones thunder with the simultaneous impact of thousands of feet. Arms
are raised, row upon row, in percussive, synchronized salutes. Caesar
Augustus, exalted god-ruler, limply returns the salute, a bored look creeping
across his face. How many such parades has he had to endure in his time? Ah,
the drudgery of being emperor!

Meanwhile, in a rented room off a back alley, in an out-of the-way village at
a far corner of the Roman empire, a baby cries. His mother and father find
precious little, in their sparse traveling kit, to meet his needs.
Swaddling-clothes. Straw for a bed. The hot breath of farm animals to warm
him. No silver spoon in this lad's mouth. Brooding bacteria of childhood
diseases swim in the air, and there are no vaccinations, no neo-natal care
unit, no antibiotics. Why, this little one, born so far from home, will be
lucky if he lives out the year!

But live he does. His family flees with him to Egypt, then settles in
Nazareth. The boy grows, thrives. When he becomes a man, and starts to turn
heads with wise words about the good and the beautiful, the skeptics will ask
in derision, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?"

CAN anything good come out of Nazareth... or Bethlehem... or Bricktown, or
Point Pleasant? CAN anything good come out of our haphazard little Christmas
celebrations, cobbled together with — we so vividly imagine — not enough
money, not enough time, not enough skill at cooking or decorating to make
Martha Stewart so much as turn her head?

If you're like many others, by the time tonight rolls around, everything's
become a mad whirl. There are the things left undone, the things shoddily
done, the things never to be done. There is the exhaustion, the impatience,
the irritation. The crowds! The traffic! The parking! The people who are
coming... and those who aren't! The gifts we'll give... the ones we couldn't
afford... and the ones we couldn't afford, but bought anyway! The dirty
dishes in the sink, and the dust swept under the rug! All of it swirls
together, in kaleidoscopic confusion.

But wait... At the center of the Advent wreath, a tall, white candle glows.
Seated beside you, or nearby you, is someone you love. Look at those
children, wonder brimming over in their body- language. The familiar words of
Matthew and Luke have washed over you by now, the carol tunes have struck a
well-remembered chord. In the stillness of worship you know, in your heart of
hearts, that it is not in the largeness and the loudness, not in the brashly
extravagant, not in the crassly commercial that the true spirit of Christmas
is to be found. It is in the cry of the babe in a manger... in his mother's
loving embrace... in the faraway gleam in the eye of his father, the dreamer.
It is in the greatness of the small... or better, in smallness made great:
made great by the touch of the hand that created all things, by the breath of
life that was breathed into a human figure of mere clay so long ago, and which
has continued to respire ever since, everywhere life begets life and love
begets love.

Look at YOUR life. Look at YOUR love. Neither is insignificant. Though they
may appear, at times, to be crowded out by terrible, surging forces of
self-centeredness and greed, life and love are still God's wondrous gifts to
the world. Both find their fulfillment in this Christ-child of Bethlehem.

There is no life apart from him — no life eternal, anyway. And God knows
there's no loving without him: for every attempt at human loving, unless he be
in it, is doomed to degenerate into exploitation and lust.

You and I cannot come to him by way of the great and the powerful. We can
only approach him by means of the small and the humble.

They say that the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem has a tiny doorway — so
small that anyone passing through must stoop low to enter. How appropriate!
For we do not come to Christ by exalting ourselves. We come to him by bowing
low, and by bending the knee, following the example of shepherds and wise men
did of old. "Come adore on bended knee, worship Christ, the newborn king!"

Carlos Wilton
Point Pleasant Presbyterian Church
Point Pleasant Beach, New Jersey

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
carlos.wilton@ecunet.org (CARLOS WILTON)