At the beginning of the Charlie Brown Christmas special, Charlie Brown is just not in the Christmas Spirit. To help him get that spirit Lucy suggests that he become the director of the Christmas play, but as we all know - that didn’t turn out well for Charlie Brown. If you are like Charlie Brown today and are just not in that the Christmas Spirit, don’t worry, there is a website that gives you step by step instructions on how to get the Christmas spirit and just about everything it says we need is in this box. Now the first thing it says we need is not in this box and that is children. They say if we don’t have any children of your own you can to borrow some. Their suggestion is to offer to baby sit some children so that their parents can enjoy some peace and quiet, or they suggest you just hang out with those adult friends who still act like kids. The next thing we need to do is get some Christmas music and then bake some gingerbread (which I don’t understand at all because I don’t like GB), and then we need to get some Christmas beverage – and their suggestion is hot chocolate. Now while the GB is baking we are to work on making a Christmas ornament which we can then place on our Christmas tree. Once we have done all of this we are supposed to sit down and watch a Charlie Brown Christmas eating GB, drinking hot chocolate and sitting in the glow of the tree with our children or the children we have borrowed. I’m really not kidding, these were the step by step instructions on how to get into the Christmas spirit quickly and easily.
Beyond the absurdness of all this, there is an underlying truth here, what this all reveals is that the peace on earth and goodwill toward men that we think of as the Christmas Spirit is fleeting. The Christmas spirit doesn’t last. Once the cartoon is over, the music ends, the GB is eaten and the Hot Chocolate has gone cold and the tree and ornaments put away, the reality of life returns and the warm glow of the Christmas spirit is gone. There is a powerful story from WWI that illustrates how the spirit of Christmas just does not last.
During the Christmas season of 1914 there were a series of truces that sprung up along the western front in Europe between the British and Germans. On Christmas Eve and Christmas Day both sides would call a truce and soldiers would leave their trenches and meet in the fields between them. The soldiers would gather together and exchange greetings and food and sing Christmas carols together. In one field the British soldiers brought out their football (soccer ball) and a game of football started between the two sides. Now it was said that the British won that game, but it was a British soldier who told that story so we can’t be sure, but the picture of peace on earth that we envision here is close to what the prophet Isaiah talked about in 11:6-9. But the problem was that this peace didn’t last. The day after Christmas the truce was over and the fierce and bloody fighting started all over again.
The Christmas spirit can produce a truce during a war, but it doesn’t bring lasting peace on earth, and while the Christmas spirit can bring good will toward men and women as we show extra kindness and forgiveness toward our family and friends, it doesn’t heal our hurts and restore relationships, and while the Christmas spirit can fill us with a sense of meaning and joy as we help those in need in around us we aren’t able to keep up that level of service and sacrifice throughout the year. What often happens is that the week after Christmas arrives and we are back to our old way of living. What all of this shows us is that the Christmas spirit doesn’t last so instead of looking to get into the Spirit of Christmas by eating GB and singing carols, what we need is the spirit of Christ to enter into us. If we want experience transformation, if we want this Christmas to be the beginning of a new way of living and a new way of loving, then what we need to do this Christmas is accept God’s gift of the Holy Spirit.
While the Holy Spirit has been around since before the beginning of creation, it was particularly active during the time of Jesus birth. Think about all the ways the Holy Spirit was at work in the events surrounding the birth of Jesus. It was the spirit of God that brought Joseph and Mary together as a couple long before there was any message of a child being born and it was the Holy Spirit that helped keep Mary and Joseph together during a difficult and uncertain pregnancy. It was the Holy Spirit that helped Elizabeth and Zechariah conceive a child in their old age and that child was a sign to Mary that the child she carried was indeed from God.
It was the Holy Spirit working in Caesar Augustus that issued a decree for a census to take place which is what forced Joseph to take Mary to Bethlehem which was where according to the prophets the Messiah was to be born. It was the Holy Spirit that gave the angels a song to sing and told them where to find a group of shepherds on the hills outside of Bethlehem. It was the Holy Spirit that even filled the Inns of Bethlehem so that Jesus had to be born in a stable and laid in a manger. Think about it, if God had wanted Jesus born in the Inn he could have reserved a room in some way, after all nothing is impossible for God, but I believe that God wanted Jesus born in a stable and laid in a manger because the humbleness of that birth reveals to us that Jesus came for everyone. It is the Holy Spirit that from the beginning made it clear that God’s love and grace was going to be extended and offered as a free gift to everyone.
It was also the Holy Spirit that placed a star in the sky that directed the Magi on their journey and the Holy Spirit that protected Jesus by sending the Magi home a different way which kept them from returning to Herod who was looking to kill Jesus, and the HS sent Mary, Joseph and Jesus to Egypt again to protect Jesus from Herod. So while there isn’t a HS figurine in our nativity scenes, the birth of Jesus would not have taken place the way it did without the work of the Holy Spirit. There would never have been a Jesus if it were not for the Holy Spirit because when Mary asked how the child was going to be conceived the angel said to her, the Holy Spirit will come upon you. It was the Holy Spirit who brought the gift of God’s divine presence to Mary and it is still the Holy Spirit who brings us the gift of God’s presence and power to us today, the question is will we receive it? Will we receive this gift of God’s Holy Spirit?
While we don’t often look to the Christmas story to teach us about the Holy Spirit, there are some things we learn about the Holy Spirit from the events around the birth of Jesus and probably the single most important thing we learn about the Holy Spirit is that it comes to us as a gift. Mary did not ask for the Holy Spirit to come upon her. Joseph did not ask the Holy Spirit to give him guidance on what to do with his life. The shepherds were not looking for a message from the angels and the Magi weren’t expecting to find a star when they searched the skies. The Holy Spirit took the initiative and came to the people – God’s power and presence were not forced on them, it was offered to them and revealed to them and it was up to them accept them and the spirit of Christ works the same way today.
The Holy Spirit is a gift from God that is offered to people who are open and willing to receive Him. Joseph, Mary, the Shepherds, the Angels and the Wisemen were all open to God and in one way or another they each accepted the gift of the Holy Spirit and when they did things changed, their lives changed - the world changed. There can be lasting change in our lives and there can be significant and lasting change in our world if we will be willing to receive the gift of God’s Holy Spirit. Are we willing, like Mary, allow Christ to be born in us. That’s what accepting the Holy Spirit is all about, it’s allowing the life of Christ to be formed in us so that our lives look more like the life of Jesus. This doesn’t happen on our own, it is the work of God when we accept God’s gift of the Holy Spirit.
As we think about what this gift of God’s Holy Spirit means for our lives we need to go back to the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit was given to the church. On that day the disciples were all gathered together and we know they were open to God because they were being obedient to the word of God. Jesus had told them to wait in Jerusalem until they were clothed with power and so they were following his instruction, they were waiting in Jerusalem and when the Holy Spirit comes upon them 3 things happen, there is the sound of a mighty rushing wind, there were tongues of fire that rested on them and they were able to speak in different languages. What some people see here is that the gift of the Holy Spirit change the disciples and the world through inspiration, purification and communication. The inspiration is the rushing wind that breathes new life into the disciples, the purification is the fire which cleanses and renews the disciples and the communication is the gift of being able to speak in different languages and as they do, the disciples spread the good news of Jesus to people from around the world. So that’s how the Holy Spirit changes us, it inspires us – it breathes new life into us, it purifies us, it cleanses us from sin and refines our faith, and then through us the Holy Spirit changes the world as we communicate God’s love and grace to others.
What I find interesting is that if we look at the Christmas story we can also see there that gift of the Holy Spirit brought inspiration, purification and communication. The Holy Spirit brought inspiration to Joseph by giving him the wisdom he needed to understand all that was taking place in Mary and clearly God inspired Mary, literally breathing new life into her. The Holy Spirit also brought purification to Mary and Joseph through the fire of trials. It was not easy for Mary and Joseph to go through all they did, but each step of faith refined their hearts and helped purify their faith, and then the angels and shepherds and even the Wisemen, God communicated his message to the world. So long before the day of Pentecost the gift of the Holy Spirit was bringing inspiration, purification and communication which makes me think that this is simply the work of the Holy Spirit.
Think about what we heard from the Prophet Isaiah this morning, his message was spoken hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus, or the day of Pentecost, but did you notice how it talked about the Holy Spirit bringing inspiration, purification and communication. In 11:2 it says that the Spirit of the Lord was going to come and rest on the Messiah and bring wisdom, understanding and counsel another way of looking at that is to say that the Spirit of God was going to inspire the Messiah. The Spirit of God was also going to bring a fear of the Lord – not a fear that terrifies but a fear or an awe that ignites a fire of passion and worship in our hearts that refines our lives, or a fear of the Lord that purifies us. And the Holy Spirit resting on the Messiah was going to bring a new order of peace and justice and righteousness. In other words the Messiah was communicate to the world that there is a better way to live and a better way to love. And then perhaps most important of all the Spirit was going to make that new way of life possible. I don’t think this image of peace and justice and righteousness was just a heavenly vision, I think it was to communicate the truth that God has a new way for us to live today and if we will accept the gift of the Holy Spirit and allow the divine power and presence of Christ to be formed in us that new way of live will come.
The spirit of Christmas is that warm sentimentality that comes with gingerbread and Christmas carols but it doesn’t last, the spirit of Christ comes with power to inspire us and to purify us and then to communicate through us that the peace and love and power of God are able available to us today. When we accept the spirit of Christ we are allowing God to breathe into us. Inspiration brings purification and as we accept God’s spirit and allow Christ to be born in us and formed in us we will find ourselves wanting to share God’s love and power with others. I’m not sure the Shepherds really thought about what they were doing when they left the stable, I think they were simply so filled with the gift of God’s spirit that they couldn’t help but share what they had seen and experienced for themselves. When we are filled with the gift of God’s Holy Spirit we will also share God’s love with others, we simply won’t be able to stop.
So the gift of God’s Holy Spirit is not the spirit of Christmas – it is the spirit of Christ and when we accept it – it will change us and then through us God can change our world. So let us accept this gift of God.
