FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, ATLANTA, GEORGIA

Communion Meditation by Dr. George Bryant Wirth

Christmas Eve 2009

wwwww.come

WAITING FOR GOD TO COME

Scripture: Galatians 4:4

INTRODUCTION

Throughout this Advent Season, we have been bound for Bethlehem, centering our attention on the theme wwwww.come and every one of the sermons has begun with the letter w: “Watching for the Light,” “Wondering How It Happened,” Wandering Toward the Manger,” “Wanting What We Need,” and finally tonight on this glorious Christmas Eve, “Waiting for God to Come.”

Which is, as you know, what the Advent-Christmas Season is all about – the word Advent, from the Latin, “Advenire” (Adventus) – literally means “to come.”

That’s what the people of Israel were waiting for, more than a thousand years since the reign of King David – they were waiting for the Messiah to come. That’s why the Wise Men from the East (probably modern day Iraq) saddled up their camels and followed the star in the sky toward Jerusalem where they reported to old King Herod that they were watching and waiting for a new King of the Jews to come (Matthew 2:2).

That is what the shepherds were told by the angel on that silent, starry night in the hills of Bethlehem, that “Unto them a Savior, who is Christ the Lord,” had come (Luke 2:11). That is what Joseph and Mary believed as they settled into the stable on that first Christmas Eve, waiting for their child, God’s only begotten Son, to finally come (Luke 2:6-7).

And we who trust that the story is true, we have gathered here to celebrate tonight what all of us have been waiting for – that God has come down from heaven to earth through the birth of our Savior named Jesus.

I

But most us, if the truth be told, find it difficult to wait for Christmas to come. Our blood pressure rises as we try to spot a parking place at the mall, and then wind up standing in long lines at the department stores. We get agitated when our plane flights are delayed, and then have to wait for our luggage to come down on the carousel, going around and around and around.

And how about waiting in the holiday traffic? A minister friend of mind in New York City was stuck in a traffic jam outside the Holland Tunnel just a few days before Christmas. Trying to be a good Christian, he motioned to the driver next to him to go on ahead, but was surprised when that person rolled down the window and shouted out loud “Don’t you tell me what to do”! You see, waiting isn’t easy, and sometimes it brings out the worst in us.

Paul Harvey once told the story about a man who lived in California and was engaged to be married to a lady in Richmond, Virginia. Christmas was coming and she told him over the phone “I can’t wait to see you.” He said “I don’t have enough money for airfare, so I’ve bought a bus ticket,” and she replied “I can’t wait to see you.” He called her on a pay phone from Chicago, and once again, she said “I can’t wait to see you.” By the time he reached the Greyhound station in Richmond, that man discovered his fiancée meant what she said, “I can’t wait to see you.” She had just left town with another man.

And speaking personally, I can remember many Christmas mornings in Sag Harbor, Long Island when I was a child. My brother and sisters and I were so excited to climb down the stairs and see what was under the tree.

But for some reason which is still a mystery to me, we always had to wait for our grandfather to shave. It took him a long time to lather up and use that big blade, and we would stand there watching him in front of the mirror in the guest bathroom, saying “Come on Grandpa, it’s Christmas”! “Just a minute, just a minute” he would reply with a twinkle in his eye, but it seemed like forever.

So if we’re honest about it, the truth is that most of us have a difficult time waiting for Christmas. With high expectations and a growing sense of frustration, we want to hurry up and get there.

II

But according to the original Christmas Story, the Bible tells us that God was not in a hurry to come. It took a long time – nearly a millennium from the reign of King David - - for the Messiah to finally arrive. It was centuries before the prophecies of Isaiah would come true. The Wise Men probably traveled for a year or more to make it to their destination. And for nine long months young Mary carried that Baby in her womb before He was born.

So it would appear, my friends, that God wasn’t in a hurry back then, and He doesn’t want us to be in a hurry here tonight. Because when all is said and done, waiting for Him to come and watching for the birth of His Son Jesus brings us to the true meaning of Christmas.

Living as we do in a high tech, fast paced, jam packed time and place, wwwww.come means that God wants us to wonder, to wander, to watch and to wait for His greatest revelation – what C.S. Lewis called “The Grand Miracle” of the Incarnation. And we cannot receive it or believe it if we are in too much of a hurry. Fr. Henri Nouwen described it this way:

“Living a spiritual life requires a change of heart. Such a conversion may be marked by sudden inner change, or it often takes place through a long, quiet process of transformation…What is new is that we are set free from the compulsions of our world and have set our hearts on the only necessary thing… Our conflicts and pains, our tasks and promises, our families and friends, our activities and projects, our hopes and aspirations no longer appear to us as a fatiguing variety of things which we can barely keep together, but rather as affirmations and revelations of the new life of the Spirit within us.” (From “Making All Things New” by Fr. Henri J.M. Nouwen)

Wasn’t that what the poet Ann Weems was trying to tell us when she wrote about “The Coming of God” in her book “Kneeling in Bethlehem”? Please listen:

Our God is the One who comes to us

in a burning bush,

in an angel’s song,

in a newborn child.

Our God is the One who cannot be found

locked in the church,

not even in the sanctuary.

Our God will be where God will be

with no constraints,

no predictability

Our God will be born where God will be born,

but there is no one place to look for the One who comes to us.

When God is ready

God will come

even to a godforsaken place

like a stable in Bethlehem.

So wait …

for you know not when

God comes.

Watch, that you might be found

whenever

wherever

God comes.

CONCLUSION

That’s what we need to do tonight – to wait and to watch for God to come. And if we stop, look and listen ever so carefully, He will come – into our hearts and homes, into this church and into our world.

A little girl was offering her prayers at bedtime with her parents, and this is what she said:

“Dear God: Please take care of Mommy and Daddy and look after my sisters and brothers and me. And please God, take good care of yourself, because if anything should happen to you, we’d all be sunk.”

My friends: what happened long, long ago in Bethlehem on that silent, starry night was that God did come, in person, to care for all of us through the birth of His Son, our Savior Jesus. So wait for Him, watch for Him, and open your heart to let Him come in.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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