That's What Christmas is All About

Growing up, every year my family and I would gather around the TV this time of year to watch the Peanuts Christmas special, Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown. It was an annual event in our household to watch that classic animated TV special. In the climax of that film, an exasperated Charlie Brown, responsible for directing the Christmas pageant but not having a clear vision about what it all means, desperately cries out, “Isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?” Charlie Brown’s best friend Linus is ready with an answer. He takes center stage, says “lights please,” and recites Luke 2:8-14 which you’ll later hear again:

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Linus returns to Charlie Brown stage left, and gently quips,

That's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.

Linus gets it right every year! Christmas begins and ends with the gospel story Linus famously recites. Good tidings, good news, of great joy, Christmas is about good news of great joy!

It was especially good news of great joy for the people honored enough to first hear the news! To be the first to hear such news, indeed, that was a profound honor. And who was honored to receive the good news of great joy first?

There’s Mary and Joseph, of course. Mary, the Mother of our Lord, was the first to hear the good news of great joy, right? The angel Gabriel came to her with the life-changing news. To her, it was at first terrifying. She was not yet married and about to have a baby. Think about how stressful it would have been for Mary to ponder that. She’d have to endure the accusing looks and the judgmental stares of her community, her neighbors disbelieving any kind of miraculous conception. 

But Mary would soon realize what the news meant. It was hard for her, surely, but it meant hope and salvation for her people, a people suffering and struggling under the weight of an oppressive empire, an occupying force, and an accommodating religion. 

Joseph and the rest of the family eventually heard the news, too. Like Mary, they knew what the good news of great joy meant. They knew how good the news of the Messiah's birth was because of the bad news they and the people experienced everyday, the bad news felt by a people controlled and abused by the worldly power of the empire.

We have Mary, Joseph, and their family - Elizabeth and Zachariah, namely - who hear the news first.  

Then come the shepherds. 

Outside Jesus’ family, shepherds were the first to be honored with the good news of great joy! Of all people to first receive the good news, God chose the lowly shepherds!

In the hierarchy of 1st century Judean culture, the shepherds were at the bottom. Shepherds were outcasts in their society. They were ridiculed for being smelly and being unclean in a hyper clean and purity focused culture. Another thing about the shepherds that is often not understood, shepherding was a job done by both men and women. In a culture that prized segregating men and women, shepherding was an integrated world – likely another reason shepherds were despised and discarded. 

In other words, shepherds were doubly oppressed. They along with all of Judea were oppressed by the ruthless reign of Rome, for sure. But they were also oppressed by a religious culture and society that pushed them to the bottom and kept them there. 

There’s a quote I read the other day. I wasn’t able to find out who originally wrote it, but it goes like this:

It’s an unwed woman who carries God. It’s pagan sages from the East who recognize God. It’s workers in the fields who hear God. It’s the marginalized neighborhood that welcomes God. It’s God who chooses the lowly and broken to rise. Christmas is here. Let hope begin.

God chose these people, an unwed Mary, wise sages from an outside religion, lowly shepherds in the field, the backwoods town of Nazareth. God chose the ones who needed grace and understanding and compassion and hope most of all. 

That to me is what Christmas is all about! God chooses first and foremost those at rock bottom, joining them there to raise them up. 

What about us not at rock bottom, though? What does Christmas mean for us non-shepherds who live relatively comfortable lives? Is it just about buying a lot of gifts for our kids, singing carols, and wishing people a Merry Christmas?

I believe there’s something more for us comfortable ones at Christmas. 

Philippians 2:5-11 gives us our paradigm, the way we comfortable ones are to follow. This passage from Philippians, scholars tell us, is maybe the earliest piece of scripture in the New Testament. It is believed to be a hymn or a litany that predates Paul’s work, and so it is a passage of scripture Paul quotes from. The passage begins with this wise admonition:

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

Christians ought to think, feel, and be like Christ, right? 

After the wise admonition to be like Christ, Paul quotes hymn lyrics that describe Christ's most important work.

Though he existed in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, assuming human likeness. And being found in appearance as a human, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.

Therefore God exalted him even more highly and gave him the name that is above every other name, so that at the name given to Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Christ emptied self to be one with the enslaved and the suffering, those at rock bottom. In turn, Christ lifts those at rock bottom up, raising them up with him in his resurrection. 

If we are to have the same mind as Christ, we are in spirit to follow Christ in his humble sojourn to those at rock bottom. We are to follow Christ and stand in solidarity with the dismissed, discarded, and disinherited ones. We are to follow Christ who not only joins those at rock bottom, but lifts them up, raising them up, exalting the humble. That's what Christmas is all about. 

Christmas is really Christ-Incarnation day. Christmas is really Christ’s coming to those at rock bottom day. 

Here are some Christmas questions, friends: Who is at rock bottom today? What people - in the world, in our own society, in our neighborhoods - are at rock bottom today? Who are today’s shepherds?

Don't you see Christ at rock bottom ready to lift the lowly up?

Let’s do more than just give Christmas gifts to our blessed family members. Let’s give of ourselves to those at rock bottom. Let us stand in spiritual solidarity with the shepherds in our society, the discarded, the dismissed, and disinherited ones among us. Let us lift the down-and-out, let us help mend the brokenhearted, let us feed the hungry, shelter the refugees, end destructive, genocidal wars. Let us protect vulnerable children all around us. Let us end the sin of ignoring those who suffer and sorrow. 

Let the poor and the poor in spirit join as one, living the life of Christ as the body of Christ. Let this Christmas season be a reminder of what Christ came to embody and what we his church are called to embody - 

good news to the poor, release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed,

to proclaim this season, this Christmas season, as a time of Jubilee, a time of the Lord’s favor toward all who suffer.