“Following the Prophets to Bethlehem, Part 3: God’s Surprising Faithfulness” by the Rev. Dr. Don Wahlig, December 22, 2024, Year C / Advent 4 - Micah 5:1-5a / Luke 1:46b-55

THEME:   God’s love is as unexpected and powerful today as it was when he became one of us in Jesus.
         

During this Advent season we are focusing on the prophets who share God’s promise of deliverance and redemption. We have heard from Micah, Malachi, and Isaiah. They lived in different places, but they all have something in common. They all write during Israel’s darkest days – the era of exile. Enemies are all around, and it seems like God is nowhere to be found. Yet time and time again, God speaks through the prophets. He assures his people that all is not lost.  God has not forgotten or forsaken them. 

On the contrary, God has remembered his covenant with Abraham and Sarah, with Isaac and Jacob; and with Moses and David. And God will give them a Messiah to deliver them from suffering. That is Micah’s message. As he writes, the Assyrian army has laid siege to Jerusalem. The city is surrounded. Annihilation seems certain. But despite the looming disaster, Micah says there is a bright future ahead – a day when God will raise up a new ruler from the line of David. This new ruler will sit on David’s throne to bring peace and prosperity for all people. It is an understatement of gargantuan proportion to say that this good news is unexpected. In truth, it is almost unbelievable. Equally surprising is the origin of this new king.  He will not come from the power center of Jerusalem. Instead, he will come from Bethlehem, the sleepy little village a few miles south whose only claim to fame is that David was born there long ago.

Now, 1,000 years after David, God renews his promise to Mary, a young woman betrothed to one of David’s ancestors. She, too, finds this good news unexpected and almost too good to be true. Then, on a visit to her pregnant cousin Elizabeth, God’s promise is confirmed in the mysterious pre-natal connection between their two unborn babies. Mary and Elizabeth rejoice – because the promise is coming true. And sure enough, in a stable in Bethlehem, God’s surreal promise becomes supreme reality. Like generations have done ever since, you and I look back at Micah’s crazy, unbelievable message of a new, everlasting king. We realize that God’s faithfulness plays out in the most surprising ways, in the most surprising places, and among the most surprising people.

The good news of God’s promise is certain. The expression of its fulfillment is unexpected and unpredictable. That has always been God’s nature. Elijah looked for God in the obvious places: a whirlwind, an earthquake, and a fire.  But he found God in a whisper instead.  Moses thought he had run away from God, but then God showed up in a burning bush to give him a mission.  God showed up to Jacob in a wrestling match beside a remote stream in the middle of the night to give him a blessing and a new name. Isaiah explains all this. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts (higher) than your thoughts.”

We all need to learn to recognize God’s presence in unexpected places, among unusual people.  Because that is where God fulfills his promise of the good news in our lives.  Some of our most creative minds have struggled with this as they have tried to portray our mysterious, surprising God. Michelangelo thought God should look like a muscular, grey-haired old man floating on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel, reaching out to touch Adam with the gift of life.  In more recent times, the producers of the movie Evan Almighty thought God should be like Morgan Freeman, an elderly black man in a white suit who shows up as a waiter in a greasy spoon diner. His name tag says, “Al Mighty” – get it? He provides unexpected and crucial guidance to a struggling wife that saves her marriage and her family.

The creators of the Muppets took a different and more helpful tack.  They thought God should look like Whoopi Goldberg as the corporate CEO of a heavenly hierarchy of angelic underlings. When one of her angels alerts her to Kermit’s deep suffering, she allows her angel to intervene to save him. Along the way, she paraphrases Isaiah, with words that you and I know to be true.  “I work in mysterious ways.”  Without question, God’s most mysterious and surprising appearance of all was in Jesus of Nazareth, a helpless infant born in a humble stable, to an unwed couple from a poor village, from which no one and no thing of any importance had ever come.

And yet that is how God chose to enter the world he created, not as a super-being with all manner of divine power, but as a helpless newborn babe, utterly vulnerable and completely dependent on the love of his parents. The question is why? Why would God do that? There are two schools of thought on this. The first is the common notion that God waited until humanity had become so consumed by sin that he was forced to intervene in order to redeem us. But there is more to the birth of Jesus than that.

The second school of thought is that God decided to do this much, much earlier.  In fact, from the very beginning of creation, God always planned to become one of us, to share our lives in all respects.  God decided to do that simply because he loves us, so deeply that the moment he created us he made up his mind to share our lives as fully as humanly possible. And to do that, he had to start life the way we all do, beginning with the experience of birth. And that is what he did. Since the vast majority of people lived like Mary and Joseph, on the very edge of survival with no prestige or power whatsoever, that is the life God chose. Because God is love and love stands out most clearly in places where it is most needed and least expected.

That is as true today as it was 2,000 years ago. God’s presence is still with us in the living Christ. We see it especially in places where love is most likely to be missing. I think we have all experienced this. We have all encountered the unexpected grace of a stranger’s kind word, or the help freely offered by someone of little means, or the act of unsolicited kindness in the face of hard times.

I recently ran across a story of just such an encounter. On a cold, rainy evening in the city, a woman named Maya was huddled on a park bench.  Her coat was worn, barely able to keep out the sharp wind. She had lost her job earlier that morning, and the weight of mounting bills and rising costs of food and pretty much everything else were weighing down her spirit. She was about as low as she had ever been in her life.  Then a young woman approached with a smile and a steaming cup of coffee. "Are you alright?" the young woman asked, clearly concerned. Maya hesitated, but then she decided to share her troubles, and the tears flowed. Without a moment's hesitation, the young woman handed her the coffee. She said, "Here. This might warm you up a bit. Let's see if we can figure something out together."

She pulled out her cell phone and started searching for local job listings. She even offered to help Maya with her resume.  Maya was amazed. This unexpected act of kindness, from a complete stranger, reignited a spark of hope. It reminded her that even in the darkest moments, there is still good in the world. Yes, there is good in the world, because there is God in the world. We feel that when we experience his love for us in the presence of the living Christ. Like Maya, we often find loving kindness in unexpected places, from unexpected people. 

There are thousands upon thousands of stories just like Maya’s. I bet you have some of your own. Where have you had an experience of loving kindness from a stranger? Did you recognize it as an unexpected encounter with the Living Christ? How did you respond?  When have you been the source of loving kindness for another, maybe for a complete stranger? What happened? Either way, whether we are the vehicle to deliver God’s love or the receiver, our lives are changed. And through us, the lives of others are changed as well.

As the saying goes, kindness is contagious. And so is the love that inspires it. We first knew that love in God’s unexpected appearance in a manger so long ago.  When you and I share his love today, it is as surprising and powerful as it was then.

May it be so.