Carlos Wilton, December 24, 2005; Christmas Eve; Luke 2:1-20

"The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen..."
– Luke 2:20a

That's poetry by the nineteenth-century preacher, Phillips Brooks: "Everywhere, everywhere, Christmas tonight." Look around, my friends: for indeed we are in good company. Not only are we surrounded by friends and neighbors, within these four walls. Look further, in your mind's eye. Look beyond these walls. Look beyond the borders of towns and counties and states and even nations, and you will sense the presence of countless others: believers and seekers (and even doubters), who have come to churches like this one (and some not at all like this one), to sing carols and light candles and hear timeless words of scripture.

It's a night of overwhelming beauty, Christmas Eve. For when else – in this culture when everyone seems to be walking around with headphones in their ears – do we do something so blessedly old-fashioned as sing songs together that everybody knows? When else – in this society so sharply divided along generational lines – do we spend a whole hour together with people of all ages, from the very old to the very young? And when else – in this world where everything seems to be plugged into the electrical grid – do we do something so archaic as stand around together, holding candles? Everywhere, everywhere, Christmas tonight!

Something has drawn us here, something very hard to put into words. It's a vision we all share – or, at least, a common hope of glimpsing it. It's a vision that finds expression in that cherished moment at the end of the service, when we hold those lighted candles and sing "Silent Night," and maybe catch the eye of a friend or loved one as we're both thinking, "Yes indeed, it's Christmas!" The vision that pulls us out of our busy, frenetic lives and into this quiet place is a vision of beauty.

So often, beauty is cheapened and devalued in our world today. Millions of dollars are spent every day to try to convince us that beauty is something money can buy. Whether it's the department-store alchemy of lipstick and eye-liner... or the sleek, aerodynamic lines of that shiny, new car at the dealership... or the crisp, high-def images dancing across the flat-screen TV in the store, there are some who would have us believe that beauty can be had – can be owned – for a price.

But not the kind of beauty that has called us here tonight. That beauty is not for sale. It is the simple beauty of a mother's smile, as she gazes down at the baby slumbering on her lap... of a father's protective love as he stands, a silent sentinel, behind her... of the gleam in the eyes of the shepherd children who have come on bended knee to adore the holy child.... of the song of the angels, and the star shining softly overhead.

Some years ago, the Norwegian actor Liv Ullman was part of a small performing troupe who traveled through the back country of her native land, presenting plays. They visited tiny villages nestled in remote valleys and perched on the sides of majestic mountains. As their journey through the land of the fjords continued, Ullman was struck, over and over again, by the sheer natural beauty of her native land. Writing about the experience later, she said, "It is so beautiful, it hurts inside."

Isn't that what we're all looking for, on Christmas Eve: a vision so beautiful, it hurts? A vision that brings a lump to the throat and a tear to the eye? That vision can't be manufactured, nor can it be bought or sold – not for any price. It can only be hoped for – and, once it is discovered, gratefully received.

That vision is so often at odds with the daily realities of life as we know it. For, while our lives do have their moments of beauty, they are also shot through with suffering and tragedy. Maybe little children are able to approach Christmas with unabashed enthusiasm, but you and I don't need to live very long before we discover that the joys of this life are seasoned with trouble and difficulty. On the morning after Christmas, we will awake to the same responsibilities, the same bills, the same relationships, the same diagnosis, the same addictions, the same memories. What difference does it make that it's "everywhere, everywhere Christmas tonight," when the day after tomorrow it's everywhere, everywhere just another day? Maybe that's what brings the tear to the eye as we behold the babe in the manger: the contrast between life as we live it, and life as we know it could be.

The famous cellist Pablo Casals, in his autobiography, Joys and Sorrows, recalls his earliest memory of going to church on Christmas Eve. He was five years old. He and his father walked, hand in hand, through the streets of their little village in Spain. Pablo's father was the church organist. As the two of them walked, he shivered – not because the air was chill, but because it all felt so mysterious. Listen to the way he recalls this memory of his, from the perspective of old age:

"I felt that something wonderful was about to happen. High overhead, the heavens were full of stars. We walked in silence. In the narrow, dark streets there were moving figures, shadowy and spectral and silent. Then suddenly there was a burst of light flooding from the open doors of the church. We moved into that light silently. Then, just as suddenly, my father broke the silence with music from the organ. And we all sang. And when I sang, it was my heart that was singing, and I poured out everything that was within me."

At the tender age of five, Pablo Casals caught it: the vision of beauty, of life as God means it to be. It stayed with him all his life, as he labored to create beauty through his music and share it with others.

Luke tells us that, after the shepherds "went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger," they "returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen." I often wonder about those shepherds – what their lives must have been like, after that vision of angels, and their trip to see the Christ child. In the years to come, did they call that precious vision to mind on cold, desert nights, hunkering down on hillsides with their flocks? Did they speak with their children about what they had seen? Evidently, the shepherds' public witness, their "glorifying and praising" of God, didn't make much of an impression – because, by the time Jesus reached adulthood, no one in Nazareth knew a thing about his exalted beginnings. Only his mother, it seems, recalled that vision of beauty, the one Luke tells us she "treasured in her heart." Visions are like that. They're hard to hold onto, because they're so fragile.

One vision that has remained durable for a half-century or so is C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia – now the basis of a film that's in the theaters. The mystical land of Narnia, in that well-loved series of children's books, may be reached through the back of an old, wooden wardrobe. That battered piece of furniture is a portal to another world – a fantasy world of good vs. evil, one that is both different from, and similar to, this world we know.

In the final volume of the series, The Last Battle, C.S. Lewis has this to say about "the new Narnia" and the old Narnia:

"It is hard to explain how this sunlit land was different from the old Narnia, as it would be to tell you how the fruits of that country taste. Perhaps you will get some idea of it, if you think like this. You may have been in a room in which there was a window that looked out on a lovely bay of the sea or a green valley that wound away among mountains. And in the wall of that room opposite to the window there may have been a looking glass. And as you turned away from the window, you suddenly caught sight of that sea or that valley, all over again, in the looking glass. And the sea in the mirror, or the valley in the mirror, were in one sense just the same as the real ones: yet at the same time they were somehow different – deeper, more wonderful, more like places in a story: in a story you have never heard, but very much want to know. The difference between the old Narnia and the new Narnia was like that. The new one was a deeper country: every rock and flower and blade of grass looked as if it meant more. I can't describe it any better than that: if you ever get there, you will know what I mean."

There's a part of us that looks at the Christmas story and wants to relegate it to the world of fantasy: to portray it as a beautiful, idyllic scene that may speak to our deepest human longings, but which has no more reality than any other work of the imagination. Yet this vision of beauty is not like that. The child who was born that day in Bethlehem was a living, breathing human being. He grew up to wear the same rough garments, walk the same gravelly roads, break the same crusty bread as anyone else who lived in that time and place. And when the day came for him to die, be fully assured that he bled the same hot blood as flowed through the veins of any other child of God.

Yes, the familiar tableau of Jesus' birth is a vision of beauty – but do you know what's the greatest thing about it? That vision was real. New Testament scholar J.B. Phillips seeks to remind us of that fact, in this much-quoted portion of a larger essay:

And so, tonight, I invite you to open your heart wide. This is no time for holding back. As we light our candles, and join together in singing "Silent Night," drink in the beauty of all our Christmas traditions. But more than that, may you experience in your deepest heart the feeling that's so beautiful, it hurts – the feeling of knowing this God who lives among us!

Let us pray:

In the silence,
in the holiness of this night, O God,
all is now calm;
all has become bright.
No longer can we maintain the boundary-walls
we have built to keep you out.
For you are waiting just outside...
waiting as you always have...
waiting for us to let you in.
Help us to do so tonight:
to give up our prideful struggle
and welcome this babe of Bethlehem,
your son Jesus,
as our Lord and our Savior. Amen.

Copyright 2005, by Carlos E. Wilton. All rights reserved.