THE WORD 4 ev 1

Tuesday, November 17th

Today’s Reading: Matthew 2 (Click here for a link to the text)

I am not really sure what it is about this text that strikes me as odd this morning as I sit down to write. Maybe it is just the calendar distance from Christmas. Maybe it is the fact that I now have children of my own who are both under the age of two. But this morning I can’t get that mournful cry of Rachel out of my Head.

After all, this is supposed to be a Christmas text—happy and joyous and tingly. Normally, we just sort of skip past Herod’s horrible atrocity and concentrate on the quaint Christmas idea of chubby little angel messengers flitting around warning not-so-wise Wisemen and the new daddy, Joseph. But today, all I can think about is that needless slaughter of so many innocents. So… (even though it is only my second post, and perhaps a little too early for something so serious) this morning, I want all of you to slow down with me for a second. Don’t jump too quickly to that Christmas euphoria (besides, it is not even Thanksgiving yet!). I want to point out that haunting passage from verse 18:

A voice is heard in Ramah,
Weeping and great morning,
Rachel weeping for her children
and refusing to be comforted,
because they are no more.

There it is, a few simple lines; almost poetic in their beauty, if it wasn’t for the fact that they describe something so terrible. Yes, this passage does indeed provoke a few questions and concerns (no matter what time of the year we read it—Christmas or otherwise). After all, King Herod does something horrendous: He flippantly murders no telling how many innocent children in and around the town of Bethlehem. But, like I said earlier, we know that already; we are familiar with the text, and certainly, we’ve all learned long ago that the Bible simply has some gruesome details like this and we just need to keep reading—because it will all be ok in the end anyway. Right? But does that really silence the questions? Because, I don’t know about you, but I can’t get that image out of my head: That poor woman, Rachel, just weeping, weeping for something she couldn’t possibly understand or come to terms with. Her children are no more! Yet, here is the real kicker: Matthew says all of this happened to fulfill the words of Jeremiah. FULFILL!!! That means God knew this was going to happen. In fact, he prophesied it through the prophet Jeremiah some 600 years before! Matthew is, in a sense, saying this had to happen in order for Jesus to be the fulfillment of Scripture.

Now, my dear friends in blogger land, we have a real dilemma. After all, it is one thing to read the nativity story and hear about how God provides for the holy family a narrow escape out of the evil clutches of King Herod. But just how do we justify the needless slaughter of so many innocents? Couldn’t the angel have made a few more stops that evening? Couldn’t he have warned a few more fathers and poor mothers, like Rachel, along the way to Joseph’s house? By this I mean, you can hardly read this text without feeling more than a little desperation. Certain questions begin to loom large:

How can such evil herald such good?

How can the birth of the Savior of the world be the cause of the death of so many little babies?

Where is the salvation?

Where is the Gospel?

These questions, once asked, can’t just be pushed aside so easily. They beg—as we beg when we behold terrible things in our lives—for an answer. But are there any good answers out there?

A couple of weeks ago we heard about the tragic shooting in Fort Hood. “Why,” we asked as ran to our computers and turned on the televisions to catch the latest headlines. Here at Epiphany things are no different. It seems like almost every week, I grieve with some member of our church family who has just received that dreadful phone call from the Doctor, who says, “I am sorry, but your test results are back, it seems you have….” Every time I get that email, or talk to that teary eyed, scared but brave person, I relive the time when my own family members were diagnosed with… well… I guess the word can only be “EVIL.”

Now, I know I am digging myself a hole that I might not be able to crawl out off, especially in a blog post. (Maybe a good sermon on this subject is in order? Actually… count on it!) But isn’t that how we feel so often when we come face to face with real and genuine, up-close-and-personal evil? And I know what you are all tempted to say right now to provide the quick and easy remedy… but resist that temptation… don’t blurt something out prematurely… don’t any of you sit there in front of your computers and throw out the word “JESUS.” Not like that! Not in the face of poor weeping Rachel. If Jesus is the savior of the world, then why didn’t He save her little baby? To throw His name out there like that, at a time like that, just seems empty and generic. I mean… really… think about it… you put down the phone and turn to look into the eyes of your best friend in the whole world—your loving wife or husband—and you have to repeat to them the horrible words that were just told you, “honey, I am sick. It does not look good.” And in that moment, when all the world seems turned up-side down, when you feel weak and sick in your stomach, when anger and rage well up inside of you… in “that” moment your loved one says to you, “Don’t worry, Jesus loves you.” Well… it just sounds pretty insultingly generic, if you ask me. I think poor weeping Rachel would have agreed. I think the families of Ft. Hood might also agree.

Of course don’t get me wrong, Jesus certainly is an answer for evil, yes. In the abstract, general sense, we know that he came to die for sin, to redeem the world from evil. We know this abstractly, but what about personally? What about when king Herod comes knocking on your door, wanting to drag your children out into the night? How is Jesus the answer in that moment?

Well… friends, sermon or no sermon, there are some questions that can’t wait to be answered. This is an old, old problem—a very well worn question. But this I know for sure: In the midst of a world filled with evil things—in a little town at the mercy of merciless king--Mathew beholds something new!

What Matthew sees in these events described in Chapter 2 is not just an answer to the questions that are prompted in us when we see evil at work in the world. Rather what Mathew beholds in an answerer. This baby born to Mary and Joseph is not just some variable to balance the cosmic equation, as if God were x and evil were y and we needed a solution. There is no solution to evil, for evil was never intended by an all-powerful and good God. Sin, rebellion, and stubbornness on the part of man perverted the good God had made. So, God did a new thing—Jesus. Matthew sees this, and by his testimony, we too, can see that all of Scripture and history points to this. In our text alone, Matthew quotes three OT passages to prove it.

Later, this baby will grow into a man and will call out to Matthew, as he stands at his tax-collecting booth. Jesus will say, “Follow me.” Matthew, without understanding any of it, will recognize him as a man with an answer. Matthew will leave his booth and follow Jesus. But he will follow not because he has some abstract sense that Jesus is the counter balance or solution to evil. No, Matthew will behold a man, a man who has a purpose and a plan for the future. You see, for Matthew, it won’t be about the “why” but the “where.” Not about why (theologically speaking) he follows Jesus, but a much more important question: “Where is Jesus going?”

Jesus goes to face evil, and he says, “Follow me, I have a plan.” Jesus experiences evil in no less, and much more, ways than we can know. He dies for us on the cross. But this is not the end, for if it was, then Evil would win and Jesus would have no answers to give because he would be dead. No… Jesus lives despite the evil he experience—even death. HE LIVES!!! If there is an answer to the question of how a truly good God deals with evil, than Jesus must be the one who can give that answer. Evil couldn’t stop him!

So we too follow Jesus to the cross, not to lament but to remember that here is one who has faced evil and come out the other side with an answer. And he invites us to come with him. “Follow me,” he says. We now share the road with Jesus. He invites us to share his road, and we can be certain that he shares our road in life. No matter the evil we encounter. My mother knows this; and though her faith has certainly wavered in the face of such evil as Multiple Sclerosis, she knows that her Lord shares the road with her. He knows the answer, and he invites her to come along with him to discover that answer. Yes, indeed, we all will! Even old Jeremiah foresaw the day the answer would be made known. He prophesied of a day when all evil will cease and God will refresh the weary and satisfy the faint. Jesus will wipe the tears from Rachel’s eyes, from all our eyes. He is the one who can answer. He is the one who has conquered. To whom else would we go?

I will see you all tomorrow.

Until then… Peace as you walk the road with Him.
Pastor Aaron