Wednesday, December 15, 2010, Advent 4 a

Matthew 1:18-25

There is a war of signs at the Lincoln Tunnel in New York City being waged between American Atheists (“Reasonable Since 1963”) and the Catholic League. On one side of the Hudson its “You know it's a myth: this season celebrate reason.” On the other we know it's real. This season we will celebrate Jesus.

In scripture, bodies of water make for a difference in outlook. The Red Sea. Jordan. Euphrates for the exiles. The Aegean for St. Paul. In American history: the Ohio. Mississippi. And now the Hudson. These bodies of water split the spiritual geography. On the one side is faith in God. On the other: faith in other stuff.

Whether or not you agree with Mr. Calvin that we as a species are depraved (I do, as long as I have enough room to enlarge on the term), there is certainly a gap between the good that God has intended for the world and the reality on the ground. The Hebrew tradition of Jubilee recognized that, over a period of seven years, we can expect the scales of justice to be tipped over to one side or another. Levitical law provided Jubilee as a “Reset” button by which accumulated imbalances (debts) were cancelled. Whether Israel actually did this or not is beside the point for the Christmas gospel. In Luke's gospel, Jesus is the Jubilee baby, The Jubilee Rule is to set aside the ordinary rules in order for God's hope (rule) to come into the world. For everybody. Not just people who have been lucky.

In Matthew's story the Rule rewrites the rules of how a child is born into this world. The rules of biology are rewritten to make a place for - what shall we call it - pneumatological insemination? And then there's Joseph. It is Joseph's testimony, so leanly scripted, that gets focus. There was a set of rules that justified him in divorcing Mary in their contracted engagement. By those rules he would have been right to do so. (see workingpreacher.org) Then there was the honor of his manhood, if he insisted on it. But he let it all go under the persuasion of dreams and angels' voices. And though it would be erroneous to import Luke's Jubilee theme into the thematic structure of Matthew's gospel as something Matthew intended, as preachers and writers discovering meaning, we can do whatever we want. It's the Rule that counts. Not the rules. By the Jubilee Rule we see the face of God most clearly in the husband – the wife – the child – who believe God, when to do so makes them seem dishonorable. Non-players in the Realpolitik of empires and special interests. Power and honor, for them, are deferred to the Holy Spirit.

Through them God pushes the “Reset” button on a world that, for all its intentions, reasonable and otherwise, is bent on self-destruction. It doesn't matter what side of the river you are on. That the Sovereign God would do so through such little ones – peons on the world stage - lies at the heart of the mystery of the Christian faith. For it is they, through that most vulnerable of children, who hold the real power.

© 2010 Andy Gay