Arise and Shine
Christmas Day Meditation
John 1: 1-5, 14
By the Reverend Odette Lockwood-Stewart
Epworth United Methodist Church

Ella, our eldest grandchild, is 7 years old. Last Monday, Ella was so excited about Christmas she was having a hard time sleeping. (I don’t know how she slept last night.)

It took me back to when our son Andrew was little… we had to make a rule in our house that we clarified every Christmas. Andrew was not allowed to come into our bedroom to wake us up on Christmas morning until … it was morning, until he could see some light outside. One year, I got up in the night and went to get a drink of water. I peeked into Andrews room, I saw our son sitting at his window, perfectly still, staring hard into the dark night sky. Waiting for the light.

Nobody has to shout “rise and shine” on Christmas morning.

I know it has a lot to do with presents under the tree … but it also has to do with lights and music and tastes and smells. It has to do with a sense of something bigger than us happening, and the suspended time of Christmas vacation … something like living in an altered state of expectation.

No one has to shout “rise and shine” on Christmas morning - for children, once they know there is cause for great expectation… but, when we grow up, when we grow out of expectations, when we stay up late, when we work hard, when we get distracted from the star of wonder by the glare of lesser light, sometimes,… we need a little prodding … or at least a reminder shout: “Arise … and Shine!”

This is the day we celebrate that Christ is born! All the Advent calendars are completed. The time for waiting, expecting, saying “not yet” is over… the promise is present … The Light is come… and we have everything we need for that light to shine in us and through us for the sake of the world God so loves.

Beth Richardson is a Deacon from Nashville, Tennessee. She writes of an encounter she had, “A couple of years ago I was sitting at Starbuck’s having a meeting with a coworker. I was talking (I’m sure) about some incredible idea of mine when I noticed a tall, scruffy-looking older man shuffling toward me. His hair was a mess, and he walked with a cane. As he passed near me, I instinctively reached down to secure my purse. A few seconds later, my coworker leaned over to me and said, ‘Did you see that? Johnny Cash just went into the men’s room.’ Oh, my gosh! I thought Johnny Cash was a homeless person. If I can’t recognize Johnny Cash, how am I going to notice Jesus in the people around me?”

In order to shine … we must first wake up and pay attention. Richardson continues, “I have to pay attention, to free myself from the fears, assumptions, and prejudices almost woven into my very cells … I want to see the brightness of God in the people I meet – that’s the only way to see Jesus.”

When we are convinced that what awaits us every day is yet another experience of the “brightness of God” in the people we will meet that day, we will be as eager to get up as a child on Christmas (OK, that is stretching it) but we will begin searching for the gifts that we know are awaiting us.

Right now, I know that there are members of this community facing trials and carrying burdens that make it hard to open your eyes, hard to stare out through darkened windows, let alone to arise and shine. One of the amazing gifts for me of our Advent Art installation this year is that darkened windows, even windows that reveal only solid walls, can become doors to mystery and ministry when you light a candle in them.

When I get up every morning I get to behold the light you shine into the world in an endless variety of ways.

Last night, for the second year, we had an early Children’s Christmas Eve service that was magnificent. This sanctuary was filled with delight and mystery and love and laughter. And I saw the Brightness of God shining in the faces of angels and of a beautiful Christmas star. I saw the holy shining in the faces of the Holy Family. I walked with wise ones seeking Jesus, and shepherds who had a lot of noisy sheep to contend with, I saw dancing angels guide the littlest angels, and the story of Christmas came alive in surprising ways.

The light of Christ shines in the commitment and excitement of the volunteers leaving for Mississippi tomorrow to make a difference in the lives of people you’ve never met. It shines in the crews who regularly prepare and serve meals at the men’s shelter. But it also shines in families risking reconciliation, youth raising difficult questions. It shines in those who cannot be physically present with us, those whose faces you might not even recognize, but who pray for you, for us, every day. It shines in a ministry of music and arts, … in the light of those … who face surgeries, or illness, with courage, or humor, or vulnerability, or faith, in those who just plain show up to help mop up flooding fellowship halls or to accompany others through trials.

A couple of weeks ago….at our Church Conference…a hundred people gathered to celebrate ministry and connection and to dream. Our Superintendent, Jane Schlager, had asked us to prepare a report on how Compassion with the heart of Christ had been reflected in the ministries of this church in the last year. I simply asked for anyone to call out where they had experienced or witnessed the light and compassion of Christ in and through the Epworth community and we responded by praising God for each one. Do you remember? It was like a river of light.

I praise God for the many ways you arise and shine.
The first chapter of John’s gospel tells us, “What has come into being in (Christ) was life, and the life was the light of all people.” We are created with the image of God stamped upon our hearts.

Kabbalah says, “First we receive the light, then we impart it. Thus we repair the world.”

Writing of the festival of Lights, Jan Richardson offers these words:

Bless the feet that dance
In Guatemala
In El Salvador
In the midst of the night
In Nicaragua
In Argentina
…
Bless the hands that clap
In Haiti
In Rwanda
The rhythm of liberation
In Palestine
In Bosnia
That light a match in the dark
In you
In me
And carry the coming dawn.

Arise … and shine …

For you carry the coming dawn!

Amen.