“A Story We Rarely Hear”
A Sermon by the Rev. Dr. Hilary J. Barrett
Preached at Pleasantville UCC, January 2, 2011
Jeremiah 63:7-9; Matthew 2:1-12 & 13-23

“And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts gold and frankincense and myrrh. 
And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod,
 they departed to their own country by another way.”
(Matthew 2:11-12, ESV)

Some of the Elders can tell you that it can be a little bit confusing to know when the season of Christmas ends and the season of Epiphany begins.  Actually, it’s very clear when the season of Christmas ends: the familiar Christmas carol reminds us that there are, in fact, 12 Days of Christmas.  The Season of Christmas lasts 12 whole days and does not end until this Thursday, January 6^th, when we celebrate Epiphany.  

What makes it confusing is that, when Epiphany falls in the middle of the week as it does this year, it’s a little hard to decide when to celebrate it in our churches.  Do we begin our festivities early (for instance this Sunday, before the end of the Christmas Season) or do we wait until next Sunday?

I participate in a listserve of preachers all over the globe who share the joys and sorrows of preparing a weekly sermon.  It’s fascinating to hear how preachers in England or Australia or Saskatchewan are viewing the same texts that we are studying.  But when I tell you that the question of when to celebrate Epiphany has caused no little amount of argument and confusion among these far-flung colleagues, you may thank your lucky stars that you kept your day job.

This is relevant to us this morning because this is one of the rare years in the Church’s life when we are encouraged to read the story we heard this morning from Matthew’s gospel: the story known throughout Christendom as The Slaughter of the Innocents.  If we were to move too quickly to the season of Epiphany, we would bypass this story altogether because The Slaughter of the Innocents is told only during the season of Christmas. 

Our Catholic friends remember the story every year with their observances on December 28^th called the Feast of the Holy Innocents.  But for many good and faithful Protestants, it’s possible to get through a lifetime of church attendance without ever hearing the story of Herod’s genocide read aloud on a Sunday morning.  And perhaps you can understand why.  Nobody likes death at Christmas.  Nobody likes to be reminded of the persistence of evil in a season when we celebrate the birth of the Holy Child of Bethlehem.

And yet that is the truth of our world; and that is the truth of ourselves.

Today we read two stories set back to back: the story of the Magi’s search for the holy child, and the story of Herod’s response to the news that a new king has been born.  One story shows us what is possible when our lives are lived under the power and influence of God’s grace.  The other story shows us what is possible when human sin goes unchecked.

Let’s begin with the Magi.

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem, a band of wealthy scholars from the East arrived in Jerusalem, having observed a star in the western sky that signaled his birth.  And after a brief encounter with the jealous King Herod, they set out toward Bethlehem to find the child.[1]  The star appears, leading them until it hovers over the place where the child lay.  They enter the house; see the child in the arms of his mother, Mary, and are so overcome with joy, they kneel before him and worship him, offering to him their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

The Greek word translated in our text as “wise men” is magoi.  These wise men were scholars of the stars, probably from Persia-Babylonia.  The word “Magi” is the root of the word, “magic.”  It has become so commonplace for us in the church to find these magoi in the manger that we forget how odd it is for them to be there.  We no longer see what they really are or what they represent.  We’ve become so accustomed to their presence that we don’t even pay attention anymore to how scandalous it is for them to be there at all.

The Magi are astrologers; they are magicians.  They may have been Zoroastrian priests.  Whoever and whatever they were exactly, they were most definitely outsiders; non-Jews.  They were folks who were not supposed to be alert to the coming of the Jewish Messiah.  It’s a curious detail in this story, but an important one, that King Herod is described as being surrounded by “chief priests and scribes” – learned scholars who know the scriptures well.  But the ones who show up to worship the Messiah are foreigners and Gentiles – they are not even what some would call ‘true believers.’

Those who are acquainted with Matthew’s gospel know that this is one of his favorite themes.  Matthew loves to mix it up by including people that the religious establishment of the day made a point of not including.  He seems to have one thing on his mind: to convey from the very outset of his gospel that the good news of God’s saving work extends well beyond those we would expect to be saved.  It even extends to “those considered most unworthy” in the eyes of the world.[2] 

Opening up the circle of salvation and extending it to include all people and all nations is the point that Matthew is making.  He begins his gospel in this way, and at the very end of his gospel he brings that point home again when Jesus bestows upon his disciples, “The Great Commission,” charging them to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations…” 

In the story of the Magi, Matthew shows us what human life looks like when it is lived under the power of God’s grace.  They are walking illustrations of God’s all-embracing love.  As the prophet Hosea declared:

“I will show love to those who were called ‘Unloved,’
and to those who were called ‘Not-My-People’ I will say,
‘You are my people,’ and they will answer, ‘You are our God’”[3]

But there is another side to this story -- a side with a darker intent and a murderous outcome:

The historical figure of King Herod the Great was an interesting mixture: “‘he was racially Arab, religiously Jewish, culturally Greek, and politically Roman.”[4]  He had a reputation for being ruthless.  “Herod had [already] killed three of his [own] sons in… [a] mad drive to retain his crown.”  Of Herod, Caesar Augustus had said, only partly in jest, that “it is better to be Herod’s pig than his son.”[5]

So when the magoi from the East asked one king where the other king was, they unintentionally kindled the suspicions of a madman and set off a firestorm of paranoid executions.  If Jesus was Lord, then Herod could not be – and that would not do.  Any cost was worth the price if it would bolster Herod’s hunger for and delusions of god-like power.  And so we have this morning’s record of a first century genocide -- the annihilation of all infants in Bethlehem and the whole surrounding region who were two years old and under.

Why did Matthew think it important to record this unspeakably brutal act?  And why have we determined not to forget it?  It is a religious practice that is a curiosity to me: that when the holy light of the Incarnation illuminates so much beauty in the world, we stop to remember a story of unspeakable suffering.

The story of the Holy Innocents has remained in the church’s Christmas readings for centuries.  And it is there to teach us something important about ourselves and our world.  The Prince of Peace may well have been born into our hearts on Christmas morning, but the world still receives Him not. 

The world as we know it is full of brutality.  “During the 20^th century [alone] there were not only two world wars but at least six major cases of genocide.”[6]  Now, it is 2011 and we are still at war.  It is the 9^th year of the War on Terror and we are just as terrified as ever and we as a nation often forget to remember the young men and young women who are daily losing their lives to fight this war. 

There are some things that we are not meant to forget.  The Slaughter of the Innocents forces us to pay attention to them.

Herod had the chance to receive the Christ-child into his life.  He chose instead to reject him, and the rejection of the Lord of Life always results in great suffering.  We have that same choice to make.  We can receive the Christ-child into our hearts, allowing him to lay claim to lives, or we can seek to be lord of our own lives and invite the sufferings that such a choice inevitably brings.

There you have it: two stories that sit side by side and speak a true Word about human nature.  We can be like the Magi who not only recognized the Lord of Life but who received and worshiped Him.  Or we can be like Herod who rebelled against Christ’s authority and brought about great and terrible suffering.

There are some tragedies in this world which can be avoided.  The slaughter of the innocents was one of them.  There are, every day, still more.  The birth of the Prince of Peace into our world does not eliminate the presence of evil and violence.  Herod and his story have proven that fact.  That holy child of Bethlehem must be received into our hearts and lay claim to lives our for real change to take place.

O holy Child of Bethlehem
Descend to us, we pray
Cast out our sin and enter in
Be born to us today
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell
O come to us, abide with us
Our Lord Emmanuel

Amen.