Luke 2:1-20: Nightshift and Northern Lights Live in Bethlehem

Presented to The Salvation Army Alberni Valley Ministries, 25 December 2022 (Christmas Day) by Major Michael Ramsay

  

Tonight, Last night, every night we have people working 9pm to 9am – overnight - at the Emergency Weather Response shelter. I don’t know if everyone here is aware that as well as all of the things that we do here at Christmas time and year-round and all the things that we do down at the Bread of Life and Kuu-us, The Salvation Army also runs the EWR shelter attached to the Bread of Life building. We have just been authorized to turn it into a permanent shelter too; so, in the next few months we will be doing renovations and adding bunk beds, hiring new staff and all kinds of fun stuff… And last night and tonight we will have staff, employees working there overnight.

 

Has anyone ever worked an overnight shift? In my experience, they are not a lot of fun. In my experience, they are not the shifts that people normally clamour for. In my experience, anyone with any experience and education usually tries to be ‘promoted’ off the night shift. Sometimes you get some great workers for the overnight shift – like we do here right now – but I think that is the exception, rather than the rule.

 

These are the folks, however, who God invited to Jesus’ birth: night shift workers! I do wonder whether they walked off the job and left all the sheep to be eaten or wander away or whether they came traipsing down to the manger with a whole flock or flocks of sheep with them. And what would our team do? Would they just leave the homeless people sleeping? Would they kick them out, or would they all come down to see the birth of the Saviour?

 

Anyway, these shepherds are working that night and this Angel, a messenger of God shows up – I am not sure how many visitors they normally get during the night but this must have been quite something.

 

It says this angel appeared before them and then the Glory of the Lord shone all around them. Have you ever seen the Northern Lights? I imagine it was somewhat like that. I remember the first time that I ever saw the Northern Lights, we were camping at Birds Hill Park just outside of Winnipeg, MB. It was really quite something. I have seen pictures of the Northern Lights, I have seen paintings of the Northern Lights, I have heard stories of the Northern Lights – but nothing in my experience had prepared me for the appearance of the Northern Lights. They were amazing. The whole sky looked to come alive. It looked at first like a cavalry charge of giant horses coming at me from every side. I was completely in awe as I saw the sky come to life. Now imagine if when experiencing this, when completely surrounded by and engrossed in this, you start to notice that these lights aren’t just dancing lights, they are dancing angels, singing angels, a choir of angels, messengers of God, backing up the message of God proclaimed by the Angel who was speaking to these folks working the night shift looking after possibly someone else’s sheep.

 

The Angel tells these nightshift workers the Good News that the Saviour has been born and that they will find the baby wrapped up and lying in a manger.

 

The shepherds are in awe; they are afraid; they must be enthralled. They listen to the Angel Choir that must have looked more brilliant than the Northern Lights and must have sounded even better than the Northern Pikes. They listen to this choir sing praises to God. When the angels leave, when the show is over, they decide to go into town (hopefully with their sheep in tow) to find the Messiah, the Saviour of the World, the Christ Child in a manger.

 

They had this special invitation. They accepted this special invitation. They went. They saw the baby Jesus in the manger. They experienced the baby Jesus’ birth, probably meeting mom and dad and whomever else happened to be there by apparent accident and actual design. They then go away and tell everyone they know, everyone they see, about what they have experienced with the Christ Child.

 

2000+ years later we are all invited to do the same thing. We are invited to experience of the joys of spending time with our Saviour. We are invited to share the story we have heard about the birth of our Saviour. We are invited to share our experiences with Jesus our Saviour. My friends as I am sure the shepherds will never forget the joy of the night that they met their Saviour, I trust that we will never forget the joy of the night each of us met our Saviour and I hope and I pray that this Christmas and this year upcoming we will be able to share that joy with everyone we meet – so that they too may experience the joys of being in the presence of our Saviour, the Saviour of the world.

 

Let us pray.

 

Luke 2:1-20: Nine Months and More (Christmas Eve Message)

Presented on-line by Major Michael Ramsay of The Salvation Army Alberni Valley Ministries, 24 December 2022

This evening is Christmas Eve. This is when we celebrate the eve of the birth of our Saviour in a manger in Bethlehem more than 2000 years ago. There are many things closed tonight and more tomorrow. We hope and we think that we are all prepared for that. Christmas Eve is a time when we hope and think that everything is prepared for tomorrow: stockings are stuffed or ready to be stuffed, presents are made or bought, wrapped and placed under the tree or ready to be placed under the tree, meal plans and/or travel plans are made. Christmas Eve is a time of anticipation.

2000+ years ago, the evening before Jesus was born (whatever evening that was) it must have been a time of great anticipation – at least for Mary and Joseph and whomever happened to be with them. Mary was very pregnant and about to give birth to her first child. Any moms (and even dads) who can remember the birth of their first child, think of your own anticipation and the plans you had made in anticipation of that day. When Rebecca was born, we had our baby bags packed and were already to drive a few minutes up the road to the hospital and it was a good thing we were prepared because almost as soon as Susan and I arrived at the hospital, so did baby Rebecca. When Susan was born, her parents were out of province; they were in Calgary, Alberta at a Premiers’ Conference. I can’t imagine what it was like for them being in a strange place, a strange province, a strange city when your especially first baby arrives.

Mary and Joseph were in a strange city when their baby arrived and they weren’t at a Premiers’ Conference. They weren’t in a fancy hotel and they didn’t have access to a modern hospital. They were in a stable, maybe with friends or travel companions, probably with animals and later to be joined by shepherds working the night shift. Christmas Eve is when we remember their waiting and their anticipation. Christmas Eve is when we remember how they must have felt after a day’s travel -by foot mostly- when she was fully pregnant; Christmas Eve is when we remember how they must have felt after a time of looking for accommodation for the night at the inn and possibly elsewhere and finally winding up in the stable. Christmas Eve is when we remember the relief and/or anxiety that they would have had at their accommodation and the relief and/or anxiety as well as the definite anticipation that they would have had as Mary went into labour waiting for the birth of the baby who would also be their Saviour and ours.

Christmas Eve is when we remember not only waiting for the arrival of their first-born child. Christmas Eve is when we remember waiting for the Saviour of Israel who is the Saviour of the World. We are celebrating that anticipation. And as we are filled with all the excitement of the commemoration of the incarnation of God and recalling the impending birth of Jesus, we are also eagerly awaiting His return. For this Jesus, who was born in a manger 2000+ years ago, is the Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace, who will return and when he does as Isaiah tells, His government will never stop ruling and being peaceful.

Let us Pray

 

Hebrews 11:6: The Faith in/of Advent.

 Presented to TSA Alberni Valley Ministries on the Second Sunday of Advent, 04 December 2022, by Major Michael Ramsay

  

The second candle of Advent is faith. The four candles are (according to the source I am using): Hope, Faith, Joy, and Peace. Advent is about waiting. It is about people waiting for the Messiah, the Christ to come the first time (as we now know He did, as a baby in a manger in Bethlehem) and it is about us waiting for Him to return, as we are now.

When people began waiting for Christ to come the first time, they did not know when He would come; they did not know how He would come; they did not know exactly where He would come (similar to us now waiting for His return) – but when the signs of His pending arrival started to appear, people started to notice and as people started to notice they started to tell others and as they told others more people began to notice the signs. (aside: all the miracles recorded in the Gospels are just recorded signs themselves that point people to the Advent of Christ). The more people notice the signs, the more they share the good news of Jesus’ arrival, the more people can experience the Good News of Christ in our lives. (The word ‘gospel’ by the way simply means, ‘good news’). In the season of Advent, today, we remember that period of waiting to hear and experience the Good News of Christ coming the first time and we apply the memory of His birth in a manger to bolster our faith (as our candle today reminds us) that just as Christ came once to save us, He will return again to have dominion, to rule, to reign forever. He will be, as Isaiah 9:6 says, “…Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father and Price of Peace; of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end…”. (That by the way was a line from a play that I needed to memorize as a child in church)

The candles of Advent remind us of what we need to be able to wait for something we so desperately want and something we so desperately need. We need Hope: Hope that that for which we are waiting will make things better; we need faith, faith that it will actually come; we need the joy of anticipation that pushes away despair in our situation; and we need peace – the peace that surpasses all understanding. It is only when we have this Hope, Faith, Joy, and Peace that we can possibly make it, that we can endure the waiting of Advent.

Advent Calendars are a great glimpse of what waiting this way is like: everyday you open a number and there is a small gift, a picture, a prelude to the greater gifts of Christmas. They are appetizers for the main course of Christmas Day. The stores sell Advent Calendars with chocolates in them; Susan often makes Advent Stockings with devotions, Scriptures, candies, and other goodies in them for us; when I was young, my mom made us Advent Calendars that would often have parts of Lego or toys in them – each day you would get a new piece of Lego and add it to your creation and at the end you would have a present; when I was a child I used to like to make Advent Calendars by drawing 24 little pictures on one piece of paper and then cutting doors out of a second piece and taping them together for people to open one door at a time. Last year I made on-line advent calendars for my children where they would click on the door and it takes them to an image, a story, or a song online. I re-did them this year.

These different advent calendars are all like the gifts that Jesus gives us everyday in our lives. The daily miracles we experience in the midst of everyday reality, the successes, the joy, the comfort, the love, that God shows us – these things we can experience each one as a new door being opened on an eternal Advent Calendar, knowing that at the end of all time (the eschaton, Maranatha!) we will experience the big gift of Christ’s Ultimate Kingdom, where that is what there is, the Hope, Faith, Joy, and Peace that make up of the Love of God.

The Advent Candles are like a mini-Advent Calendar with only four or five doors. Behind today’s door is Faith. Faith gives us something very important as we wait for Christ to return. It gives us the ability to wait because we have the knowledge that what we are waiting for will come. No one waits for something that the don’t in some way believe may come. As a child in a Christmas concert, we performed a musical called the Music Machine. I actually sang the one and only solo I ever sang in my life in it – the song about self control. I still remember parts of that song and other songs from that performance (and all those practices, many, many years ago); I remember one song from the Music Machine called, “Faith’ The chorus of that song sings Hebrews 11:6, "And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him." And this whole song is based on Hebrews Chapter 11, in which verse 1 and 2 define faith in this way: "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for."  

This is the Candle that we have lit today. We have lit the Candle of Faith that it will be all right, we will get through. This Candle is a symbol of the confidence we have in Christ’s return based on both our knowledge of and relationship with Him and our knowledge of His coming before. This faith can be used to transform not only the future but also the present.

In Bible Study we spoke a little bit about the Greek word in the New Testament for ‘Faith’ and I won’t put anyone on the spot by asking what it is or what it means: the word means more than just belief. The word means action as well. It means BOTH ‘faith’ in someone or something AND ‘faithfulness’ of someone or something. And as we faithfully serve Christ, He can and will transform us and our world even as we are eagerly awaiting His ultimate return.

Let me share you some stories from the kettles and more. This week from the kettles, I heard a lady tell me of her father and how he served in the War and how God through The Salvation Army was on the front lines giving them whatever they needed, free of charge, without asking anything of them. I heard the story of another man, when he was a boy, his folks were trapped in their addiction, their house burned down, God through The Salvation Army found them a new place, furnished the place and walked with the family so that the cycle of addiction was broken and the children were free to not only live their own life but to help their children and now grandchildren live their lives free of addiction and even poverty.

And I will never forget one Christmas season when I was at a lunch with a number of Executive Directors of various non-profits in the community we were serving at the time. One told me of a Barbie the Army gave her when her family was in need – she still has the Barbie. Another told me of a hamper she received as a child and a third ED of a local branch of a major non-profit told me a similar story. These gifts from God, given through The Salvation Army, transformed these children’s lives: they all grew up to serve God and others. These actions of love, these actions of faith: providing the most basic things for people in need, was transformative. They broke generations of poverty, addiction, and created lives of service and salvation.

My friends this is what God is doing for us and through us by His faithfulness; so, as we leave this service today, let us go out boldly in service, in faith and faithfulness proclaiming His Gospel and then He may use even us to transform this world even now as we eagerly await His ultimate return (at the eschaton) and which point the whole world will be make anew. Maranatha! Let us pray.