December 24, 2025

Christmas Eve

Luke 2:1-20

Epiphany, Winnipeg

Mary, I’m sure, is quite worn out by the whole affair. No birth is ever easy, and this one comes at the end of a long trip, maybe 120, 130 kilometres, from Nazareth to Bethlehem. There might have been a donkey or a camel for a ride, or maybe Mary was just wearing out her shoes along with Joseph and everyone else who was slogging their way south.

It’s not that she wanted to travel, and it’s not that her fiancée Joseph thought it would be fun to make a trip south for a few weeks. They’re only going because the Emperor said they had to go to their ancestral home to be counted in the census…it’s an executive order from Emperor Augustus, who likes to be called lord and saviour, and who thinks of himself as the bearer of good news for the whole world.

So Mary had this long journey, and this birth, and once the birth is over and the unexpected guests have left - this little group of shepherds - Mary has nothing to say. She just ponders what’s happened, and has nothing to say.

Now a few months before all this, Mary did have a lot more to say. She had just learned that she was pregnant, so she went off to visit her cousin Elizabeth, who lived in the hill country, a long way away from the prying eyes and the gossip of neighbours. Mary and Elizabeth had a raucous reunion, with hugs and hellos and all kinds of words about Mary being the mother of the Lord, and Mary sang a song. She sang about how in these weird circumstances of her life she is being named as Blessed by her God. Then she sang about her God, who is filling the hungry with good things and sending the rich away empty because they’ve already got more than they need. She sang about her God who is pulling the powerful down from their thrones and lifting up the weakest of the people. She sounded strong and sure. She was strong and sure.

But tonight, she has nothing to say.

The angels have something to say, though. They find some shepherds, and they sing a song to shepherds about a different kind of ruler who has just been born and who is bringing peace for all the people; a peace that no Emperor will ever give. Then the shepherds run to Mary and Joseph to see the baby and to tell them that they’ve heard the news too, that this baby will bring gifts that no emperor could ever give. And then someone else told the story. And then someone else. And then someone else. And here we are tonight, hearing this news that has lasted long long beyond that Emperor named Augustus, who honestly thought that he ruled the world.

Here’s one piece of good news for this night and these days: Emperors and tyrants and dictators don’t last. Where is Caesar Augustus today? Where will the ones all over the world be, the ones with names we might resist the urge to say out loud on such a lovely night as this…where will they be next year or the year after or five or ten or twenty years from now? They’ll be gone. Sure, other kinds of not-quite-right rulers will come after them, and they will disappear, but tonight’s promise of peace for all the people and good news for all the people will keep on being spoken. The powerful on their golden thrones will never have the last word. And this stubborn word that is born tonight, about a way of peace and grace and kindness and justice, this stubborn word will keep on be spoken.

Mary, I’m sure, is quite worn out by the whole affair. That long trip, that birth, those shepherds showing up just when she needs sleep more than anything. So tonight, she just listens and ponders. Maybe she’s just too tired to speak. So she listens and ponders, and that’s OK because sometimes someone else has to do the speaking. Like angels, or shepherds. And their word will keep being spoken while the ones who are worn out can do little more than catch their breath and listen.

Have you ever been quite worn out by the whole affair? Just by the grind of the day’s events…? Are you right now?

I’m sure it’s not a stretch to say that some of us are feeling that way right now. I can’t begin to count how many conversations I’ve been a part of this year where some of us or all of us shake our heads at the latest scary or infuriating or just downright weird item in the news of the day. And that’s wearing away at a lot of us, and sometimes all we seem to be able to do is shrug and try not to worry about it. But it wears on us….

There are all those other things that might be wearing any of us down right now. We’ve all got stories to tell of something or some thing or too many things that have happened in our own lives in the last year, and that are wearing us down. Then tonight we hear of Mary, who might just be out of steam, and she listens while someone else speaks the promise that she doesn’t have the energy to speak right now.

If you’re finding it hard to find the words tonight, or a promise of good news and peace seems so far away, that’s OK. Any of us can just listen while the people around us play the parts of angels and shepherds, singing good news for the ones who are worn out or ground down.

If the words come easily for you tonight, and your battery is full and you know with every ounce of your being – or even quite a few ounces of your being – that there will be peace, and there is good news for everyone, and it’s all coming to life in the birth of this child, then sing along with the angels and shepherds, and know that someone right here tonight is being held up and carried along while you sing all those promises of a child born for us this night.

And whether we listen and ponder, or whether we sing it out loud, this child we welcome tonight turns around and welcomes us to this place. Welcomes us to a table, to a small feast of a wafer and a little wine, where no one who hungers is sent away empty, just like his mother sang. Then that same child leads us out into the world, welcomes us into the winter night, where the promise is still being spoken, and where the promise will surely come true.