Blue Christmas Service-The Rev Melanie Lemburg

 Blue Christmas 2021

December 15, 2021

 

        Years ago, I was visiting a parishioner in the hospital.  When I walked into her room, she looked up at me from where she was slumped in her chair; her eyes were shadowed with pain, and she said, “I know God doesn’t give us more than we can handle, but this feels like too much.”  I flinched and opened my mouth to respond, and then I thought better of it because hospital rooms and funeral homes are not the places a priest should be arguing theology with her people when they are hurting.  But I suspect, there are some of you here tonight who have been wounded by someone saying those words to you in the face of suffering or tragedy—that God doesn’t give us more than we can handle-and so I want to spend a couple of minutes tonight reflecting on what we do believe about God in the midst of suffering.  Spoiler alert:  the God that is captured in that horrible saying is not the God I believe in or follow.  (I don’t think I have to say this to y’all, but I’m going to say it anyway, just in case.  It is better to stay silent in the face of suffering—both someone else’s or your own—than to say to someone else or yourself that God doesn’t give us more than we can handle.)

        When I was pregnant with our daughter, my husband David and I went with some friends to see a Cirque de Soleil performance.  Before the performance started, they had these clowns wandering through the audience as entertainment.  Somehow, I caught the attention of one of the clowns, and he came over with a giant stack of empty wrapped packages.  He proceeded to entertain the crowd by trying to stack package upon package in my lap, which also contained the medium-sized baby bump that was Mary Margaret.  And what added to the show was my fiercely protective husband seated next to me, who kept taking package by package off my lap into his own while he and the clown made angry gestures at one another. 

        Friends, God is not like some clown putting on a show and piling things up in the laps of already hurting and vulnerable people.  God is the one who loves us, sitting right next to us, trying to help us bear some of the burden.

        We see this at work in both the Isaiah reading and the gospel reading for tonight.  God’s chosen people of Israel are hurting, and God reminds them, that God is strong and righteous and ready and eager to help them.  In the gospel, John the Baptist hears about Jesus while imprisoned and sends his disciples to find out if Jesus is really the messiah.  In typical Jesus fashion, Jesus answers the question enigmatically saying, “Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them.”  Those who are weak or vulnerable are being restored to strength; those who are hurting are being comforted.  This is spoken by Emmanuel, God with us—who has no interest in testing the limits of “what we can handle.” 

        God created us to be in relationship with God and each other.  Bad things happen, sometimes because of our own decisions or the decisions of those we love and sometimes they just happen—we don’t know why.  But the God of love who sent Emmanuel to be with us does not want us to suffer.  God longs to be fully reconciled with us and for us to live our lives in peace and whole-heartedness, and God is willing to come along-side each one of us to help us bear our burdens and sorrows.

        There’s a story I read this week that is attributed to the writer Elizabeth Gilbert.  It gets to the heart of why we are here tonight, why we gather, what God promises to do for us, and what we are called to do for one another. 

Here’s what she writes: 

“Some years ago, I was stuck on a crosstown bus in New York City during rush hour. Traffic was barely moving. The bus was filled with cold, tired people who were deeply irritated with one another, with the world itself. Two men barked at each other about a shove that might or might not have been intentional. A pregnant woman got on, and nobody offered her a seat. Rage was in the air; no mercy would be found here.

But as the bus approached Seventh Avenue, the driver got on the intercom. ‘Folks,’ he said, ‘I know you have had a rough day and you are frustrated. I can’t do anything about the weather or traffic, but here is what I can do. As each one of you gets off the bus, I will reach out my hand to you. As you walk by, drop your troubles into the palm of my hand, okay? Don’t take your problems home to your families tonight, just leave them with me. My route goes right by the Hudson River, and when I drive by there later, I will open the window and throw your troubles in the water.’

It was as if a spell had lifted. Everyone burst out laughing. Faces gleamed with surprised delight. People who had been pretending for the past hour not to notice each other’s existence were suddenly grinning at each other like, is this guy serious?

Oh, he was serious.

At the next stop, just as promised, the driver reached out his hand, palm up, and waited. One by one, all the exiting commuters placed their hand just above his and mimed the gesture of dropping something into his palm. Some people laughed as they did this, some teared up but everyone did it. The driver repeated the same lovely ritual at the next stop, too. And the next. All the way to the river.

We live in a hard world, my friends. Sometimes it is extra difficult to be a human being. Sometimes you have a bad day. Sometimes you have a bad day that lasts for several years. You struggle and fail. You lose jobs, money, friends, faith, and love. You witness horrible events unfolding in the news, and you become fearful and withdrawn. There are times when everything seems cloaked in darkness. You long for the light but don’t know where to find it.

But what if you are the light? What if you are the very agent of illumination that a dark situation begs for? That’s what this bus driver taught me, that anyone can be the light, at any moment. This guy wasn’t some big power player. He wasn’t a spiritual leader. He wasn’t some media-savvy influencer. He was a bus driver, one of society’s most invisible workers. But he possessed real power, and he used it beautifully for our benefit.

When life feels especially grim, or when I feel particularly powerless in the face of the world’s troubles, I think of this man and ask myself, ‘What can I do, right now, to be the light?’ Of course, I can’t personally end all wars, or solve global warming, or transform vexing people into entirely different creatures. I definitely can’t control traffic. But I do have some influence on everyone I brush up against, even if we never speak or learn each other’s name.”

She concludes, “No matter who you are, or where you are, or how mundane or tough your situation may seem, I believe you can illuminate your world. In fact, I believe this is the only way the world will ever be illuminated, one bright act of grace at a time, all the way to the river."