Holy Family Sunday
Sermon for December 26, 2004
1. Good Morning! Let’s Pray – O Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing to You O Lord our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
2. Well how was Christmas Day for y’all? I’ll bet the kids cashed in gooooood! You’re all looking pretty happy. Christmas really is for most of us a glorious time when most of us are trying to bless others with our gift giving and hospitality. Don’t you wish that Christmas was every day?
Well in the Liturgical
year this is always the day that scripture focuses on the Holy Family – Joseph,
Mary and Jesus. In fact this Sunday, the
Sunday immediately after Christmas Day, is referred to as “Holy Family Sunday.” It has been like this for centuries.
So today let’s actually focus on the Holy Family.
Try to imagine what our Lord’s earthly family must have
like . . . Now remember Jesus is fully
human and fully divine – He can be
tempted but is without sin. In other
words He is what we were meant to be before the Fall. What would this look like in real life? What does the perfect baby,
youth and young man look like? What does
God incarnate – in fleshed – look like?
How does He talk? How does He
walk? How does He respond to the fallenness – the sinfulness – of others? What does He think about? What types of conversations do you think Mary
and Joseph had with Him and had about Him after they had spoken with Him?
Joseph is now referred to
as
Can you imagine what it
must have been like to be with God incarnate for 10, 20 ,
30 years? What wonderful
conversations! How wonderful their
family life must have been. I wonder how
the inevitable little annoyances that are part of what happens when human
beings live together were resolved? I wonder . . . .
Try to envision it right now
– you can close your eyes if you wish.
Tradition tells us that Joseph was an older man when he married Mary so envision a young Mary, an
older Joseph and the baby Jesus.
Look at them as they go about their daily chores. Joseph with
his carpentry, Mary with her gentle and loving nurture of the baby Jesus and
her many daily chores about the home and her shopping trips to the local
bizarre. What do you notice about them?
. . .
Now let’s fast forward 10
years say. Jesus is now an apprentice to
His father – learning the trade of carpentry.
Mary is now no longer a teenager but a more mature young woman and
Joseph is probably middle aged by now. What do you notice as you watch them going
about their daily lives. What do you
notice about them? . . .
Now let’s fast forward
another 10 years. Jesus is a 20 years old, Mary is in her middle to late thirties and
Joseph may very well have passed into Glory by this point.
How do you think Jesus
felt at His step father’s death? What do
you think He thought or said at Joseph’s funeral service? What sort of friendship did Joseph and Mary
have and what role did Jesus play in the richness of that relationship? What must their evenings together been
like? Try to imagine their conversations
in those relaxed moments of their domestic lives together.
How do you think Jesus
took care of Mary after Joseph’s death?
What do you think they spoke to each other about over the next 10 years
of so?
What changed in Mary over
the 30 years of her time with Jesus? What
was she like as a young maiden and now as a more mature woman? What has changed about her as a result of the
presence of Jesus Christ – God incarnate?
Now let’s focus in on the
qualities of this Holy Family. What must
it have been like for outsiders to walk into their presence and perhaps share
an evening meal with them. Try to envision that scene – Mary serving
Joseph and Jesus and the guests – watch the interaction . . . see how Jesus
responds to Mary’s loving care. Listen
in to their gentle conversation . . . what would a visitor walk away with? What impressions? What transformations would have occurred
perhaps just because they were in the incarnate presence of God the Son?
3. Focus in on
Scripture – Sirach 3:2-7, 12-14. Now our
Scripture readings reveal some of those qualities that must have been evident
in our Holy Family – let’s explore them briefly shall we?
Please turn with me to Sirach 3:2-7, 12-14:
God sets a father in honor over his children; The Father
then is to be honored – respected. What
respect must have been evident in the Holy Family! Reading on:
A mother’s authority he confirms over her sons. Mary had authority over her God-incarnate Son. How must this have worked it’s
way out in the Holy Family? How
respectful and obedient Jesus must have been to Mary. Reading on:
Whoever honors his father atones for sins, and preserves himself from them. Ah! Since Jesus was sinless but you and I aren’t
and the promise in this verse is that as we honor our father our own sins are atoned
for and we are preserved from their ill effects . . . as we honor our
Fathers. Reading on:
When he prays, he is heard; he stores up riches who
reveres his mother. Wow – did
you hear that? If I revere my Mother my
prayers will be heard by God and I will be storing up riches that will be mine
at a later time. Wow! I like this . . . !
Suppose I didn’t have an honorable
father – what if I
Honor him anyway and then begin to
pray for him? Ah! My prayers will be heard and answered. In other words, my very obedience to God’s
“family plan” will inevitably bring His blessings into my family
situation.
Let’s read on:
Whoever honors his father is gladdened by children, and, when he prays,
is heard. Ah!
As we honor our mother we will be gladdened with children and when we
pray God will hear and answer us from heaven!
Wow! Reading on:
Whoever reveres his father will live a long life; he who obeys his
father brings comfort to his mother. O yes, a
long life because of our reverence of our father and in addition we bring great
comfort to our mothers.
Now listen to these verses:
My son, take care of your father when he is old; grieve him not as long
as he lives.
Even if his mind fail, be considerate of him; revile him not all the days of his life;
kindness to a father will not be forgotten, firmly planted against the debt of
your sins - a house raised in justice to you.
Wow!
We’re to take care of our fathers and mothers – we’re not to grieve
them. And perhaps when their minds begin
to fail we’re to be considerate of them and not to abuse them in any way. Indeed, as we do this our kindnesses will be
remembered by God and will be used to reduce the debts we engender as a result
of our sins! Wow!
What is God
telling us here! As we seek to imitate what must have been a reality in the Holy Family
then the blessings that were certainly attendant in their family will begin to
flow into ours.
As we honor our fathers and mothers – our payers
will be answered, our sins will be atoned for. We will live long lives and we will have
children who will themselves then bless us with their honoring respect!
So the cardinal family
values being highlighted here are honor and respect for our Mothers and
Fathers.
4. Now let’s turn briefly to our Psalm for today
– Psalm 128 verses 1 – 5. What can we learn here about how God wants
our families to more perfectly reflect that of the Holy Family? Please turn with me to Psalm 128 beginning at
verse 1:
Psa. 128:1 Blessed are all who fear the LORD, who walk in his ways. 2 You
will eat the fruit of your labor; blessings and prosperity will be yours. 3 Your wife will be like a fruitful
vine within your house; your sons will be like olive shoots around your
table. 4 Thus is the man blessed
who fears the LORD. 5 May the
LORD bless you from
So, in addition to the cardinal virtues of honor and respect the virtue of “fear of the Lord” is being highlighted as a cardinal virtue of a family which seeks to become more and more like the Holy Family.
So what does it mean to “fear
the Lord?”- the Hebrew word translated “fear”
is “Yarii” and it means – fear, reverence and
honor.” Can you see a connection between
this reading in Psalm and the one in Sirach or Ecclesiasticus?
Yes,
it’s the focus on “honoring and reverencing” but with this one addition –
fearing. What we’re getting at here is
that sense of “awe” – it’s what happens when we lose our breath and can’t speak
in the presence of something or someone infinitely powerful and wonderful!
So
what is God telling us here? A cardinal
virtue of a great and noble Christian family is a
overriding sense of the awe of God! They
are in this sense of the word a “God-fearing family!”
Is your family a God-fearing family?
What would it look like if it
were?
What did this look like in the Holy
Family?
My
sense is that there was a continual and profound sense of God Almighty’s
presence in their family.
For
the Holy Family – God the Father was very very present. Joseph was a good and godly man but he was in
fact not the Father of Jesus but rather His step-father so the real Father - God Almighty - was very much present in the
Holy Family and they must have walked continually in each other’s presence as
though they were walking on holy ground.
Walking and talking with an overriding sense that God was very present
to them and was working out all things to their good!
How much will the dynamics of your family – my family – change as we begin to walk more and more in that sense of Gods infinite and almighty presence? O Lord may that become more and more a reality in my family and in the families here at TCC! Amen and Amen!
5.
And finally we turn to the Gospel
So what do we learn from this? First, I find it very instructive that God came to Joseph and not to Mary. God came to the Father of the home to give specific instructions for the protection of the family. I believe that this tells us that God will guide you and me, as fathers, to ensure the safety of our families. Let us be listening fathers for God’s alerts.
But this passage also tells us that God cares for us and will guide us to safe places. God, the Almighty Father, is our Father and will guide us if we’re willing.
Ah! This really is the central point of this
entire reflection – God Almighty is our Father
and is working to establish those virtues in our earthly homes that will create
environments that will nurture the future disciples – the future warriors, of
God Almighty. And it’s these warriors –
these disciples, who will be better equipped to win the war against the Devil
and inevitably establish Heaven on earth!
6. So what is God saying to you and me this morning?
This
morning God is reminding us to work more diligently to establish His heaven in
our homes by once again asserting the cardinal virtues of ‘honoring our
heavenly Father first and then honoring our earthly mothers and fathers all
within the sweeping context of “fearing” our God – seeking at all times to live
in His awesome Presence desiring to honor and reverence Him by the way we live
out our lives here and now. Amen and
Amen!
Let’s Pray.