Jan. 4 Sermon (Happy New Year!!) John 1

If you look around, the holidays are over. Santa, who has been in the mall since he got off his float at the Macy’s day parade on Thanksgiving, is back at the North Pole with his elves. The Christmas trees are mostly put away, and advertisements for weight loss products are again in full swing. We’ve been preparing for the holidays for 2 months, and at the stroke of midnight on January 1st, it’s all over. I don’t know how many of you witnessed this for yourselves on New Year’s Eve. My family, like many, gathered around the TV with friends and watched Dick Clark and Ryan Secrest welcome in the new year with style and pizzazz, all sponsored by Nivea skin lotion. The anticipation rose. All night there was music and entertainment. We even witnessed the now obligatory New Year’s Eve marriage proposal from a recently returned Marine veteran to his beautiful girl. Then, at 11:55, everyone’s eyes turned up toward the big beautiful, crystallized light in the sky. We watched as it slowly began to drop down, then, it seemed like the whole world counted down until “Happy New Year!” Which, I have to admit seems like it is being welcomed with a bit more anxiety than new year’s past. For one golden moment, everyone cheered, strangers embraced on crowded street corners, friends toasted with Champaign. Then, at 12:05, it was all over. The lights went out on the giant ball, and everyone began to make their way back into the darkness. The party’s over and the celebration has come to an end. Time for resolutions, to take down the Christmas lights, time to settle in for the rest of the winter. Pack it up until next year.
But, I ask you, people of God, is that all there is? A short lived celebration to “remember the spirit of Christmas” before we’re engulfed by the cold dark realities of life and winter? For believers in the risen Christ, the celebration continues! The lights in Time Square may dim before 12:15 am, but our light, our life, our hope, shines on. Our human creations of “light” may dim, may fade, may go out of season. However, when we look at John 1:8 we are given a message: “He (John the Baptist) was not the light, he came only as a witness to the light. Human lights go out by 12:15 New Year’s day. Human celebrations don’t sustain us. This is because, family of God, WE ARE NOT THE LIGHT. Our “man made” light may be made to sparkle with the help of crystals, it may glimmer in the night sky like magic…it may even give us a celebratory feeling. But eventually, human light begins to dim. The crystals break, the confetti falls, and the party is over. Back to worries about packing up Christmas trees, and tangled LED lights and plastic red nosed reindeer. Keep them safe in boxes until next year, when we bring it out again.
But fellow believers, God’s celebration doesn’t end with the stroke of midnight. WE don’t have to pack up our light or feel the lull after the holidays. Our party continues. And the grand master of ceremonies tells us exactly how to party on. In our Gospel, John the Baptist tells us how to have the biggest celebration of all “prepare the way of the Lord! We have received one blessing after another!” Unlike Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, we aren’t mere spectators, the MC gives us a part in the party—we are to make straight our paths, to recognize that the Savior has arrived. This isn’t a temporary celebration, a break from our everyday lives—this message is to BECOME our lives, it BREAKS the patterns of the past, and RENEWS us with eternal hope, with an ETERNAL light.
Prepare for the Lord. Not only do we receive this message, we are empowered to spread the Gospel to all people, to make the party grow. How will you let the people in your life know that this party is for them? Because there are so many out there who want to be a part of this celebration. They LONG for a feeling of belonging: why else would so many want to create a party during the holidays? What gifts has God given you to spread the good news of great joy, to tell the world that Christ’s celebration is never over? Or maybe YOU need to hear that message, that God invites YOU to the table, every week, to commune with your brothers and sisters in Christ. You don’t feel like a party? Your sins are too many? Your life not in order yet? Not enough faith? It’s not the right time? Dear friends, when we feel most alone, most filled with doubt, most immersed in sin--that it is the absolute right time to join this eternal celebration. Lights won’t be dimmed when it gets too late, or too sin filled, or too painful. The host will not ask you to leave if you’re too sad or difficult, or lacking the right look.
The party isn’t complete unless you are here. God needs your gifts, your sins, your broken, yet healed being to be with Him. The table is ready, the lights are on, and a meal has been prepared for you. Take and eat, take and drink. The light shines in the darkness, and has OVERCOME it. AMEN.