sunday sermon snippet 21 dec
“In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that the whole empire should be registered.” — Luke 2:1
This week’s posting of the Sunday Sermon Snippet comes from this past Sunday’s sermon, “Good News of Great Joy for ALL People.” As I said yesterday,
For a couple weeks now we’ve been pondering the misunderstandings that can arise about who God is and what he is up to in Christmas, largely because Christianity is unlike any other religious system in the world, and cuts against the grain of wrongheadedness due to fallen humanity, which generally believes the gods, or the Christian God, is someone to whom you must give, in order to receive. And with our Christmas question this season I intend to press against that tragic misconception: “What if there was a God who loves you so much that he wants to give to you rather than take from you?”
We proceeded in the sermon to see, from Luke’s historical account, specifically 2:1-21, two ways this rhetorical question proves true. For the first of those two, continue on below for what may be surprising to you; namely, the politics of Christmas…
And if you’d like to check out the whole sermon, just click here.
The Politics of Christmas
Luke 2:1 “In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world.”
It’s precisely this kind of entry that makes Luke’s story historical, but at the same time, he doesn’t log it here merely because he wants you to know the times. Luke understood the times he was living in, and what had happened, and as a historian, he’s not merely reporting, but making connections. He’s showing us, friends, that Christmas is political, Christmas is about a clash of Kings and Kingdoms.
Caesar is simply the title assumed by Roman emperors after Julius Caesar, and in this case, the man behind the title is Octavian, who, by the birth of Jesus, had assumed the throne and would rule until AD 14. Suffering illusions of grandeur, Octavian took for himself the title of Augustus, which means “worthy of reverence and worship.”
Caesar was the center of power, at the top of a Roman empire which in its day was all-powerful. As such, some argued that in Caesar Augustus, the long-awaited Messiah had come, bringing peace and happiness to mankind. And so it would be no surprise that when Augustus would tour his vast realm, he was greeted with his own hosts of heralds, singing and proclaiming dedications and orations that hailed him as “Savior,” “Bringer of Good Tidings,” and “God, the son of God.” So that when Caesar makes decrees, things happen, and quick.
And now we’re beginning to understand what Luke’s up to. Better, what God is up to. Namely, a political providence. You see, God is bringing about something subversive to the existing emperor and empire. While all the attention of all the world is on what appears to be the center of all the power, God aims the camera of his storyteller at a small guest room in the home of relatives, where the light of a star shines down to illuminate in the darkness all ‘round another kind of King who will bring another kind of kingdom entirely. In other words, Caesar is background for the main act, he’s merely a bit player who thought he should be center stage, he’s a tool in the hand of God, unwittingly being used — in what he thought was a display of his power — to bring about the rise to power of the King of all kings and Ruler of all rulers. Little did he know he was merely a player in God’s play, a tale of political intrigue, one ruler subverted and upended by another. As if to say, in the words of Dale Ralph Davis, “Don’t be too impressed with Augustus; keep your eyes on the city of David and on the house and family of David, because that’s where the really important stuff will be happening. And Christians also know this experientially — (or we should know, this being a reminder if we’ve forgotten) — because if we give Jesus his proper place we are never overly-impressed by Caesar or any other worldly power.”
Do you see? We’re the ones who believe that it is God always making use of all worldly powers, using them as his servants to achieve his purposes, plans, policies. The Father sent the Son into the world to rule, and bring all powers — including political powers — under his reign. After all, don’t we all quote with frequency at this time of year — and maybe we’ve not thought about what it means — that the government shall be upon his shoulders? What exactly does that mean, anyway, if it’s not a political statement?
So don’t shy away from this part of the celebration of Christmas; namely, that it means insurrection, and the establishment of something new in the halls of power. Which is exactly what Herod was afraid of. Which is exactly what the angels are heralding, saying to Caesar and Rome, “Take that!”
If you’d like to check out the whole sermon, just click here.
(I’m indebted to Douglas Wilson for pointing me to the idea of the politics of Christmas, and you’ll find his fingerprints all over my thinking here.)
