“Past, Present, and Yet to Come” a sermon based on "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens, December 17, 2017 Trillium United Church, Mono Mills

Read Matthew 1:20 - 2:22

Christmas is a time most of us associate with family, friends, good feelings, food, wine, laughter, - for those who are religious, it is a time of reflection, celebration, affirmation, joy. They are all positive emotions, and in general they put us in a more generous and better frame of mind, we are a little more open to others, a little more patient - we come a little closer in touch with what we are supposed to be about all year around, all our life..

Dreams are strange things. We can do things in dreams that we can’t do during our waking hours. Most of our dreams, we don’t remember. Some we do, and often they bring us messages we need. Musicians tell stories of memorising pieces of music in dreams, or composing in dreams. Our minds - amazing things that they are - keep on working. Dreams tell us things about ourselves that we aren’t always able to face otherwise. There are lots of logical explanations, but it is still miraculous what the mind can do, and how it can help us see ourselves.

I remember vividly one particular dream, early on in ministry, and after what seemed to be a particularly trying week. I dreamed I was laboriously climbing up a very steep mountain, grabbing on to small trees, tufts of grass, anything which provided a handhold - hand over hand climbing the mountain. At one point I stopped for a rest, and happened to look off to the side - and there, parallel to the course I was charting up the mountain, was a clear path - unimpeded by trees or rocks or grass.

For Scrooge, Christmas Eve could have been described as a nightmare. He certainly thought it was a series of pretty bizarre nightmares. Had the visitations stopped after Marley, or maybe the first of the three “spirits”, he might have been able to write the whole thing off as that particular piece of mouldy cheese he’d eaten earlier in the evening with his thin gruel - and nothing would have changed.

The last visitation is the one which really makes him sit up and take notice. This spirit is a phantom - none of the light of the first spirit of the past, or the generosity and joy, and yet clear criticism of the spirit of abundance. He is visited by a phantom which seems to suck light in, and cast nothing but gloom around. There is no conversation, no words, no real interaction, only a relentless insistence that he continue this journey.

And so the phantom shows him a father walking slowly home from the graveyard; in the home by the fire, a small chair sits empty, with a small crutch beside it. Tim, Bob Cratchit’s son, has died. Scrooge begins to realise that the boy did not die because of something he might have done, but precisely because of the opposite - because of what he did not do. He sees the result of his philosophy, that if he minded his business and the rest of the world minded theirs, he caused no harm.

The phantom shows him a man lying on a four-poster bed covered in a sheet, hears people derisively sneering over the body, stealing the very slippers off the body and discussing the waste of even giving the man a funeral. They’re dividing up bedclothes. And he doesn’t even recognise any of them – yet they are people he knows, who look after his home, do his cleaning and cooking for him. And at the end, he finds himself up against that which we all face – the end of life. He is in a graveyard, seeing his own name etched on a gravestone. In a most powerful way, he is faced with the end, and suddenly how feeble and inadequate his life seems. A life of nothing but amassing a fortune, just because; a life of obsession, and shutting out light and love, and warmth.

But hear the words, as he falls to his knees in front of the spirit - his soul finally broken open, and the realisation that it is this which breaks his heart open to learn and grow, and his vision is clear to look at himself.

“I am not the man I once was” he says, “I will not be the man I might have been, had it not been for this. Why show me this if I am past all hope?” “Assure me that I may yet change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life.”

Now - as I said - it may be that Scrooge was dreaming. Today we would say his subconscious finally opened up. A Buddhist teacher of mine would have said internally something shifted, and he could see. Maybe - but maybe not - who knows for sure?

Dreams have figured strongly in the story of Jesus birth. Mary had a dream that an angel visited her to announce her pregnancy. Joseph had a dream, just as he was about to separate himself from Mary - an angel again announcing that her child must be born, and be named Jesus - because he will save his people. After the birth, Joseph again has a dream - that he, Mary and Jesus are in danger. Each of these visitations begins with “Do not fear.” Life is about to turn upside down, but don’t be afraid. Life will be dangerous, but don’t be afraid. God is here, God is with you. Don’t be afraid.

About fifteen years ago, in my very first parish, a group of us went to the town of Creemore, Ontario, to the “Journey of Love” - which is a recreated walk of the road to Bethlehem, complete with props and actors. The first time I went, the journey ended at the manger. The second time, one walked on around a corner, further from the manger. There stood a cross, and a Roman soldier.

Both life, and faith, are a journey. Scrooge was taken - however we care to explain his experience - on a journey in which his life literally passed before his eyes. He was a man afraid – oh, not always that way – but little by little fear took hold of his life – and it was fear which gave him his life back. He was shown his life as it had been, as it was, and finally what it might be in the end.

The story of Scrooge is a story of past, present, and possible futures. It's a story which tells us how not doing anything is really, actually, doing something, but not something constructive. What would have happened if he had not made change? The first possibility – the death of a despised man, and people celebrating – maybe a decrease in the surplus population. Bob Cratchit’s son Tim, dead because of a lack of action. Scrooge himself, when he awakens in his own room and realises it is Christmas Day, and he hasn’t missed it, exclaims “I will live in the Past, Present and Future! The Spirits of all three shall strive within me!”

The church year is also designed as a journey, with Past, Present and Future. I don’t think we can say it enough - that Christmas would be nothing without Easter. Christmas and Easter take their meaning from each other - they are, to some extent, the bookends. Without the birth, there would be no Easter. If there were no Easter, there would be no Christmas.

And we as a church declare faith in the connection of past, present and future. The birth, the life and death, and the new life. In one way or another, at the communion table we note that Jesus died, Jesus rose, and that Jesus will come again.

Christmas past - the historical birth of a small baby in a backwater town – the most humble of beginnings;  Christmas present - the celebration of that birth, Jesus reborn within us each Christmas – for the meaning of Christmas is that Jesus continues to be born into each of us who claim this faith; and Christmas yet to come - that Jesus will continue to come into the world to be active in the world through the hearts and spirits of all people of peace and goodwill.

That was, I believe, the message in Dickens great drama - in those words of Scrooge “I will live in the Past, Present and Future. I will keep Christmas in my heart!”

Past, Present, and Future.
What we were once - what we are today - what we may yet be. Who knows?

Christmas Past, Christmas Present, Christmas yet to come.

Christmas in all of life, and the story is unfinished...................................................


Sources:
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

“Christmas Present” a sermon based on Isaiah 61 and Luke 1, preached at Trillium United Church, Mono Millls December 10, 2017

Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11

The Spirit of God is on me, because God  has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. I am sent to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the Jubilee, the year of  God’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of God for the display of splendor. They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.

Luke 1:46-55

 My soul magnifies God and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, who has been mindful  of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed,  for the Mighty One has done great things for me— holy is God’s  name.  His mercy extends to those who fear him,  from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm and has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.  He has brought down rulers from their thrones  but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel,
remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever,  just as our ancestor s were promised.”

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Poor Scrooge. He was exhausted after trying to shut out the light of the Spirit which shone on his past. Finally, aware of being back in his own bedroom, he fell into a deep sleep. For some reason he wakened early and pulled back all the bed curtains to have a good view of the whole room. - and waited...the bell tolled one. Time passed, fifteen minutes in fact, before he realized the light across his bed was coming from under the sitting room door.

Dickens describes the scene as Scrooge entered his sitting room:
“It was his own room. There was no doubt about that. But it had undergone a surprising transformation. The walls and ceiling were so hung with living green that it looked a perfect grove, from every part of which bright, gleaming berries glistened. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe and ivy reflected back the light, as if so many little mirrors had been scattered there. Such a mighty blaze went roaring up the chimney as that dull hearth had never known, either in Scrooge’s time or Marley’s, if at all. Heaped upon the floor, to form a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, poultry, great joints of meat, suckling pigs, long wreaths of sausages, mince pies, plum puddings, barrels of oysters, red-hot chestnuts, cherry-cheeked apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, immense cakes, and seething bowls of punch, that made the chamber dim with their delicious steam.”

Seated on this throne sat a Giant, who Dickens described as “free in its genial face, its sparkling eye, its open hand, its joyful attitude.” Scrooge was timid, hung his head, not wanting to meet the clear kind eye of the Spirit.

“The Spirit was dressed in a deep green robe, bordered with white fur. The robe hung loosely, the large chest was bare. Its feet were also bare, and on its head it wore a holly wreath, set here and there with shining icicles.” He carried a kind of torch which looks like a horn of plenty - and as Scrooge and the Spirit travel the city, Scrooge’s eyes are opened to the world around him, to the things he doesn't know about that world.

"Is there a particular flavour in what you sprinkle from your torch?" asked Scrooge.

"There is. My own."

"Could it apply to any kind of dinner on this day?" asked Scrooge.

"To any kindly given. To a poor one most."

“Why to a poor one most?” asked Scrooge.

"Because it needs it the most."

In this visitation, Scrooge is stunned that the ghost blesses the home of his clerk, Bob Cratchit -  a tiny place of four rooms. He didn't know Bob had children - he didn't know one of them was ill. When he begs to know that Tim will live, he hears back his own words "If he's going to die, he should do it, and decrease the surplus population."

And - says the Spirit. "Will you decide which men shall live and which shall die? It may be that in the sight of heaven you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man's child. O God! To hear the insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his brothers in the dust!"

And in one of the versions, when Scrooge is offered a drink and gets decidedly tipsy, he asks the ghost what is in the cup, and the ghost answers  “The milk of human kindness.”

“The Spirit of God is upon me, for I have been appointed to bring good news to the poor, bind up the brokenhearted, - to proclaim the Jubilee, the year of God’s favour.”

“For God has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich have been sent away empty.”

It's not hard to relate this to the present. We all know people like Scrooge, hurt by life and by their own actions, who also believe that by not doing anything, no one is hurt. Yet even doing nothing is tantamount to doing something. Don’t we all know people who are critical of the poor, who blame the  poor for their poverty, without ever knowing their circumstances. Scrooge blamed the poor for their own circumstances instead of looking closely at the conditions around himself and them, even instead of finding out from them *why* or how they got into such a position.

The Spirit takes Scrooge to see Bob Cratchit’s home - where the feast is meagre, yet Bob Cratchit’s family are full of gratitude for that which they do have. It’s a sharp comparison - the great bounty around the Spirit, and the meagre Christmas meal of the Cratchits. There are a couple of things to draw from this today - just as Dickens did then.

First, that the Spirit, - and the huge feast laid out around him, the green-ness of the room and the warmth of the fire - are representative of the realm of God - the vision God has for people on earth, living in creation without any fear or want. The Spirit represents Immanuel, God-with-Us. This whole scene to me is a representation of the Jubilee year in which all debts are erased, the hungry are fed, the poor and sick are now well looked after, everyone participate in the realm of God. And I see it as God offering to Scrooge a glimpse of the real kingdom – a table full of good things, and Scrooge is invited to the table, if he wants to come.

Second, it reinforces a very real truth. For Dickens it was clear that there was lots of food to go around, opportunities to make the world a better place – but that the wealthy were not so willing to give others good employment and access to exactly the same things the rich treated as their right. For us today, the story shows us that there is actually more than enough food in the world already to feed everyone. The problem is not with the amount of food available, but  the distribution. The so-called First World countries take more than their fair share of what’s needed, often wasting it - and the poor of the rest of the world go without. In some parts of our country we live with a sense of entitlement - that we somehow deserve everything we have, even if it is over-the-top. And we are seeing the bulk of wealth increasingly concentrated in the hands of a few, and those who really need being pushed aside. “Are there no prisons, are there no poorhouses?” “This boy is ignorance, this girl is want. Be most afraid of the boy.”

At the end of this part of the story there is a particularly telling scene. The Spirit and Scrooge are standing out in the cold, Scrooge asks the Spirit what is under his robe  - the Spirit pulls back the front of his green robe, and huddled there are two children: hungry, shriveled, destitute, prematurely aged.

“Are they yours?” asks Scrooge?

“They are Man’s.” replies the Spirit. “This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, but most of all beware this boy.” “Have they no refuge or resource?” asks Scrooge, and again hears his own words flung back at him “Are there no prisons? Are there no poorhouses?”

Today, I guess we would say are there no jobless programs, are there no shelters? Today we still live side by side with Ignorance and Want, and think it doesn’t affect our lives.

In the scriptures, angels were messengers from God. Joseph has a visit from an angel, telling him that Mary’s child will be “God-with-Us”. Scrooge encounters angels, who shine the light of God into his heart; who proclaim the good news. In this open and joyful Spirit we hear these words from Isaiah – and which we hear from the Scriptures in Jesus’ lifetime: “The Spirit of God is upon me. I am sent to bring good news to the oppressed, to comfort the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, and release to prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”

The picture of this messenger - God’s green creation full of everything human beings could ever need, also proclaims the year of God’s favour. Christmas Present - every year should be the year of God’s favour.

Marley came to Scrooge in the darkness of his rooms and his soul, to speak of repentance, of changing his ways. Two Spirits come in the bright light of vision, into the recesses of hard hearts, and then the bright light of vision on the world around. Yet neither Spirit *was* the light. Dickens’ Spirits are those who come to testify to the light – to quote the Gospel of John, to bring messages from God. They point to the one who is coming - the centre of Christmas. The Spirit of Christmas Present comes to testify to good news for all people. As Scrooge took another step along the road to his repentance and reclamation, so we also take a step on the road to repentance, a commitment to living the Gospel to its fullest. May our hearts at Christmas be broken open for those who are dismissed, ignored, hungry, thirsty, homeless, sick in spirit and soul – may the true message of Christmas be heard as we approach the time of birth. Amen.

The Ghost of Christmas Past December 3, 2017 A sermon based upon Isaiah 40:1-4 and Mark 1:1-8 Trillium United Church Mono Mills, Ontario

Isaiah40:1-4  Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.  Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from God’s hand double for all her sins.

A voice of one calling: “In the wilderness prepare the way, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. The glory of God will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For God has spoken.”

Mark 1:1-8:  The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God,  as it is written in Isaiah the prophet:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way, a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.’”

So John the Baptiser appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptised by him in the Jordan River. John wore clothing made of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. This was his message: “After me comes the one more powerful than I, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.  I baptise you with water, but he will baptise you with the Holy Spirit

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As Scrooge lay in the bed, the curtains were drawn back, and he saw a figure unlike anything his imagination could have produced - like a child, yet like an old man diminished to a child's proportions. Its hair, which hung down its back, was white as if with age yet the face had not a wrinkle, and the tenderest bloom was on the skin. It wore a tunic of purest white, and round its waist was a lustrous belt, the sheen of which was beautiful. It held a branch of fresh green holly in its hand. From its head shone a bright clear light, and it held a great cap under its arm.

“Are you the spirit whose coming was foretold to me?” asked Scrooge?  "I am."
"Who, and what are you?" Scrooge demanded. "I am the Ghost of Christmas Past."
"Long Past?" inquired Scrooge, presumably noting signs of age. "No. Your past."
Scrooge begged the spirit to put the cap over its very bright head.
"What!" exclaimed the Ghost, "Would you so soon put out, with worldly hands, the light I give? Is it not enough that you are one of those whose passions made this cap, and force me through whole trains of years to wear it low upon my brow!"

“I am here" said the Ghost. “for your welfare, your reclamation.”
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And so begins a journey into the past, and we get a glimpse of what made Scrooge the man he had become. A small boy, sitting alone in a schoolroom, while all his classmates leave for Christmas at home. The small boy’s mother died giving birth to him, and the father rejected him. He is sent to a boarding school, and a little bit of this boy hardens up and closes away.

The scene changes. A little girl comes in. "I have come to bring you home, dear brother!" she says. "Home, for good. Father is so much kinder than he used to be, that home's like Heaven! He spoke so gently to me one night when I was going to bed, that I was not afraid to ask him once more if you might come home; and he said Yes, you should; and sent me in a coach to bring you. And you're never to come back here.”

The scene changes again. Scrooge is older now, a man in the prime of life. His face already wears the signs of greed and obsession. He is sitting with a fair young woman, in whose eyes there are tears.

"It matters little," she said, softly. "To you, very little. Another idol has displaced me; and if it can cheer and comfort you in time to come, as I would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve."

"What idol has displaced you?" he asks. "A golden one." responds the young woman.

"Have I ever sought release?" "In words? No. Never."

"In what, then?"

"In a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another atmosphere of life. In everything that made my love of any worth or value in your sight. If this had never been between us," she asks; "would you seek me out and try to win me now? Ah, no!"

"Spirit!" says the watching, old Scrooge, in agony again, "show me no more! Conduct me home. Why do you delight to torture me? No more, I don't wish to see it! Show me no more!"
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We have seen a small and lonely boy, cut off from family, left alone at Christmas - a child whose father blamed him for the death of his mother in childbirth. We learn that the girl is Scrooge’s younger sister, probably by a second marriage, and that he loved her dearly – she was his connection. Fan also died, giving birth to Fred, Scrooge’s nephew. There are hints of abuse, of violence in this child’s background. He learns that the response to pain is to shut himself off. His father blames him and isolates him; Scrooge blames his nephew Fred, and isolates himself even further. Then we see him as his engagement ends, becoming harder, and the idol of money becoming his first love, instead of her. He doesn’t go after the young woman – he lets her go.

In the first part of this story, Scrooge shows unwillingness even to be open to those around him. He works in a dark place, with little light other than one candle. He lives in a dark house, huddled away by himself. He keeps his spirit in the dark, blocking out everything. Christmas, with all its joy and goodness, offends his darkness. He has been given a talent, but instead of using his talent for the common good, as Paul says, he uses it - but not even for himself. For all his comments about Bob Cratchit, and his nephew being poor, he himself lives in a poverty of spirit, and physical poverty.

In this encounter with the Spirit of Christmas Past, he cannot bear the light which emanates from the ghost, and wants it covered. “Would you put out the light I give with worldly hands” asks the ghost “especially since you are one of the people responsible for forcing me to wear it year in and year out.” At the end of this visit, Scrooge grabs the hat and pushes it down over the Spirit, but even that cannot shut out the blinding light. The light causes him pain, because it shines into the darkest places of his soul. He does realise I think, that this spirit has come to help him bring his gifts into the light, but the effort of looking at himself is unbearable, and he goes back into the darkness.

Scrooge did have gifts at one time. As we look back, he was a sensitive child who cared deeply for his sister, who wanted desperately to be loved by his father, who had a gift of joy, love and intelligence. His father was a similar man, but when life brought grief, he blamed a child, and lost the ability to love well. Scrooge doesn’t even realise the tiny seed that was planted.

He is treated justly and kindly by his employer, and he and Marley are successful enough to go out on their own; he finds a beautiful young woman, and they have plans for their future. He is able to employ his gifts and his intelligence - and he has the opportunity to use those “for the common good”, yet he doesn’t. Remember Marley’s ghost, wailing into the dark night in an agony of the soul “Mankind was my business, the common welfare was my business.” Scrooge just doesn’t see it.

Finally, there is the underlying theme of repentance. I have a poster, supposedly John the Baptist, shouting “Merry Christmas, you brood of vipers! Now repent!”

What does it mean to repent? Nowadays we seem to think repent means to say we are sorry for something and promise not to do it again. Well, perhaps that’s part of it - but not all! To repent literally means to turn our lives around, to go in a different direction altogether. To repent means to look at the crooked paths of our lives, shine the light of the Spirit into those dark corners, take out all the things we have hidden away there and nurse so carefully, and throw them out.

The Ghost of Christmas Past forces Scrooge to let its light shine into the very darkest recesses of his own heart. Only by going back into his past, and the places where the road became crooked and bent, can he understand where he got away from the Spirit of Life. It’s the beginning of making the rough places smooth again, for abundant life.

What chains do we carry around from our past? What do we have in our hearts which needs to be illuminated, so that we can truly prepare for God’s love to enter? What do we push down? What has shaped us, in such a way that our gifts are mis-used, or not used at all? Are we aware of the messengers who bring the gospel of peace?

While Advent is a time of waiting for the coming of Jesus, it is also one of the two times of the year when we are called to take time for introspection and reflection. Faith does not just happen, as Scrooge is beginning to find out. Faith is important, but it takes work. To turn our lives around, to step out on a new road, can only happen if we understand ourselves.

There’s one other theme here, and the theme that keeps coming back - not only in Scrooge’s story, but the Christmas story, and in our story. God is reaching for each of us, wanting to make us whole people in every way. God will go to any length necessary to reach us, to help us, to comfort us, to show us what love is, and who we can be as children of love. Love makes the rough places a plain, and the road straight.

Sources:
1. Sermon from Advent 2 Year B Rev. Fran Humber United Church, Corner Brook
2. “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens Part the Second.