Text: Isaiah 9:6-7, Luke 1:46-47, 52-55
One of my favorite Christmas movies every year is that timeless tale by Charles Dicken’s – a Christmas Carol. For those of you who haven’t seen it or visited the story for a while, it takes place on Christmas Even. Ebenezer Scrooge is a wealthy and stingy businessman who has no joy in is heart.
And like the plot of most good Christmas stories… trust me, this same story can be found in just about every Hallmark movie out there… the poor soul who is greedy and unhappy and without love in their heart discovers the true meaning of Christmas along the way.
This particular story begins with three ominous words: Marley was dead.
Scrooge’s business partner had died and this particular Christmas tale turns into a ghost story – with Marley haunting him from beyond the grave.
Marley appears, restless, dragging along clanking and heavy chains that represent the greed he exhibited in his life. He cannot find peace and is doomed to carry those burdens forever.
In the gospel of Luke there is a parable of the rich man and Lazarus.
Lazarus is a poor man, covered in sores, who spends his days at the gates of the rich man’s house. But the rich man never finds compassion for this neighbor who is always within his sight.
Both die.
Lazarus is carried up to heaven by the angels and the rich man is carried to the place of torment. In his suffering, he begs for mercy and compassion, but it cannot be given. So he asks just one more thing – to be able to warn his family not to make the same mistakes that he has made.
Marley, too, is hoping that Scrooge might learn from his mistakes, repent of his sin, and find redemption before it is too late.
Unlike our gospel parable, Marley gets the chance to speak from beyond the grave. He sends three ghosts throughout the tale to help Scrooge discover that he is traveling on the wrong path. Over the next three weeks of the Advent season, we will hear the message that each has for Scrooge… and for us… so that we, too, can arrive at Christmas and learn how to keep it well.
What are these sins of Scrooge and Marley?
Simply put, they loved money more than they loved other people.
Like the rich man in Luke’s parable, they could not see the value of another human life beyond the economic value of how much money that person could make for them.
That word, economy, is the basis for where we begin our story.
Economy actually comes from two Greek words: oikos, meaning house… and nemein, meaning manage. It is a word to describe how we manage our household, our affairs, our own material resources.
When Scrooge is visited by Marley in the middle of the night, he cannot begin to understand why his partner has been tormented so. Together, they had been focused on wealth, counting every penny, looking out for themselves. By worldly standards, they were both economic successes.
“You were always a good man of business, Jacob!” Scrooge cries out.
And here, Marley is able to call out the error of their ways:
“Business!” he answers, “Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were, all, my business.”
Or rather, they were supposed to be.
But Marley and Scrooge had mixed up their priorities.
They were so focused on themselves that they never looked out for others.
They, like the rich man in the parable, didn’t realize that God’s economy has a different standard.
Our household extends beyond simply those who reside within the walls of our home, our community, or our country.
We are children of God, were are family of one another, God’s household encompasses our neighbors – rich and poor – stranger and friend.
And in God’s economy, how we manage our resources, how we value the life of another person, and the generosity of our hearts towards another human being are what matter.
Now, in death, Marley can see the plight of the poor… he hopes that Scrooge might see it before it is too late.
Dicken’s begins A Christmas Carol with the words, “Marley was dead,” and in so doing sets the stage for how redemption might appear in the life of Ebenezer Scrooge.
In the same way, our gospel stories begin with the introduction of someone who is going to forever change our lives. We are reminded of the promises of the past, the words of prophets like Isaiah, that a Savior is coming who will change the way we, too, see the world.
A young woman named Mary is visited in the middle of the night by an angel who announces that she will soon bear a child.
And Mary breaks forth into song, recognizing that this child who was to come would not only bring about redemption in her life, but in all lives, for all time.
Like Lazarus, in that parable of the rich man, Mary can see the plight of the poor and lowly. She has experienced it. And, she understands that God’s economy is different from that of the worlds. As her voices rises to the heavens, she tells of how God will bring about redemption by turning the economic values of greed and gluttony upside down.
“God has pulled the powerful down from their thrones and lifted up the lowly. God has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty-handed. God has come to the aid of the servant Israel, remembering God’s mercy, just as promised to our ancestors…” (52-55)
When Scrooge looks out upon his neighbors with their generosity and singing and love for one another, his only cry is “Bah! Humbug!”
He cannot yet envision how God is working to create peace and justice for all people.
He cannot see the value of his own employee, Bob Cratchit, much less the others who inhabit his community.
As Matt Rawle writes in his book, The Redemption of Scrooge – “When prosperity becomes the only measure of a godly life, the poor are vilified, the less fortunate are assumed to be lazy, greedy, and apathetic… mission work becomes something done for the poor rather than an invitation for the voiceless to speak.” (page 27)
God’s salvation, God’s justice, God’s economy is bigger than how much money we have in our bank account.
After all, our salvation is not based upon a figure or a math equation, but upon the gift of a child.
The gift of a child.
It is not something we can earn or create ourselves. It is pure grace, freely given, bestowed upon the deserving and undeserving alike.
As Isaiah reminds us, this son who will be given to us, this Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal One, Prince of Peace, has come, will come, is coming to establish endless peace with justice now and forever more.
This peace is not something we can earn or buy.
But we discover it in the compassion we share with one another.
In the love we are shown by the kindness of a friend.
In the household we create when we see each person we meet as a child of God.
May it be so. Amen.
