Month: December 2025

December 21, 2025  First Congregational Church UCC, Brimfield MA

Matthew 1:18-25 ¹⁸ Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant from the Holy Spirit. ¹⁹ Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to divorce her quietly. ²⁰ But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. ²¹ She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” ²² All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: ²³ “Look, the virgin shall become pregnant and give birth to a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.” ²⁴ When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife ²⁵ but had no marital relations with her until she had given birth to a son, and he named him Jesus.

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.

This has been a terrible week.  It’s the week before Christmas, and we’d like to see everything go well… but not this week, not in our world.  

On December 13, a lone gunman attacked and killed two students at Brown University, right down the road from here, and right across the Seekonk River from my home.  Eleven students were shot, two of them died.  On Friday,, after a search that was haunted by mindless attacks from outsiders, the perpetrator was found dead in New Hampshire.

On December 14, a terrorist opened fire on a crowd of Jews at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, who were there at the beach celebrating the first night of Hanukkah.  Fifteen people were shot dead, including a 10 year old girl.  A brave Muslim man tackled one of the shooters, saving lives – but he was hit by the other shooter and is still in the hospital.

Also on December 14, popular, well-respected film maker and actor, Rob Reiner and his wife Michele were murdered in their home by their son.

Each of these terrible events was haunted by people who deliberately spread lies about the event, the people involved, to make it seem – at least in the Brown University shooting that the Providence mayor, being gay, was incompetent, that the Providence police chief, being an immigrant, was also incompetent, and that the president of Brown University was not just incompetent, but maliciously incompetent.

And that doesn’t even count the regular stresses and anxieties of the season.  

Will we have enough cookies? 
Will the sauerbraten turn out well or be a bust?  
Will that relative, you know the one, keep their mouth shut, or start ranting?  
If I have to hear one more harangue about how an American Teddy Bear is superior to an English Paddington Bear, I will scream… right?

And there’s more: Is my job in jeopardy?  How am I going to make the car payment?  Can anyone help me get to my medical appointment?  What will that test show?  Does my beloved have dementia?

And here it is, just a few days before Christmas, and how are we to be merry, surrounded as we are by so much stress?

Isn’t Christmas all about the joy of a new baby, about the hope he embodies?  It’s when we sing all those joyous carols – Joy to the World, Hark the Herald Angels Sing – right?

Isn’t Christmas all about the joy of a new baby, about the hope he embodies?  It’s when we sing all those joyous carols – Joy to the World, Hark the Herald Angels Sing – right?

Well, yes, … but… we also sing quiet ones, songs that go under the joy to recognize the reality of why we’re so joyous in spite of all that’s awful in our world.  Songs that help us remember that all is not sweetness and light, that much of the time we struggle – and that we’re not failures because it’s happening that way.  Christmas re-calibrates our picture of life, adjusts the frame so we can see what’s really happening, instead of living inside a Hallmark Christmas movie.

Songs like O Little Town of Bethlehem, remind us of life’s dark streets, and a world of sin.  The author, Bishop Phillips Brooks, of Boston, knew about the stresses of real life – he’d been a pastor in a number of churches.  Or “It Came Upon the Midnight Clear”’s third verse, helps us see the realities of life’s crushing load, calling on us to rest by the weary road and hear the angels sing.

Here’s the bottom line.  Christ isn’t coming as a baby to make the best better.  Christ comes, comes as a baby, in the dire-est of circumstances, to a poor struggling family with no money, no power, no anything much at all, to bring us to God’s unending love, even in the worst of times.  It’s not about sugary icing; it’s about satisfying, life-sustaining, nutritious meals.

This morning’s Gospel reading, from Matthew, is a testimony to that truth.  It’s one of three different ways of telling the story of the birth of Jesus.  We’ll hear the other two on Christmas Eve – the beautiful words from Luke, and then the totally metaphorical words that begin the Gospel of John.  In their differences, they remind us that the story of Jesus is not about facts of his birth, but about the truth of his coming.

What matters most to us is not when or if there were Wisemen, but the truth, the reality, that God came to earth, to live as a human being.

I don’t know but maybe the most important part of the traditional set of birth stories isn’t that, not long after the birth, Jesus and his parents have to take off for Egypt, to hide out from King Herod’s agents, determined to kill him.  It’s important because we see there a family with no power, not even free to live in their own home, but being driven away to save their lives.  Jesus is the companion for all of us who are powerless.  His first memories are of growing up far away from his parents’ families, of scrabbling for scraps to make a living.  Born into a poor family, with no influence and little money, Jesus knows what it is to struggle.

It’s pain, and struggle, disappointment and fear that are the normal ways of our life.  Jesus comes to help us overcome, to bring us to a place where we can rejoice, even when things go wrong, even when there is death and disaster, like this week past.  This is the kind of time for which Jesus came.  The days are short, dark, and mostly bitterly cold.  Anguish is all around us; anger tints even the closest of conversations.  So much seems wrong. 

And then comes Jesus, come to live with us, to bear the same sorrows, to know the same horrors, to feel the same pain, to be here so that we might know that God knows us, stands with us, comforts us, and lovingly brings us home.  

Christmas is not a pointer to eternally happy family celebrations, perfection around the table or living room.  It’s a reminder that God cries when Jews are shot on Bondi Beach, when college students are murdered in a classroom, when parents are stabbed to death by a troubled son. 

Even more – it tells us God is devastated when people are hungry and no one reaches out with food, when people are struggling to pay their health insurance premiums and no one tries to change the way medical costs are calculated; God is devastated when people are mean to one another, deliberately and intentionally.  

For all those reasons, Jesus is born to be among us.  Let us give thanks.

Amen.©2025, Virginia H. Child

December 7, 2025 First Congregational Church UCC, Brimfield MA

Mt 1:1-17 An account of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, and Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and Hezron the father of Aram, and Aram the father of Aminadab, and Aminadab the father of Nahshon, and Nahshon the father of Salmon, and Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab,and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of King David. 

And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, and Solomon the father of Rehoboam, and Rehoboam the father of Abijah, and Abijah the father of Asaph, and Asaph the father of Jehoshaphat, and Jehoshaphat the father of Joram, and Joram the father of Uzziah, and Uzziah the father of Jotham, and Jotham the father of Ahaz, and Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, and Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, and Manasseh the father of Amos, and Amos the father of Josiah, and Josiah the father of Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon. 

And after the deportation to Babylon: Jechoniah was the father of Salathiel, and Salathiel the father of Zerubbabel, and Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, and Abiud the father of Eliakim, and Eliakim the father of Azor, and Azor the father of Zadok, and Zadok the father of Achim, and Achim the father of Eliud, and Eliud the father of Eleazar, and Eleazar the father of Matthan, and Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah.

So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations; and from the deportation to Babylon to the Messiah, fourteen generations. 

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.

I want to tell you about one of my favorite stories – well, really, not just one book, it’s turned into one of those series – but the first book is about a Southern lady, a widow in a small North Carolina town.  Her name is Julia Springer, and in the opening book, Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind, we meet a lively, sharp-tongued and proud woman in her middle 60s, recently widowed.  Miss Julia is the social leader of her town; she expects that everyone looks to her to know the right thing and to do it.  Decades of marriage to the super-perfect and demanding Wesley Lloyd Springer trained her to be swift, sure and unimaginative in interpreting what the right thing is in any circumstance.  She has built her life on being, and being known as, the most righteous person in town, in the most righteous marriage.

Then her husband died.  He had a fatal heart attack in the front seat of his new car, parked in front of the house late one Thursday night.  He was always late on Thursday, because he was preparing for the board meetings of the bank he owned.  

Gradually, Miss Julia’s world begins to change – not because Wesley Lloyd is dead, but because of what his death reveals.  

She’d always thought they had some money but not enough to not be really careful, but as the sole heir, she discovered that “some” could be counted in millions and her husband had deliberately kept her on a tight budget.  

She’d always thought Wesley Lloyd was one of the good bank owners; but it turned out that he made private loans, at usurious rates and wasn’t above blackmailing people to get more money out of them..  

She learned that he owned a lot more of the town than she’d realized, she learned that he kept his properties in terrible shape; she learned he was a mean-spirited landlord.

And then came the final blow.  It wasn’t enough that she’d learned her husband was cheap, manipulative, dishonest, and unpleasant.  

A little while after the funeral, the full extent of her husband’s activities came home to her, when his mistress knocked on her door, and dropped off the son Miss Julia had not known about.  The mistress was left with nothing but the boy – not even the house Wesley Lloyd had set her up in – and has signed up for a beauty school in the big city so she can earn her living.  While she’s studying, little Lloyd needs a place to stay, and she brings him to Miss Julia.

It was devastating.  Every single thing she’d built her pride on: her husband’s honesty, competence, compassion – and now his basic decency – was gone, and along with it, her social position.  She was humiliated all the more when it turned out that every one of her friends had known about the mistress and the son.

Julia’s picture of herself is destroyed by the truth of her reality.  There’s a whole series of books about her; they’re light reading and pretty funny.  But they are also the story of a woman who, after facing the truth, rebuilds her life.  Her basic honesty about what has happened changes her world. 

Instead of living in the midst of secrets, she takes the mistress and her son in.  She learns to trust, makes stronger friends, and practices a faith which is built on the idea that “no matter who you are, you are welcome here” (though she doesn’t put it quite that way).  It’s not easy; she struggles throughout the series with her habitual assumptions – men are untrustworthy, for instance, or poor people are trashy.  But in book after book, she moves deeper and deeper into a better life.

I hope you’re wondering what Miss Julia has to do with that interminable genealogy I read!  Well how about this:  the genealogy is there to tell us that Jesus is a direct descendant of King David, and through King David, a descendant of Abraham – but it’s also designed to tell us more.  In Hebrew scripture, what’s included – and what’s left out – always has a hidden meaning and this list is no exception.

Every section of the list represents 14 generations, which was an auspicious number.  Any number that’s a multiple of 7 has both literal (it really is 14) and figurative “wow, 14 reminds me of the 7 days between sabbaths,” or the “seven days of creation”, or whatever meanings.  In a world where numbers had mystical meaning these numbers matter.

And there’s one more thing in the list.  That’s because hidden in all those names of dads are four, and only four women.  You all know that the Bible rarely mentions women, right?  Back in the day, we weren’t all that important to history.  It’s important that in this long list of men with hard to pronounce names, there are four women because women are seldom mentions and almost never mentioned by name.  Why were these four women named?  What do they have to say to us?

Usually, you remember the names of the people you’re proud of – they’ve done great things.  Do genealogy, and you’ll learn to tell the story of your immigrant ancestors and their courage in coming here, or you’ll be especially proud of the one who fought at Lexington and Concord.  You’d expect these four women to be like queens of Israel, but that’s not what gets them on the list.  These women were not the public leaders of their generation. They’re not even the biggest female names in the Bible – not Miriam, Moses’ sister and co-leader; not Jael who killed Sisera and saved Israel, not Judith, note Deborah, the famous judge.  No, not great leaders — every one of those women had something “wrong” with her.  Not one of them had an unspotted record, not by the standard of their time, and mostly not by ours either. 

Tamar.  Rahab.  Ruth.  Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah.  Four women.  There were other women, of course, but only these four were remembered.  

Tamar’s first husband died and left her childless; her second attempt at marriage left that husband dead as well – and still no child.  Everyone thought she was cursed.  No one would marry her.  But she wanted a child and she wanted that child to be her father-in-law Judah’s heir.  it’s a complicated story, but in the end, she is pregnant, Judah is the father, and there’s lots of scandal.  Tamar was daring and smart and scandalous.  And remembered in this list.

Rahab kept an inn in Jericho.  Our Bible makes it clear she offered more than rooms and bed.  Her reputation was only saved by the way in which she helped Joshua win the battle of Jericho by giving safe space to him and his spies.  And she’s not Jewish; she’s Canaanite, an outsider.  Rahab was daring and smart and of ill-repute.  And remembered in this list.

We all know Ruth.  She’s a fixture of sentimental readings at weddings even though that beautiful passage is about a daughter-in-law and a mother-in-law.  Now, unlike the other women in this list, no one suggests that Ruth is immoral, but everyone knows that Ruth is the fullest of outsiders.  We remember that Ruth was daring and smart and hard-working and loyal – but not a Jew.  And yet she’s remembered in this list.

Finally there’s Bathsheba.  I think we all know enough of that story that I don’t need to go into detail.  We know Bathsheba and we know she committed adultery.  Even though today we read back into the story a good deal of blame on King David – it’s hard to say no to a king, right? – we know that in her time, in Jesus’ time, she was a woman of ill-repute.  And yet she’s on the list.

Not one of these women was fully acceptable.  And that’s the point of our conversation today.  Miss Julia thought that her position came because her husband was so impressive.  It was only later, after Wesley Lloyd’s death, that she began to understand that in the sight of God it’s not our money, or our position, or our public acceptability that really matters.  As she begins to move out from behind her husband’s assumptions, she discovers that what really matters is welcoming the stranger, loving those who are unimportant.   

As we study the Scripture, we discover that in the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the savior of the world, are embedded the names of four unacceptable women.  That list is not a list of the greatest women of all time, or the greatest men.  It is a list of people who are a mixture of good and bad.  And in there, not one entirely impressive woman; not one woman who, back in the day, would have been easily welcomed in any home.  

Life is hard.  As Wendell Berry writes, “we live the life we’re given, not the life we planned” or expected, or wanted.  Doing everything right, getting to where our goal pointed us – that’s not always going to happen.  

No matter how hard you study, no matter how good your grades, if neither of your parents went to college, it’s going to be harder for you to go and succeed than it will be for someone whose parents went and graduated.  

No matter what your goal in life, if you get addicted to alcohol or drugs, your life will be harder.  If your spouse moves out… if the place where you work goes bankrupt… if, if, if… then …..

And when “then” happens, who are you?  Are you less welcome in God’s world if you’ve been arrested?  Not according to this lesson!  

Are you less welcome in God’s world if you’ve been divorced?  Or if your parents abused you?  Or if you’ve had trouble holding a job?  Or if you’re feeling overwhelmed by all that’s on your table?

What does the Gospel tell us today?  It tells us that we live in a world, a faith-world, where you are welcome, as you are, with all your past.  If those women, immoral and unwelcome, can be celebrated as the ancestors of Jesus Christ, how can you not be welcomed with open arms?

God does not hold back his welcome and save it only for the righteous.  God welcomes everyone to the Table; God welcomes everyone to the family.  

In the dark of December, in the gloom of Advent, we claim once again this welcome.  We light our Advent candles to remind ourselves that the baby who will come will change everything, has changed everything for us.  

It may be dark.  Everything may have gone to pot. It’s likely we’ve done things we’ll regret the rest of our lives, and some days it can be hard to get out of bed.  But no matter where we are on life’s journey, we are welcome here, in God’s house, in God’s family.

Amen.

© 2025, Virginia H. Child