Christmas 2A

Merry Christmas!

Today is the last day of the twelve days of Christmas.

Have you all seen the Home Alone movie?

The movie focuses on Kevin,

the youngest of the family and the cousins

who gets left home by accident.

The family was going to Paris for Christmas to visit relatives and there was an accident and the parent's alarm didn't go off. They were woken up by the doorbell ringing with the bus pick up service.

Kevin, asleep on the third floor, after being sent there as punishment the night before

doesn't hear the hustle and bustle when they all run to the buses to get to the airport to go on their vacation.

The oldest of the kids is told to do a headcount, but she comes up with the right number because she accidentally counts the neighbor boy who has come to see them off.

It's not until they are on the plane over the ocean

does his mother realize they don't have Kevin with them.

She screams his name and passes out.

I can imagine poor Mary having a similar moment.

Jesus was thought to be with the caravan headed north.

There would have been family and friends and neighbors all headed in the same direction

after the festival and they assume Jesus was with the large group.

Children do have a tendency to wander around.

Its a good thing, they learn a lot that way.

But in the hustle and bustle, they leave him behind.

In both scenes, Kevin and Jesus, seem very happy to have been left behind.

Kevin was tired of being the family scapegoat and needed some alone time.

Jesus was excited to be learning about his Father, God in the Temple.

In both cases, the boys wanted to find some peace.

Kevin needed some peace from his family, and in a sense with his family.

Jesus wanted peace in learning about his family, his divine family.

Both were searching for answers and peace.

Through different ways they both found peace.

During the season of Advent,

one of the Prayers of the People prayer stations

was writing down hopes and dreams for St. John's, Franklin, or Venango County.

I prayed through them all during the season and I found an overarching theme.

A longing for peace.

Peace with change, peace with other life circumstances,

peace for our country, peace in relationships.

We have a real need for some peace in our hearts and minds right now.

So what is peace?

Naturally, in trying to figure out what peace is,

I looked up the definition.

The definitions of peace includes the words:

harmony, agreement, tranquility, freedom, quiet, concord, silence.

It is interesting to me that peace tends to go with silence and quiet.

There is something about the hustle and bustle of our lives that pushes out peace.

One of the ways we allow God's peace to enter into our hearts and minds is through holy silence.

By times of meditation or quiet times, retreat times,

we are able to let go of all the noise and hear what God is saying to us.

Throughout his life, Jesus offers people around him

the gift of peace.

Even in times of trouble,

he gives people a moment of peace in relationship.

Throughout the Synoptic Gospels

Mary suffers through many rounds of anxiety.

Jesus has a tendency to do things his mother is confused and surprised

and a little worried about.

This was not the first, nor the last.

Jesus offers his mother peace,

though she may not have recognized it at the time.

Jesus offers us peace,

starting with his mother, moving out from there. 

Thankfully, peace is something God offers

peace is a gift for each of us.

God offers us this gift

and we can learn

to accept God's gift and live into real peace.

There is that saying, growing older is mandatory, growing up is optional.

I think we all need to be encouraged to grow in wisdom and peace

Finding the peace of God in our lives

is a deepening of our spiritual lives and our relationship with God.

Peace is a gift which starts in the heart.

When we are not at peace with ourselves, we cannot be at peace with those around us.

When we are not at peace with ourselves, all of our relationships are affected.

Naturally, being at peace with ourselves is one of the hardest things to do.

Self-knowledge and self-acceptance are aspects of our lives we shy away from,

since they require facing truths we do not always want to face.

Peace comes from facing them

and recognizing ourselves in our own truth,

knowing that God loves us.

Unfortunately, sometimes, people understand peace in such a way

as in 'keeping the peace'

in which it doesn't really matter what the truth is,

there are norms in place in the status quo which need to be kept.

This is not peace.

While there are many status quo systems on our planet,

in almost no case can we say that there is true "Peace on earth."

Jesus came as a baby,

as a teenager,

as a man

into this world

to share with us the truth

and in knowing the truth,

we see the gift of peace God is giving to us.

Part of what we do in coming here each week

is a communal searching for the truth

for the peace and love which God offers us.

Our communal life together is made up of times of joy

and sorrow,

of song and music

and silence

to recognize the truth in all its facets

and find the gifts which God offers each of us.

Peace on earth and joy to all.

Amen.