Angels n' Action

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 22, 2019
St. Michael’s Episcopal Church
The Reverend Canon Michael J. Horvath
Gospel: Matthew 1:18-25

In Matthew’s story of Jesus’s birth, Joseph is asked to make a leap, to take an action that goes beyond how he would normally understand the law, and in listening to the angel and taking this leap of action, he is doing what some see as quintessentially Jewish. In his book "Between God and Man", Rabbi Abraham Heschel wrote, “A Jew is asked to take a leap of action rather than a leap of thought. He is asked to surpass his deeds, to do more than he understands in order to understand more than he does.” I love today’s Gospel passage because it directly ties and connects us with our Jewish brothers and sisters in ways that are deeply profound, and for which we should be truly grateful. What some people view as wide chasms amongst the Abrahamic faith traditions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – seem to be mostly created by men, but the reality is that the essentials, the ways we are supposed to love and treat one another, is the same in each.

So, in the Gospel of Matthew, Joseph and Jesus are being placed squarely in the Jewish tradition that reminds us that actions will always speak more forcefully, more loudly, than words. And, indeed, both of these men will come to embody that tradition.

In today’s Gospel we read that during his engagement to Mary, Joseph discovers that she is pregnant. Joseph knows the baby is not his, and he knows that Jewish law would find Mary guilty of adultery, an act that can be punished with death and that is always punishable by shame. The law required that Joseph divorce her. However, because Joseph is a righteous man, he also understands another part of what the law demanded: he understands that the law is to be rendered with mercy. And so instead of exposing Mary to a public divorce he decides to let her go quietly, in a way that would reduce public scrutiny and judgment.

But the application of law with mercy isn’t dramatic enough for Joseph to help usher in Emmanel who is “God with us.” Much more is needed, that which will go beyond the old patterns of action that Joseph knows so well, something that can only come to us from the depths of a dream. As he is enveloped by night and deep sleep, an alternative explanation of what is happening comes to Joseph in a dream. And it’s through this dream that God reaches out finds his way deeper into the heart of this good and righteous man.

An angel appears to Joseph and speaks the same words that we will hear spoken to the shepherds on Christmas Eve in Luke’s gospel: “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid. Do not be afraid to act in order to bring to fruition something that the law and the prophets have yearned for, do not be afraid to do something that moves you past your limited understanding of what mercy can be - do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife”. This is a pivotal moment in Joseph’s life; all of what he knows is being questioned by an angel in a dream, and that angel is inviting him to forsake all of that in order to participate in a new story.

We’re all a little like Joseph, I think; we are limited by our tried-and-true ways of doing things or of perceiving our world. We each have our own ways of dealing with personal, spiritual, and professional matters, our own ways of moving through this demanding season of the year. Perhaps there is a voice we’re already dimly aware of from a dark night where God whispers to our hearts. Perhaps it’s a voice we’re trying to avoid, a voice that is asking us to go beyond those tried-and-true ways in order to surrender more fully to God and to assist in the coming of Emmanuel “God with us” in our own lives and in the life of the world.

But what will going beyond those tried-and-true ways mean? What things we would rather avoid and dismiss quietly might we be asked to make our own? “Do not be afraid,” the angel is whispering to you and to me about making these mysterious things our own. “Do not be afraid.”

It is easy to become fearful and overwhelmed by the chaos of the world, and statistically the state of our country can make us want to stuff our ears and close our eyes. Since November 2016 when a new president entered into office, the United States has experienced a yearly increase in mass shootings. As of November 2019, the US has had 1.13 mass shootings a day. Since November 2016, the number of racially and ethnically-motivated hate crimes has risen each year. Since November 2016, hate crimes against LGBTQ people have steadily risen, according to the most recent FBI data, with 1 in 5 reported hate crimes being against LGBTQ persons, an increase from 17% in 2017 to 19% in 2019. Since November 2016, violence against women in the United States has steadily increased. The United Nations this year cited that nearly a quarter of female college students reported having experienced sexual assault in US colleges and universities – let that sink in for a moment - one in four women in our colleges and universities have reported being sexually assaulted in 2019.

And our environment is not exempt from suffering. Since November 2016 more than 80 environmental rules and regulations meant to protect and strengthen the environment were eliminated in favor of the fossil fuel industry and other big businesses. There are so many wrongs that God calls us to make our own and make right, and we can’t be afraid to tackle them. We cannot flinch. We cannot let ourselves be shaken. We cannot let ourselves be intimidated. We cannot hide. Like Joseph, we must be ready to take leaps of action, rather than simply leaps of thought.

As Christians (and indeed anyone of the Jewish or Islamic faith will tell you the same thing), we have made a covenant with God to bring wholeness to each other and to this world through justice and compassion. We are pretty good at giving lip-service to compassion, but where would you say we stand with regard to actions of justice? Have we taken the leap of embodying our faith through our actions? The statistics that I shared today tells me that there’s more work to be done by all of us.

Throughout the Bible God is always urging us to not be afraid - God says “Do not be afraid, Abraham, when I ask you to leave your land of your youth and to travel to a new place that will challenge you, but that will be your own. Do not be afraid, Moses, for I will stand squarely by you when you, a slave, address Pharaoh, the king of the Egyptians. Do not be afraid of any evil, David, for the Lord will be your shepherd no matter where you are. Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God”.


Do not be afraid. Let angels guide you to dream in big ways for the goodness and love of everyone you encounter. Do not be afraid to act because if you listen closely enough you will hear the angels urge you, in ways that only you can, to help bring Emmanuel into our world again and again and again. Amen.