Making Room: Present (Matt. 1:18-25) Chris Altrock – December 4, 2016

In the 1850’s thousands of homeless children lived on the streets of New York City.^[1] Many sold matches, rags, or newspapers to survive. For protection against street violence, they banded together and formed gangs. There were almost no social services for these homeless children.

A young minister, Charles Brace, took up their cause. He founded the Children’s Aid Society. Brace worked to get the homeless children out of the city and into the country. He used trains to do this. His desire was to get farmers and others in the midwest to adopt the children–to give them homes and a more healthy way of life.

More than 100,000 children were sent, via “orphan trains,” from New York City to homes in rural midwest America.^[2] The children often boarded the train having no idea where they were headed or if they would even be adopted. They were leaving the only place they knew for places and people they’d never seen before.

Advertisements at train towns in the midwest announced the arrival of the these orphan trains and their children.^[3] Residents were invited to come and inspect the children and consider adopting them. Sometimes the children would have to board the train and head on to another city for another “showing” because they wouldn’t be selected at this stop. Sometimes they’d be selected but wind up in a home that was very unsuitable–they’d be used primarily as labor on a farm. And sometimes they’d finally find a new mother and father who loved them as their own.

The book Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline is a fictional account of one of the children on these very real orphan trains.^[4] Kline’s book tells of an Irish family of immigrants in the early 1900’s. The family includes a young girl named “Neeve.” A fire rips through their apartment complex in New York City, leaving young Neeve orphaned. The Children’s Aid Society collects her, places her on one of their orphan trains, and sends Neeve to the midwest.

The first family who takes her in uses her as slave labor in their sewing business. She is given food rations that barely keep her alive. She is required to produce a quota of clothes. She is forced to sleep in a hallway on a mat which she rolls up each morning.

When the stock market crashes, and their sewing business crashes, the owners give Neeve back to the Children’s Aid Society, who then place her in a family living in deep rural poverty. They have no electricity. No running water. With the mother suffering from depression and chronic fatigue, Neeve is forced to take over cooking, cleaning, and caring for the other young children. She is abused until she runs away and is taken in by her fourth grade teacher.

It is at this point in Neeve’s tragic and lonely life that she makes this statement:^[5]

“It is a pitiful kind of childhood, to know that no one loves you, or is taking care of you, to always be on the outside looking in. I feel a decade older than my years. I know too much. I have seen people at their worst, at their most desperate and selfish. And this knowledge makes me wary. So I am learning to pretend, to smile and nod, to display empathy I do not feel. I am learning to pass, to look like everyone else, even though I feel broken inside.”

There is a special brokenness which only orphans like Neeve can know fully. Yet it is a brokenness which many of us have experienced at varying degrees. Many of us us have known the brokenness of feeling that no one loves us, of feeling that no one really cares for us, and of being on the outside looking in. 

It’s a brokenness that shows up in the birth narrative of Jesus:

18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. 20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). 24 When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, 25 but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus. (Matt. 1:18-25 ESV)

Joseph and Mary experienced a kind of brokenness.

If Joseph and Mary are ordinary Jews, and we have every reason to believe they are, Joseph would be about 18-20 years old and Mary would be about 12-14 years old.^[6]

They are betrothed. That means that they’ve not yet consummated the marriage. In their culture, a couple would be betrothed, and then a year later, they would get married. The betrothal was very serious, far more serious than today’s engagement–it required a divorce to break.^[7] But there was no intercourse until after the marriage itself.

Joseph has given his heart to Mary. He’s pledged himself to her in a very serious way. And one day, one night, she says, “Joseph, we need to talk. I’m pregnant.” And Joseph felt exactly what we imagine he felt. He felt that brokenness. “I thought she loved me. I thought she cared for me. I’m her betrothed, but here I am standing on the outside looking in. She’s pregnant and I don’t even know who the father is!”

And consider things from Mary’s side. She’s given her heart to Joseph. But one morning she wakes up sick to her stomach. She’s missed her period. Maybe weeks or months go by. There’s movement in her womb. There’s a growing bump at her belly. She can’t hide it anymore. And she has to tell Joseph. And she knows it’s going to destroy him and them. She loves him. But how is she going to explain this pregnancy? She could lose this man and his love and be on the outside looking in.

There’s even more. They stay together. They work it out. But in doing so, they put themselves on the outside of their culture. In moving forward with the marriage, everyone will now assume that Joseph is the one who got Mary pregnant before the wedding.^[8] Joseph and Mary lived in a culture driven by shame and honor. The moment he refused to divorce her and instead married her and walked her to the altar with her baby bump, both of them would have been the target of shame fired by their families, friends and their entire community. Now no one loved them. No one cared for them. They were on the outside looking in. Matthew is telling us that Mary and Joseph understood this brokenness.

It’s that brokenness so many of us are familiar with. Many of us us have known the brokenness of feeling that no one loves us, of feeling that no one really cares for us, and of being on the outside looking in.

Recently, a friend name Jeremy shared of one of the darkest times in his life. He moved to a new neighborhood, but one by one, all of his new friends moved away. Then one of his beloved cats got into some of his medicine and died from kidney failure. Then one day during the same time period he came home to find his beloved dog dead. And then on the same day that he purchased an engagement ring to propose to his girlfriend she contacted him and broke off their relationship. He completed the story by saying this: “There was no one left for me to love. They had all died.”

Many of us us have known the brokenness of feeling that no one loves us, of feeling that no one really cares for us, and of being on the outside looking in.

Perhaps this explains a strange thing that happened a few years ago at the Modern Museum of Art (MOMA) in New York City.^[9] Marina Abramovic is an artist who engaged in performance art in 2010 at MOMA. For three months she simply sat in a large chair inside MOMA and offered another large chair for anyone else to sit in and spend a few moments with her. She would not speak to them. But she would simply be with them. She would spend several uninterrupted moments with whomever wanted her company, giving them her full and undivided attention.

When they planned the performance art exhibit, they believed the other chair would be empty most of the time. They didn’t believe many people would want to occupy a chair and just sit with an artist. People are busy, after all. They’ve got a lot of things to do. And even in a museum, they want to see all the other exhibits. They don’t want to just sit with an artist.

But they couldn’t have been more mistaken. What they found was that thousands of people could not wait to spend a moment with someone who would give them her undivided attention. They lined up outside, waiting for hours, even waiting overnight just for the experience of having the complete attention of another human being. Here are the words of Marina Abramovic explaining why this exhibit was so popular:

 

It is no coincidence that the art was simply called “The Artist is Present.” What she offered was simply her presence. Her full and undivided presence. And what shocked her and her team was how hungry people were for presence. People waited for hours just for someone who would be fully present with them. For someone who wasn’t checking her phone, or looking over their shoulder, or trying to rush them away. They longed for a few moments with someone who would unhurriedly be fully present with them. It brought person after person to tears.

Why? I think it’s because we’re all so familiar with this brokenness. We know what it’s like to not feel loved, to not feel cared for, and to feel like we are on the outside looking in. Because of our brokenness, when another gives us their full presence, it moves us deeply.

And it’s in that context that we hear these words:

22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).

Matthew’s readers may have been doubting this. They lived at a time when Rome had destroyed the temple in Jerusalem. It may have seemed to them that God was absent, not present. When it came to the most important relationship of all, they may have been experiencing that brokenness. They may have felt that God didn’t love them. God didn’t care for them. And with God they were on the outside looking in.

Thus, Matthew includes this critical line, reminding them that the primary gift of God in Jesus is his presence. Despite the apparent power of the mighty empire around them, God is present. In Jesus, God is present.^[10] To those who feel they are on the outside looking in, who feel that no one loves them or cares for them, Matthew wants them to know one thing: God is present.

This, in fact, is the bookend around the entire gospel of Matthew. The book ends with a similar promise:

19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in[b] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matt. 28:19-20 ESV)

The idea of God’s presence begins and ends Matthew’s gospel. God, it turns out, is the one, the only one, who is fully present with us throughout our lives. Despite the very best intentions of those who love us the most, they cannot be with us. They cannot be present with us. Death takes them. Jobs take them. Disease takes them. Sometimes they take themselves from us by the choices they make. Circumstances change that are often beyond our control and we are separated from the people who mean the most to us.

No one loves you. No one cares for you. We are on the outside looking in.

Except with God.

God is always present.

God is with us.

That is the message of Jesus. That is the gift of Christmas.

God is with us. He is with us always, to the end of the age.

If all of life is simply us in one chair and another chair set before us, the truth is that the chair is often empty. Even those we count on the most can’t be in the chair all the time. But there is one who can. God. God is always in the chair. He is always present. He is always with us. And whenever we wish, anytime we sit down, anytime we want, the Artist is present. He is ready to give us his undivided attention. That is the gift of Christmas.

Brother Lawrence was a kitchen cook to Carmelite priests in Paris who came to believe that God was as present at the kitchen as he was in the cathedral. He became so adept at experiencing the joy of God’s presence while scraping dirty dishes and stacking clean dishes that people sought him out far and wide. They longed to learn how to experience the presence of a God who didn’t disappear the moment they left mass or said Amen.

God is with us. God is present.

The challenge, of course, is for us to be present to him. Because God is present to us, we are called to be present to him.  You can summarize all of discipleship, all of Christian spirituality in that one word: present. It’s simply learning to be fully present to the God who has already become fully present to us. It’s learning to live fully in each moment, being aware that in each moment of each day, God is with us, and will always be with us. That is his gift to us. And our gift to him is learning to be fully present to him each moment of each day as well.

Would you say this out loud: “God is with me”