 Please join me in a few moments of centering silence and now please remain seated as we sing our in-gathering hymn number 126 and the words appear in your order of service. The First Unitarian Society of Madison. This is a community where curious seekers gather to explore spiritual, ethical and social issues in an accepting and nurturing environment. Unitarian universalism supports the freedom of conscience of each individual as together we seek to be a force for good in the world. My name is Karen Rose Gredler and on behalf of the congregation I would like to extend a special welcome to visitors. We are a welcoming congregation so whomever you are and wherever you happen to be on your life journey we celebrate your presence among us. Newcomers are encouraged to stay for our fellowship hour after the service and to visit the library which is directly across from the center doors of this auditorium. Bring your beverages and your questions. Members of our staff and lay ministry will be on hand to welcome you. You may also look for persons holding teal stoneware coffee mugs. These are FUS members knowledgeable about our faith community who would welcome visiting with you. Experienced guides are generally available to give a building tour after each service so if you would like to learn more about this sustainably designed addition or our national landmark meeting house please meet near the large glass windows on your left side of the auditorium after the service. We welcome children to stay for the duration of the service however because it is difficult for some in attendance to hear in this lively acoustical environment our child haven and commons are excellent places to retire if a child needs to talk or move around the child haven is back in that corner and the commons are behind the auditorium. The service can still be seen and heard well from those areas. This would also be an excellent time to turn off any devices that might cause a disturbance during the hour especially cell phone ringers and now I'd like to acknowledge those individuals who help our services run smoothly. At this service we have Mary Manoring taking care of sound for us our lay minister is Tom Boykoff our greeter is Patty Witty and our ushers are Gail Bliss, Marty Hollis and Anne Ostrom. We have Nancy Casa who will be fixing coffee and is back in the hospitality kitchen. We do have John Powell signed up to give a tour so remember to meet him over here at the end of the service if you'd like a tour. Please note the announcements in our red floors insert to your order of service which describe upcoming events at the society and provide more information about what's going on this week. Particularly you'll want to see the list of all the Christmas Eve services and hopefully you'll see one that looks like something you'd like to attend. Again welcome we hope today's service will stimulate your mind touch your heart and stir your spirit. We gather in the dim light and the damp chill of mid-December finding warmth from each other turning darkness to a time of light and nourishing hope where reason fails grateful for small miracles and everyday blessings we rejoice in the wonder of making light out of darkness love out of enmity and hope out of despair. I invite you to rise and body your own spirit for the lighting of our chalice and if you will join your voices in reading the bolded italicized text may the light of joy we kindle this morning brighten our lives may the light of morality teach us the right may the light of freedom burn more purely in our hearts may the light of hope give us high vision may the light of Hanukkah solstice and the Christmas season never be extinguished from our lives and in the spirit of the season I invite you to turn to your neighbor in exchange with Emma Warmbreeding and if we have some children among us today which I think I see just a few out there you'd like to come up for the message for all ages so where's all your ugly sweaters we can't have an ugly sweater contest without that's a pretty good one yeah I think there's a snowmobile on the front of it yeah no it's not it's a very pretty sweater did you know they have ugly sweater contests yeah why oh it's just a thing that old people do so this is this is a christmas story called a christmas card for mr mcfizz anybody ever heard this story that's one of my favorites mr mcfizz was a chipmunk you know what a chipmunk is little guy right exactly yeah and he lived in a burrow and the burrow was built beneath an old big oak tree and it was just as safe and as sound a burrow as anyone could hope for it and it gave mr mcfizz great peace of mind the previous owner though had left it in a terrible mess and mr mcfizz had a lot of hard work to do to clean it all out but fortunately there was nothing that mr mcfizz liked to do more than clean you believe that he did and so the job was a happy one he swept and he scrubbed and he repaired and he painted and everything was in good order and mr mcfizz was just as pleased as punch about his new home he took immense pride in that little house so imagine his horror when a pack rat family named the griswolds moved into the hollow stump next door you know what a pack rat is looks kind of like a gerbil all right that's a pack rat now mr griswold wasn't a bad sort of fellow he just was a little messy he was a serious collector and you know pack rats do collect things they love shiny little objects that they will bring back and put in their nests and so mr griswold was a collector forever finding treasures in other people's garbage and he would drag these home and stockpile them believing that someday all of this stuff would come in handy now mr mcfizz could barely stand to look out his window to see this growing pile of rubbish in his neighbor's yard and the situation just went from bad to worse and mr mcfizz's irritation turned to disgust and disgust turned into loathing as all of that clutter gradually accumulated in other words he didn't like mr griswold very much but it was not until december that his feelings about mr griswold turned into genuine hatred now like most fussy little creatures mr mcfizz didn't have many friends in fact mr mcfizz didn't have a single one most of the time this didn't bother him because he was always so busy with his cleaning but every christmas time he'd become just a little bit sad because he didn't have any friends now every day mr mcfizz would sort through his mail go out to his mailbox and open it up in his mail contained nothing but advertising circulars and bills and he desperately wished that just someone anyone would send him a single personal christmas card now in the past mr mcfizz had been able to cope with this emptiness in his life no christmas cards and no friends but then one horrible day in december after another disappointing trip to his mailbox he saw that there were several large envelopes in mr griswold's mailbox he snuck over and he examined those envelopes and they were all addressed hand addressed to the griswold family they surely had to be christmas cards and then he realized looking up that mrs griswold was standing on her porch staring at him he was so embarrassed he walked back to his house feeling very very guilty however this was only one of many bad days that followed because he observed a steady flow of christmas cards coming to mr griswold's mailbox mr mcfizz was never so relieved to see a christmas holiday passes this one but instead of forgetting all about it he worried about it all the next year and so when christmas approached again he decided he was going to play a very very nasty trick on the griswold's his plan was very simple in late november mr mcfizz took all of his savings and he went out and bought as many christmas cards as he could and then he addressed them all to himself he mailed a few of them every day to his address increasing the volume of cards as christmas day approached and then knowing where the postman stopped to get coffee every morning he would creep up to the postmaster's letter bag and he would steal all the griswold's christmas cards before he could deliver them mr mcfizz then settled into a thought about oh what a delightful delightful expression must be on the griswold's face because they weren't getting any christmas cards that would serve him right for being such a slob but to his surprise mr mcfizz didn't feel very good as he watched his neighbor day after day go to his mailbox open it up and find that it was empty and there wasn't a single christmas card in it and strangely enough mr mcfizz started to feel sorry for the griswold's and so sorry that one evening he sat down at his desk and he wrote out a christmas card and addressed it to the griswold family a few days later he watched mr griswold open his mailbox and take out the card that mr mcfizz had sent to him and mr mcfizz felt really good he understood now what christmas was all about and the best part of it was yet to come for the very next day mr mcfizz found a christmas card not one that he had addressed to himself but someone else had sent him a christmas card wishing him a very very christ merry christmas and you know who was from the griswold and they also invited mr mcfizz to come and join them for christmas dinner which he did and they drank eggnog and they ate roasted chestnuts and they sang christmas carols before a roaring fire and mr mcfizz could not remember a time when he ever had so much fun but even so all throughout that wonderful evening he wondered how maybe he could say to mr griswold could could you maybe clean up your yard a little oh well he thought to himself i guess that conversation will have to wait until easter so that's the story of mr mcfizz and mr griswold hope you enjoyed i hope you have a great christmas and we're going to sing you out as you head through your classes now carol rose will share with us our first reading this from the christian gospel of luke one day jesus was teaching and a lawyer stood up to test him teacher he said what must i do to inherit into eternal life jesus replied what is written in the law what do you read there the lawyer answered you shall love the lord god with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself and jesus said to him you have given the right answer do this and you will live but wanting to justify himself the lawyer asked jesus and who is my neighbor jesus replied once a man was going down from jerusalem to jericho and fell into the hands of robbers who stripped him beat him and went away leaving him half dead now by chance a priest was going down the road and when he saw him he passed by on the other side so likewise a levite when he came to the place and saw him also passed by on the other side but a samaritan while traveling came near him and when he saw the stricken man he was moved by pity he went to him and bandaged his wounds having poured wine and oil on them then he put him on his own animal brought him to an inn and took care of him the next day he took out two denari gave them to the innkeeper and said take care of him and when i come back i will repay you whatever more you spent which of the three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers the lawyer said the one who showed him mercy jesus said go and do likewise the second reading is also taken from the gospel of luke the chapter the fourth chapter but in this instance the passage has been reworked by the british author philip pulman who is perhaps best known for his dark materials trilogy which includes the fictional book the golden compass when he returned to nazareth he went to the synagogue on the sabbath as he always did he stood up to read and the attendant handed him the scroll of the prophet isaia isn't this the son of joseph the carpenter someone whispered jesus read the words from one part of the book and then from another the spirit of the lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor he has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind to let the oppressed go free to proclaim the year of the lord's favor he then gave the scroll back and all eyes in the synagogue were fixed upon him because everyone was eager to hear what he had to say you want a prophet he said more than that you want a miracle worker but you need to think a bit harder some of you know who i am jesus the son of joseph the carpenter and this nazareth is my hometown when has a prophet ever been honored in his hometown consider this if you think you deserve miracles because of who you are when there was a famine in the land of israel and no rain fell for three years whom did the prophet elisha help by god's command an israelite widow no a widow from sarapath in syden a foreigner and again were there lepers in the land of israel in elisha's time yes there were many the whom did he cure naaman the syrian do you think that what you are is enough you'd better start considering what you do who does this man think he is someone from the crowd demanded how dare he come here and speak to us like this yelled another this is scandalous said a third we shouldn't have to listen to a man running down his own people right here in our synagogue and before jesus could say another word they seized him and they dragged him to the hill above the town and they would have hurled him down from the top but in the confusion and in the struggle for some of jesus's followers were there and they fought the townspeople jesus managed to get away unharmed thank you my friends always wonderful to have chimes in the holiday season and with the approach of the christmas holidays the putative birthday of jesus of nazareth old ideas and images of him resurface in this season even non-subscribers to christian orthodoxy are more attuned to stories of jesus's nativity and of his subsequent ministry and i suspect that much of what the average person believes about jesus is relatively benign that he was generally speaking a gentle and peaceful man who roamed the countryside proclaiming love forgiveness and a redeemed human condition yes he could have a sharp tongue at times yes he did offend people at times but in the end hauled before the roman prefect ponches pilot for judgment jesus was judged by pilot to be blameless i find no basis for an accusation against this man pilot declares in the gospel of luke mark and matthew concur here too pilot seriously questions whether jesus deserves to be crucified what evil has he done he asks a jewish mob that's clamoring for his execution in john's gospel pilot examines jesus about his claims to kingship to which the latter replies my kingdom is not of this world the answer reassures pilot that jesus is not an enemy of the roman state to his accusers pilot says i find no case against him but the jews continue to demand jesus's death and although he demores twice more pilot finally does the crowds bidding what i wish to emphasize is that all four gospel writers go to considerable lengths to portray jesus as basically harmless a victim of jewish jealousy and resentment but by no means a threat to pox roman is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor or not the Pharisees asked jesus in an effort to trip him up give me a coin of the realm jesus says whose head and title are on this corn Caesar augustus they replied then give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to god what belongs to god and the Pharisees walk away chagrined and shaking their heads earlier on and after his baptism jesus retreats to the wilderness the devil appears and subjects him to three temptations the last of which is a chance to become a mighty ruler away from me satan jesus commands for it is written you shall worship the lord your god and serve him only clearly he has no desire to supplant the roman emperor and so the gospel writers drive a wedge between jesus and his jewish co-religionists while strongly suggesting that he has no bone to pick with Rome according to luke early in his ministry jesus even cures the servant of a roman military officer a centurion now contemporary new testament scholars are in substantial agreement that these writers who composed the gospels did so not out of a concern for historical accuracy but first to win converts to the new faith and second to protect themselves and these nascent christian communities from persecution and so to this end they embellished jesus's accomplishments and they recast his message so that it would not be construed by the romans as subversive the gospel the gospel writers had ample reason to be fearful the romans because the romans only recently in 66 ce had crushed a major jewish rebellion in palestine serious questions had been raised about judaism whether its followers could be trusted to toe the line and submit themselves to roman authority and at that time 66 ce christianity was still regarded as a branch and offshoot of judaism so this is the thing matthew mark luke and john wanted to establish jesus's bonafides for their readers but they also wanted to allay roman suspicions about the intentions of jesus's followers jesus was not a rebel and neither were we this is the subtext that the evangelists hoped that the romans would take to heart but these men are writing 30 40 50 years after the fact none of them were eyewitnesses to the events they described nor were they among the audiences that jesus addressed and scholars now offer considerable evidence that the evangelists whitewashed the story so that jesus would appear less revolutionary than he really was and as a result the gospels seriously understate the controversy that surrounded jesus during his brief and tumultuous ministry any analysis of his message has to begin with the concept of the kingdom of god variations on that term appear more than three dozen times in the gospel of matthew 32 times in the gospel of luke but what exactly was jesus referring to what sort of kingdom was this and in what sense might it possibly have been subversive now for the british comparative religion scholar sgf brandon the kingdom of god could have meant only one thing to his jewish listeners the restoration of jewish sovereignty brandon suggests that jesus had a greater stake in the future of israel than mainstream christian commentators have typically allowed jesus was executed as a rebel against rome and not as a heretic against judaism brandon insists and he offers several telling points to support this thesis first two of the gospels mentioned that jesus's inner circle included a disciple who was a self identified zealot an individual who today might be described as a freedom fighter the zealots were declared enemies of rome and it was they who launched that insurrection in 66 c e that i mentioned earlier and which was very quickly and very brutally put down second brandon addresses jesus's actions in the great temple of jerusalem where he drives out the money changers and chastises the priests this was truly provocative and revolutionary because the temple was the supreme religious institution of israel presided over by a priestly and hereditary aristocracy jesus's attack would have been seen as a direct assault on the tithing system that benefited the jerusalem elite enormously that's how they made their living it was also a serious challenge to the spiritual authority enjoyed by these hereditary elites and by sowing anarchy and disorder within the jewish community jesus made life all that much more difficult for the roman overseers this invasion of israel's holy of holies was audacious enough that the upper echelons of society both jewish and roman would have had ample reason to apprehend and to neutralize jesus now luke is the only one of the four gospel writers who makes even passing reference to the serious charges that jesus faced when he went before pilot having delivered him to the prefect the council of jewish elders charge jesus with perverting the nation forbidding us to pay taxes to caesar and saying that he himself is the messiah brandon says that luke intends his readers to understand that these accusations were malicious but in reality they were probably quite accurate and then finally brandon notes that after his death jesus's closest associates established a community a congregation a presence in jerusalem and this community predicted that jesus would return shortly in supernatural power and glory to redeem israel from oppression and give it sovereignty over the gentiles in other words those jews who were closest to jesus a number of among the number was his own brother james for them he was and continued to be the long awaited messiah the savior of god's chosen people the historian michael grant says that his was a stormy personality jesus argued constantly with formal formidable ferocity he felt an immovable certainty that he was the figure through whom god's purposes would be fulfilled and this absolute conviction of an entirely peculiar relationship with god this was not completely unknown among israel's religious leaders but in jesus it became a great deal more vigorous and violent than anyone else's so that's one school of thought about jesus the rebel but now let me introduce to you another school that diverges from the one that i just outlined it is similar in that it paints a picture of jesus as an authentic rebel and the difference between the two views hinges again on variant interpretations of the kingdom of god was jesus first and foremost a jewish patriot a militant advocate for israelite sovereignty the second school says not so much rather he was a religious reformer bent on breaking down the historic and cultic barriers to genuine human communion jesus's vision of the kingdom was radically inclusive this school of thought says and therefore it was profoundly threatening to the parochial stakeholders in a social system that prevail at that time in israel for establishment jews of the first century Pharisees Sadducees Levites scribes priests nothing was more important for all of these people than purity holiness and holiness in the Hebrew language literally means separateness to achieve and to maintain purity one had to observe a strict set of rules avoiding contamination with anything that could be judged to be unclean and this purity code created a world in ancient Palestine of sharp social boundaries and by extension of vast inequities and jesus himself was probably a victim of this very system he was from Nazareth in Galilee can anything good come out of Nazareth a future disciple asks in the first chapter of john's gospel and although he was Jewish as a Galilean he would have been regarded by his southern Judean brethren as tainted scratch a Galilean and find a Samaritan was a commonly held opinion moreover jesus bore the stigma of being a momser he was an israelite of suspect parentage the people of his own village called him mary's son not jesus as would have been customary and as a mamser jesus would have been excluded from the mainstream of religious life such people ruse chilton informs us lived in a cast apart and they were denied a voice in israel's public and religious life and that may help to explain why oftentimes jesus spoke to his audiences out in the open air on seasides and hillsides rather than in the synagogue so this then was probably a man who had suffered the indignities of israel's ancient purity system and as a result jesus identified with those who had been subjected to similar treatment and the list of those would include all Gentiles the abjectly poor whose poverty was believed to be a consequence of their own sinfulness the disease that deformed and the maimed because bodily wholeness connoted purity certain occupations like tax collector and even shepherd and finally those who were considered to be unclean included all women the purity system marcus bore writes established a spectrum of people ranging from the very pure through varying degrees of purity down to the radically impure according to the purity map of the time priests and levites came first and the temple was the geographic and cultic center of that map the gospels provide ample evidence that jesus was adamantly opposed to this system in both word and indeed he sought continuously to undercut it and the parable of the good Samaritan is a case in point and it undoubtedly struck its first century listeners as profoundly subversive so as you heard from Karen a near dead man probably unconscious is lying in a ditch a priest and then a levite approach and they see the man and they pass him by on the other side they refuse to render aid why is that out of fear of contamination the man is bleeding perhaps he's already dead for all they know and thus on two counts that man is unclean putting their own purity concerns first the priest and the levite walk this wide berth around him the Samaritan not only helps the stricken man but goes above and beyond bandaging his wounds paying for his care and for his logic but in Israel Samaritans were themselves classified as unclean so to compare this man favorably with the ultra clean priest and levite would have struck many as scandalous why would jesus share a story like that because he was bent on overthrowing a purity system in order that a kingdom of love and compassion could replace it and his behavior was of appease with his teaching jesus touched leopard lepers and hemorrhaging women he entered a graveyard to exercise a man's demons he practiced indiscriminate table fellowship anybody was welcome he challenged the practice of ritual hand washing before meals he invited women into his intimate circle where they enjoyed essential parity with men and on one occasion he called a woman who was afflicted with a spinal disease he called her a daughter of Abraham walter wink says this is an expression never before seen in jewish literature because women in ancient israel were saved through their men so to call this woman a daughter of Abraham was to give her status as a full-fledged member of the covenant and with equal standing before god and now let's revisit that jerusalem temple episode here again we have israel's holy of holies the place where the strictest rules of purity had to be maintained the temple jack miles tells us was not just the central shrine of the jewish religious establishment it was also the seat of such political power as the nation of israel retained and thus jesus's invasion was an act of the utmost seriousness and could in fact have been grounds for execution because his was a frontal assault on conventions that many jews solemnly upheld it does it disrupted an economic activity that the powerful elites depended on for their livelihood and many jews of the time believed that it was only by living in harmony with the strict commandments of god and his prohibitions maintaining this high degree of holiness it was only by doing this that the almighty would eventually be moved to intervene on their behalf and drive the romans from israel so in the eyes of the officials and many others michael grant says jesus's actions would have seemed like megalomania or perhaps even of madness but jesus's experience of god and his convictions about the kingdom they were of a completely different order for him marcus borg explains compassion not holiness is the dominant quality of god and it is therefore the ethos of the community that seeks to mirror god this ultimately was what the kingdom of god was all about for jesus nevertheless as bart airman says at times jesus pushed his emphasis on love to such an extreme that it seemed to others that he was discounting god's law as recorded in scripture so what happened to this jesus this jesus the rebel it largely disappeared with the first century destruction of jerusalem and its great temple and the community of followers that sought to carry jesus's work forward separated from israel christianity became a gentile religion its founder a dying and rising god similar to others that were popular in the greco-roman world at that time and the cause of course became much much greater not deliverance from roman oppression or from a harsh purity system but deliverance instead whole human race from sin and from death rebel jesus is not the one we celebrate in our christmas carols but it is the one that jackson brown that great folk rock singer celebrates in one of his songs and so i conclude these reflections with the lyrics to jackson brown's rebel jesus the streets are filled with laughter and light and the music of the season and the merchant's windows are all bright with the faces of the children and the families hurrying to their homes as the sky darkens and freezes will be gathering around the hearths and tables giving thanks for all god's graces and the birth of rebel jesus they call him by the prince of peace they call him by the savior and they pray to him upon the sea and in every bold endeavor as they fill his churches with their pride and gold and their faith in him increases but they've turned the nature that i worshiped in from a temple to a robber's den in the words of rebel jesus we guard our world with locks and guns and we guard our fine possessions and once a year when christmas comes we give to our relations and perhaps we give a little to the poor if the generosity should seize us but if and one should interfere in the business of why they are poor they get the same as rebel jesus but pardon me if i have seemed to take the tone of judgment for i've no wish to come between this day and your enjoyment in this life of hardship and of earthly toil we have need of anything that frees us so i bid you pleasure and i bid you cheer from a heathen and a pagan on the side of rebel jesus blessed be and amen our offertory today as you can see will be shared with briar patch youth services as it was last week did you great work in our community on behalf of young people so please be generous as a community of memory and hope and through this time and place we bring our whole and at times our broken selves we carry with us the joys and sorrows of the recent past seeking here a place where they might be received and celebrated and shared we pause now to acknowledge an entry by cece bowyard who asks for our prayers and our care for her niece who is in stage four cancer and so we we wish the best for her and for her family in this holiday season in addition to that concern just mentioned we would acknowledge any unexpressed ones that remain among us as a community holding them with equal concern in our hearts but a sit silently for just a moment or two in the spirit of empathy and of hope blessed be and amen and now i invite you to rise in body and spirit as we sing together our closing hymn number two seventy six please be seated for the benediction and the post this week all over the western world children have been asking their parents that age old question when will it be christmas why is it taking so long i think i know the answer it will finally be christmas when every crib is a shrine it will finally be christmas when every child is received as though he or she were the messiah it will finally be christmas when we learn to see that the holy and the sacred is not up there or out there but in here readily apparent in the ordinary world of sight and of sound it will finally be christmas when we learn to value our differences rather than to fear them and it will finally be christmas when we recognize that the holiday is an anticipation of foretaste of the peaceful kingdom for which our hearts long and for a particular birth that took place so long ago it will finally be christmas when the birthing of a new consciousness takes place in all of us not just today and tomorrow and through christmas but all year long and we each do what we can to hasten that day along blessed be and amen