Isaiah 63.7-9; Hebrews 2.10-18; Matthew 2.13-23

Every Who down in Who-ville
liked Christmas a lot…

But the Grinch, who lived
just north of Who-ville,
did not! 

But, whatever the reason,
his heart or his shoes,
he stood there on Christmas Eve,
hating the Whos,
staring down from his cave
with a sour, Grinchy frown
at the warm lighted windows
below in their town.

For he knew every Who
down in Who-ville beneath
was busy now,
hanging a mistletoe wreath.
“And they’re hanging their stockings!”
he snarled with a sneer,
“tomorrow is Christmas!
It’s practically here!”

Then he growled, with his
Grinch fingers nervously drumming,
 ”I must find some way
to stop Christmas from coming!”

And the story continues . . .  the Grinch makes up what he thinks is a stupendous plan. He dresses himself up as Santa Claus, his dog Max as a reindeer, and descends to the town to remove everything to do with Christmas from the people’s homes. He pinches presents from stockings, empties fridges, puts out fires, and lies to a child who catches him at it.

The next morning, he gears himself up for the cries of dismay that he expects to hear emanating from the houses.
But, the Grinch ends up astounded when he hears not wails and tears, but singing, one of the things he most hates.

And the Grinch,
with his grinch-feet
 ice-cold in the snow,
stood puzzling and puzzling:
“How could it be so?”
“It came without ribbons!
It came without tags!”
“It came without packages, boxes or bags!”

And he puzzled three hours,
till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something
he hadn’t before!
“Maybe Christmas,” he thought,
“doesn’t come from a store.”
“Maybe Christmas…perhaps…
means a little bit more!”

And what happened then…?
Well…in Who-ville they say
that the Grinch’s small heart
grew three sizes that day!

And the minute his heart
didn’t feel quite so tight,
he whizzed with his load
through the bright morning light.
And he brought back the toys!
And the food for the feast!
And he . . . he himself  - the Grinch  -
carved the roast beast!

Christmas is a tough time for those with small hearts, but it can also effect changes in those who allow themselves to be caught up in the joy of it all. The Grinch is one story - yes, of course, it’s not real - but it makes a point, the same point that Dickens made in the story of A Christmas Carol and the conversion of Ebenezer Scrooge from miser to philanthropist.

But sometimes, of course, that conversion experience never comes. Matthew’s chronology is not quite clear, but the arrival of the wise men seems to occur in Matthew before the holy family have returned home to Nazareth. As we know, they stop off to visit Herod on their way to Bethlehem, and, it is at this point, that Herod begins to feel threatened by the baby born in Bethlehem, the baby the wise men say is to be king of the Jews.

Herod was a cruel man, who during his lifetime killed not only those who meant nothing to him, but also his three sons, his wife and his mother-in-law. It is said that he gave orders that at his death some of the leading citizens of Jericho were also to be killed so that there would be weeping on the day of his funeral.

For Herod, this small, vulnerable child was not a God to be worshipped but an inconvenience to be destroyed. His jealousy and obsessive longing for power led him to commit acts of atrocity against anyone who got in his way.

There is no independent witness to the story of the slaughter of the innocents that Matthew tells us about, but scholars all agree that it was the kind of thing that Herod would not think twice about doing.

It sounds ludicrous - Herod scared of a tiny child. Yet, of course, it was what that child was destined to become that caused Herod to worry, and we can hear echoes of Jesus’s own words: I come not to bring peace but a sword. Not that Jesus himself was going to kill anyone, but that reaction to him would lead to others wanting to destroy his goodness, and the goodness of those who follow him.

Feeling threatened by the power of another can be a deadly force. It causes people to seek to destroy others - only this past week we have heard of the death of Benazir Bhutto, by someone or a body of people who opposed her, though we don’t know exactly whom yet. Herod’s jealousy and envy of what the Christ-child was to become caused him to act in a destructive way.

It’s easy to look at this story and to decry Herod’s actions, but we too can be caught up in this jealousy and envy, if we are not careful. Jesus was very clear that he came as a servant not some to lord it over us. And Jesus was able to live this out because he was secure in who he was - a child of God. Jesus didn’t feel threatened by the power of the national and religious leaders; he didn’t feel jealous of what they had.

Envy and jealousy can eat one up. They don’t usually affect the one of whom we are jealous in any great way unless we act out or envy, but it can certainly cause us to suffer, and it can destroy the relationship between us.

Jealousy leads us to a place where we struggle to be thankful for what God has given us. It causes us to be always looking for something else, rather than learning to be happy with who we are. It can cause us to become bitter; it can separate us from God. Envy can lead us to becoming distrustful and unloving; it can make the focus of our lives something other than God.

No wonder then that the last of the Ten Commandments was do not covet your neighbour’s possessions.

Envy undermines relationships and increases hostility between people. It can also lead to some bizarre behaviour - the sales on Boxing Day this year were worse than ever our newspapers tell us, with people being injured, and selfishness rife as people tried to snap up bargains so that they could emulate those whom they admire, and join with them in seeing designer labels as a sign of being successful.

If we shape our longings by comparing ourselves with either what others have got or with who they are then our lives become distorted. We end up always disappointed, often sad, and out-of-kilter with God our Creator.

At heart, envy is caused when we are not happy with ourselves, when we are not aware of our worth and value in itself because we are God’s children.

Envy often reveals the gaps in our lives; gaps that are hard to fill and which probably won’t be more than plastered over, if we get our heart’s desire.

Envy can disguise our unhappiness with ourselves, our unhappiness with our relationships, our loneliness, our lack of fulfilment in our faith, our wanting others to think well of us. So, if we are aware of things or people of which we are envious, it might be worth looking a bit deeper, and asking why we’re not happy with our lives as they are.

Part of our success in conquering envy is found in where we place the centre of our lives. If God is at the centre, and we are able to acknowledge that and be thankful for all that we have, then our lives will be fulfilled and fulfilling, and we will find that we give much to others, through what we say, through what we do, and through being ourselves. If our desire for something other is the focus though, we will never be satisfied or fulfilled.

Herod found his value in his desire for power. That desire was so strong that he destroyed anything that blocked his path. It is unlikely that our envy will take us that far, but it can cause us to become bound and not liberated to be the people God has made us. No one else in the world who has ever lived or who will come will have exactly the same role as you or me. 

As Rosemary Lain-Priestley puts it in her book The Courage to Connect: “One antidote to envy is accept that you are your own unique and singular self. You are the only person who can reflect God in the world in precisely the way you have been positioned to do. The interconnection of lives, circumstances, events, happenings that makes you truly what you are is yours alone. God can act in and through you in a way that God cannot act in and through anyone else.”

How liberating that can be - that we don’t need to try to be anyone else but ourselves, and that by doing that, God will use us to be constructive in building his kingdom, and that we will not cause destruction as Herod did because his desire for power over others was so great. Herod longed to hold on to his power, whatever it took; God divests power, to a small human child born in Bethlehem and to each one of us.

May God be praised! Amen.