Do you know who said these words?
“I live in a world of fools…Merry Christmas after Merry Christmas…what is Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money, a time for finding yourself a year older and not an hour richer? If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with Merry Christmas on his lips should be boiled with his own Christmas pudding and burned with a stake of holly through his heart…Merry Christmas! Friends! Love! What could be more idiotic? Bah! Humbug!”
That’s Ebenezer Scrooge, of course, introduced to the world in 1843 in Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.” When you try to find joy in material things, as Scrooge did, everything is humbug, because it doesn’t work. Now, that doesn’t stop us from trying. Preparing for Christmas seems to bring this to the forefront. If you are looking for joy in material things, if everything has to happen just perfectly in order for you to have joy, then it’s inevitable: you’re going to be tired and disappointed, and not only that. If you buy into this idea that the path to joy is found in newer, bigger, faster, better stuff, you’re going end up being cynical. You will end up with a fundamental distrust of everything. Why? Because more stuff cannot soothe a guilty conscience. More stuff does not satisfy our appetite. And finally, more stuff cannot prevent your eventual death. Chasing after more stuff is a trap, as the character Ebenezer Scrooge finds out before it’s too late. Many more real people keep up the chase, and remain cynical, joyless, and isolated. I’m here today to tell you: God offers something different to His people.
The words of today’s Old Testament reading were spoken by a man who lived in the seventh century before Christ, a time much like ours; a time of power struggles and change. The prophet Zephaniah saw power plays in government, financial dealings in the marketplace, strife among social groups, debate about proper religious practices. In other words, business as usual; but Zephaniah is singing a sad song, because so few people are really seeking the Lord. So few are asking about the Lord God or even seem to care.
Zephaniah witnessed the cruelty of rulers, the dishonesty of merchants, the violence of neighbors, the complacency of the wealthy, the hypocrisy of the priests, and the willingness of the people to adopt any religion that would help them get what they want. When things get to that point, there’s nothing good to say. Zephaniah describes the people in total as “obeying no one” and “accepting no correction.” And the prophet proclaims that God’s judgment is near and coming quickly. Not a fun message to proclaim, but that’s the burden of being a prophet. The even deeper burden Zephaniah bore is that he knew that chasing after stuff could never bring true and lasting joy, and he had to watch as his people—his own people—kept racing after junk and racing toward their own destruction.
Now this is as good a point as any for me to stop and ask the question, “Does any of this sound familiar?” Yes, Zephaniah was talking about people in a long ago place. But when he describes people whose hearts have turned away from God and turned to satisfying themselves; when he describes people as disobedient to God, people who accept no correction; when he describes people who try desperately to find joy in more stuff, don’t we have to look around…and look inwardly? Like I said, not a fun message to proclaim. But it’s like breaking a bone in order to reset the thing. It’s necessary. Painful, but necessary.
There might be a little voice inside you saying, “I don’t know if I want to be different from the world.” But listen to Zephaniah. He’s speaking a warning that this world and its ways will fail you. This world and its ways will always take more than they give you. This world and its ways will one day come crashing down. What’s the alternative?
This is it: Zephaniah offers a clear invitation to seek the Lord again. The message coming through the prophets like Zephaniah and John the Baptist is the message of making a choice. The prophets urge you and me; they plead with you to choose to put aside pride, to put aside dishonesty, to put aside the other gods that we’ve chased after. Choose to put aside the things that block God from coming to you. Confess these things as sin. Hand over your cynicism, your disappointment, and your fear to him. Look to the Lord Jesus for meaning in life. Look to him for fulfillment. When you learn to enjoy God; I mean, really treasure who He is and what He’s done every day, you will finally have what you’ve been running after. You’ll have peace and purpose that can’t be changed by circumstance. You’ll have security that flows from a God who defeated death. You’ll have joy because the things that cause guilt have been removed from you. Listen to the prophets. Choose to turn around. The arms of your Father God are open and waiting. What’s this God like? Zephaniah tells us:
“The Lord has taken away your punishment; he has turned back your enemy.” This is the surprise of the Gospel; the twist ending that leaves us breathless. Just imagine you’re on death row, awaiting execution. You hear the steps of the guards. They are coming for you. They go past you. Somebody else is taken. The death hood is placed over that person, and he is marched out and executed. Then the guards appear at your cell and tell you that you’re free to go. They open the heavy door. Later you learn that the person who died in your place was guilty of no crime, and what’s more, they volunteered to take your place. Jesus did that by going to the cross. It is for that reason that Jesus came into the world. And get this. The Bible tells us that it was for the joy set before Him that Jesus endured the cross. What was the joy set before Him? It was the joy of knowing you forever. He wanted to enjoy a relationship with you so much it killed Him. The horror of his suffering and death was worth it to Him, because it meant that he could be with you always.
Listen to the prophets. Choose to turn around. But know this: Jesus chose you first. That’s where real joy comes from.
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