Hear The Whispers of Angels

December 20, 2024 Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol tells the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, "a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner,” who gets the chance, through the Spirits of Christmas Past, Present, and Future, to be redeemed, to have his hard heart softened and his eyes opened to the things of God.

After his journey with the Ghost of Christmas Past, Scrooge falls into a deep sleep and awakes to a ghostly light coming from under the door to the adjoining room. He softly shuffles to the door and when he places his hand upon the lock, a strange voice calls him by name and asks him to enter. "Come in!" exclaimed the Ghost. "Come in, and know me better, man."

The Ghost of Christmas Present takes Scrooge to his clerk’s, Bob Cratchit’s, house and sees their small home and their meager feast and witnesses the innocence and joy of Tiny Tim, Cratchit’s crippled son. He learns that Tiny Tim will not live much longer. Their next stop is the home of Fred, Scrooge’s nephew. Scrooge turned down an invitation to dinner at Fred’s house, so Scrooge sees the party he is going to miss. Dickens describes Scrooge as having become “so [jolly] and light of heart” that he did not want to leave and asks the Ghost to stay until the end of the festivities.

One of the most damning lines about Scrooge is in the 1984 movie adaptation, when the Ghost of Christmas Present says to Scrooge, “You’ve gone through life not noticing a lot.”

One of the biggest challenges to being faithful today is the constant presence of distraction. We are a distracted culture, our attention dissected one-hundred different ways, unable to prioritize what’s important because we’re told everything is important, which means nothing is important.

On Christmas Eve we hear the scriptures read, we hear the angels announce the birth of Christ to the shepherds, “Do not be afraid; for see I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord" (Luke 2:10-11). To you is born THIS day. Not tomorrow. Not yesterday. This day.

I wonder if you and I would respond with the same urgency as the shepherds.

“Today? Hmm. That’s really not good for me. I’ve got a 9 a.m. coffee, some Christmas shopping to do, I need to pick up my kid from school and run by the grocery. I’m free at 3 p.m. on Wednesday. Can Jesus wait until then to be born? Do I have to see the Christ child NOW?”

How often do we miss the sights, the smells, the miracles all around us? How often are we so distracted we miss God? How often is this season, not a time to see God, but simply a time to get through? One author compares attentiveness to God with birdwatching. He writes:

If you are walking through the woods, and your goal is to get from point A to point B, you’ll get from point A to point B…But, if you are birdwatching, then when you walk through the woods, they come alive with robins and bluejays and whippoorwills and doves. The same woods that could be simply an obstacle to traverse instead overflow with life, each flap of the wings sounding like the whisper of angels.

For Scrooge, being present in the moment for him was a waste of time. His focus was either on the past and what didn’t get done or on the future and what needed to be done. His head was always in his ledger, his eyes on the bottom line, his employee simply a cog in the gear of Scrooge’s money-making machine. And, as the ghost showed him, Scrooge missed the overflow of life around him. The "whispers of angels" got drowned out by his own greed.

How often do I, do we, miss the "whispers of angels"?

The prophet Isaiah spoke during a extremely difficult season in Israel's history. It was a time of great political turmoil as Assyria was expanding its empire, attacking Israel. Yet during the nation's difficulties, heartaches, and beatings, Isaiah spoke a word of hope, of joy. The prophet cried, "Say to those with anxious hearts…Take courage, fear not. Behold, your God will come...He will save you..." (Isaiah 35:4).

Amid a host of distractions, the prophet calls on the people to open their eyes to the God in their midst, the God of their past, present, and future, the God who has not and will not leave them. It is with God they will find hope and joy. Isaiah shouts to us to not allow the world around us to cause us to miss what God is doing and is about to do, for "the eyes of the blind will be opened And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped. Then the lame will leap like a deer, And the tongue of the mute will shout for joy” (Isaiah 35:5-6).

This is what Tiny Tim wanted to do, to remind those around Him that hope and joy is real. Bob Cratchit tells his wife, "[Tiny Tim] told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see."

Don’t we all struggle with the many Ghosts of Christmas Present?

• A vanishing present as we see things changing around us.

• A painful present as we travel through a difficult and hurtful season.

• A humdrum present as we feel trapped and devalued.

• A busy present filled with distractions.

Regardless of the Ghost of Christmas Present we are struggling with, our God

is with us, and our God offers us hope today, tomorrow, and forever. We must open

our eyes to what is around us, to the moment. Jesus taught us to pray, “Give us THIS

day our daily bread.” We must strive to see beyond the distractions to God in our

midst and not miss the "whispers of angels.”

By stopping a moment, slowing down, taking the focus off the problem, removing the distraction, shifting our gaze from past and future to present, and looking up, opening one's eyes and heart to God, we will see love and hope and blessing we were blind to just a moment before when we were racing along through life. When we slow down, shift our focus, look up and discover God’s presence in our midst, amid whatever craziness surrounds us on that

particular day, our focus shifts from self to God, and then, because God is love (I, to the needs of others. It is there, our hearts skyward, prayers lifted, the Spirit of Christmas Present, the Holy Spirit, opens our eyes, and like Scrooge, we find beauty that, just a moment ago, was covered by the dirt of life and the grime of our own self-centeredness.

Once again, our Savior will cause blind men and women to see. Our eyes will be opened, and we will find ourselves shouting like the prophet Isaiah, "...see the glory of the Lord, The majesty of our God. Encourage the exhausted andstrengthen the feeble. Say to those with anxious heart, Take courage, fear not" (Isaiah 35:1-4).

We will find ourselves, in the moment, like Scrooge at his nephew's party, “[jolly] and light of heart,” and like Scrooge, we will find ourselves not wanting to leave.

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