SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT
'Tis a Gift to be Generous
Luke 3:1-6
Today is not only the second Sunday of Advent. December 6th is the Feast of St. Nicholas. St. Nicholas was a real person, an historical figure. He was born around 280 A.D. in Asia Minor, an area we now call Turkey. He grew to become a priest in the church and eventually the Bishop of Myra. He wore the tall red cap of a bishop and the long red robes of a bishop. He traveled on a white horse and was followed by his faithful servant, Black Bart.
St. Nicholas loved to travel. He loved the sea and all sailors. But mostly he loved children. He is remembered that way in Italy and in Spain and especially in Holland. And when people from Holland came to the new country, they brought their love of ‘Sinter Klaas,’ as they called him, and their celebration of his day, the Feast of St. Nicholas.
In the new land, in the city they called, “New Amsterdam,” a city now called, New York City, there lived a fine baker, Baker Hans. He was such a fine baker that people came from all over town for his breads and his cakes. Baker Hans was also a scrupulously honest man. He checked his books and balanced his scales. He wanted to give his customers exactly what they paid for – no more and no less.
Baker Hans was busy the whole year and he did well the whole year, but he was especially busy in the days leading up to December 6th – St. Nicholas Day. Why? Because he was most famous for his St. Nicholas cookies. They were gingerbread and iced in red and white. They looked just like the good bishop himself.
Now one day during this time, the time leading up to St. Nicholas Day, he was just ready to close up his shop, an old woman came in the door. She asked for a dozen St. Nicholas cookies. Baker Hans pulled out a sheet of brown paper and counted out 12 cookies. He began to wrap them up, but the woman stopped him.
“Baker Hans,” she said, “I asked for a dozen. You only gave me 12.”
“Old woman!” he said. “Everyone knows that 12 is a dozen and a dozen is 12.”
“But I want 13,” she replied. “Give me one more!”
Baker Hans was not only scrupulously honest. He was not one to tolerate foolishness. He said, “Madam, I give my customers just what they pay for, no more and no less. So, you’ll take 12 or you’ll take none at all!”
“I’ll take none at all,” she said, and she turned to go.
But when she got to the door she stopped and said, “Baker Hans, you will regret this!” And she was gone.
Grumbling, Baker Hans put away all his baking things. He ate a bowl of thick, rich soup, and went to bed.
He got up early the next morning. He took out all the ingredients for St. Nicholas cookies – the flour, the sugar, the ginger and spices, and the eggs – and put them into a bowl. But, when he began to stir, he saw that the ingredients weren’t coming together.
“What is wrong with this dough?” he thought to himself. He poured everything out and started again, but the same thing happened. And so when his customers came in that morning, he had no St. Nicholas cookies to sell them.
And so it went all that year. Nothing he baked turned out the way he wanted it. His cookies would be too chewy or too crumbly. His pies were too sweet or too sour. His bread rose too much or too little. By the time the next December rolled around, most of his customers had gone to other bakers.
Then, on December 5th, the eve of St. Nicholas Day, he closed his shop. Almost no one had come into the shop that day. He ate a bowl of thin gruel and went to bed.
While he slept, he had a dream. He dreamt that he was a boy again back in old Amsterdam. There in front of him was St. Nicholas himself. His white horse stood next to him with bags full of gifts. He was handing out toys to all the boys and girls.
As he watched he noticed something strange – that whenever St. Nicholas would take something out of his bag to give it away, the bag didn’t grew smaller – it grew bigger!
At last the bishop turned to him to hand him his gift. It was a St. Nicholas cookie! But before he could take it, the bishop said to him, “Baker Hans, you should be more generous.”
As he was reaching for his gift, Baker Hans fell out of bed. He awoke with a start and said to himself, “I will! I will be more generous!”
He got up and went down stairs to his bake shop. He got out his baking things. He mixed the ingredients for St. Nicholas cookies. This time it worked! They rolled out beautifully.
As soon as the first pan was out of the oven, the front door to his shop opened with creak. There stood the old woman.
She looked at him and said, “I’ll take a dozen of your St. Nicholas cookies, Baker Hans.”
“Right away, madam,” he said, as he tore off a sheet of brown paper. Then he counted out 13 cookies and wrapped them up.
She smiled at him and said, “Baker Hans, I see that your counting has improved.”
“Indeed it has, madam,” he told her. “I call it a ‘baker’s dozen.’ And a merry Christmas to you,” he added as he handed her the package.
She turned to go, but before she headed out the door, she stopped and said to him, “Baker Hans, you’ll never regret your generosity.”
And just for a moment, he thought he caught a glimpse of a red bishop’s cloak underneath her own. But he wasn’t sure.
But one thing he was sure of. He never regretted his generosity. For he continued to be an honest baker and he made a very good living at it.
But he also went beyond honesty and so made many people happy.
St. Nicholas is an embodiment of generosity. Even today he is pictured with a large bundle of gifts in his sleigh or on his back. His generosity is a challenge to us to go beyond our self-protective limits, even beyond our own virtues, our desire for fairness, and to become more generous.
John the Baptist cuts a much different figure. He does not wear red bishop’s robes, but animal skins. He does not enter people’s houses, but calls them out into the wilderness. Yet his call is also a challenge – to examine our lives, to repent where we have erred, and to seek God’s forgiveness. And the purpose of his call to repent is not to satisfy an angry God, but to open us to what is coming, to what God will do for us.
In the last couple of years, I have come to see a much closer connection between what I would call the moral life and the spiritual life. The purpose of the moral life for Christians – whether you think of it as obeying the Ten Commandments or following the teaching of Jesus or simply living as God wants you to live – is not primarily to avoid punishment or to gain reward.
The purpose of the moral life is, first of all, to curb our egos and limit our self-centered ways. The moral life helps us be less focused on ourselves and more open to others. When we are more open to others, we are more open to God and more ready for what God will do in our lives.
But the moral life also enables us to live without regret. This means not only avoiding doing things now that we will later regret. It also means repenting our mistakes of the past, to seek to change our behavior and where possible to make amends for how we have hurt others. This will help free us from regret. And regret is a barrier in the spiritual life because it keeps us from experiencing the fullness of God’s forgiveness.
You could say that St. Nicholas of Myra is a prophet for the moral life. He not only embodies the generosity of God. He also calls us to change. And he gets us ready for a greater spiritual life.
John the Baptist is certainly a prophet. As Jesus says later, John is the greatest prophet up until now. He does not get us into heaven. Nevertheless, he gets us ready for what is to come. He gets us for the One who is to come – the One who by his birth and death and resurrection opens heaven for us and welcomes us into eternal life with God.
His name is Jesus. |
