Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol has become a holiday classic. From its initial publication in 1843 to various film adaptations, the characters of Mr. Scrooge, Bob Cratchit and Tiny Tim, have become Christmas companions.

One of the opening speeches Scrooge gives to his nephew lays out Scrooge’s idea of what Christmas means. “What else [but cross] can I be when I live in such a world of fools as this? Merry Christmas! Out upon Merry Christmas! What’s Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer; a time for balancing your books and having every item in ‘em presented dead against you? If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart.”

The illustrious Mr. Dickens did not mince words. Scrooge saw no reason for celebration at Christmas. While all around him people, no matter their station in life, celebrated, Scrooge begrudgingly saw Christmas as just an excuse to take a holiday from work. And indeed for some, that is all Christmas has become. It’s a respite from the every day grind of the workplace. For others Christmas is just a time for gathering with family; simply a convenient time to see one another. For far too many, Christmas has become primarily about receiving gifts.

The story of the child born in a stable becomes buried under the mounds of wrapping paper. The angel’s “Gloria” becomes drowned out by the tunes of “Here Comes Santa Claus.” The “good news of great joy” fades in comparison to the “good news of great toys.”

Now lest you think that I am beginning to sound like a different version of Scrooge, I enjoy the Christmas season and who doesn’t like giving and receiving gifts? I enjoy spending time with my family and basking in the glow of the Christmas tree.

While Scrooge and others of his ilk look at the world only through the lens of how it can benefit them in tangible ways; either through wealth or material possessions, Scrooge’s nephew looked at it differently. He said, “There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say. Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round – apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that – as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say God bless it!”

You are probably familiar with how the rest of the story goes. In the night, Scrooge receives visits from three spirits. These spirits take him on journeys through Christmases past, Christmas present, and Christmas yet to come. Through this journey, Scrooge realizes the error of his “Bah! Humbug!” ways. When he awakens on Christmas morning, Scrooge is a changed man. The money he previously sought to hoard is liberally given out. The kindness, which had been completely absent from his character, flows freely. He is such a changed man that to those who knew him previously he is completely unrecognizable.

Right about now I’m betting that you’re wondering what in the world this mostly secular story has to do with why we are gathered here this evening. After all, the name of Jesus holds no prominence in Mr. Dickens’ work. There is little mention of God apart from Tiny Tim’s declaration of “God bless us every one.”

When Mary and Joseph found themselves spending the night in the stable in Bethlehem, I wonder if they knew the extent of the transformation being wrought in the world that night. Mary had received the greeting from the angel Gabriel nine months before. She had been told that the child she would give birth to would be not just the miracle that every birth is but that this child would be the Son of God.

From that first encounter with the angel, Mary had begun to ponder. She pondered the angel’s greeting including what the Lord’s favor might mean. She pondered with the people who surrounded Elizabeth when she gave birth to John. From that first angelic greeting, Mary has been pondering what type of greeting this might be. What will this child become?

When Jesus is born the transformation begins in earnest. The message of the breaking in of God into the world is first proclaimed to the humble shepherds in their fields. The good news of great joy for all people is proclaimed in the birth of the Messiah.

This is amazing news! God has entered the world! And yet God has not entered into the world as a triumphant defeating army commander. God has not entered the world by way of the secular seats of power. God has entered the world as a child – a fully human child – a helpless child. But this child is not born to a rich family. The riches of this God-child are not to be surrounded by silver or gold. This God-child is born in a stable among the mules and manure. This child is laid to rest not in a fancy cradle fashioned by the most talented craftsmen. This child rests in a humble manger, a feed trough. This child, this bread of heaven, sleeps in a manger.

The shepherds began to see it. Mary had felt it. The world was changing. The world was being transformed. The transformation came not with the loud trumpets proclaiming the birth of a king to the noble court. The transformation came in the cry of a child. The message came not to the rich and the powerful. The news came to the poor and powerless. And the message was and is: God is here! God is here and you can look at him and touch him. God is here in the flesh. Thus the transformation was wrought.

The transformation at work in the world is this: God’s love took on skin and bones. God’s Son entered fully in to our fallen sinful human world. God’s transformation is at work in a child. And as the shepherds looked upon the child in the manger, they knew that what the angels had said was true. They, the poorest of the poor, were looking upon a king. Those who cried out for salvation looked upon the Savior.

To those who are so obsessed with running the balance sheets with the only goal being to increase the bottom line, the birth of Christ makes no sense. There’s no financial profit in it. That is why Scrooge says “Bah! Humbug!” to Christmas. If the day of Christmas is simply, as he said, “a poor excuse for picking a man’s pocket every twenty-fifth of December!” then to that we can all say humbug.

For Christmas is not a day for financial profit, no matter what the Black Friday sales say. Christmas is a day of transformation. It is the day when God broke into the world. It’s the day when God transformed an old stable into the king’s chamber. Christmas is the day when poor shepherds because noble courtiers. Christmas is the day when God said to the world, “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.” Christmas is the day when God shone light in the dark corners of our world. For God came with messages not for the rich as they counted their money. The message came for the poor, the suffering, the oppressed, the ones hoping that something more is at work here in this world.

That night in the stable there was no gold or silver. There wasn’t a fancy cradle. There was just a child. A child lying in a manger wrapped up in bands of cloth. And yet this gift was more than all the presents under the tree. This gift – the gift of a Savior, the Messiah, the Christ – this gift transformed all of creation.

When Scrooge ends his time with the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come, he is faced with his own death and prays for a way to sponge away his name from the cold tombstone. Emphatically he begs for a change only to wake up in his own bed with the church bells ringing out their song of celebration. And in that night before Christmas, Mr. Scrooge is transformed. Stinginess becomes generosity. His sneer becomes a smile. His despair turns to hope.

Even if he tried, Scrooge could not have hidden his transformation. Mr. Dickens writes, “Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset.” Indeed some laughed at Scrooge and some indeed may laugh at the good news of the gospel. Yet the transformation is there.

God’s transformation, which began in a stable with a king attended by humble shepherds, is still at work among us. For unto us is born a child, a Savior, the Messiah, the Lord. The world has never been the same since. For God’s light shines in our darkness. God’s hope casts out despair. God’s love is available for all. The world has been transformed. We have been transformed.

Glory to God in the highest heaven! Amen.