Matthew 1-3
December 24, 2025
My Advent spiritual guides this year
have been two writers I had never known, let alone read, before the month of
November began. One was Erna Kim Hackett[1]
who began her Advent reflection guide by comparing Advent to a Korean spa. In such a spa, Hackett describes receiving a
Korean scrub.
I have never been to such a spa or received such a scrub, so here I rely on my new spiritual guide’s description.
American spas are all about soft music, dim lighting, and good-smelling oils. A Korean spa is a middle-aged person who is utterly unfazed by your pain, scrubbing every inch of your flesh until dead skin you didn’t even know was there rolls off your body. They do not care about your modesty or self-consciousness . Their job is to scrub off the dead skin that has been building up since your last visit. It will not be comfortable. But you will be cleeeaaaannnnn. You will wonder if you have ever bathed before.Even when we cannot see it, dirt still accumulates.[2]
And the Korean scrub makes sure all of
it, every last dead skin cell, is rubbed off our body.
What Hackett means in that comparison is that our
wider culture has gotten us used to the regular violence, the regular
de-humanization, the numbness, the powerlessness that has been quietly building
upon us. And Advent, particularly in
reading through the Gospel of Matthew’s story, is an invitation to scrub all
that is regular and normative to American Christianity off because it is
antithetical to Jesus.
You want to protect a vulnerable, exhausted family,
a hunted-for-child? Then you had better
scrub all that dead skin off, buck up, and find yourself in the story.
Will there be, can there be, a people who will
choose a gritty, hard-nosed tenderness and vulnerable humility, presence and
collective power, an earth-centered, enduring journey over domination? Will there be, can there be, a people who
will look back through their genealogies to see humble and suspect roots that inform
them about what God sees and how God acts? God does not see their or our roots
and authority in the same way that the wider world does. Will there be, can there be a people who know
that that is exactly where God would arrive—in a backwater community,
off-the-beaten path—to begin resolute resistance against authoritarianism and
oppression, a state religion of violence and slaughter, and community-wide culture of sickness and
death? Will there be, can there be a
people who will be about tenderness over domination?
If we are caught up in the detritus and dross of
domination, Advent invites us to a Korean spa.
God does not care about our modesty or self-consciousness. A child’s life is at stake. Time to scrub clean. “We stand in a long line of people who
refused to disappear. Their courage is
in our bodies, reminding us that another world is possible and already being
born.”[3]
“God is groaning with the birth pangs of a new
creation. And birthing something new
costs something.”[4] Birth is engaging with loss and engaging with
death, and the messiness of bodies and blood.
Domination loves to carry its message through abstraction. Domination
loves to get away from bodies, loves to get away from the earth--because it is
all messy and because bodies and the blood and the earth are all considered
feminine. And domination wants to
conquer and fight against . . . to
control. Will there be, can there be a
people who will be about tenderness over domination so that this new birth in a
backwater, war-torn, occupied Bethlehem is possible—in a manger? Under the rubble?
Throughout this Advent, I have been sharing that you
have to believe the world needs to be saved to understand the logic of Matthew’s
gospel. If the world is good “as is”
then the Gospel of Matthew makes no sense.
In Matthew, political leaders are obsessed with
power, prone to grift and bribes, and self-absorbed in their own
accomplishments and legacy. Probably not
a surprise that the city-building King Herods named two of their cities after
Caesar. Caesars love to have their names
on things. And these Herod guys know
what side their bread is buttered on. In
Matthew, the state religion praises those in high political office, treat them
as gods, to gain access and special favors, creates their own justifiable,
charismatic means for draining the most vulnerable of their livelihood, and
justify violence, targeted assassination, and war as a means to bring about
peace. Even Rome’s entertainment, the
empire’s spiritual practice, sported amphitheaters like the Colosseum. Here were brutal re-creations, microcosms, of
how Rome destroyed people they “called” barbarians by
having them bloody each other. Or they would capture majestic wild animals,
starved them into angry beasts, to make these animals the equivalent of the
barbarians. In Matthew, tributes,
tariffs, and taxes drove people in rural Galilee into tremendous debt. And those who were poor became destitute,
their spirits broken by poverty, as they sold off their land which had kept
them at subsistence level. Sickness,
deformity, mental illness, and death became community-wide as regular issues
around hunger, nutrition, sanitation, and community health became everyday
struggle. Imperial pressure led to
disease becoming rampant.
Huh.
Matthew’s world sounds nothing unlike where we are today. Matthew makes it clear. The world needs saving.
Time to scrub all that dead skin off, buck up, and
find ourselves in the story.
We could be Joseph. Joseph was not the main character but the supporting actor in the story. He offers a model for how we can learn to stay involved, show up in presence, and be attentive to God even when we are not the main character. Yes, he could have become the main character by publicly shaming Mary. He could have chosen his individual piety and righteousness to contrast with her supposed immorality. Even before the dreamer receives divine counsel, he is going to choose tenderness and kindness. And then the angel challenges him to go further. Stay in the story, Joseph. Stay in the story when the story isn’t about you. Tenderness is revealed through support and accompaniment.
[S]o many people claim “divine messages” that justify cruelty and protect empire. Joseph’s dream pulls him in the opposite direction. It calls him out of guarding his status and into a different kind of courage.[5]
We could be Joseph.
We could be the author of the gospel of
Matthew. Even though King Herod may be
known as a skilled solicitor of the Roman Caesar and a great builder—an
architect of aqueducts, a constructor of cities, a fortifier of fortresses, and
a remodeler of the Second Temple—the author of the gospel of Matthew has
different eyes. Matthew has different eyes, eyes that are trying to see the
world as God sees it. If success under
empire were measured as righteousness, Herod would be considered a hero. But Matthew paints Herod as a fool.
And in outlining the author of Matthew’s vocation, Nobel Prize winning writer Toni Morrison said,
Authoritarian regimes, dictators, despots are often, but not always, fools. Certain kinds of trauma visited on peoples are so deep, so cruel, that unlike money, unlike vengeance, even unlike justice, or rights, or the goodwill of others, only writers can translate such trauma and turn sorrow into meaning, sharpening the moral imagination.
A writer’s life and work are not a gift to [hu]mankind; they are its necessity.[6]
Writers like the author of Matthew satirize
authoritarianism, call a fool a fool, but most importantly, humanize people and
populations authoritarian rulers are trying to de-humanize to kidnap, imprison,
and wipe off the face of the earth. This
is exactly what Herod Antipas does in kidnapping, imprisoning, and murdering
John the Baptist. For authoritarian
rulers like Herod, people become pawns and human beings become expendable. The author of Matthew will have none of
it. He calls a fool a fool and honors
the humanity of the most vulnerable.
Domination systems want us to fear and hate each
other. And we need a good scrubbing to
make sure we will not be a low-level Herod, call these fools out, and humanize
our neighbors. There is accumulated dirt
from an empire that trains us to dehumanize, dominate, or despair. Scrub . . . it . . . off.
We could be the author of the gospel of Matthew.
We could be the Magi. The Magi use the Earth and Sky to discern
God’s wisdom in the world, a spirituality rooted in creation, one that listens
to the universe as a sacred text. They
confront the fool, refuse to obey in advance, and are not impressed with
Herod’s title, his throne, his illusion of authority. The Magi don’t somehow confuse Herod’s
position for some kind of spiritual faithfulness. They choose not to be errand boys for
empire. Herod tells them to go find the
baby, this “so-called King of the Jews,” and report back.
Know people like that? Folks who have signed onto the project that
the King Herods of the world started? People
willing to carry out violent, de-humanizing acts, breaking laws and using
unjust practices carrying around weapons, like Herod’s soldiers, to be errand
boys for empire?
These Magi take another road home than the one
appointed to them by King Herod. Herod
wants them to follow orders. By going
home by another way, they break the law.
Follow orders! And as Erna Kim
Hackett writes,
Instead they used their
wisdom and resources to stay curious, to follow the truth written in the sky,
and to respond with humility when they finally reached Jesus. And when they
found him, they worshiped. And here’s
what I truly love about the Magi. They did not try to colonize Jesus for
themselves. They did not linger to claim ownership, or build a shrine to their
discovery, or make sure everyone knew they saw him first. They simply went
home.[7]
In confrontation, non-cooperation,
refusal, humility, and full humanity, we could be the Magi. Scrub off being the errand boys for
empire. Do not become empire’s
emissaries. We could be the Magi.
Finally,
we could be Mary. We learn more about
Mary and who this young girl is more in the Gospel of Luke than in
Matthew. But the author of the gospel of
Matthew makes sure we know, through the beginning genealogy, that Mary is
sexually suspect. And Mary, this young
girl, does not allow how the world might see her to quiet her voice or back
down. The Powers-That-Be want to retreat
into shyness, to shut up, but she refuses.
She sings with a
strong voice the story of her people and her knowledge of God as
Liberator. She does not allow her
worldly status to dictate her boldness.
The story says that the angel asks that the story continue through her
only with her consent. And she gives
it. For God is not Herod. God is not Herod!
Finally,
Mary also seeks out the Elders in her community to discern further wisdom. Once again, humility is part of her
character’s narrative.
She
will not allow worldly convention to limit her boldness. While others might suggest that she has no
role to play, Mary is not playing that game.
She knows that God sees her very differently than how the world might
see her. And she is banking on how God
sees her. She is the bearer of the
Divine.
We could be Mary.
She, herself, becomes a follower of Jesus. And to follow Jesus is to love our neighbor
not abstractly, but in material, public, courageous ways.[8] Mary shows up, sings, does not let her status
dictate her behavior. Scrub off the way
empire wants and intends you to be shy, tells you to shut up about your truth,
about the accountability of the wealthy and the powerful.
Two of the most well-known pieces of art depicting
Mary put her strength and tenderness on display. One is holding her child. The other is holding her crucified son.
All
empire brings is death.
Now
I am sure there are many other ways to become the community that resists empire
and domination. Joseph, the author of
the gospel of Matthew, the Magi, and Mary with the help of Luke, remind us that
the only way to resist is in community so that we might be the tapestry woven
together to be the Empire of Heaven--in tenderness, humility, wisdom, and
boldness. Sisters and brothers, siblings
and cousins, this is how it always has been so that you might find your place
in the story. And now the day comes.
To understand the meaning of Jesus’ birth, we do not start in heaven with abstract theology. We begin on the ground, in a geography marked by occupation, surveillance, and the threat of state violence. Matthew does not offer us a warm fairy tale. He gives us a border crossing. He gives us a baby whose first encounter with political power is a death sentence. He gives us a holy family forced to flee by a tyrant whose fear curdles into violence. Jesus enters the world not as a conqueror or a protected royal heir, but as a refugee carried across a border by parents desperate to keep him alive. His first breath is taken in a country that is not his own. His early memories would have been shaped by displacement, uncertainty, and the lingering terror that every boy his age was murdered because of him.[9]
You
want to protect a vulnerable, exhausted family, a hunted-for-child? Then you had better scrub all that dead skin
off, buck up, and find yourself in the story.
Maybe this year, maybe if we act soon enough and
with enough courage, we might take our part early enough to even save some of
those children in Bethlehem who have not escaped Herod. Maybe this year, right? Maybe this year. Wouldn’t that be something? Praise God—the tender, the merciful, the
humble, the presence, the bold, the one who accompanies us on the longest of
journeys. Praise the Living God who
chooses, age after age, tenderness over domination. Praise God.
Amen.
[1]
Erna Kim Hackett defines herself as a public theologian, raised in the Korean
immigrant church. She holds a Master’s
in Intercultural Studies from the Institute for Indigenous Theological Studies,
and her work sits at the intersection of faith, decolonization, and justice.
Erna specializes in leadership development for those navigating systems of oppression. In 2019, she founded Liberated Together,
a sanctuary for women of color, queer WOC, and non-binary folks deconstructing
and reconstructing faith through liberative theology and sustainable approaches
to social justice.
[2]
Erna Kim Hackett, “The Long Unlearning of Empire and Patriarchy: Advent 2025,” Liberated Together, pp.
7-8.
[3]
Ibid, p. 16.
[4]
Rev. Jonah Overton, “"A Messy Christmas", Advent 4 (Matt. 1:18-25),” The
Green Lectionary Podcast, December 12, 2025.
[5]
Hackett, “The Long Unlearning,” p. 37.
[6]
Toni Morrison, “Peril,” In These Times, https://inthesetimes.com/article/toni-morrison-peril-racism-fascism-liberation-black-women-writers.
[7]
Hackett, “The Long Unlearning,” pp. 55-56.
[8]
Hackett, “The Long Unlearning,” p. 25.
[9]
Hackett, “The Long Unlearning,” p. 68.
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