Chocolate Calendars Christ the Redeemer Church December 7, 2008 2nd Sunday in Advent – Hope Isaiah 40:1-11 Rev Gary L. Smith www.christredeemerchurch.com
(I had the children come up to the front of the church to sit down on the floor for this sermon after the kids thought I had forgotten the children’s sermon.) The previous three Advent seasons here at Christ the Redeemer Church; I purchased your advent calendars for you in early November. That did not happen this year. I was so busy getting out Christmas cards that I did not make it to San Antonio to purchase your Advent calendars in early November as I have in years past. People have laughed at my getting out our Christmas cards early. Only a minister and family understand why that happens. I have to plan for Christmas long before Christmas happens…September is when the choir director selects Christmas music, November is when I have to get out our Christmas cards and purchase your Advent calendars. Once Thanksgiving hits, Pam and I have no free evenings or weekends until after January 1st. I got tired of waiting to receive Christmas cards from people. I sent ours out three weeks ago and still have not received one card. What is wrong with people these days? So I started calling people to ask why they have not yet mailed us our card. Trudy in Ohio said, “I got your card…before Thanksgiving. But I refuse to open any Christmas card before Thanksgiving. So yours has not even been opened or read.” I failed to get your Advent calendars in November, so I decided to just not buy you any this year and to not say anything. I knew none of you would ask about them. Before church last Sunday, Pam the teacher said to me, “Aren’t you going to give the children Advent calendars this year?” I explained to her that I was not going to because I had failed to purchase them in San Antonio and then I told her that no child would notice. She gave me that teacher you know better than that look. Last Sunday during Children’s sermon I was trying to focus your attention on Thanksgiving and to not talk about Advent. 8-year-old Sydney interrupted me and asked, “When are we going to get our Chocolate Calendars?” I promised Sydney and you all that I would have your Advent Calendars today. Friday December 5th was upon me and I still had not driven to San Antonio to buy your Advent calendars. I was in Bastrop and left Bastrop at 12 noon to head to San Antonio to buy your Chocolate Calendars.
I would rather go to jail then to face Sydney and you all with no Chocolate Calendars. I drove 137 miles out of my way to go to the store that has the Chocolate Advent Calendars. The same store I buy them for you each year. It is a huge grocery store at Randolph Air Force base. The Chocolate calendars are less expensive there. $1.00 a piece is the price there. I was so excited to walk into the store. I went to the shelf where those calendars are each year. The shelves were bare. Empty. Pitiful. Scary empty. The clerk told me that they had had huge sale on Advent Calendars last week, after the first Sunday of Advent passed. Gone. I said, “But you always have hundreds and boxes of them…they can not be gone.” She said, “Honey, they are gone. You are too late. Sorry. Merry Christmas.” When store staff call you honey you are cooked. So I drove to seven other stores in San Antonio on my birthday to find you your Chocolate Advent calendars. They were all sold out. There has been a run on Advent calendars this year. All these years I thought I was the only one who bought Advent calendars for all the children and adults in church. Wrong. I called Janice and Brenda from San Antonio and asked them if they could call around and help me try to find Advent Calendars somewhere in Texas! Walgreen’s had some. Walgreen’s – in San Marcos. I asked them how many they had left. “48.” I told them to save all 48 for me and that I would drive from San Antonio to San Marcos immediately to buy the 48 they had left. “You want all 48 of them?” the girl asked. “Yes.” I drove from San Antonio to San Marcos quickly. She rang them up at $1.99 each. Over $100 with tax. I asked if I could talk with the manager. He came to the front to talk with me. I asked if he could give me a break on the costs of his Advent calendars…that they would go to kids in church, all 48 of them. He knocked the price down to his cost of $1.29 each with no tax since we are a church. $61.92 instead of over $100. Saved over $40 due to his generosity. I was hoping he would not remember that I ring Salvation Army bells in front of his store, harassing his patrons and taking money from them as they enter his store. I even take money from his employees with words of guilt. I tell people they will have a Merry Christmas if only they give to the kettle. My goal is to have one donor a minute. Last Monday our Church got 178 donors in 175 minutes…we met our goal. Guilt works. A divorce attorney friend always reminds me to take advantage of guilt. I do. So I drove 137 miles, took 6 hours, shopped 9 stores in San Antonio and San Marcos, involved three people on the search, used my birthday time, used my cell phone
minutes…all to try to meet Sydney’s hopes that she would have a Chocolate Calendar this morning. Isaiah captured the Hopes of the people. Hoping for something is part of what Isaiah and Advent are about. Hoping for the Messiah to show us the way. Hope. I loaded the boxes of Chocolate Calendars into my truck. Came home exhausted. Had a great birthday dinner that night. Too tired to unload the Chocolate calendars. Yesterday afternoon I had to go buy potatoes for Mona’s Progressive Dinner. I had to bake Potatoes Au Gratin potatoes for our church Progressive dinner. Jumped into the truck and noticed your Advent calendars. They were sitting in the sun. I opened one December 4 door. The chocolate was melted. Ruined by the sun. I opened the second door. December 4th. This one was not melted. It had been protected by box # 1, which took the sun’s heat for the rest of the boxes, thus saving them and me. I continued opening some more December 4th doors though…just to make sure. I sped to the store to get my potatoes. I only had one hour to fix the potatoes Au Gratin at home and read the recipe more closely. Takes five hours to fix this recipe. Oh brother. Christmas and Advent and parties will wear you out. So I cut four hours out of the recipe and got the potatoes done. On time. Here are your Chocolate Calendars. Most did not melt. Only the ones at the front of the box. The lead box protected the rest. Some of your Advent calendar chocolates have been opened…December 4th has been eaten. But you still have 24 other doors to open! God goes before us in life to protect us. Three lessons from this. One, your hopes for a Chocolate box completely shaped my week. If I would do all I did this week to get you your chocolate calendars, think how much more God will do for you! You are the Hope of God in this world! You had no idea what it took for me to get these calendars, did you? We have no idea what God does for us daily until we start listening and looking around. It requires a lot to keep this world going and to create the beauty all around us. Second lesson. What I looked for all over San Antonio was very near my house. What you need most in life is very near you. What we need is not in San Antonio. What we need is here this morning, in our midst. Family, friends, church, love, acceptance. All sitting right by you. The love we look for it not out there. It is here, right by us. Right here in San Marcos. You do not have to drive 137 miles. It is right here. Here are your Chocolate Calendars. Enjoy. Have a Blessed Advent. Oh, lesson number three. Next year I will buy your Advent calendars in November, after I mail my Christmas cards out in October. Amen.