This is my friend L.Z.  His real name was Zophar but I started calling him little Zophar when we brought him home and then little Zophar became L.Z. and that’s what I called him from then on.  I have had lots of animal friends in my life, dogs and cats mostly, but L.Z. was my very best animal friend of all time.  I always said that L.Z. was part dog.  He didn’t have that haughty streak like lots of cats do.  He would come to meet me when I came in the door.  He would lie next to me for afternoon naps.  He would sit on a chair in the kitchen and watch me when I was cooking or cleaning up after a meal.  He loved to play and to get into places where he wasn’t supposed to be, doing things he wasn’t supposed to be doing.  A year ago last September I came home and found L.Z. had died while we were at work.  He seemed fine that morning so it was obviously a very sudden thing.  I was heartbroken.  So was Bruce.  So was L.Z.’s brother, Max, who had been with him for their entire lives.  Our household was very sad for several days and still today often feels empty without our good friend L.Z.
     I know that some of you are thinking that I am making too much out of the friendship I had with L.Z.  After all, you might say, he was only a cat.  An animal.  Just an animal.  And that’s okay if you truly feel that way.  Perhaps you have never been privileged to have a true friendship with an animal.  But those of you who have know that privilege

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know just what I am talking about.  While I was writing this sermon, Netta came into the office telling us that her family had just put their beloved dog, Sidney, down.  She was crying and we all cried with her.  That is what I am talking about.
    Earlier the children sang an old Christmas hymn called “The Friendly Beasts”, about the various animals who might have been close by when Jesus was born.  It’s a song that we often teach to children and they love it.  But it’s not just a children’s song.  It is a song with a deeper meaning, one that we might have never considered – but ought to consider – as we think of the Christmas story. 
     The animals have always been a part of God’s plan for His good world.  We read in the story of creation that the first thing God did on day #6 was this:
AND GOD SAID, “LET THE LAND PRODUCE LIVING CREATURES, ACCORDING TO THEIR KINDS; LIVESTOCK, CREATURES THAT MOVE ALONG THE GROUND, AND WILD ANIMALS, EACH ACCORDING TO ITS KIND.  AND IT WAS SO…AND GOD SAW THAT IT WAS GOOD.
(GENESIS 1:24-25)
After creating the animals God made human beings – you and me.  We are created differently than the animals in that we are created in the image of God.  We have been given the power to reason, to plan, to think, to act on more than simply our natural instincts.  Animals were not given these characteristics.  And so they need special care.  God took care of that  as well:

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(GOD SAID) “RULE OVER THE FISH OF THE SEA AND THE BIRDS OF THE AIR, OVER THE LIVESTOCK, OVER ALL THE EARTH, AND OVER ALL THE CREATURES THAT MOVE ALONG THE GROUND.  (GEN. 1:26)
To “rule” in this case is not to be oppressive but instead to be caring.  We have been given the task of caring for the other living things in God’s good world.  And, as some of us know very well, many animals will care for us in return, in their own special ways.
    When we speak of the animals in and around the barn on the night of Jesus’ birth, we think of them in terms of the very special gifts each one of them gave to Him.  The donkey carried Mary on his back to Bethlehem.  The cow gave her manger, the place where her food would usually be found, as a place for the baby to lay.  The sheep gave wool for a blanket to keep the baby warm through the cold night.  The camel carried the wise men to the place where Jesus was born.  The dove made soft, soothing noises to lull the baby to sleep.  The rooster crowed loudly to tell everyone around that it was morning and the beginning not only of a new day but the beginning of a new world now that the Savior had come.  Each of them gave a special gift to the Baby Jesus.  And each of them also represents the very best attributes of the spirit of Christmas.  The patient hardworking donkey, the gentle sheep, the camels who knelt to worship Jesus just as the Wise Men did, the quiet dove, the noisy rooster shouting the Good News from the rooftops.  All of them gave freely and happily of the things that they possessed.  All of them shared with the newborn Christ in whatever way they could.  All of them helped to welcome Jesus into our world.

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    But we must be careful not to try to put a big red bow on this story and think that we have it all wrapped up.  There is another side to the story, of course.  Jesus came into a world where things were not always peaceful, not always harmonious, not always
friendly.  Jesus came into a world where there were wars.  There was poverty.  There was disease and suffering of all kinds.  We might not see all that in the beauty and light of the nativity scene.  But it was there anyway.  Jesus came into a world that was a lot like our world – good and beautiful things happen, of course.  But bad and ugly things happen as well.  Jesus came into a world where the simplest of God’s creatures were welcoming and kind.  But he also came into a world where there were a lot of, yes, wild things.
    I am sure many of us have read, or had someone read to us, the book “Where the Wild Things Are”.  It has been made into a movie that is now playing around town.  It has received numerous awards from children’s book experts and publishers.   It is the story of a little boy named Max who is a little belligerent, a little difficult, a little ornery.  He gets into an argument with his mother, which culminates in her telling him that he needs to go to his room and that he won’t be having any supper.  So Max imagines himself in the land of the wild things, huge, scary-looking monsters.  And we are told that they:
ROARED THEIR TERRIBLE ROARS AND GNASHED THEIR TERRIBLY TEETH AND ROLLED THEIR TERRIBLE EYES AND SHOWED THEIR TERRIBLE CLAWS.
But Max showed them that he was not afraid of them and they declared him the most wild thing of all and made him their king.  In this movie clip, the wild-thing-in-charge,

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named Carol (and interestingly voiced by James Gandolfini, aka Tony Soprano) takes Max to meet the Wild Thing family:
VIDEO CLIP
Carol admits readily that there are some pretty , shall we say interesting, characters
in this family.  Max’s kingdom was going to be tough to rule sometimes  Because the wild things say things to hurt each other and it is obvious to us all that they are a lot like some people we have known.  Because, let’s face it, everyone is a wild thing now and then.
    The wild things were going to come after Jesus very soon after his birth.  One of them,  Herod, king of Palestine, a very powerful and frightened man,  was interested in the birth of the Messiah himself.  He was worried that this new Savior would reduce his own power.  We remember that in the story the Wise Men had come to Herod when they saw the star over Bethlehem, asking if the king knew where the baby was.  Herod did not know but he did ask one thing of the Wise Men:
“GO AND MAKE A CAREFUL SEARCH FOR THE CHILD.  AS SOON AS YOU FIND HIM, REPORT TO ME, SO THAT I TOO MAY GO AND WORSHIP HIM.”
(MATTHEW 2:8)
Herod, of course, wanted to know where the Savior was so that he could send soldiers to kill him and thus reduce what he perceived as a threat to his power.  The Wise Men did, of course, find the baby but they didn’t do as Herod asked.

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HAVING BEEN WARNED IN A DREAM NOT TO GO BACK TO HEROD, THEY RETURNED TO THEIR COUNTRY BY ANOTHER ROUTE.  (MATTH. 2:12)
The power of God protected the baby Jesus through the dreams of the Wise Men.  The Wild Things were already after Jesus.
     Jesus came into a world full of  wild things.  The poverty, the people with evil intentions, the oppression of the weak, the religious leaders who would use their power to make life miserable for others and who would, eventually, bring about the death of this baby in the manger when he grew to be an adult.  Jesus stood up to the Wild Things and let them know that he was not afraid of them.  He looked them right in the eye.  And when he did many people who saw this proclaimed him Messiah, Savior, King.  The Wild Things would not triumph over Jesus.
    And the message of Advent and Christmas is that the Wild Things will not have the last word.  There will come a day when God’s world will be a place of unbelievable peace and love.  The prophet Isaiah speaks of such a day when he says”
THE WOLF WILL LIVE WITH THE LAMB, THE LEOPARD WILL LIE DOWN WITH THE GOAT, THE CALF AND THE LION AND THE YEARLING TOGETHER, AND A LITTLE CHILD WILL LEAD THEM.  THE COW WILL FEED WITH THE BEAR, THEIR YOUNG WILL LIE DOWN TOGETHER, AND THE LION WILL EAT STRAW LIKE THE OX.  THE INFANT WILL PLAY NEAR THE HOLE OF THE COBRA, AND THE YOUNG CHILD UT HIS HAND INTO THE VIPER’S NEST.  THEY WILL NEITHER HARM NOR DESTROY ON MY HOLY

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MOUNTAIN, FOR THE EARTH WILL BE FULL OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE LORD AS THE WATERS COVER THE SEA.  (ISAIAH 11:6-9)
Edward Hicks, a Quaker farmer and artist living in the late 1700’s used these words of Isaiah as inspiration for his well-known painting “The Peaceable Kingdom”.  Here
we see the beauty of a world where all God’s creatures live together in harmony and peace.  This is the vision of Isaiah and it is the hope of all Christians for the future.
    Jesus was literally born where the wild things are, surrounded in a barn or cave by the animals who make those kinds of places their dwellings.  Jesus was also born into a world where many, many wild things lived – people who had totally misunderstood God’s will for them, people who needed a Savior so they could really learn about God and who God truly is.  That little child who would lead the wild things was Jesus and he is still changing a world of wild things into a world of peace, through those of us who call ourselves Christians and who strive every day to live according to his teachings.  Moving into a future that we pray will be a time of peace for all of creation.  For now, however, we wait for the fulfillment of God’s promise.  We wait.
    L.Z.’s brother is named Max.  Max will be 15 years old this coming March.  He seems to have adjusted to the loss of his lifelong companion and appears to be content with just Bruce and me (mostly Bruce).   He is a good and faithful friend to both of us.  He lies between us while we watch television in the evenings.  Sometimes we go upstairs to get something to eat or drink.  Max does not come upstairs with us but sits like this at the

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bottom of the stairs, waiting for us.  He will sit like that until both of us are back downstairs and settled on the couch.  Then he comes and sits once again between us.
His waiting is over and his people have returned to him. 
    I have placed the animals in the nativity set now.  They, like the people there and like us, are waiting, waiting for Jesus to come again into the world of wild things.  He will bring us hope.  He will bring us peace.  And he will bring us love.