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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
For several different reasons, recently I have been thinking about different circumstances under which I have passed Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, such as different people whom I have been with and different places that I have been. Your experiences may be like or unlike mine. When I was younger, my family frequently passed Christmas away from our home with relatives in the northern United States or in different campgrounds across the southern United States. When I was older, I was frequently working on the holy days and so in retail stores, at T‑V stations, in restaurants, and at churches, as now. Sometimes I was with or near family, and other-times I was thousands of miles away from family. I have passed Christmas Eve with other people’s families in their homes, and I have passed Christmas Eve alone in a motel. The year my father was in a cardiac-intensive-care unit, the whole family spent a good deal of time in the hospital, and we exchanged gifts in the lobby of the hotel across the street. Of course, neither the people whom we are with, nor the places that we are, nor even our exchanging gifts ultimately matters most. What matters most, as we hear in the Gospel Reading for this Christmas Day, is “God’s Giving and Our Receiving”.
In today’s Gospel Reading, St. John, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, gives his account of Jesus’s birth, in a sense going back even further than St. Matthew and St. Luke’s accounts, to before the creation of the world. Drawing on Old Testament descriptions of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity (for example, Proverbs 8:22-31), St. John refers to that person as “the Word”—in Greek, ὁ λόγος, as printed on the bulletin cover. The Word was already in the beginning, related to God the Father as His only Son and sharing His Divine nature. Then, when the fullness of time had come (Galatians 4:4), the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And, that Word-made-flesh is at the center of “God’s Giving and Our Receiving”.
In regards to “God’s Giving and Our Receiving”, St. John in today’s Gospel Reading first says both that the Word was in the World but the world did not know Him and that the Word came to His own and His own people did not receive Him. The fallen world does not recognize the Word and is not in a right relationship with Him. Even God’s people of Israel did not accept what was transmitted to them and were not in fellowship with Him. By nature, Jews and Gentiles alike are under sin, as Scripture says, none is righteous no one understands, no one seeks for God; all have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one (Romans 3:9-12, citing Psalm 14:1-3; 53:1-3). God’s law stops every person’s mouth and holds the whole world accountable to God (Romans 3:19), including each one of us. On our own, we are not children of God, and we do not become children of God by human blood, nor by our own will, nor by our own flesh. In spiritual and Divine things, we are in darkness and the shadow of death (Luke 1:78-79; Matthew 4:16; confer Formula of Concord, Solid Declaration II:10), but, as we heard in the Gospel Reading, the Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome the Light. Rather, the Light overcomes our darkness!
As Jesus’s word raised His friend Lazarus from the dead (John 11:43-44), so God’s Word raises us from the death of our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1, 5), empowering our turning away from our sin to God, our trusting in God to forgive our sin, and our at least wanting to do better than to keep on sinning. God sent John the Baptizer as a witness about the Light (Who alone has seen God the Father and makes Him known), that all people might repent and believe through John the Baptizer. Like the faithful watchmen mentioned in today’s Old Testament Reading (Isaiah 52:7-10), John the Baptizer called people to repent of their sin and, when they did, then he brought good news and good tidings, proclaimed peace and salvation. So also for us: when we repent of our sin and trust God to forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake, then God forgives us, our sinful natures and all of our sin.
For, St. John in today’s Gospel Reading also says that to all who did receive the Word, to those who believed in His Name, He gave the right to become children of God, children born of God. Since we children share in flesh and blood, the Word Himself partook of the same things, that through death His death on the cross He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery (Hebrews 2:14-15). The Word, as we heard in the Epistle Reading (Hebrews 1:1-12), through whom God created the World, is, after the fall, vital to the world’s re‑creation and to our redemption. Out of God’s great love for us, the Father’s only Son by the power of the Holy Spirit came down from heaven, was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and was made man, for us and for our salvation. That Son, not the Father or the Holy Spirit, that Son personally united the Divine and human natures to live the perfect life that we fail to live and to die in our place the death that we otherwise deserve. After making purification for sins, He rose again, ascended into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. Yet, He is not gone but continues to be Immanu‑el, God present with us to forgive us and to save us, as we who repent and believe receive His forgiveness through His means of grace in faith (Apology of the Augsburg Confession IV:94).
That faith is given to us, for example, through Holy Baptism, where we are born of God by water and the Spirit (John 3:5). There God adopts us as His children and we are made brothers and sisters of Christ and so also of one another. Children of God, we seek out father confessors for the sake of individual Holy Absolution of the sins that we know and feel in our hearts. And, in the Sacrament of the Altar, we feast on bread that is the Body of Christ given for us and on wine that is the Blood of Christ shed for us, for the forgiveness of our sins, for life, and for salvation. Jesus says unless we eat of the Flesh of the Word made flesh and drink His Blood, we have no life in us (John 6:53), but whoever feeds on His Flesh and drinks His blood abides in Him and He in him or her (John 6:55), and whoever feeds on His flesh and drinks His blood has eternal life and is raised up on the Last Day (John 6:54),
Al Stillman’s 19‑54 song lyrics written for Perry Como may be true, that there is no place like home for the holidays. People with whom we are and places that we pass Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and even our exchanging gifts, do matter to some extent, to be sure. But, we all are here now, and in this “Christ Mass”, if you will, we not only join with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven, but we also join with all true Christians of every time and every place, as God gives His greatest gift in and through the human nature of His Son Jesus, the Christ, and we receive in faith that gift and all the gifts that go with it. Our exchanging gifts last night or today might reflect “God’s Giving and Our Receiving”, but it is God’s giving and our receiving, especially of His Body and Blood, by which we share in His Divine life and for which we break forth together into singing for joy that the Lord has redeemed and comforted His people, including us.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +