Sunday’s Readings: 2 Samuel 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16; Psalms 89:2-3, 4-5, 27, 29; Romans 16:25-27; Luke 1:26-38
…from your Pastor’s Desk
For unto us this day is born a Savior
Christ is born for us! That is the clear message of our celebration today. Christ is born— He didn’t just ‘appear’ but was born, just as we were all born. We believe that Christ, although Divine, is truly human like us in all things except sin.
Christ is born—there is no illusion in his birth, He is fully human. Christ is born—born of Mary, born of a virgin, born as a tiny baby. The eternal God, the infinite One, came in the incarnation as a tiny child.
This immense contrast between the infinity of God and the absolute fragility of a tiny baby is incredible. Why did He do it? He did it for us! Christ is born for us – to be with us! Christ takes on our humanity so that we can share in His Divinity.
We have, at one level, absolutely no idea what that might mean—except that God loves us more than we can imagine. God comes to our world to set us free from sin, but also that we might share in the Divine life. That we might begin to have eternal experiences here and now.
So – into the silence of the night came the birth of a baby who was God. Into the silence of the night came the birth of the Word. The Word of God comes as a baby who does not know how to speak at all and must learn speaking as you and I do. Incredible – isn’t it?
That is, God, Jesus, was born, grew up, and lived life just exactly as we all do- yes, as infinite, almighty God, but also as a flesh and blood human being, really and truly like us all-yet still really and truly God. How can this be? That is the mystery of the Trinity.
Do you see then what these words – “God became flesh, God is with us” – really mean? They mean that our religion must not lead us to seek God someplace outside of this world, like only in heaven, someplace outside of our human history. They mean that the Christian religion, right from the very beginning with the birth of Jesus at Christmas, specifically teaches the direct opposite-that God came into the world, that God is right here, with us, STILL in the world, in daily human history with all of its good and bad, with all of its ambiguity; that for us this is the place where we can find God.
Emmanuel-God IS with us! To me, this is the special, particular message of Christmas that, like Jesus, we must make our way by whom we are, and where we are, and when we are. That is it; that is all; that is the whole story.
And that is the kind of understanding to which Christmas calls us in these simple Scripture words; “God became flesh; God is with us”. God is here.
God knows what it is like to be like you.
God knows you.
God loves you.
God will never hurt or abandon you.
I wish you all a Blessed Christmas and a Peaceful New Year.
Fr. Ron
