A Radiant Presence

I welcome you to our Christmas celebration. While our magnificent church continues a massive restoration project we are gathered here in this more intimate space.  What makes this time so important for our worship is the Christmas promise of hope and joy to all the world.  It is a time for peace, respect, and an end to violence.  Our prayers and celebration this year are for peace and happiness for you and your family, and may the love of God always be with you.

"An angel of the Lord stood before [the shepherds], and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.  But the angel said to them, 'Do not be afraid; for see-- I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people.'"

Each year at Christmas we enter into the story of Jesus' birth.  It is our story, and by being here, singing those wonderful carols and hymns of praise, we enter into the events of the past as though they were happening right now.

Imagine the story of Jesus’ birth.  Mary and Joseph were ordinary simple people.  Joseph was a carpenter, a laborer married to Mary who was pregnant and about to deliver a baby.  Where was their family?  Why did they have to leave home and travel to Bethlehem to be registered?  Were they refugees?  Did they not have any friends or relatives in Bethlehem?  We don’t know the answer to these questions, only that Mary and Joseph were alone and had to find shelter for themselves.  There was no room in the inn so they were left to fend for themselves, and they found a bed of hay in a stable.  There they gave birth to a baby boy and laid him in a manger.

How incredible is this!  God chose these poor people to bear his birth in human form.  What this means is that God is not only with us, but God is known in the lives of the poorest and loneliest people everywhere.  It means that God knows and loves each person regardless of the circumstances of their life.  It is miraculous, wonderful good news.  God was and is in Christ, a baby born in a manger and named Jesus.  He grew into adulthood, became a rabbi and ministered to outcasts, tax collectors, prostitutes, and foreigners.  Later he was killed and buried, and then he rose again three days later.

What we are doing by retelling and reliving this story, as we do at Christmas every year, is to bring our Christian history into the present.  It becomes a living enactment of our human condition two thousand and fifteen years after the fact.  The story of Christ's birth is our story, and we are like the shepherds who were visited by the angel of God bringing hope and good news of great joy for all people.

This is a sacred moment that gives us a sense of peace and joy that is separate from all the usual frenetic happenings of the season.  It is a sense of God’s radiant presence in our lives. We have done our shopping, decorated our homes and places of worship, and we have planned our menus and holiday events.  We can now embrace the darkness of this night as a prelude to the new light that shines throughout our Christmas celebration.  The Prophet Isaiah said, "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness-- on them light has shined." 

We know well the darkness that surrounds us this year.  There are millions of refugees around the world, people with no home.  There are those who are hungry and malnourished, victims of gun violence, people who are unemployed, and those with little or no education.  Then, there are people living with fear and feelings of insecurity because they have lost a sense of hope.  Many of them have lost a sense of their identity. For all these people and for so many others the darkness is very real.

However, there is light that shines through the darkness.  It is God's gift of the incarnation; the Word of God becoming flesh by taking the form of a human being.  It is the incarnation of God born as an infant named Jesus who is destined to live and minister to those who exist in the dark shadows of society.  Although destined to die a torturous death on a cross of wood, after three days he rose to new life, a life of love and the promise of eternal life for all people. 

During the past several weeks we prepared for this great day.  We sang “O Come, Emmanuel,” God be with us, be part of who we are, love us and care for us and for all creation.  God is love, a love that knows no boundary, a love that transcends all and is within every living creature.

There is no better news.  The light shining through the darkness is about God's Son living as we do through the life cycle of birth, growth, maturity, death and resurrection.  As the Christmas collect says, may we "who have known the mystery of the true light on earth also enjoy him perfectly in heaven."  The take-home message is that life is precious and fragile, relationships matter, and love, compassion and justice are worth having and sharing. 

This is the story of our lives.  It is the drama of God's creation, and it is the true meaning of Christmas.  Birth, life, and death are the realities of our human experience.  They are also the realities of God.  God, acting in the birth of Jesus, bestows the promise of eternal life, and the rebirth of innocence, love, and hope for peace and justice.  It truly is "the good news of great joy for all the people."  May God's radiant presence, blessing, peace and joy be with you this Christmas and always.  Amen.