Christmas may seem like a distant memory at this point however the Church is still celebrating, and as such it's not too late to upload my sermon from Midnight Mass (that's the excuse I'm going with anyway). As usual the audio is below (which was recorded at our early morning communion service on Christmas day itself).
This sermon is based on John 1:1-14 and Hebrews 1:1-4
Glen Scrivener writes:
‘They say there’s a big man, who lives far away, supposedly jolly but it’s hard to say. I’ve never seen him and neither have you, but the children believe and I s’pose that’ll do. He’s known as a loner with many a quirk, no time for a chat he’s embroiled in His work. He keeps to Himself for most of the year, I reckon we’re grateful he doesn’t appear. We send him requests for particular needs, but we never hear back, who knows if he heeds. We try to be good, give his arm a twist, to merit our place on his blessed little list. And maybe one day, if we do what we should, he’ll give us our things just so long as we’re good. I’ve had it to here, I’m calling his bluff, he’s a weird, moralistic dispenser of stuff.’ Now, neither I nor Glen are going after Santa here, Santa is certainly odd when you think about it, but how often do we think of God like this? When you think of God are you thinking of St Nick in the sky? A big bearded man in a far away place, ‘he see’s you when you’re sleeping, he knows when you’re awake, he’s watching and waiting to catch your next mistake’. But Christmas declares no. Christmas is a cry against a Santa Claus image of God. He’s not far off waiting to smite us; He’s here in the crib. Those opening words of John’s Gospel are wonderfully poetic but a perhaps a tad confusing. This is John’s take on the Christmas story, no angels or shepherds, no Bethlehem or Mary. John skips over the local scale story told by Matthew and Luke and goes cosmic, right back to beginning. Before anything was: God. God existing as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. John here refers to the Son as the Word of God, there at the creation of all things, of light and life. But since then things have gone wrong haven’t they. We don’t have to look very hard to realise that the world as it stands now whilst still full of light and life is also full of darkness and death. And we can’t wash our hands of that, if we’re honest with ourselves, if God is like Santa, we’re all on the naughty list. We’re all getting coal in the morning. But God isn’t like Santa, God loves this world and He loves us so he comes to put things right. The Word became flesh and lived among us. God the Son surrenders the glory of heaven, steps down from the throne, leaves the place of perfect light and life and goodness and comes to earth. The all powerful creator of the universe becomes a helpless baby. The very Word of God becomes a wordless child. He empties Himself and becomes human. Look in the manger and you see the glory of God become human, God with us. He comes to put things right, as we careered towards certain destruction God didn’t stand idly by, He came and grabbed the wheel and set us back on course. Away from darkness and death and back towards light and life. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it. God comes to us to put things right, becomes vulnerable and helpless for our sake. God the Son becomes God our brother. He enters into our human life with all its hardships and challenges, with all its messiness and difficulties. And in a beautiful exchange, in becoming human, in God entering our human life, humanity can enter into the life of God. Jesus our brother invites us to become children of God. To all who receive Him, He gives power to become the adopted children of God. As we gaze upon that human family in the crib, Jesus born to Mary and Joseph, we are invited into the family of God. Which means we can stop striving to be good enough, to earn our place in heaven, to work our way onto God’s good side. Karl Barth puts it like this: ‘we have been toiling uphill, but, with the news of Christmas, of God become human, we are merrily cycling down’. We don’t have to work our way up to God, God comes down to us. Whoever we are, whatever we’ve done, God invites us into His family, not because we earned it, but because He wanted to. If you’re not sure about God this evening, is it because you’re picturing Him as a cosmic Santa? If you want to know what God is really like do what the writer to the Hebrews tells us. Look to Jesus, the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God. In Jesus we find a God who comes to us, who stoops from the glory of heaven to the messiness of the crib. Who stoops even lower at Easter to the cross, all out of love for you, all to bring you into the family of God. Oh come let us adore Him, Christ our Lord.
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AuthorAn Anglican Curate in my 20's I was raised in an Anglican Church, went to a Youth Club run by an Evangelical Church, attended a Baptist Church while at Uni and was a member of a New Monastic Community after graduating. As such my faith has been influenced by these experiences and traditions into what I hope is a more rounded viewpoint. Archives
September 2022
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