Year A
Isaiah 52:7-10
Psalm 98
Hebrews 1:1-4
John 1:1-14<\/p>\n\n\n\n
May the words of my mouth O God\u2026 speak your truth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the beginning was the Word\u2026 and the Word was with God… and the Word was God\u2026 and the Word became flesh and lived among us<\/em>\u2026 these words from John’s Prologue are among my favorites in scripture\u2026 because they speak to the cosmic mystery that surrounds us\u2026 they refer to that which makes little sense\u2026 they speak to square pegs that fit into round holes\u2026 to God’s realm of no-space and no-time\u2026 they’re an in-your-face challenge to the post-modern\u2026 predictable machine-works universe in which we think\u2026 we live\u2026 and believe we understand\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n But I think that the Incarnation was inescapable\u2026 because the fabric of creation is woven with forgiveness\u2026 redemption\u2026 and the persistence of life\u2026 and when covenant after covenant failed\u2026 when prophet after prophet was ignored or dismissed or killed\u2026 then God\u2026 like a mother hen who gathers her chicks under her wings\u2026 took a wiser\u2026 more direct approach\u2026 <\/p>\n\n\n\n Jewish Wisdom traditions were influenced by Greek thought\u2026 Wisdom\u2026 Sophia<\/em>\u2026 became\u2026 a personal being standing by the side of God over and against the created world… but not unconcerned with it\u2026 <\/em> and Lutheran theologian Rudolf Bultmann believed that the Prologue started out as a re-written Logos hymn\u2026 which came from a Gnostic community\u2026 which traced its origins back to John the Baptist\u2026 ] and many scholars agree that the Jewish Wisdom tradition had significant influence in the language of the Prologue\u2026 but John makes an important shift\u2026 Sophia<\/em> is a feminine noun\u2026 and is often depicted as a feminine character in Wisdom literature\u2026 and so John uses the word logos<\/em>\u2026 a masculine noun\u2026 and reshapes the wisdom tradition to reflect the specificity of gender\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n John 1:1 highlights the eternal existence of the Word with God\u2026 outside of time and space\u2026 and evokes images from Genesis about creation out of nothing\u2026 and as the Prologue unfolds\u2026 the eternal Word will not stay outside of space and time\u2026 but will enter a time-bound world\u2026 John tells us that\u2026 the Word is what God is\u2026 and the Word does what God does\u2026 that’s why Jesus said\u2026 If you have seen me, you have seen the Father… and if you know me, then you know the Father<\/em>\u2026 John’s Gospel tells us that the Incarnation\u2026 and our Christmas celebration of it\u2026 were inescapable…<\/p>\n\n\n\n We heard in last evening’s Gospel reading that the Emperor decided to register everyone\u2026 to do a census\u2026 doing a census was about counting people and knowing who lives where\u2026 about establishing boundaries and creating districts\u2026 it’s a way to figure out how much money the government will get\u2026 it’s an attempt to make things neat and tidy\u2026 to put people into boxes\u2026 even though no boxes exist in nature\u2026 but it can pit people against each other\u2026 it can create an “us and them” attitude\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the Word is not so neat and tidy\u2026 the Word will not be contained\u2026 and there can be some real discomfort when theology is too open\u2026 though wideness is a quality which is expressed in Psalm 118:5\u2026 it says\u2026 I called to God from my narrowness\u2026 and God answered me with a vast expanse<\/em>\u2026 you see\u2026 narrowness can be controlled more easily than vast expanses\u2026 but Christ came into a world of boundaries as boundlessness\u2026 and Christ comes in still\u2026 . and shatters our limited ideas\u2026 Christ comes as rebellion against our myopic outlooks\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n And though maybe only dimly\u2026 Herod understood the implications of Jesus’ birth\u2026 he could see past the surface of things\u2026 he was familiar with myth and imagination\u2026 he understood that this child would topple his and all earthly kingdoms\u2026 that’s why he killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old and younger\u2026 hoping against hope that he could hold on to the worldly things\u2026 which meant the world to him\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n To me\u2026 a myth is not a story that’s untrue\u2026 but a story that carries a deeper truth… that draws us in\u2026 as a five-year-old once said\u2026 a myth is a story that is true on the inside<\/em>\u2026 and author Thomas Moore suggested that theological imagination is one of the most underutilized and undervalued spiritual gifts\u2026 so I invite you to imagine yourself in the story of Jesus\u2019 nativity\u2026 because Jesus is not simply born to Mary\u2026 he is born to us\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Are any of us King Herod\u2026 fearful of losing power or privilege as God is doing a new thing\u2026 or an Eastern sage seeking the starlight of inspiration\u2026 or a shepherd routinely going about our business when the skies seem to open up\u2026 or a prophet crying out in the wilderness\u2026 or an empire\u2019s bureaucrat choosing to stand apart on an unfolding human drama\u2026 or one who judges a homeless unwed mother-to-be\u2026 or a vulnerable child born into a violent world\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Richard Rohr wrote\u2026 we see in the original Gospel stories of Jesus\u2019 birth\u2026 that there\u2019s really nothing pretty about the first Christmas\u2026 and sometimes\u2026 the only way human beings can understand spiritual things is that they have to be presented in physical\u2026 material form\u2026 otherwise we just can\u2019t get it\u2026 we have to see it and we have to touch it\u2026 perhaps as Thomas did\u2026 and how God comes into the world would also seem to be very important\u2026 as if to say to us\u2026 this is where God is to be found\u2026 the great question has always been… what is God\u2026 who is God\u2026 where is this God hiding\u2026 ] because initially\u2026 God isn\u2019t really obvious to most people\u2026 the mystery we celebrate today is the acknowledgement that the divine has chosen its hiding place in the world\u2026 it is hiding in all material things\u2026 and now\u2026 all of creation becomes summed up in the body of Jesus\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n And where is this infant God being revealed\u2026 not in the safe world\u2026 but at the edge\u2026 at the bottom\u2026 among those where we don\u2019t want to find God\u2026 where we don\u2019t look for God\u2026 where we don\u2019t expect God\u2026 ] the way many of us have created Christianity\u2026 it seems like it\u2019s all about being nice\u2026 pretty\u2026 middle class\u2026 normal\u2026 and under the law\u2026 ] but in the Gospel stories\u2026 Jesus\u2026 Mary\u2026 and Joseph are none of those things\u2026 so maybe we ought to be looking elsewhere\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Good News of Christmas\u2026 is that no matter who you are or what role you play\u2026 you are one of God’s beloved\u2026 just as God’s voice from heaven spoke at Jesus’ baptism\u2026 and said\u2026 This is my Son\u2026 in whom I am well pleased<\/em>\u2026 this is what God says about each one of us\u2026 no matter how hard we may try to make it untrue\u2026 no matter what tapes play in our heads… or what anyone in our lives or in the media says to the contrary\u2026 or about why we’re unworthy\u2026 we are God’s children and God could not love us more\u2026 and that’s reason enough to say Merry Christmas\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Year A Isaiah 52:7-10 Psalm 98 Hebrews 1:1-4 John 1:1-14 May the words of my mouth O God\u2026 speak your truth\u2026 In the beginning was the Word\u2026 and the Word was with God… and the Word was God\u2026 and the Word became flesh and lived among us\u2026 these words from John’s Prologue are among my favorites in scripture\u2026 because they speak to the cosmic mystery that surrounds us\u2026 they refer to that which makes little sense\u2026 they speak to square pegs that fit into round holes\u2026 to God’s realm of no-space and no-time\u2026 they’re an in-your-face challenge to the post-modern\u2026 predictable machine-works universe in which we think\u2026 we live\u2026 and believe we understand\u2026 But I think that the Incarnation was inescapable\u2026 because the fabric of creation is woven with forgiveness\u2026 redemption\u2026 and the persistence of life\u2026 and when covenant after covenant failed\u2026 when prophet after prophet was ignored or dismissed or killed\u2026 then God\u2026 like a mother hen who gathers her chicks under her wings\u2026 took a wiser\u2026 more direct approach\u2026 Jewish Wisdom traditions were influenced by Greek thought\u2026 Wisdom\u2026 Sophia\u2026 became\u2026 a personal being standing by the side of God over and against the created world… but not unconcerned with it\u2026 and Lutheran theologian Rudolf Bultmann believed that the Prologue started out as a re-written Logos hymn\u2026 which came from a Gnostic community\u2026 which traced its origins back to John the Baptist\u2026 ] and many scholars agree that the Jewish Wisdom tradition had significant influence in the language of the Prologue\u2026 but John makes an important shift\u2026 Sophia is a feminine noun\u2026 and is often depicted as a feminine character in Wisdom literature\u2026 and so John uses the word logos\u2026 a masculine noun\u2026 and reshapes the wisdom tradition to reflect the specificity of gender\u2026 John 1:1 highlights the eternal existence of the Word with God\u2026 outside of time and space\u2026 and evokes images from Genesis about creation out of nothing\u2026 and as the Prologue unfolds\u2026 the eternal Word will not stay outside of space and time\u2026 but will enter a time-bound world\u2026 John tells us that\u2026 the Word is what God is\u2026 and the Word does what God does\u2026 that’s why Jesus said\u2026 If you have seen me, you have seen the Father… and if you know me, then you know the Father\u2026 John’s Gospel tells us that the Incarnation\u2026 and our Christmas celebration of it\u2026 were inescapable… We heard in last evening’s Gospel reading that the Emperor decided to register everyone\u2026 to do a census\u2026 doing a census was about counting people and knowing who lives where\u2026 about establishing boundaries and creating districts\u2026 it’s a way to figure out how much money the government will get\u2026 it’s an attempt to make things neat and tidy\u2026 to put people into boxes\u2026 even though no boxes exist in nature\u2026 but it can pit people against each other\u2026 it can create an “us and them” attitude\u2026 But the Word is not so neat and tidy\u2026 the Word will not be contained\u2026 and there can be some real discomfort when theology is too open\u2026 though wideness is a quality which is expressed in Psalm 118:5\u2026 it says\u2026 I called to God from my narrowness\u2026 and God answered me with a vast expanse\u2026 you see\u2026 narrowness can be controlled more easily than vast expanses\u2026 but Christ came into a world of boundaries as boundlessness\u2026 and Christ comes in still\u2026 . and shatters our limited ideas\u2026 Christ comes as rebellion against our myopic outlooks\u2026 And though maybe only dimly\u2026 Herod understood the implications of Jesus’ birth\u2026 he could see past the surface of things\u2026 he was familiar with myth and imagination\u2026 he understood that this child would topple his and all earthly kingdoms\u2026 that’s why he killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old and younger\u2026 hoping against hope that he could hold on to the worldly things\u2026 which meant the world to him\u2026 To me\u2026 a myth is not a story that’s untrue\u2026 but a story that carries a deeper truth… that draws us in\u2026 as a five-year-old once said\u2026 a myth is a story that is true on the inside\u2026 and author Thomas Moore suggested that theological imagination is one of the most underutilized and undervalued spiritual gifts\u2026 so I invite you to imagine yourself in the story of Jesus\u2019 nativity\u2026 because Jesus is not simply born to Mary\u2026 he is born to us\u2026 Are any of us King Herod\u2026 fearful of losing power or privilege as God is doing a new thing\u2026 or an Eastern sage seeking the starlight of inspiration\u2026 or a shepherd routinely going about our business when the skies seem to open up\u2026 or a prophet crying out in the wilderness\u2026 or an empire\u2019s bureaucrat choosing to stand apart on an unfolding human drama\u2026 or one who judges a homeless unwed mother-to-be\u2026 or a vulnerable child born into a violent world\u2026 Richard Rohr wrote\u2026 we see in the original Gospel stories of Jesus\u2019 birth\u2026 that there\u2019s really nothing pretty about the first Christmas\u2026 and sometimes\u2026 the only way human beings can understand spiritual things is that they have to be presented in physical\u2026 material form\u2026 otherwise we just can\u2019t get it\u2026 we have to see it and we have to touch it\u2026 perhaps as Thomas did\u2026 and how God comes into the world would also seem to be very important\u2026 as if to say to us\u2026 this is where God is to be found\u2026 the great question has always been… what is God\u2026 who is God\u2026 where is this God hiding\u2026 ] because initially\u2026 God isn\u2019t really obvious to most people\u2026 the mystery we celebrate today is the acknowledgement that the divine has chosen its hiding place in the world\u2026 it is hiding in all material things\u2026 and now\u2026 all of creation becomes summed up in the body of Jesus\u2026 And where is this infant God being revealed\u2026 not in the safe world\u2026 but at the edge\u2026 at the bottom\u2026 among those where we don\u2019t want to 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