Thursday 3 January 2019

Sunday in Octave of Christmas 30 Dec 2018 Sermon


Sunday in Octave of Christmas 30.12.18 The Incarnation

We unfold the Christmas mystery. The word was made flesh and dwelt among us.

We try to deepen our understanding of this mystery.

If we had been born before Christ became man, and someone said this is going to happen – that God will become man, we would probably have ridiculed the idea. Gods do not do that sort of thing.

But the real God did do exactly that. And then would die for us.

Some say that God is unfeeling and cruel, but look what He has done. He made us out of nothing to  share in His infinite glory; and in doing that is giving us a privilege beyond anything we could possibly deserve, or even dream of asking for.

We would have been happy just with ‘give us our daily bread’, and then leave us alone – like contented slaves or employees.

That He would come down that far, and dwell with us, to teach us what we can be, what we are called to be; to help us to do that by His grace and mercy, to inspire us with vision far beyond the everyday, the mundane. All this He has done.

We walk about in a world where God has become one of us. This is such a dramatic claim in itself; it takes a lot of absorbing.

But also amazing is that most of the human race either does not believe that truth, or does not think it is important.

People anxious not to know the truth have regressed into pre-Christian beliefs: there is some sort of deity out there somewhere, about whom we can know almost nothing.

They completely ignore that the same God has come all the way in from ‘out there’, has taught and showed us, and done all these things that have been recorded.

So how can we say we don’t know anything about Him? We have much information, which we can draw on anytime.

When we suffer – which is the most challenging time – we can make contact with Him, calling on His grace to help us cope, and overcome. We may not understand why He permits certain sufferings, but we come to trust Him for His own sake. This is Someone who has joined Himself to my nature. He must be interested in what happens to me. I cannot think He is unfeeling.

We go about our daily tasks, and we might look the same as the unbelievers as far as appearance goes, but we are lit up by an interior joy that all of this does lead somewhere.

We are not just like insects following each other until we fall over dead.

We are called to so much more than that, to eternal life, to be better, to respond to God and give Him that infinite yearning we have within us; and really be lifted up out of ourselves as the flesh shares in the Word.

Being human we have a choice which way we look – up or down. Towards Christ or away from Him – that is the question.

He came to His own and they knew him not. We will rewrite that part of history. We shall know Him.

We never think that God can be tied down to our definitions. We let Him lift us to His world rather than try to fit Him into our world.

The Word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us. Come, let us adore Him.

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