Christmas Hope

A Sermon preached on Christmas Day December 25, 2020 at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden

Isaiah 52:7-10, Hebrews 1:1-4, John 1:1-14

Robert Vukovic preached at our Christmas Eve services yesterday and he was determined to get the traditional Christmas story readings from Luke, so I ended up with the other option, John 1, for today’s service. Robert preached an excellent sermon about the shepherds …. and there are no shepherds in John 1. In fact, there is no stable, there are no kings, there is no star, and no heavenly chorus either. It is a much more abstract reading, and not suited at all to pageants or creche scenes. But it might actually be a more appropriate Christmas Gospel for this year, for this “COVID-Christmas!” After all, we would not all be allowed into the stable because of the 5-person limit, the shepherds would have been at home due the curfew, and the kings or wise men wouldn’t have been able to travel due to COVID restrictions.

But that is not quite what I was thinking of. John does not recount the story of the birth of Jesus, instead he draws our attention to who Jesus is and what he came to do. And that is perhaps even more important at this time, even more reassuring, even more hopeful than how Jesus came into the world. Who is Jesus according to John? Jesus is God’s creative word. Jesus is the true light. Jesus is the incarnate Word.

The first thing we learn is that Jesus is God’s creative word and was with God before Creation. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) Through the Word all things were created and without his activity, not a thing can exist. This takes us back to the first creation story in Genesis, “God said” and with that divine word everything came into being: light, the earth, plants and animals, finally human beings. In a time when part of nature seems to be working against us with this virus, this is a vital reminder that God is behind all of creation, however broken it may seem – and however broken we make it. Creation is full of things that can and do harm us – not by intention but as part of their own cycle of growth and survival and as a result of change and mutation, often as reaction to other changes. Creation, as God set it in motion, is not static, not unchanging. It is as free to develop as we are free to develop and choose. But if God is behind creation, we can still be sure that love is its ultimate purpose just as love was the motivation and in the Word, the Son, in Jesus, love the very means by which we were made.

John the Baptist, sent from God, to testify to the light is like a first ray of light shining in the darkness. But John “was not the light … [because] the true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.” (John 1:8) Who or what is the true light? Well, according to theologian and former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the “Son radiates and reflects the unimaginable beauty and light of the source from which he comes.” The Son brings God’s light into the world. There’s a lovely line about this light in the carol ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’: “Yet in the dark streets shineth the everlasting light, the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”

We sure do need light; we need this Christmas to be a celebration of light. For those of us living in the northern hemisphere it is the darkest time of the year. For the whole world right now what it is dark like the “the midnights of our souls, our lives, our loves, our griefs and our fears,”[1] as we face an invisible enemy and for many a lonely or lonelier Christmas celebration than before. John 1 reminds us that at this time God sent and sends us the light of hope, the light shining in the darkness of the world, It is a light to whom we can bring our fears, and in faith and light our fears will be turned into hopes.[2]

For us as Christians, word and light are not abstract principles, they are a person: the incarnate word or as I always say in the prayer I use before I begin my sermon, the living word. “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)

God became human, became one of God’s creatures us in Jesus of Nazareth. God lived among us - literally made his dwelling or set up his tent among us – to share and change our lives so that we might fulfil the promise given at creation – that we were made in God’s image. Look, John says, if you want to know what that means and who God is, just look here, look at Jesus. The author of Hebrews calls him “the reflection of God's glory and the exact imprint of God's very being” (Hebrews 1:3)

Here is God’s grace in a person – God’s gift to us who goes on to give himself for us. Here is God’s truth in a person – “God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.” (1 John 4:9) Here is God’s glory in a person – importance, greatness, honour, splendour, and power are lived out and demonstrated in poverty, sacrifice, and service, and not by a life of material wealth or worldly power and privilege.

The great promise of the prologue to John’s Gospel is that the event we celebrate at Christmas, Jesus’ birth, was not just some singular event in history, not just something that happened just over 2,000 years ago. The Gospel tells us that as the creative word, Jesus was at the creation of the universe, it tells us that Jesus came into the world to bring light and life 2,000 years ago, and it tells us that Jesus is here with us today. Through the Incarnation God said, “I am with you always.” Or in the rather more poetic language that the Apostle Paul uses in his Letter to the Romans: “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39) That is the hope and reassurance of Christmas – in all its versions.

Amen.

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[1] At Home in Advent, Gordon Giles, p. 84-85

[2] Ibid

Mary did you know?

 

A Sermon preached on Advent IV Sunday December 20, 2020 at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden and St. Christoph, Mainz

2 Samuel 7:1-11, 16, Romans 16:25-27, Luke 1:26-38

There’s a Christmas song – though one we don’t sing here at St. Augustine’s – called “Mary did you know” that causes controversy every year, around this time. Here are the lyrics:

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would one day walk on water?

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would save our sons and daughters?

Did you know that your baby boy has come to make you new?

This child that you've delivered, will soon deliver you

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would give sight to a blind man?

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would calm the storm with his hand?

Did you know that your baby boy has walked where angels trod?

When you kiss your little baby you kiss the face of God

Mary, did you know that your baby boy is lord of all creation?

Mary, did you know that your baby boy would one day rule the nations?

Did you know that your baby boy is heavens perfect lamb?

That sleeping child you're holding is the great I am

Why is this song controversial? Oddly two groups you would not normally connect have a problem with the text: Feminists consider this to be a classical example of “mansplaining.” A man – the songwriter – claiming to know more than a woman – Mary – the one who actually experienced this all, who went through Jesus’ birth, brought him up, saw him die, and then return. And Catholics – both Roman and Anglo - who have a problem with the “Mariology” of this song as it contradicts the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, which states that the Virgin Mary has been free of original sin from the moment of her conception – so she would not need to be delivered (from sin) or made new. As one Catholic critic writes: “But if Mary is a sinner in need of a saviour, then she cannot be the worthy vessel in whom the All-Holy God takes on human nature as the Word-Made-Flesh.”

Are the critics right? Well, I certainly find the song very condescending towards Mary. It makes her sound very naïve and innocent. I think she knew quite a lot. What did she know? Let’s have a look at the scriptural witness, especially the passage we heard today: The Annunciation from Luke’s Gospel.

Mary knew that the son she would bear would be named Jesus, which means “God saves”: The angel said to her, “….. you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.” (Luke 1:31) Mary knew that this Jesus was the Son of God, the Son of the Most High: “He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, ….. he will be called Son of God.” (Luke 1:32, 35) Mary knew that his reign and rule would never end: “He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” (Luke 1:33) And Mary, more than anyone, knew that her pregnancy was special - a result of the Holy Spirit and the power of the Most High.

She did not know the detail of all the miracles that were to come, but she knew her son would be holy and would have great power from God. We see this absolute trust in his power in John’s Gospel, at the wedding in Cana, when she tells the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” She doesn’t know what Jesus will do, just that he can. And although she did not know how or when her son would die, she knew – from Simeon when he blessed Jesus in the Temple – that pain and suffering would be part of his life and that suffering would be part of her own vocation and ministry as the mother of Jesus: ‘This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed—and a sword will pierce your own soul too.’ (Luke 2:34-35)

So, did Mary know? Yes, she did, not every aspect, not every event, not every episode, but she knew and heard and reflected on the fact that she was being invited to play a huge role in the salvation of humanity and all of creation. Sure, God wants complete trust. And God cannot tell those who are called everything that will happen – much of it depends on the reaction of other human beings and their free will. But God also does not leave those God calls in the dark. God told Moses what he was supposed to do – go to pharaoh and tell him to let God’s people go. That’s why Moses was a bit reluctant at first – why me? Today’s Gospel places Mary in that long line of people – not just prophets and priests - who were called by God, directly or through a messenger, an angel. And all of them - Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Samuel, Isaiah – after hearing what God wanted responded with the words: “Here am I.” Just like Mary: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word,”

What about the “catholic problem”? Does this song make Mary too ordinary? The Immaculate Conception is not an Anglican doctrine, but we still agree with our RC sisters and brothers that Mary was special, chosen, and blessed. One of the results of the ongoing dialogue between Anglicans and Roman Catholics (called the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission or ARCIC) is a document called “Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ,” that identified many more areas in which we agree about Mary, than where we differ. Luke’s narrative of the annunciation portrays Mary, ARCIC says, as uniquely the recipient of election and grace. ARCIC also argues that the Magnificat is the scriptural basis for an appropriate devotion to Mary, since according to that canticle – which we will hear later in the hymn version “Tell out my soul” – all generations will call her ‘blessed.’ “Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.” (Luke 1:48-49)

So yes, the song “Mary did you know” ignores just how special and how unique Mary is. She did not need the cross to be saved. She was blessed by virtue of her election for this role as the bearer of God, or theotokos to use the Greek name. But it is also important not to make her too special or to negate her humanity. Mary’s calling was the greatest, but as I said she still stands in a long line of people called by God. Mary’s humanity is important for two reasons. One is the incarnation, God becoming human. Jesus’s divinity is from God, his humanity comes from Mary and if we negate her humanity and set her too far above us, we negate Christ’s humanity too and that is the basis of our salvation. That Christ became like us, took on human form, so that we might become like him. The incarnation is God’s personal and personified yes to creation and to God’s creatures.

Secondly, Mary is supposed to be a template for us all, a model believer. And a “superhuman” cannot be a model. Coming back to the dialogue between Anglicans and Roman Catholics, Mary forms a template because, “The pattern of hope and grace already foreshadowed in Mary will be fulfilled in the new creation in Christ when all the redeemed will participate in the full glory of the Lord.” Mary is unique and Mary is part of an ongoing pattern: God’s plan always involves using ordinary people to bring about extraordinary changes, people – like a young Jewish girl from an obscure village – whom no one would expect to respond so favourably to God’s revelation. In the Gospels she is followed by many other unexpected witnesses and disciples: Lepers, beggars, tax collectors, Romans, Episcopalians  …..

And while Mary’s call to be the Theotokos—the God-bearer—was indeed unlike any other in all creation, are we not all now called to be God bearers? In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul writes “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore, glorify God in your body.” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20) Our first reading from Samuel reminds us that God wants to be among God’s people, not living in a house but in us, in our hearts. And not for ourselves. Just like Mary we know who Jesus is. And like Mary, we are sent to bring Jesus, to bring the Word of God, to bring the Good News into a world that needs it. And like Mary let us respond to God’s call, knowingly and faithfully with the words: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

Amen.