A Homily for the Sunday after Christmas

 They shall call his name Emmanuel, which, being interpreted, is "God with us."
God hath sent for the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, "Abba, Father."

 In the world around us, Christmas is over for another year. The pre-Christmas sales are over, and the after-Christmas sales have begun. The public, non-denominational seasonal decorations are coming down, and the carols are gone from the mall public address systems. The trees are on the curbs for recycling. It has been a long Christmas season this year--the first decorations were up shortly after Labor Day and were already looking frayed and stale by Thanksgiving.

   In the Church, of course, Christmas is not yet half over. Christmas for us is a twelve-day festival, and today is the sixth day of Christmas.

  In the world around us we have been bombarded, as we are every year, with sentimental talk about the "true meaning of Christmas." What have we been told? The true meaning of Christmas is being at home with family and friends; the true meaning of Christmas is knowing that we can all live together in tolerance; the true meaning of Christmas is that the message of all religions is basically the same; the true meaning of Christmas is hope, is love, is childhood; the true meaning of Christmas is peace on earth.

   In the Church, of course, we know that the true meaning of Christmas is this: the Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us.

   In the beginning, when the earth was without form and void and when darkness was on the face of the deep, God spoke: "Let there be light!" In the beginning, the Word was with God, and the Word was God. By the Word that was God, God spoke the whole universe into being. Through him all things were made; and without him was not anything made that was made.

  This is the first bit of good news: the world was not created by impersonal forces at random, or even in accordance with natural laws; but by a personal being, with a logical plan and purpose (that is, with a logos, a "word"). The infinity of space, with all its billions of stars and planets, is under control and that control is exercised by God's word.

   And the next bit of good news is this: the Creator loves and cares for his creation. To be sure, he loves and cares for all those stars and planets; but the best news is that he cares for human beings, whom he created in his own image and likeness.

   When we consider the heavens, the work of God's fingers, the moon and the stars that he ordained, what is man that God should be mindful of him, or the son of man that God should visit him? But God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten son, to the end that all who believe in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

   This word, this Son, was in the form of God, and thought it no robbery to be God's equal. But he emptied himself and took the form of a servant, becoming a human being. And for this reason God raised him on high and gave him the name that is above every name.

   In the fullness of time, God sent forth his Son, born of a human woman, a particular woman--Miriam (Mary), the wife of Yusef, of the family of David son of Jesse, of the tribe of Judah, of the nation of Israel. She brought forth her firstborn Son, and they called his name Jesus--Yahweh saves--for he saves his people from their sins; and he is also called Emmanuel--God is with us. God is with us to save us from our sins.

   And at that name--Yahweh saves, God is with us--every knee shall bow, of things in earth, and of things in heaven, and of things under the earth. In that name devils are cast out, and the ill are cured, and the dead are raised to life. In that name are we baptized, and through that name we pray.

   And for a season he walked among us. He was in our world, the world that was made thorough him, and his world knew him not. He came to us, to his own people, made in the image and likeness of God, and we, his own people, did not receive him. He was truly human: he was in every way tempted, as we are tempted, but he committed no sin. We saw him despised and rejected, a very scorn of men, cast out from among his people. And he humbled himself still further, to suffer death, a shameful death on the cross, so that lifted on that terrible tree he could draw all people to himself.

   And to all those who believe in him he gives the power to become God's children, born again by the will of God himself, to a new life with God himself in heaven. What the Word is by nature, we may become by grace through faith. God sent forth his Son to that we might all receive the adoption of sons. And to as many as believe in him he gives power to become the sons of God, even to those who call him by his name: "Yahweh saves, God is with us."

   And he sends his Spirit into our hearts to cry out to God: "Abba! Father! Papa!" With him, we, his adopted brothers and sisters, can say, in the words of the psalm: "Thou art my Father, my God, and my strong salvation."

   He it is, also, who teaches us what it means to have God for our Father. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, who makes the sun rise on the bad and good alike. Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father in heaven. Be perfect, even as your Father is perfect. Come, you who are blessed by my Father: inherit the kingdom made ready for you from the beginning of the world!

   What is man that God should be mindful of him, the children of men that God should visit them? A fragile, carbon-based life-form on the third planet out from a second-rate star, a good distance from the middle of a mediocre galaxy. And yet, because of Christmas, the children of men have the power to become the sons and daughters of God almighty, and if sons and daughters, then inheritors of the Kingdom of God and joint-inheritors with the Christ himself, the word of God incarnate.

   What, then, is the real meaning of Christmas? Christmas marks the incursion of the infinite and the eternal into the life of the mortal men, with the promise that we can have a share in the life of the eternal. Christmas means that the word spoken in the beginning, the word that was with God and was God, has become flesh and pitched his tent among us; and we call him by his name, "Yahweh saves, God is with us"; and he has sent his Spirit to us, teaching us to call God, "Papa."

   Merry Christmas!

Church of Saint Mary Magdalene
Orange, California
December 30, 2001