Homily for the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Our Lord

Wednesday, 2 February 2011, saw not only the fruits of a severe winter storm complete with freezing rain, sleet, and snow (affectionately called "snowmaggedon" or "snowpocalypse"), but it also gave us the privilege of celebrating the feast of The Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Our Lord. Nine of us, including the Kantor and the Pastor, braved the elements and gathered to celebrate our Lord's presentation in the temple forty days after His nativity. The homily, "Great Promises in a Small Package," focused on Simeon holding the Infant Savior, his now immortal song, and what it all means for us in the Lord's Church.

Click this link (or the title link), download the audio file, and listen to "Great Promises in a Small Package."

Homilies-Long Overdue

I must apologize to all followers and regular readers for not posting in such a long time. I especially apologize to any and all who may listen to my homilies as posted here on this blog. But now, at long last, I'm finally getting caught up. So here are links to several homilies spanning from Advent through Christmas and now into the Epiphany season.

As usual, just click on the title (the link) for each homily listed below, download the audio file, and listen away.

Fourth Sunday in Advent (12/19/2010)
Text: Luke 1:39-56
Title: "Mercy Magnified"

The Nativity of our Lord, Christmas Eve (12/24/2010)
Text: Matthew 1:18-25
Title: "How to Receive the Infant Savior"

The Nativity of our Lord, Christmas Midnight (12/24/2010)
Text: Luke 2:1-20
Title: "Yes, Our God IS Small!"

St. Stephen, Martyr (12/26/2010)
Text: Acts 6:8-7:2a, 51-60
Title: "Merry Martyrdom!"








The Epiphany of our Lord (1/6/2011)
Text: Matthew 2:1-12
Title: "True Light Shining For You!"

Second Sunday after Epiphany (1/16/2011)
Text: John 2:1-11
Title: "God's Will for Empty Vessels"

Christmas Beagles

When the RAsburry household celebrated Christmas on 21 December (yes, a few days early, due to other plans for Christmas Eve & Day this year), the whole family got involved. Yes, the *whole* family, including our "Christmas Beagles."

Here Porthos and Gimli sport their Christmas collars, which they received as gifts last year. (It kind of looks like Porthos over did it on the rum-spiked eggnog and needed the couch to hold him up, but I assure you, that was not the case, at least for Porthos. :-)


Here our "Christmas Beagles" considered playing "Santa Claus" to hand out the presents, and thus take the job away from Son RAsburry, our traditional "Santa Claus." (They're lying down because they were getting impatient from all the pictures being taken while they waited for the treats that I was holding to keep them in place.)


Each of our "Christmas Beagles" even got to open a present - a pair of chew curls each, one (chew curl, that is) basted in chicken and the other basted in beef. It was great fun to watch each of them tear into their present. Yes, the chew curls were placed in boxes and wrapped with care using old Christmas wrapping paper that we didn't mind being torn to shreds. But what was even funnier was watching how Porthos wanted a) to guard his chew curl from Gimli, who was really too preoccupied with his own chew curl, and b) to hide his chew curl for safe keeping (a future snack?) under his bed cushion, behind the couch, or even under the Christmas tree. At first, he spent more time dashing around looking for a safe place to chew than he did actually chewing the darn thing.

Here's one of Porthos' ideas for securing and chewing on his curl. He wormed his way under the couch cover at the back of the couch, then squirmed to the right arm under the white pillow, and finally settled into his "chewing position" on the floor, wrapped up snuggly and securely inside the couch cover. (This picture is from today, but Son RAsburry caught him doing the same thing right after opening his present yesterday.)


And here is the wide shot to see just how safe - and "far" - Porthos got from Gimli.


And when Gimli took a break from chewing to look back and see what Porthos was doing, Porthos dutifully growled as if to say, "Don't even think about it, pal!" But Gimli, the ever-dominant sibling, just went on chewing his own curl (and no doubt thinking, "What on earth is that nut of a brother doing under that couch cover?")

"The Smallness of God"

Here's a great post from fatherstephen over at Glory to God for All Things on "The Smallness of God." He calls it "an annual December posting," and I can certainly see why it's a post worth pondering year after year. It also dovetails nicely with my previous post on the antiphon "O Wisdom."

Whom have we, Lord, like you -

The Great One who became small, the Wakeful who slept,

The Pure One who was baptized, the Living One who died,

The King who abased himself to ensure honor for all.

Blessed is your honor!

St. Ephrem the Syrian

We draw near to the Feast of our Lord’s Nativity, and I cannot fathom the smallness of God. Things in my life loom so large and every instinct says to overcome the size of a threat by meeting it with a larger threat. But the weakness of God, stronger than death, meets our human life/death by becoming a child - the smallest of us all - man at his weakest - utterly dependent.

And His teaching will never turn away from that reality for a moment. Our greeting of His mission among us is marked by misunderstanding, betrayal, denial and murder. But He greets us with forgiveness, love, and the sacrifice of self.

This way of His is more than a rescue mission mounted to straighten out what we had made crooked. His coming among us is not only action but also revelation. He does not become unlike Himself in order to make us like Him. The weakness, the smallness, the forgiveness - all that we see in His incarnation - is a revelation of the Truth of God. He became the image of Himself, that we might become the image we were created to be.

It seems strange to speak of God as humble, and yet this is what is revealed in Scripture. Cultural references to God are full of power and mankind’s own claim to wisdom that somehow the all-powerful God has not straightened things out yet. On this basis some will even come to reject the very existence of God. The power of God is nothing like our power. Though He created all that is, He did so out of nothing. This bears no resemblance to anything we think of when we “create.” And He who created is also He who sustains, and yet in His humility we cannot directly see His sustenance, unless He has given us eyes to see.

The all-powerful reveals Himself in His weakness, and not, I suspect, because it was a “backdoor” plan. Rather I believe the all-powerful revealed Himself most fully, most completely on the Cross because this is indeed what the power of God looks like. I do not know how to fathom the reality that the power that can only be seen in the Cross of Christ, is the same power that created the universe, but I believe it is so.

We never know fullness, until we empty ourselves into His emptiness. We never know love until we are drowned in the waters of His mercy that do not kill but make alive. We cannot see the great until we see Him very small. He who enters the womb of a Virgin will also enter the waters of Jordan, and will also enter infinitessimally small spaces of hades’ yawning gape. And there we shall see greatness indeed, He who is everywhere present and fillest all things.

Fatherly Wisdom-Christ's Birth, Our Birth

From Leo the Great, Bishop of Rome [461]:

"The state of infancy which the Son of God did not find unworthy of his majesty gave way to the state of manhood with the passing of time and, once the triumph of his passion and resurrection had been accomplished, all the actions of humility undertaken for us came to an end. Nevertheless, in adoring the birth of our Savior, we find that we are celebrating the commencement of our own life. For the birth of Christ is the source of life for the Christian people, and the birthday of the Head is the birthday of the body" (Sermon 6 for Christmas; cited from Wright, Readings for the Daily Office from the Early Church, p. 20).

Fatherly Wisdom-Why Christ Came

As we prepare to celebrate the Incarnation and Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, this little bit from Bernard of Clairvaux goes to the heart of the celebration:

"See," says the Prophet, "the name of the Lord coming from afar." Who could doubt it? Something tremendous was needed in the beginning if the majesty of God was to deign to come down from such a distance, for a sojourn so unworthy of it.

There was, indeed, something tremendous about it; great mercy, immense compassion, abundant charity. For what purpose do we believe Christ came? We shall find it without difficulty, since his words and his acts clearly reveal to us the reason for his coming.

It is to search for the hundredth lost sheep that he came down in all haste from the mountains. He came because of us, so that the mercies of the Lord might be revealed with greater clarity, and his wonderful works for humankind. What amazing condescension on the part of God, who searches for us, and what great dignity bestowed on the one thus sought!

If we want to glory in it, we can quite reasonably do so, not because we can be anything in ourselves, but because he who created us has made us of such great worth. Indeed, all the riches and glory of this world, and all that one could wish for in it, is a very small thing and even nothing, in comparison with this glory. "What are we that you make much of us, or pay us any heed?"

But then again, I should like to know why he determined to come among us himself and why it was not, rather, we who went to him. For it is our benefit which is concerned. And, what is more, it is not the custom of the rich to go to the poor, even if it is their intention to do something for them.

It was, therefore, really our responsibility to go to Jesus: but a double obstacle prevented it. For our eyes were blind, and he dwells in inaccessible light. We were lying paralyzed on our pallet, incapable of reaching the greatness of God.

That is why, in his immense goodness, our Savior, the doctor of our souls, came down from his great height and tempered for our sick eyes the dazzling brightness of his glory. He clothed himself, as it were, with a lantern, with that luminous body, I mean, free from every stain, which he put on.

There we see that swift and brilliant cloud on which, the Prophet had foretold, he would ride to come down to Egypt. (Sermon 1 for Advent 7-8; cited from Wright, Readings for the Daily Office from the Early Church, p. 18-19)

Twelve Days Medley

And while we're "YouTubing" it, here's an a cappella group called "Straight No Chaser" giving their rendition of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." Actually, I'd call it "Twelve Days Medley" and not only does it show some pretty talented singing, but it also gives a few laughs. (HT: Daughter RAsburry for showing this to us at the breakfast table this morning--using my iPhone, that is; no we don't have a computer sitting at the breakfast table.)

Fatherly Wisdom: Reversing & Reclaiming Eden

In St. Louis one often sees billboard signs advertising some business that will buy old, ugly, run-down homes in order to renovate them and then, presumably, to resell them for a good profit. One such billboard even says, "Ug buys ugly houses," with "Ug" being the cute, furry, "Cousin It" type of a mascot (or at least ad gimmick) for that particular business. Reclaiming old homes in order to renovate them must be good business in older cities with run down areas, and it certainly has the benefit of bringing beauty out of ugliness.

Such an act of reclamation aptly illustrates the great truth we celebrate on Christmas. As we prepare for Christmas (yes, it's still Advent; yes, we're still preparing; save the real celebrating for "ChristMass" and its Twelve Days!), we prepare to celebrate not just a heartwarmingly familiar story of a cute little baby. Nor do we gather on Christmas Eve/Day merely to sing our good ol' favorite Christmas songs with family and friends. While such hearing and singing is certainly meet, right and salutary, Christmas gives us so much more. It gives us God's very own "reclamation project" for all of humanity and all of creation.

Our Lord Jesus Christ took on our human flesh and blood, bones and organs, reason and senses--became incarnate--in order to reverse the grave tragedy we know as the Fall into sin and death in the Garden of Eden (see Genesis 3). Our Lord's Incarnation had a particular purpose: to reverse the effects of the Fall in Eden and to reclaim us and His whole creation and bring us back to life with Him. Now that's something to hear, treasure, and sing about!

Here's St. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons (ca. 202) on how our Lord's coming in the flesh both reverses and reclaims (my words) Eden, that is, God's creation and us, the crown of His creation (and I love the various connections and parallels):

The Lord, coming into his own creation in visible form, was sustained by his own creation which he himself sustains in being. His obedience on the tree of the cross reversed the disobedience at the tree in Eden; the good news of the truth announced by an angel to Mary, a virgin subject to a husband, undid the evil lie that seduced Eve, a virgin espoused to a husband.

As Eve was seduced by the word of an angel and so fled from God after disobeying his word, Mary in her turn was given the good news by the word of an angel, and bore God in obedience to his word. As Eve was seduced into disobedience to God, so Mary was persuaded into obedience to God; thus the Virgin Mary became the advocate of the virgin Eve.

Christ gathered all things into one, by gathering them into himself. He declared war against our enemy, crushed and trampled on the head of the one who at the beginning had taken us captive in Adam, in accordance with God’s words to the serpent in Genesis: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed.”

The one lying in wait for the serpent’s head is the one who was born in the likeness of Adam from the Virgin. This is the seed spoken of by Paul in the letter to the Galatians: “The law of works was in force until the seed should come to whom the promise was made.” He shows this even more clearly in the same letter when he says: “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman.” The enemy would not have been defeated fairly if the vanquisher had not been born of a woman, because it was through a woman that the enemy had gained mastery over humanity in the beginning, and set himself up as the adversary.

That is why the Lord proclaims himself the Son of Man, the one who renews in himself that first person from whom the human race was formed; as by one person’s defeat our race fell into the bondage of death, so by another’s victory we were to rise again to life.

(Irenaeus of Lyon, Against Heresies, 5, 19, 1; 20, 2; 21, 1; SC 153, 248-250, 260-264, as cited in J. Robert Wright, Readings for the Daily Office from the Early Church, p. 11-12.)

The Visitation

Last week, on June 24, we celebrated a little "Advent in June" with the Nativity of John the Baptist. Today we who use the historic One-Year Series from LSB celebrate some "Advent in July" with the Visitation. (Those who use the LSB Three-Year Series celebrated this festival on May 31.)

In the Visitation we hear the account of the Virgin Mary going to visit her relative Elizabeth. Elizabeth is six months pregnant with John the Baptist, and Mary has just been given the miraculous conception of the Word of God, the eternal Son of God, in her womb. But the visitation that truly captures our attention and elicits our praise, along with that of Mary and Elizabeth, is that God Himself comes to visit us in the flesh.

Readings
Isaiah 11:1-5
The Prophet Isaiah proclaimed the coming of our visiting Lord and Savior as "a shoot from the stump of Jesse." The Holy Spirit would rest on Him, thus showing Him to be the very embodiment of God's "wisdom and understanding," "counsel and might," "knowledge and the fear of the LORD." We discover all of this in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh in the womb of the humble Virgin. The Savior who comes to visit us brings righteousness, that is, righteousness as the gift of God's forgiveness and the vindication of being set free from sin, death, and the devil. Thus this "shoot from the stump of Jesse" would "judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth." How blessed we are that our Savior comes to visit!

Romans 12:9-16
When our Savior comes to visit us in our flesh and blood, He comes to reunite and restore us to life with our holy, Triune God, the very life we had before Adam and Eve's fall into sin and death. Thus today's Epistle reading draws our attention to our true humanity, what it should look like and how it is meant to be lived. "Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor." Certainly the Virgin Mother of God displayed these qualities and lived these virtues in her lowly state, but our Lord Jesus showed them perfectly and supremely. While Mary is certainly a good example of faithfully receiving the great things that God did for her, her Son both shows us how to "rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer," and He freely gives such gifts to us through His atoning death and resurrection and in the work and life of His Church. Since He has come to visit us in great humility by taking on our flesh and by dying and rising for us, we too can "rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep." We also can live and love in our recreated humanity and "live in harmony with one another," striving not to be haughty but rather to associate with the lowly and shunning conceit. This is the life that our visiting Lord embodies and gives for us.

Luke 1:39-56
Today's Gospel gives us the account of Mary coming to visit Elizabeth. However, the greater visitation happens between those who are unseen at this time: John and Jesus each in their mother's wombs. When Jesus enters the house, residing in Mary's womb, John, in his mother's womb, leaps for joy. His Savior, as well as the Savior of his parents and of the Virgin herself, has come to visit. Then Mary sings her magnificent song of praise, lauding God Himself, extolling His deeds for her and the rest of humanity, and teaching us how to receive God's good things no matter how lowly our estate. Mary serves as our great example for how to receive our God who comes to visit us in the flesh--in the flesh of His Incarnation and "in the flesh" of His Body the Church, especially as He comes in His Body and Blood on the Altar. Luther said it well in 1521: "Therefore god lets us remain poor and hapless, because we cannot leave His tender gifts undefiled or keep an even mind, but let our spirits rise or fall according to how He gives or takes away His gifts. But Mary's heart remains the same at all times: she lets God have His will with her and draws from it all only a good comfort, joy and trust in God. Thus we too should do; that would be to sing a right Magnificat" (The Magnificat, 1521; cited in For All the Saints, III:1307).

When our Savior comes to visit in His flesh and blood then, in Mary's womb, and in His Body and Blood now, at the Eucharist, we rejoice greatly, because He restores us to life with God by working His justice over our sin and death and over our enemy the devil. Thus we sing as Mary teaches us: "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior."

Fatherly Wisdom-Honoring John the Baptist

Bede (The Venerable) (673-735) gives this explanation for celebrating the Nativity of John the Baptist:

Quite rightly does the universal Church, which celebrates the many triumphs by which the holy martyrs gained entry into heaven, honor also the birth of Saint John the Baptist and his alone, apart from that of our Lord. We may be certain that this custom did not arise without the support of the gospel. On the contrary, we should treasure in our hearts the fact that as an angel appeared to the shepherds when our Lord was born and said: Behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day a savior, who is Christ the Lord, so also an angel told Zechariah that John would be born, adding: You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great before the Lord. With good reason is the birth of each celebrated with joy and devotion, but in the one case joy is proclaimed to all peoples at the birth of Christ the Lord, the Savior of the world, the Son of almighty God, the Sun of Righteousness, while in the other case it is recounted that many will rejoice at the appearance of the Lord's forerunner, his mighty servant, a blazing and radiant lamp.

John went ahead in the spirit and power of Elijah to teach the Lord's people to be perfect, baptizing them with water so that they would be able to accept Christ when he appeared. Christ came after John in the spirit and power of God the Father to make it possible for them to be perfect, baptizing them with the Holy Spirit and with fire so that they would be able to see the face of the Father (Homily II, 20; quoted in For All the Saints, vol. 4, p. 1314, emphasis original).

Nativity of John the Baptist

Today the Church celebrates the Nativity of John the Baptist and gives thanks to God for His forerunner who announced the coming of the Coming One, our Lord Jesus Christ. Based on Luke 1:36, we know that John was six months older than Jesus. Thus we celebrate John's birth on this day, six months prior to Christmas. Today's feast, then, properly begins to prepare us for the coming celebration of our Lord's Incarnation and Birth--a subtle six-month Advent season, if you will.

Not only does the Church calendar begin to prepare us for our Lord's Incarnation and Birth, but the cosmos also joins in proclaiming the relationship between John and Jesus. As others have noted, the feast of John's birth comes at the beginning of summer, just after 21 June, when the amount of the day's light is at its peak. From this point on the daylight will decrease each day until the winter solstice on 21 December. However, come winter and the time when we celebrate our Lord's Nativity, the light will again begin to increase with each day. What a marvelous cosmological tool to echo John's own words: "He must increase, but I must decrease" (Jn. 3:30). It also reminds us that our true light is not John, but Jesus Christ, the Light of the world.

Lutheran Service Book appoints Isaiah 40:1-5 as today's Old Testament reading. John, of course, fulfills the prophecy of a voice crying, "In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God." It was most fitting that our Lord would send His forerunner ahead of Him to prepare people, because our Lord Jesus would bring the truly life-saving and life-giving message: "Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the LORD's hand double for all her sins." John was given the honorable vocation of directing the people's attention to the Christ who would bring such comfort.

Acts 13:13-26 serves as the Epistle reading. While in Pisidian Antioch St. Paul is asked to proclaim "any word of exhortation for the people" and proceeds to recount how God had saved His people from Egypt, led them through the wilderness, and brought them into Canaan. He also spoke of the prophet Samuel and of kings Saul and David. As he then spoke of Jesus, St. Paul said, "Before his coming, John had proclaimed a baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel. And as John was finishing his course, he said, 'What do you suppose that I am? I am not he. No, but behold, after me one is coming, the sandals of whose feet I am not worthy to untie.'" St. Paul teaches us how to honor and remember John the Baptist--as one who prepared the way for the Savior by preaching a baptism of repentance.

The appointed Gospel reading is Luke 1:57-80, the Nativity of John the Baptist. Since Zechariah, John's father, could not speak (see Lk. 1:20), Elizabeth had to give the unexpected name "John." When Zechariah confirmed this name by writing on a tablet, he was able to speak. Then, led by the Holy Spirit, Zechariah sang of John's vocation and purpose in life. John would be "called the prophet of the Most High" and he would "go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins." Not only would John preach a baptism of repentance, but he would also direct the people to their God-given Savior who would forgive their sins.

Therefore, when we celebrate the Nativity of John the Baptist, we end up celebrating the things of most importance: our Lord's Incarnation and Birth and our Lord's comfort and salvation in repentance and baptism, that is, in the forgiveness of sins.

Collect of the Day
Almighty God, through John the Baptist, the forerunner of Christ, You once proclaimed salvation. Now grant that we may know this salvation and serve You in holiness and righteousness all the days of our life; through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

Hymn Verse
We praise You for the Baptist,
Forerunner of the Word,
Our true Elijah, making
A highway for the Lord.
The last and greatest prophet,
He saw the dawning ray
Of light that grows in splendor
Until the perfect day. (LSB 518:18)

Christmas Color Scheme a la the Church

The Church's "color scheme" for the days of Christ-Mass sure seems to fly in the face of the world's typical "red and green" (not that there's anything wrong with the red and green; it can also have a good, Christ-centered meaning).

What I mean is this: Christ-Mass (12/24 & 25) is white, St. Stephen's day (12/26) is red, St. John's day (12/27, today) is white, and then Holy Innocents (12/28) is red. The glorious light of the Infant King shines in both the glory of His divinity (white) and the blood of martyrdom (red) for His saints. What a great and glorious color scheme it is! Not only does God the Son humble Himself to become Man and thus reveal Himself and God's gracious favor, but His followers, epitomized by St. Stephen and the Holy Innocents, also find their glory in being sacrificed for Him.

But the blood red of martyrdom means very little without our Lord's own blood. So, the Church's "color scheme" for the twelve days of Christ-Mass really tips the hat to what our Incarnate Lord comes to do - sacrifice Himself to save us from sin, death, and the devil. His glory is fully revealed in His own shedding of blood for us!

And, as a fruit of His life of white and red, glory and sacrifice, we, His followers, get to live the same "white and red life." Our glory comes through being sacrificed - that is, in putting to death the sin and death in us by His grace. This shows up especially in the life we live in Baptism. As Luther explained it so well, our Baptism "indicates that the old Adam in us should by daily contrition and repentance be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a new man should daily emerge and arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever" (Small Catechism, IV:4).

So, the Church's "color scheme" for Christ-Mass shows us our Lord's life and our daily life in Him!

Homily - Nativity of our Lord - Christmas Day

With special thanks to my good friend Pr. Weedon. He gave this homily out at our Pericope Study for possible ideas, and the whole thing was just too good to pass up. So I adopted and adapted, tweaking some things here and there and adding other points along the way.

God Locates Himself
John 1:1-18

In the Bible, God loves to locate Himself somewhere specific. Of course, He’s always present everywhere, but He also promises to be at a certain place so that His people can find Him and receive the gifts He comes to bring.

God located Himself in the days of ancient Israel. He let the people know where they could and would find Him. He was in the Tent. If you were an Israelite, you only had to go to that special tent called the Tabernacle, and you could find God there. He would be there to receive your prayers, and in that very place He would shower you with His forgiveness, His grace, and His truth. Later God located Himself somewhere more permanent: the Temple. It did not move around the land. It stayed put in Jerusalem. In that specific place all of the promises that God made for His people and attached to the Tent remained in effect. God would be there to receive their praise and worship, their prayers and supplications. God would locate Himself in that place to give out His gifts of salvation – His glory, His grace, His truth.

But the people abused both the Tent and the Temple. They thought that since God promised to locate Himself for them at that specific spot, they had God locked up and on their side. Instead of faithfully following Him and receiving the gifts He came to give, they went their own ways. They thought they could worship Him in any old way they wanted, that they could use any old statue or image they might make or choose. So God chose to abandon the Temple. Ezekiel saw the glory of the Lord leave. It was a sad sight. The cloud of glory picked up and moved out of the Temple, out from the city of Jerusalem. Then it hovered for a few moments on the Mount of Olives, as if sadly looking back, and then it was gone [Ezek. 10-11]. Simply gone. And no one at the Temple even seemed to notice. Very sad.

And still, God loves to locate Himself somewhere. He’s not just a God “out there” somewhere. He’s much more than merely the “man upstairs.” God does not want His presence, His glory, His grace, or His truth, to be unanchored and un-located. The Tent and the Tabernacle were merely pictures and shadows of a greater reality that God was planning – sort of like black and white sketches of a more vibrant, colorful reality yet to come. God would inaugurate His new reality in a stable in Bethlehem some 2000 years ago.

A Virgin had carried a Child. A Baby is born. Mary gives birth to her only Son. But this is no ordinary child. This Child is none other than the Eternal Word of the Father – He through whom all things were made; He who still holds all things together in Himself; He who is “begotten of His Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father.” That’s who this Child is. And the very flesh of this Child becomes the true Tent and Tabernacle of God. God located Himself somewhere specific, all right. From that moment of conception, from that holy birth, and for all time to come, anyone who wants to find God will find Him only in the flesh of the Man Jesus.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” That word “dwelt” is most interesting. In Greek, it’s the word for “pitched His tent.” The Word became flesh and pitched His tent among us. Find the flesh of Jesus, and you find the Tent of God – the very place, the specific somewhere, where He promises to be, receiving our adoration and praise, hearing our petitions and supplications, but most of all giving out His gifts of grace, mercy, and truth.

“And we have seen His glory.” Glory goes with the Tent and the Temple. “Glory” is another way of saying God’s brilliant, radiant, life-giving presence. It’s the glory that Moses and the Children of Israel saw in the wilderness, hovering over the Tabernacle. It’s the same glory that the Apostles saw in the flesh of the Man Jesus. They knew He is “the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

But they did not see that glory at Bethlehem. They weren’t there then. And, to tell you the truth, there wasn’t much glory at Bethlehem anyway. A baby wrapped in swaddling cloths may sound like a precious sight, but it’s really no different than wrapping a baby in a warming blanket in the hospital today. The miracle of Bethlehem is that this Baby is true God as well as true Man, but we have no Biblical hint that any glory was visible there. Then what about the halos and nimbi we see in the pictures? They’re imported by the artists.

But the Apostles did see the glory shine. And they saw it shine through the very flesh of Jesus Christ. It happened on the Mount of Transfiguration. John, along with Peter and James, saw the very flesh of Jesus Christ gleam like the sun, only brighter. For that brief moment they saw His divine Godhead united with the flesh that He assumed from the Virgin’s womb. It was a sight they never forgot. With this glorious event in his mind, John looks back on the Baby in the manger. He is overawed by what he sees. After all, it is our flesh that this Baby has – flesh of our flesh, bone of our bone, identical with ours. And it’s this flesh stuff that is glorified in Christ Jesus beyond all imagination.

Think of that as you look at people around you. They share the same flesh – the very flesh that our God honored so highly by taking it into Himself. And once He put it on, He has never taken it off. He is still clothed in that flesh and blood that He received from Mary’s womb. It is exalted to the highest place, and yet it is still the same flesh as ours. When we see that God has honored our flesh in this way, how dare we dishonor it by treating each other shamefully? If you cannot find something good to say to or about that other person, then at least say this: “This person has the same flesh and blood as the Son of God.” And then behave toward them accordingly. Whether they know it or not, whether they realize it or not, they are blood relatives of the King of heaven.

You see, that’s why He came among us. He came to make a new beginning for the whole human race. He came to share our flesh and blood. He came to bleed and die for our sins, and thus make atonement – that is, reunite us – with God. But even more, He came to unite our weak, corrupt, and dying flesh to His flesh, His flesh radiating with strength, purity, and life. In this way He overcomes our decay and death with His glorious flesh and resurrection life.

So, the glory of God is located in the flesh of Jesus, flesh full of the life and light and grace and truth of God. And God does not leave you to find that flesh on your own. No, He locates it somewhere specific for you: “Take and eat, this is My Body. Take drink, this is My Blood.” Behold, the Tent and Temple of God! Behold, the glory and grace and truth and life and light of God for you! It’s all right here, hidden under the bread and wine, located on this very Altar. And when you eat and drink it in faith, it’s all hidden in you too. Yes, your Bethlehem Lord makes you His Temple too. He pitches His tent in you by putting His Body and Blood into you. He pours His endless life into you. He unites you to Himself as a branch to a vine, as a body part to the body – the Body of Christ, that is.

Jesus knew that His body, His flesh, is the new Tent and Temple of God. After all, He said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (Jn. 2:19). Yes, His flesh, His body is the very Temple of God. And here we worship and adore Him with the angels: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased.” Here He comes to give us His grace, His truth, and His life. Amen.

Homily - Nativity of Our Lord - Christmas Midnight

Where Is Bethlehem?
Luke 2:1-20

Make no mistake about it, this little Child sitting on Mary’s lap is perfect God and perfect Man. He’s the God-Man, “Immanuel” – God with us. As the Bible says, “God so loved the world,” the whole human race, that He came out of eternity into time so that we might see Him and be reunited with Him. As Isaiah proclaims to us tonight: “For to us a Child is born, to us a Son is given; and the government shall be on His shoulder, and His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

That all sounds very nice, but perhaps it sounds a bit too abstract, a bit too disconnected from real life. After all, we want something real and down to earth. And guess what? God knows that. In fact, that’s how He created the world in which we live. There is a natural order to life in this universe: normally life functions through physical matter. Think of vegetable life. It works through flowers, plants, and trees. Think of animal life. It also works through physical matter, namely, animal bodies. And human life? Yes, we too live life in and with physical bodies. I’ll bet you’ve never seen a baby without a body!

So, the Lord of all life comes into this world, not in a blaze of glory to drive people to their knees, but in a way that fits with His own created, natural order, in a way that draws us to Himself – in a body. God manifests Himself in the flesh. The eternal God becomes a little Baby! As one favorite Christmas hymn says:

“Christ, by highest heav’n adored,
Christ, the everlasting Lord,
Late in time behold Him come,
Offspring of a virgin’s womb.
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see,
Hail the incarnate Deity!
Pleased as Man with man to dwell,
Jesus, our Immanuel!” (LSB 380:2).

But that still might seem a bit too abstract, a bit to disconnected from real life. We know the story quite well. Mary “gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths and laid Him in a manger.” Imagine that: God in diapers! God nursing at His mother’s breast! Almighty God who cannot yet hold His head up straight! The Creator of all things with tiny hands and fingers that cannot yet grasp anything! God became one of us so that we can recognize and receive Him. “But that was some 2000 years ago!” you might say. “I believe all of this is quite true and beautiful. But how does it change my life here and now?”

Yes, God came in the flesh at Bethlehem many centuries ago. But it’s more than a history lesson or a cute, heart-warming, inspirational story. God became Man – God took on our human flesh and blood – to change our life even today. Children may not have a hard time seeing the reality of the Christmas story, but we adults seem to. We think of the Christmas story as, well, ancient history. We want something to help us make sense of our life here and now. We want something to help us deal with the selfishness that we suffer from other people. We need something to help us deal with the selfishness that we inflict on people around us. We might even ask, “Where is Bethlehem today?” Dear friends, Bethlehem is right here, tonight, before our very eyes. Bethlehem is right here at the Altar, in the Holy Communion.

Pastor Berthold von Schenk wrote about Christmas this way in his book, The Presence:

What is Christmas to most people? Candles, lighted trees, carols, presents, happy faces. How touching! How beautiful! Isn’t Christmas lovely? With some, it is a little more. How they love to hear the story of a young peasant maid who came to Bethlehem, who, finding no room in the inn, gives birth to her first child in a stable. With reverence they listen to the Christmas sermon as the preacher begins to rationalize on Christmas. But this must leave us unsatisfied. We feel in our inner selves that Christmas must be more than this. And it is. Christmas must be experienced. The shepherds experienced Christmas. There they found the Christ-Child and made known abroad what they had heard and seen. Through the Communion, we too have a sure way to appreciate the Manger-Child (p. 54).

Yes, as Pastor von Schenk says, Christmas must be experienced. Lighted trees, presents, and happy faces are fine things, but they are not the beating, living heart of Christmas. Hearing the Christmas story told in reading, preaching, and song is also very fine, but there’s still more. Bethlehem must come here to us today. We need the God-Man, Immanuel, the God who was born of a pure Virgin, to come and rescue us from the darkness of our sin and death. And that’s exactly what He does in the Holy Communion. Here is your Bethlehem! Here is God in the flesh for you! Here is the best way for you to experience Christmas. All of the other things are wrapping paper and pretty bows. Here, on the Altar, you have the truest, most genuine Christmas gift: the God-Man giving Himself in Body and Blood under the bread and wine for you.

Here’s the reality and down to earth life of Bethlehem that we need and crave. We live in a world that says, “Find your meaning in money” or “Find fulfillment in the many electronic toys from Best Buy or Circuit City.” The TV and the Internet train us to find our fulfillment in pleasing ourselves at the click of the remote or the computer mouse. But we human beings were not made for such shallow things. We were not made to be automatons that merely seek the next little thrill for a quick fix. Besides, focusing on ourselves in these ways leaves us very unfulfilled, even frustrated. And we end up taking our frustrations out on people around us, on those near and dear to us, even on our fellow Christians. Deep down, we know there’s something more to life. And Bethlehem on the Altar delivers it.

In our second reading St. Paul describes the glorious fruit of Christmas, the joys of Bethlehem on the Altar for us. He says, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age.” When we experience Christmas at the Lord’s Altar, we learn how to do just that, how to live godly lives in the present age. We see how our Lord has honored us by becoming one of us. We see how He honors the whole human race. We see how His love for us begins to radiate in us and through us toward the people around us. We see that our real meaning and fulfillment come from the God who loves us enough to become one of us.

You see, God so loved the world that He came into the world. He came into the world to lift us up to Himself, to restore us to His life and His love. The very flesh and blood Son of God born of the Virgin Mary comes here today. He’s the same Son of God, Jesus Christ, who spilled His innocent blood on the cross. He’s the same Lord of life who conquered death by dying and then rising again on the third day. And He gives you this life in His Body and Blood on the Altar. “Veiled in [Meal] the Godhead see! Hail the incarnate Deity!”

So, where is Bethlehem? It’s right here at the Altar. How do you experience Christmas aright? Right here at the Altar, eating and drinking the very Body and Blood of the God-Man, the Manger-Child, the God-with-us, Immanuel. And with the eyes of faith, you will see on this Altar not merely bread and wine, but the Christ-Child, the Word made flesh. And then you can imitate Mother Mary by treasuring all these things, pondering them in your hearts. And then you can leave here imitating the shepherds, glorifying and praising God for all that you have heard and seen…and tasted, as it has been told you. Amen.

Christ's Holy Birth is Our Birth

From Martin Luther, Sermon for Christmas Day, 1522 (cited in "Day by Day We Magnify Thee," p. 33):

Christ has a holy birth, immaculate and pure. Man's birth is unclean, sinful, and accursed, and man can only be helped through the holy birth of Christ. Yet Christ's birth cannot be shared out to us, nor would it help; but it is offered spiritually unto every man wherever the Word is preached. He who firmly believes and receives it will not suffer harm because of his own sinful birth.

That is the way we are cleansed of our wretched Adam's birth, and that is why it was Christ's will and pleasure to be born as man, so that in Him we might be born again. 'Of His own will He brought us forth by the Word of truth, that we should be reborn unto a new creation.' Behold, in this manner Christ takes our birth away from us and sinks it in His own birth and gives us His birth, that we may be made new and clean, as if it were our own birth. Therefore shall every Christian man rejoice in this birth of Christ, and glory in it, as if he too were born of Mary. He who does not believe that, or doubts it, is no Christian.

O, this is the great joy of which the angel speaks. This is God's comfort and His surpassing goodness, that man (if he believeth) may glory in such a treasure, that Mary be his very Mother, Christ his Brother, and God his Father. For all these things have truly happened that we might believe in them.

See, then, that thou make this birth thine own and dost change with Him, so that thou mayest be rid of thy birth, and mayest take over His, which comes to pass if thou believest. Thus does thou surely sit in the Virgin Mary's lap, and art her darling child. But thou must learn to have such faith and to exercise it throughout thine earthly life, for it can never be strong enough.

(I just love it when Luther, the German, speaks in Elizabethan English! :-)

"The Doctrine of Bethlehem" - part 6

Just in time for celebrating the Nativity of our Lord, here's the sixth and final installment of what I'm calling "The Doctrine of Bethlehem" taken from Pr. Berthold von Schenk, in his book The Presence: An Approach to the Holy Communion (1945). I hope that these readings from von Schenk have helped you prepare to celebrate the mystery of our Lord's Incarnation, especially as we experience it - indeed all of Bethlehem - at the Altar. I know they have helped me!

Here's Part 6, continuing and concluding Chapter III:

It is Christmas. The Gospel states “And it came to pass that a decree, etc.” The preacher gives his message. The sacred vessels are being prepared. Then these words are prayed: “This is My Body.” Now what do you see, bread and wine? Yes! and more! These are only the veil. It is now the true Body and Blood of our Lord. Remember the Spiritual Body. If we have the eyes of faith we see the Babe in Mary’s lap, not as it was then in the state of humiliation, limited to space, but glorified, triumphant, through His Resurrection Body.

An awful mystery is here
To challenge faith and waken fear;
The Saviour comes in food divine,
Concealed in earthly bread and wine.

In consecrated wine and bread
No eye perceives the mystery dread,
But Jesus’ words are strong and clear;
My Body and My Blood are here.

We come to Church on Christmas and we have the right to ask: Where is He? In Bethlehem, is the answer. But where is Bethlehem? Thank God that we can be directed. We are as sure of it as the angel was. We must believe this: The Babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger…then wrapped in Mary’s arms, now wrapped in bread and wine.

Communion is the bulwark of our faith in Bethlehem and in the Incarnation of our Lord. Every time we receive the Communion we confess to the faith that this little Babe is Mary’s Son and God’s Son. And we know that to those who kneel at the Communion rail, the fact of Bethlehem becomes a reality in a very special manner. The faithful communicant will never question the Virgin Birth; he will never doubt that the Christ-Child is true God and man, for there He is—the same—yesterday, today, and forever.

Therefore, the Holy Sacrament is the bulwark of our faith and doctrines, rather than any elaborate system of doctrine apart from it. If we neglect this truth, then the deadly fifth column starts its dreadful work in our midst, weakening gradually but surely our real defences [sic]. The Holy Sacrament is the battleground of the very belief in the Deity of Christ. At the Altar there can be no rationalism. At the Altar all shadow of doubt disappears and Christmas means something real, for through it we are linked to Bethlehem.

What is Christmas to most people? Candles, lighted trees, carols, presents, happy faces. How touching! How beautiful! Isn’t Christmas lovely? With some, it is a little more. How they love to hear the story of a young peasant maid who came to Bethlehem, who, finding no room in the inn, gives birth to her first child in a stable. With reverence they listen to the Christmas sermon as the preacher begins to rationalize on Christmas. But this must leave us unsatisfied. We feel in our inner selves that Christmas must be more than this. And it is. Christmas must be experienced. The shepherds experienced Christmas. There they found the Christ-Child and made know abroad what they had heard and seen. Through the Communion, we too have a sure way to appreciate the Manger-Child.

You may say: Are you not materializing God? Is there not something almost superstitious about it? Indeed not. We are following very biblical lines. God is worshipped through the finite body, and is approached through this finite channel because the world is built on that law, because we are made in that fashion. Unless we have a great truth focused to a point where we can grasp it, it is unreal, hypothetical, theoretical. Our Christmas must be based not only upon an historical fact, but it must be a vibrant truth, a reality, an experience. And this truth becomes a reality in the Communion. At the Altar we fling the challenge to the world. We say: Man has not been made for money, or wage-slavery, or mere pleasure or passion; man was not made to be a machine. Man has been made to be God’s own, made in the image of Eternity. And this is not the vague dream of a mystic. It sprang into realization at Bethlehem and is brought down to us today at the Altar.

It is Christmas. Have you found the way to Bethlehem? It is important to make straight the pathway of the Lord into your hearts. That duty is now done. Now take your pilgrim-staff and your gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. You will not have to stop off at Jerusalem to inquire the way. The Altar is your Star. There you will find Bethlehem.

Bethlehem means “house of bread.” Indeed, “bread of life,” “staff of life.” You will come, then, as the shepherds came. You will kneel as they did in adoration. And if your vision of faith is clear enough, you will see at the Altar not merely bread and wine, but the Christ-Child, the Word made flesh. After Christmas? You will do the same as did the Wise Men. They went home by another way, not by way of Jerusalem. You will go another way, the way of the new life. And with the shepherds you will also make known abroad all that you have seen and realized. The confession—“Who for us men and for our salvation came down from Heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary and was made man,” will be more than a vague truth, more than an historical event. Christmas will be an experience. You will truly understand the truth of the angelic words: “They shall call His Name Immanuel, which is, being interpreted, God with us,” aye, Immanuel—at the Altar.

"The Doctrine of Bethlehem" - part 5

Part 5 of our serial reading from von Schenk's The Presence ties Bethlehem with Christ's Resurrection Body and, of course, with the Altar. Here's the first half of chapter III:

Chapter III
Finding Bethlehem Today

Our destiny is supernatural. We must be caught up with the divine love. We are to love God so much, and be so “one with Him” that His own very love is to shine in us and through us to others.

Now you will say: “That is right. I have failed in my life because I have not had love, the God love in me. But I see it now.” And then, with tears in your eyes, you will say bitterly: “How can I own this love? How can I fulfill my destiny of union with God? It is a beautiful thought—and yet so impractical.” But that is not true. It is not vague. Bethlehem is not just a beautiful fact of history. You can find Bethlehem. Bethlehem is here today, living and vibrant. Bethlehem comes to us in the Sacrament of Holy Communion. At the Altar you find Bethlehem—There is Christmas! If we become as a child of simple faith and good will we shall see it as we have never seen it before.

The angel’s [sic] directed the shepherds:

“And this shall be a sign unto you. Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.”

Is there not a sign for us? Bethlehem is a very beautiful story. It must be more than the sweetest story ever told. Christmas must really be more than candles, more than tinsel. How is this possible? We were directed to Bethlehem by way of Bethlehem’s doctrine. Then we progressed to the though how Bethlehem shows us our highest destiny. Let us now see how Bethlehem is brought down to us today.

At Bethlehem, 1900 years ago [von Schenk writes in 1945!], God applied the laws of His own creation, focusing Himself in the form of a little Babe. The Word, the Eternal, was made flesh so that we could behold Him, grasp Him, see Him. He did this because the world is what it is. However, He has also focused the truth of Bethlehem so that it can be vibrant and living today. He did this because of what we are. What are we? Spirit? Only immortal soul? All of that, but more. We are a spirit functioning through matter. Our soul expresses itself through our body—our weak, frail, finite body.

“God is a spirit and they that worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth.” We cannot cast out our spirit from our body. Our body is the only vehicle by which our spirit can work. We are an infinite soul, wrapped in a finite body. God has given us the spiritual enshrined in the material. He gives us the unseen veiled in the seen. He did this in Bethlehem. It is because of this that the Christmas story is so meaningful to young and old. It is to be more than a story, even more than a great truth of doctrine. Bethlehem must be brought down to today. Bethlehem today! How? Where? At the Altar. “This shall be a sign to you.”

Why must Bethlehem be more than an event, more than a doctrine, a theory? Faust answers: “Grau, teurer Freund, ist alle Theorie, und gruen des Lebens goldener Baum.” [“Gray, dear friend, is all theory, and green the life the golden tree.”] All theory is indeed gray. Christmas must be green and living.

If we take offense at God’s making this truth of Bethlehem real to us by His Real Presence at the Altar, then we must take offense also at the whole Christmas story. If we stumble at the Altar, we shall also stumble at the threshold of the stable.

There are people who say: I believe only in the non-material religion. That position would be correct if we were angels—but we are not. We are men. Therefore, God must deal with us as we are. What, then, is our doctrine of the Altar? We believe that the bodily Presence of Christ is in the bread and wine. The Catechism calls it “a sacramental, not a spiritual eating and drinking.” Through the outward means, bread and wine, we obtain the inward, the Body and Blood, given and shed for the remission of sins. It is the unseen, veiled in the seen. Now we know that God is everywhere. But is not God in any special place? We ask Moses, “Where is God?” He tells us, “God is everywhere.” “But is He not in any special place, Moses?” “Aye, in the burning bush. Take off thy shoes.” We ask the High Priest, “Where is God?” “Everywhere.” “But is He not in some special place?” “Aye, in the Holy of Holies, at the Ark of the Covenant.” We ask our catechumens where God is. They reply: “Where the Word is.” How true! But is He not in some special place? Yes, at the Altar, for Christ says: “This is My Body.” You may say to yourself; is not all this quite complicated? It is, unless you have the interpreter’s stone. The key to the whole problem is the spiritual Body of the Risen Saviour. Recall that after His resurrection, He had the spiritual Body. He came through closed doors, and yet the disciples saw Him. He ate broiled fish and yet ascended to Heaven. Now we cannot explain this risen spiritual Body, because the risen Body of the Lord is governed by divine laws of which we know nothing.

We know it only by revelation. But if we deny the reality of the spiritual Body we shall have to remove from our Bible all the resurrection appearances of our Lord, and that is what many people do, consciously or unconsciously. They cannot think of a body, except it be like there own, carnal, limited, subject to death and decay. But Paul insists that there is a natural body and that there is a spiritual body. At the cemetery we say it…”Sown a natural body; is raised a spiritual body…for this corruptible must put on incorruption.”

If you desire to bring Bethlehem down to today, then you must sit at Paul’s feet and listen closely to his teachings of the Resurrection Body. Likewise, in our comprehension of the Bodily Presence of Christ in the Sacrament, we must also sit at Paul’s feet to hear him declare: “There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body" (pp. 49-52).

"The Doctrine of Bethlehem" - part 4

Part 4 continues where Part 3 left off and runs through the end of Chapter II of The Presence: An Approach to the Holy Communion:

The only thing which can satisfy man’s heart is to love God so completely that man becomes the channel of the divine love to his fellowmen. The only love which will affect our fellow men is the supernatural love. All other love is tainted with self-interest, and this is the reason why we often fail—because we do not love enough with the divine love. If we could only love with the divine love, then our duties to God and to our fellowmen would become an expression of our divine love. This is the one thing we must ever seek in Bethlehem—that Bethlehem begets in us that divine love—a selfless, supernatural love, which is the Bethlehem love, a love which alone can ease the heartache of the world.

When we fail in our relationships with our fellowmen, either at home or in business, it is because our love is tainted with self-interest. But it is only the divine love which can make us irresistible.

And this love can save society. The world is always tense with wars, revolutions, global planning. If it is not one thing it is another. Labor is tense, capital is tense—dissatisfaction. The result is more revolution. Why does man revolt? He revolts because he is dissatisfied. That much he knows. The laboring man knows, perhaps only subconsciously, that he has not been created to be a machine, a cog in the wheel of selfish, materialistic civilization, and he rebels against such an order of things. Still he may not know the true reason for his dissatisfaction, which is that man has been made for union with God, and nothing else can satisfy him but that. An eight hour day, minimum wage scales, proper housing conditions, are not the answer. Bethlehem is the answer to the labor problem, for Bethlehem means union with God. And why is the employer, the rich man, so often unhappy? You say that he has everything—no financial worries, every luxury, beautiful homes, shiny cars, money in the bank, security; but he is unhappy still—discontented. Why? Within yourself you think; if I had his money I would never complain again! Oh yes, you would. This man is unhappy despite his money and luxuries because deep down in his soul he knows that he has not been made for money. He has not been made for riches. For after he has accumulated his fortune, he finds himself still dissatisfied. Why? Because he has been made for God.

The only solution, then, for the agony of the industrial world, whether we be in the ranks of labor or capital, is Bethlehem; that divine fact that God came down to earth to lift man up to Himself. Any philosophy, any social order which ignores it, is bound to lead to hell. There are two conflicting forces in life: Good and evil; love and self; God and the devil; Heaven and hell. And if you find the Bethlehem evangel in your life, then Love and Heaven are yours. If not, you will read hell. The reason we have hell in our national, political, social and domestic life so often is that men have lost the way to Bethlehem. The reason we church-members are so impotent is that we too often lose sight of the way and, therefore, cannot direct others back to Bethlehem (pp. 47-48).

"The Doctrine of Bethlehem" - part 3

Our serial reading of Pr. Berthold von Schenk's treatment of Bethlehem and Christmas, in his book The Presence (Ernst Kaufmann, Inc., 1945), continues with Chapter II, "The Vision of Bethelehem":

Chapter II
The Vision of Bethlehem

Are you an earnest seeker? Do you want Christmas to mean more than holly wreaths and tinsel? If so, let us inquire earnestly: “Where is Bethlehem?”

We have deepened our understanding of the doctrine of Bethlehem. The doctrine enshrined in Bethlehem is this: The little baby Jesus is God Himself, and still the little baby Jesus.

Why was He born a little baby? So that He could focus Himself on our thinking and feeling. Again, why did He become man? The answer which gives us the biggest lift is this: God became true man so that He could thereby bring us back to Himself.

How difficult it is to bring home the Christmas message! The Preacher wants Christmas to be a reality, to count, to mean something in people’s lives; but too often he finds that the people still thing of Christmas in terms of candles and holly wreaths. But it can be much more to us if we get the Vision of Bethlehem. How is this possible? Bethlehem, let us remember, cannot be rationalized. It can at least be realized. And if it is to be realized, then we must become really simple—simple enough to grasp the full implications of just one word—and that word is the key to the mystery of God, the mystery of our problems and troubled lives—and that word is Love. The mystery of Bethlehem is meaningful when we remember that God is Love.

Why did God create man? What was His motive? Why—love, and love cannot be anything else but itself. God made us because He loved us. What does God desire of us? What does love always desire? Love does not ask for gifts. Love asks for love. “I don’t want your gifts,” says the maid to her lover, “I want you.” Why this? Because love must always give itself to and for the beloved. If love were to give anything else but love, it would not be real love. Now this little baby in Bethlehem is God. It is love, it is God giving Himself.

Mark you, Bethlehem reveals its secret only to those who receive the simple truth that God is Love, and Love can never be satisfied with anything less than Love. When we realize that God is Love, Bethlehem must follow. It would almost seem to us that it all could have been no different from God’s point of view if it would fulfill this loving purpose with man. Because God is Love, Love had to give itself. It did give itself. The Child in Bethlehem was born because God love the world.

But let us see this from man’s point of view.

God is love. He made us because He loved us, and He gave Himself at Bethlehem. But there is more to this. He gave Himself so that we could love Him in return! To love God is man’s highest destiny. Thus Bethlehem teaches man his highest destiny, his greatest goal, and if people could find the way to Bethlehem, all problems and difficulties could be solved.

What is man at his best? Is not a child of God at his best always when he gropes after God? The poet realized this: “ As the hart panteth after the waterbrooks, so panteth my soul for thee, O God, My soul thristeth for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?” This is not the cry of a helpless fanatic. This is the cry of a man at his best. The most precious longing of the heart is to be at one with God. Jesus expressed this with His own precious lips on the night before He died, when He prayed for His disciples in that high-priestly prayer: “That they also may be one in us; as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us; that the love wherewith Thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.” We are to be one with God through our faith in Christ—by our surrender to Him. This union with God through our Lord Jesus Christ is to be so real, so complete, that the very love with which the Father love the Son, that is, the very divine Love itself, the love of Bethlehem, the love of Calvary, is to RADIATE IN AND THROUGH US. That is our destiny. There can be no other destiny than this. We are to be so completely at one with God that our weak love is caught up with His divine love. And the result is that we become channels of the divine love to others. Not a love like the divine love, but the very divine love itself. Therefore Jesus said, “…that the love wherewith Thou hast loved me may be in them.” Our destiny then, is to love with the divine love. It cannot be otherwise. We know that this is true. In our best moments we know it is true. It is the only thing which can keep us sane. Therefore, since that first Christmas Eve, the Christian in his deepest moments, has turned to Bethlehem—sometimes with hope, often almost with despair, but he turns to it as the sweetest thing in the history of man. He turns to Bethlehem because Bethlehem shows him his highest destiny—to love. Thus Christmas must be a vision of divine love. This is the HOPE OF THE WORLD. The story of Bethlehem is important, but the receiving of the Bethlehem Love is Life (pp. 44-47, emphasis original).

And for a little "holy-day" fun...

...check out this rendition of the "Hallelujah Chorus" (quite entertaining, for a bunch of men impersonating nuns!).

...and, while you're at it, check out this cultural statement about saying, "Merry Christmas" instead of a mere "Happy Holidays."