Sermon for 25 December, 2006 - Christmas Day - John 1:1-14
From StMichaelsLutheranChurch
John 1:1-14 by Pastor Stephen Schultz Christmas Day, 2006
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light (Genesis 1:1-3).
And so, at the word of God all creation came into being. At the word of God the atmosphere and the ground and the oceans were formed. At the word of God vegetation, fish, birds and animals were created. And at the word of God humans were brought into existence and given life and breath. Such is the awesome power of God’s word that when he speaks it happens.
The Bible is God’s word to us relating the actions of God through the course of history. And as we turn each page we discover more and more about the might of our God and about his ability to determine and shape the course of that history.
At God’s word a devastating flood was sent upon the earth. At God’s word the barren Sarah gave birth to a son. At God’s word the Red Sea was parted to allow his people to escape. And at God’s word nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts (Psalm 46:6). It is no wonder that the Psalmist in response to this display of God’s sovereignty could declare: For the LORD is the great God, the great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him. The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land (Psalm 95:3-5).
Our God is an awesome God and he reigns from heaven above. There is none that can compare to him and the sheer wonder of his majesty. We praise his name and stand in awe of his nature as an all-seeing, all-knowing and all-present God. As the Psalmist said elsewhere: Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast (Psalm 139:7-10).
It is amazing to think that God is in control of everything and that his powerful word is sustaining all of his creation. But there is something even more amazing than all of this. The eternal, powerful word of God became flesh and dwelt among us.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. The God who is everywhere confined himself to somewhere. The eternal Word who spoke the universe into being was born as a baby in the little town of Bethlehem under the very sky he created. The eternal Word who holds the depths of the earth in his hand, who formed the mountain peaks and the sea, was wrapped in cloths and laid in a manger.
This was not a momentary sojourn upon our earth, a brief visit to take the fancy of the Almighty. This was not the infinite God appearing simply in the likeness of a human to make a secret visit to his creation to satisfy his own desires. This was the Word becoming flesh to make his dwelling among us. In the words of Paul in his letter to the Philippians (2:6-7): Jesus…being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant.
But why would such a powerful God condescend to do such a thing? Why did he allow himself to be limited in this way? Why did he allow all the fullness of his Deity to live in bodily form (Col.2:9)? He did not, as some seem to think, need to become a human being in order to understand us better. He created us. He knows us intimately. God did not need to experience humanity so he could know how we feel and what we think and the way we struggle. He has known all of this since before the creation of the world. He is the all-powerful, all-seeing and all-knowing God. He did not become flesh so that he could better understand us. He became flesh so that we could better understand him.
To have a God who is everywhere can feel the same as having a God who is nowhere. As a result of the fall we lost the capacity to know God simply through observing his all abiding presence in creation. We were made in the image of God but had lost the capacity to perceive his image and grasp it. Though all we see around us is sustained by God’s Word we can’t seem to comprehend it and we can’t seem to access God through it. So the Word became flesh to make the invisible Word visible and accessible to us.
Jesus Christ is the eternal Word of God being physically enacted among us. That is why the Apostle John wrote: In him was life, and that life was the light of humanity. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it (John 1:4-5).
The fullness of God’s life and light was invested in his Son. As the prophet Isaiah could predict: The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned (9:2). When God is everywhere we don’t seem to know where to look in order to find him. But when the Word became flesh to dwell among us, the life and light of God was concentrated in the person of his Son. This has given us the focal point we need in order to perceive and apprehend our God.
And what is it that we see? What is it that the life of Jesus has revealed to us about our God? How long have you got? Hymn and song writers have been putting this good news to song for centuries and still they have not exhausted what could be said about Jesus and what he means to us. He is, as Simeon said when presented with the baby Jesus in the temple: a light of revelation to the nations and the glory of the people of Israel (Luke 2:32). He is, as Charles Wesley wrote in his famous hymn: the heaven-born Prince of Peace, the sun of righteousness. Mild he lays his glory by, born that we no more may die.
Jesus has revealed to us the extent God is willing to go to in order to make his voice heard. He is not content to have us remain deaf to his Word, and so, he fleshed out his Word for us in the person and work and words of his Son, Jesus. Jesus is God pinning himself down in the flesh so that we can receive him and believe in him and have the right to become the children of God. In Jesus we get to see God’s glory, the glory of the One and Only, for he came from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14b).
Jesus took upon himself our humanity so that we could once again comprehend the nature of God’s divinity. We have access to God the Father through Jesus the Son. In Jesus we have a Saviour in the fullest and deepest sense of the word because he is the eternal Word of God voicing his undying love for us and our world. Jesus is our flesh and blood and it is through his flesh and blood that we have been reunited with our God. Now we can truly know the heart of our God because through Jesus we have seen the amazing depth of God’s love…in action. Amen.
