St. Paul’s Church in
Bergen & Church of the Incarnation,
Jersey City NJ
Jersey City NJ
December 24, 2014
Christmas Eve
Isaiah 62:6-12
Psalm 97
Titus 3:4-7
Luke 2:1-20
Incarnation
“But
the angel said to the shepherds, ‘Do not be afraid; for see I am bringing you
good news of great joy for all people; to you is born this day in the city of
David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
Merry
Christmas to you all.
It’s
been a dismal few days weather-wise around here. Warmer than we’d probably like.
And, I don’t know about you, but to me, rain showers and drizzle don’t feel
very much like Christmas.
Actually,
as I’ve thought about it, the gloomy weather kind of captures the mood of a lot
of people. You
may have noticed that the world is kind of a mess these days.
In
just the past couple of weeks many of us have been shocked and dismayed by
decisions made by grand juries in Missouri and Staten Island and elsewhere.
There have been large protests against the use of what many consider excessive force
by the police and at least the perception of entrenched racism in our legal
system.
Last
week we were horrified by the assassination of two New York City police
officers, Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu by a deranged man, highlighting the
risks police all around the country take every single day just to do their job,
and reminding us here in Jersey City of the assassination this past summer of
Officer Melvin Santiago.
What
else?
Well,
let’s see. The Russian economy is collapsing, the North Koreans hacked Sony
Pictures leading to the temporary shelving of a movie, Ebola continues to rage
in parts of West Africa, and bitter division and violence poisons much of the
Middle East, including the town of Bethlehem.
And
for many of us there are all the usual and all too difficult challenges and
fears of life – unemployment or underemployment, not enough money to pay the
bills, disappointments big and small, ruptured relationships, illness and the
shadow of death.
Yet,
in the midst of this mess, even with all the rain, it really is Christmas!
The
angel said to the shepherds long ago and says to us today, “Do not be afraid;
for see I am bringing you good news of great joy for all people; to you is born
this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
The
world’s a mess and we might be a mess but it really is Christmas!
Look
around. The church has never looked more beautiful.
Our
music tonight – I’ll say it – rivals what’s being played and sung in the
world’s grandest churches.
And,
what gives me – and I hope you – great joy, is that, for what is I’m sure the
first time ever, our two neighboring Episcopal churches – St. Paul’s and
Incarnation - are celebrating Christmas together!
This
makes me so happy for many reasons but one kind of selfish reason is that it
gives me a convenient way to talk about Incarnation – not the church but the
mind-blowing idea – the most amazing gift – that in and through Jesus, God has become one of us.
Incarnation.
That’s
what we’re remembering and celebrating tonight.
Incarnation.
Incarnation
is such a beautiful word – and a fine name for a church.
Incarnation
means “enfleshment.”
At
Christmas we celebrate that in and through Jesus, God loves us enough to join
us right here with a real flesh and blood human body.
Incarnation.
And
the Evangelist Luke gives us some details to make sure we understand that this
flesh and blood human Jesus was born into a world, into a life, at least as
messy as our own.
Flesh
and blood Jesus was born into a homeland occupied by a foreign power, ruled by
Emperor Augustus in faraway Rome.
Flesh
and blood Jesus was born not in his hometown of Nazareth, where he and Mary and
Joseph would have been surrounded by loving and caring family and friends but
in the unfamiliar town of Bethlehem where there was no room for them at the
inn.
Flesh
and blood Jesus was placed in a manger, which sounds so quaint and charming,
until we remember that it was a feeding trough used by animals.
Luke
tells us that flesh and blood Jesus was greeted first not by local officials or
prominent residents of Bethlehem but by shepherds – shepherds who were probably
kind of stinky and definitely low class in First Century Palestine.
Incarnation.
In
and through Jesus, God joins us right here with a real flesh and blood human
body.
The
flesh and blood Son of God was born into poverty and “broke bread with outcasts
and sinners, healed the sick, and proclaimed good news to the poor.”
We
know that at what seemed like the
end, that flesh and blood body born in Bethlehem will be whipped and beaten,
nailed to wood, and killed.
But,
on the third day that same flesh and blood body, that same human and divine
Jesus rose again.
Incarnation.
Now,
far be it for me to question God.
But,
this business of God becoming one of us, becoming incarnate, becoming
enfleshed, this seems like a bad idea.
There
must have been a better, easier way, right?
I
mean, our bodies are amazing and all of that, of course, but they also give us
a lot of trouble, don’t they?
Through
his life, from the first cries of shock in the Bethlehem manger through
childhood and adolescence and adulthood, Jesus experienced the pains and
troubles and embarrassments that come with being a flesh and blood human being.
But,
despite all of that mess, God chose to become one of us, to become flesh and
blood, to join us here in the mess because this was and is the best way – probably
the only way – for us to see what God is really like.
Despite
all of that mess, God chose to become one of us, to become enfleshed, to join
us here in the mess because this was and is the best way – maybe the only way –
for us to see what we were always meant to be.
And,
now, especially on Christmas, we are all called to be – we are meant to be –
incarnation.
We
are already flesh and blood but we’re called to be more than that – we’re
called to be incarnation – we’re called to be the Body of Christ in the world, allowing
Jesus to continue his work in and through us, when we break bread with outcasts
and sinners, when we heal the sick, and when we proclaim good news to the poor.
We
are the Body of Christ. We are the incarnation, right here in messy Jersey
City.
“But
the angel said to the shepherds, ‘Do not be afraid; for see I am bringing you
good news of great joy for all people; to you is born this day in the city of
David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
Despite
the rain and the mess, it’s Christmas!
We celebrate that, in and through Jesus,
God loves us enough to join us right here with a real flesh and blood human
body.
And,
today, that incarnation continues in and through us, in and through St. Paul’s
and Incarnation.
Merry
Christmas, indeed.
Amen.
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