Tag: Christmas

Advent, The Prologue and Relationships: 4 Jesus and Moses (John 1:1-18)

John 1:1-18

Moses isn’t the first Old Testament character that comes to our mind at Christmas, I’ll give you that. Maybe we think of Isaiah prophesying the virgin birth or the One who is called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. We might remember Micah and his prophecy that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem, which Herod’s advisers quote when the Magi show up.

But Moses?

Well, John seems to think it’s worth contrasting Jesus with Moses at the end of our great passage. Hear verses 14 to 18 again:

14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

15 (John testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, ‘This is the one I spoke about when I said, “He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.”’) 16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in the closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.

Why didn’t I just read verse 17, which is the only verse here that explicitly mentions Moses? Because even when he’s not named, John is alluding to him. And by doing so, John tells us more about what the Good News of Jesus is.

I’m going back to three episodes in Moses’ life that John has in mind and we’ll see how the comparison and contrast with Jesus tells us about the wonder of the Incarnation.

Firstly, we go to the wilderness:

14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

When we read, ‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us,’ the English ‘made his dwelling’ if translated more literally would be ‘tabernacled’ Jesus tabernacled among us. Why is that significant?

Do you remember the tabernacle that Moses was instructed to get Israel to construct? It was the dwelling-place of God’s presence that the Israelites carried with them in the wilderness. And indeed it remained so until the Temple was built, centuries later, in Jerusalem.

The tabernacle was the portable presence of God. When John says that Jesus tabernacled among us, he is telling us that in coming to earth Jesus is the very presence of God with us. He wasn’t just some prophet. He was the very presence of God in the midst of human life.

We do not believe in a God who has stayed remote from us. Contrary to the Julie Gold/Nanci Griffith song that Cliff Richard covered, God is not simply watching us from a distance. God has traversed the distance and in Jesus he is Emmanuel, God with us. He knows what it is to live the human life with all its joys and struggles. He is not an ivory tower God.

When we struggle with suffering or injustice, Jesus has lived it. This is what he came to do. As I often say at funerals, when I go through a bad experience in life, the people who come up with the clever answers that explain my predicament are no help. They are as smug as Job’s comforters. But those who have walked the road I am on, and who come alongside me – they make a difference. So it is with Jesus.

One simple example from my life: a few years before I met Debbie, I had a broken engagement. (Or a narrow escape, as my sister called it. I married the right woman in the end!) One day, when I was particularly down, two friends of mine, Sue and Kate, rang the doorbell and said, “We’re taking you out to lunch.” What I discovered over lunch was their own histories of broken relationships.

Jesus tabernacled among us. He understands. He is still present with us by the Holy Spirit. Hear the Good News of Christmas that the Son of God tabernacled among us. He is Emmanuel, God with us.

And it’s the model for the way we spread that Good News. For after the Resurrection, Jesus told his disciples,

As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you. (John 20:21)

So the way we begin sharing the Gospel is by openly living for Christ in the midst of those who do not yet believe. We do not go on helicopter raids to bring people in, we start by going among other people, living our Christian lives before them. This is what Jesus himself, the Word made flesh, did, when he tabernacled among us. So too us.

In one town where I ministered, some Christians left the local United Reformed Church and said they were going to start a new church on a deprived estate. They hired a hall there for meetings. But did any of them move to the estate and live out their faith among the people they were supposedly going to evangelise? No.

The Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us. It is Good News for us in all that life throws at us, and it is the model for us sharing that Good News even today.

Secondly, let’s look generally at the exodus and for this we go to verse sixteen of John chapter one:

16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given.

Many people say that the Old Testament is about God’s Law and the New Testament is about God’s grace. Wrong! There is grace in the Old Testament. The New Testament tells us so, in verses like this. So when Jesus comes, his mission of grace builds on what has gone before and takes it to new levels.

In Moses’ case, grace is seen in the Exodus. God sees the suffering of his people in Egypt as they are enslaved, as Pharaoh worsens their already bad working conditions, as he attempts to have male Israelite babies killed.

The Israelites themselves are not perfect, but God in his mercy and grace will save them. Moses whom he calls to lead them is also far from perfect – in fact that’s an understatement, he’s a murderer. But in grace God calls him and mercifully redirects his passions.

Grace comes before anything we ever do for God. He acted in grace to deliver the Israelites from Egypt. And when Jesus comes, he does so to bring grace on a far greater scale, a cosmic scale, even. Yes, God is still interested in setting free people who are suffering due to the sins of others, but in Jesus he comes to do even more. He comes to set people free from their own sins. He comes to bring reconciliation not only with God but with one another. And he comes to heal broken creation. For when Jesus is raised from the dead, it will be the first fruits of God’s project to make all things new, even heaven and earth, as we learn in the Book of Revelation.

If from Moses and the wilderness we learn that Jesus is Emmanuel, God with us, then from Moses and the Exodus, we learn that Jesus is – er – Jesus, the One who will save his people from their sins.

This tells us why the Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us. He came to bring this comprehensive salvation. To save us from what others do to us. To save us from what we do. To save creation from its brokenness.

Never let us reduce salvation to a personal and private forgiveness of my own sins which earns me my ticket to heaven. Yes, we do need our own sins forgiving, we do need to repent of them and put our faith in Jesus, but that is just the beginning. God saves us to involve is in the whole project of grace that Jesus heralded. We have a job to do, and Jesus is enlisting us in the ways of grace.

I love to tell the story of a keen young Christian who found himself on a train sharing a compartment with a man of the cloth dressed in a purple shirt, in other words a bishop. The young Christian had heard about these religious establishment figures and was sure the bishop would not have any vital experience of Christ, and so he said to him, ‘Bishop, are you saved?’

The bishop looked up and calmly replied, ‘Young man, do you mean have I been saved? Or do you mean am I being saved? Or do you mean will I be saved?’

Before the bemused young man could respond the bishop continued: ‘Because I have been saved – Jesus in his grace has forgiven my sins. I am being saved – Jesus by his grace is slowly making me more like him. And I will be saved – because one day there will be no more sin in this creation. I have been saved from the penalty of sin, I am being saved from the practice of sin, and I will be saved from the presence of sin.’

The bishop understood what it meant for Jesus to have given us ‘grace in place of grace already given.’

Thirdly and finally, let’s go to Mount Sinai with Moses.

17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

Ah, the law: that’s what we associate Moses with, isn’t it? Coming down from Mount Sinai with God’s prescription of two tablets, and then all those other laws, some of which perplex us today.

So it was law in the Old Testament and grace in the New Testament after all? Except you have to remember when it was that God gave the law to Israel. It was after he had delivered them from Egypt in the Exodus and they were on their way to the Promised Land. So it’s not true that keeping God’s law was the way to salvation, it was rather how they responded to salvation.

Even so, there was a problem. Israel failed to keep the law. Prophet after prophet called them to repentance, but either they rejected the message or it didn’t stick.

Hence, the coming of Jesus with grace and truth. For grace is not just about forgiveness. It is about that on-going salvation from sin that the bishop told the earnest young Christian about.

And he does not only bring the truth, he is the truth. Jesus the truth lives among us and eventually within us by his Spirit. The truth of God is no longer laws external to us on tablets of stone. Now that truth lives within us and enables us to be different. This is the promise of Christmas. Not only God with us, not only God saving us from our sins, but God within us.

An old lady once collared me after a service and told me that what this country needed to do was simply to get back to the Ten Commandments, and then all would be well. But she missed the grace that Jesus offers here. Because on our own we fail to keep the Ten Commandments, or indeed any of God’s law. We need the grace of forgiveness, and the grace of God’s presence in our lives to transform us. If faith was just a rule-keeping exercise, Jesus would never have needed to come.

But he did come. He came to be present with us, even when we wander in a wilderness, and he calls us to do the same in the midst of others. He came to bring the greatest exodus of all, in the many ways he liberates us and this world from sin. He came to bring the inner strength we need if we are to respond to God’s love for us by being with us and within us.

If anyone has reason for joy and celebration this Christmas, it’s the disciple of Jesus. Don’t be miserable in the face of inappropriate celebrations in the world at Christmastime. Instead, show that we have greater reasons to throw a party than anybody else.

I know there are lots of things that affect our mood and our ability to celebrate at Christmas. We may have had a good or a bad year. There may be an empty seat at the table this year, or there may be new life in our family.

But in terms of our faith, the coming of Jesus gives us true strength. Christmas really is ‘good tidings of great joy.’

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Advent: The Prologue And Relationships: 3, Jesus And Ordinary People (John 1:9-13)

John 1:1-18

Well, it’s that time of year when you can’t escape the Christmas songs in the shops wherever you go. I have a certain sympathy for those shop workers who are subjected to the same songs all day long on an hourly basis. Maybe they think that by the time they’ve heard Slade’s Merry Xmas Everybody for the eighth time that day, it must be close to the end of their shift.

And I grew up, surrounded by those songs. I remember the Slade record coming out, just as I also remember Wizzard’s I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday being released, along with Elton John’s Step Into Christmas and many others. Goodness knows, I was an adult by the time Wham’s Last Christmas and Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas found their way into the world.

But if I were to confess a soft spot for one Christmas single, no, it’s not Mariah or Cliff, but it might be Driving Home For Christmas by Chris Rea. I wonder how many of you will be driving home for Christmas. Or perhaps you are at home and other family members are driving home to you?

Do you look forward to seeing family at Christmas? I do. That sense of the wider family gathering is important to me.

But what we often miss is that Christmas is about family in another sense. John tells us the purpose of Jesus coming is to invite us into the family of God.

Yet many of us missed our own Creator coming into the world (verses 9-10). Even a lot of those who should have known better ignored him or rejected him (verse 11).

12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God – 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

So what does it take to become a child of God? Let me recount a story that appears in my book ‘Odd One Out’:

Many years ago, I used to meet a friend in central London and we would go to see movies together. We would always find somewhere to eat first and catch up with each other over a meal before heading for the cinema.

On one of these occasions, my friend suddenly said during the meal, “I’ve got something to tell you.” Putting on my best pastoral expression, I listened carefully.

What my friend said was this: “I was adopted as a child.”

Seeing the look of concern on my face, my friend continued, “Don’t worry, it’s all right, I rather like the fact that I know I was adopted. It means I was wanted.”

And that’s how we come into God’s family. We are not naturally children of God, as John says. So God adopts us as his children. And like my friend, he adopts us because he wants us.

In fact, he so wants us in his family that he sent his Son Jesus to bring the invitation personally to Earth. And when Jesus came, he knew that we had barriers we had erected between ourselves and God.

So Jesus took down those barriers. The shame we feel, rightly or wrongly, over our lives: nailed to the Cross. Our wrongdoing, when we do the opposite of what God loves: nailed to the Cross. Our weakness in the face of the forces of evil: nailed to the Cross.

What is there left for us to do? John tells us it takes two responses: receive Jesus, and believe in Jesus.

To receive Jesus is to receive him and all the gifts he has given us, including what I’ve just described, where he has taken away all the barriers between us and God.

To believe in Jesus is not simply to believe in his existence, but to trust in him. In fact, it is to trust our lives into his hands. Not only does he know what is best for us, he also enrols us on his adventure of making all things new. He has a purpose for our lives when we believe in him.

So this is God’s invitation to us at Christmas: to understand that Jesus has come with God’s invitation to join his family, because he wants us and loves us. And to respond by receiving all that Jesus gives us, and by entrusting our lives to him.

These things bring us into the family of God, and we join our brothers and sisters in the family who support us in our new journey.

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Second Sunday of Christmas: The Mystery of the Incarnation (John 1:1-18)

Here’s this week’s video devotions, followed by the text of the talk.

Seasoned Methodists may wonder why this isn’t a Covenant Service on the first Sunday of the New Year. Both my churches are in Tier 4 and have chosen to close for gathered worship, and I’d rather keep the Covenant Service until we can renew our commitment to Christ face to face with each other. Besides, it’s a long and complex service, and these video devotions need to be shorter than the usual act of worship.

However, if you’d like a Covenant Service sermon, you can search this blog and find quite a few.

John 1:1-18

The Christmas decorations came down earlier in our house this year. The tree was in the place where Debbie had had her home office set up for working from home during the pandemic, so things had to be put back to normal sooner than usual.

Nevertheless, I still want to wish you Happy Christmas, because we’re still in the Christmas season, according to the rhythms of the Church. And of course, I also want to wish you Happy New Year – a happier year than last year, I pray.

Our famous reading from John chapter 1 is known as the Prologue to John’s Gospel. Sometimes, when it is read at carol services or in the Christmas season, the reader will introduce it with words such as, ‘The mystery of the Incarnation.’

Of course, it’s about more than the Incarnation, but for these thoughts I’m going to pick out three themes that John relates here to the Incarnation.

Those themes are light, glory, and grace and truth (which are a pair that go together).

Firstly, light.

John talks about Jesus as being the light of all (verse 4) and the light in the darkness (verse 5) even before his birth. Then, after John the Baptist witnesses to the light (verses 6-8) Jesus the light comes into the world (verse 9) but he is neither recognised (verse 10) or received (verse 11) except by a few (verse 12), and they become children of God (verses 12-13).

Strange, isn’t it? The people that were walking in darkness had seen a great light and yet few recognised and received that light. For Israel, it was the darkness of occupation by Rome. But perhaps they didn’t receive the light because it came in a form they didn’t recognise or indeed want. They wanted the darkness dealt with in a different way.

We may battle with different forms of darkness, but the danger is the same for us. We have our fixed ideas about what God should do about the darkness and how. When he doesn’t deliver, then some people stop believing in him. But of course what they’ve done is find that their own picture of God is faulty.

For what Jesus shows us about the light is he hasn’t come just to banish darkness with a click of his fingers and the flick of a switch, but rather by walking into the depths of darkness and shining his light there. That’s what ties together the Incarnation and the Cross. It’s what his whole life is about.

I recently read an article entitled ‘4 Myths Christians Should Stop Believing About Depression’, written by a professional Christian counsellor who has herself suffered from depression. If ever something is an experience of darkness, depression is.

And one of the most telling statements in the piece for me was this sentence:

Depression has nothing to do with lack of faith, in fact, for me—it has been the catalyst for even deeper faith. Because some days, in the hardest moments, faith was the only thing I had.

Do you see? She found Jesus, the light, in her darkness. That’s where he was.

In 1983, fifteen years before the Good Friday Agreement, a book was published about Christian reconciliation work in the Troubles in Northern Ireland. It was called ‘The Darkness Where God Is’. That’s how Jesus is the light in the Incarnation. He comes to be light in the darkness.

So when we encounter darkness, let’s look for Jesus there.

Secondly, glory.

Just as Jesus brings the light of God in an unexpected way, so also he shows the glory of God in an unforeseen manner. Verse 14:

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

We see his glory through the fact that ‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.’

How would a Roman emperor have shown his glory? In the majesty of his court and the humiliation of his enemies.

How does the Son of God display his glory? Paradoxically, by leaving it all behind in heaven. He comes into a poor family and lives among the poor. ‘Emptied himself of all but love,’ as Charles Wesley put it.

Or as recorded in Mark’s Gospel, Jesus put it this way: ‘The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’

That is the glory of God. Putting aside status to live humbly, serve, and give up his life for the salvation of the world.

Those who are impressed by shallow things and shiny trinkets will never see such glory and will miss their way to the kingdom of God. But for those who have eyes to see, this is God’s glory, the shining of his splendour.

How might the world see the glory of Jesus today, then? When his people decide that hob-nobbing with the rich and powerful is not the way to go, and choose instead to serve the poor, the last, and the least. As one Internet meme puts it:

Want to put Christ back into Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you.

That was what Jesus came to do. That is how his glory was seen. It’s really quite straightforward for us to do the same. Isn’t it?

Thirdly and finally, grace and truth.

We just read that Jesus ‘came from the Father, full of grace and truth’ (verse 14). John goes on to tell us that in doing so, he brings ‘grace in place of grace already given’ (verse 16) and that whereas Moses brought the law, Jesus brought grace and truth (verse 17).

In the Old Testament, God is shown to be a God of grace, not least when he saves the Israelites from Egypt and Pharaoh. He then gives Israel his law to keep as a response to that grace and as a sign that they are the People of God. God continues to show grace to his people, even when their sin and rebellion require discipline and punishment. Jesus comes to bring grace on top of all this grace. He brings not only grace, but truth.

So the Incarnation of Jesus says this to us: just when you thought God could not be more gracious, he sends his Son to show grace in person. Now his grace saves us not simply from other people’s wickedness but from ourselves, for our sins would have cut us off from God eternally. It’s a grace that goes all the way from the manger to the Cross.

John is telling us that Jesus was born into this world on a mission of mercy. It is those who recognise their need of mercy who find fulness of life and a place in his family. Those who consider themselves good, decent, upright, upstanding members of society will never see Jesus for who he is. Only those like the publican in the Temple staying at a distance praying, ‘Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner’ understand the Christmas story.

And if we are to live the Christmas story ourselves today, we need to be people who speak about God’s grace and who demonstrate God’s grace. Who needs to hear about a God of grace and mercy? Who will only understand that if his people today show grace and mercy in their actions?

Can we think of one person who would be set free from their personal prison if they knew about a God of grace?

Can we think of one person to whom we need to show grace and mercy?

To conclude, the revelation of Jesus as bringing light, glory, grace and truth at the Incarnation is wonderful, but it is also challenging, because there are implications for us.

The Christmas story encourages us to find the light of Christ in the midst of our darkness.

The Christmas story challenges us to show the glory of Christ not in conquest and arrogance but in humble service.

And the Christmas story calls us to embrace the message of grace for ourselves and spread it by speaking of grace to others and showing grace to those who need it.

The Christmas season may be about to end, but there is no reason for its message to fade away.

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Christmas Day Morning Service

COVID-19 and Tier 4 (UK readers will understand) mean no gathering in our buildings on Christmas Day, so I have put together a video service as a substitute.

Thanks go to many groups who have made their material available for free at this time, including Engage Worship, the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity, and the Trustees for Methodist Church Purposes.

A very Happy Christmas to you all, even in our current straitened circumstances.

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A Brief Sermon For Christmas Eve Midnight Communion: The Christmas Covenant

Luke 2:8-20

Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. (Verse 11)

On Friday, Debbie and I took the children to the Wintershall Estate to see their annual nativity play. We began outside, witnessing Joseph accompanying Mary on a donkey, walking from a distance, picked out by a spotlight in the darkness of late afternoon December. Having then followed them to the inn, we found ourselves witnessing the shepherds. And while it rather stretched the imagination to behold a female shepherd singing ‘In the bleak midwinter’, one effective part of the play had those shepherds debating Israel’s history and hopes before they were shocked by the sudden appearance of the angel. It was a fitting context for what was to come in the angel’s message.

Why? When the angel says, “Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord,” this is about the fulfilment of Israel’s hopes. It’s why we sing in the carol,

The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight.

The angel uses covenant language in announcing the birth of Jesus. Israel was well used to this. They had known it from the time they were on the borders of the Promised Land as described in the book of Deuteronomy. When Moses preaches back to them there their recent history, he does so in the format of an ancient covenant.

It was like this: a great king would make a covenant with a weaker group of people. The powerful king would bless the weaker party or nation by delivering them or protecting them in some way. In return, those he had saved would promise obedience to him in certain ways prescribed in the covenant. So, on the borders of the Promised Land, the covenant recalls that God, the great king, has provided a miraculous deliverance for the children of Israel from Egypt. Now, in return for his salvation, he asks them to follow his laws.

It’s similar here: the baby is called ‘the Messiah’. He is to be the great king who will deliver Israel, and hence he is also ‘Saviour’. Certainly, Israel was looking out for such a figure. The shepherds in the play at Wintershall recounted how their nation had been exiled in Babylon, but even after returning to their own land they had been invaded by Greece and now by Rome. They were like exiles in their own land.

Of course, with hindsight we know that the Messiah who was born, Jesus, would save his people in a different way from that which they expected. Deliverance from their sins was not to mean an army raised up against the Romans but a Saviour nailed to a Roman cross.

Furthermore, the Messiah’s coming to bring salvation is not just for the Jews, it is ‘good news that will bring great joy for all the people’ (verse 10, italics mine). What begins with the people of God will extend to the world.

The basic truth is clear: the long-awaited Messiah has finally come, and he is bringing salvation. We celebrate this at Christmas. Christmas will make complete sense with Easter: the One who came in poverty and weakness, ‘wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger’ (verse 12) will die in poverty and weakness, hanging on a Cross while soldiers gamble for his clothes. But in doing so, he will absorb all that the darkness will throw at him, and he will conquer evil. The first half of the covenant is clear: God’s king will save his people.

But what of the second half? The king saves a helpless people: what does he demand in return? Again, it is all clear in the angel’s announcement: ‘a Saviour has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord’ (italics mine). Just as God saved his people from Egypt and then called them to obey his Law, so now Jesus the Messiah comes. He will save his people, and in response he calls them to recognise who he truly is – Lord.

In other words: salvation is freely given. God in Jesus brings it of his own initiative. It is not our doing. But while the gift is free, the appropriate response costs us everything. As Lord, he has the right to direct our ways. What is more, in the life of the Messiah he will show us that explicitly himself. He will not demand of us what he does not demand of himself.

However, it will be costly. In a world ruled by the Romans, to call someone Lord is to imply that the person who usually claimed the title of Lord is not. Caesar claimed to be Lord. To enter into covenant with God’s Messiah involves declaring that Jesus is Lord and the powers of the world are not. Jesus claims our ultimate allegiance, not the world.

Some Christians think that Christmas is just the prelude to the real message, that of Easter. But really they are of a piece. Both announce that the king has come. He is proclaimed at Christmas, and enthroned at Easter, on the Cross. Christmas proclaims Jesus as the Saviour, and Easter delivers on that proclamation. Christmas also says that the Saviour is the Lord, and Easter says he is declared as Lord in the Resurrection.

At Christmas, then, we see that Jesus is the fulfilment of God’s covenant with people. He is the King who comes to save his people. He is the Lord who calls all who receive that salvation to follow him as their Master.

This Christmas, may we come to worship the baby king who was given for our salvation and who commands our allegiance, not our tinsel.

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A Methodist Message For Christmas

Mark WakelinThis is the Christmas message from the President of the Methodist Conference, the Revd Dr Mark Wakelin:

“Truly this was the Son of God!

“I was asked once by a well-known broadcaster, ‘do you believe that Jesus is the Son of God?’ I replied, as you do, by asking him, ‘it depends on what you mean by, ‘Son of God.’  His reply shook me because he then said, ‘It’s a perfectly simple question, ‘Is Jesus Christ the Son of God?’ My own thought was immediately, ‘I wonder which bit of ‘Son of God’ he is finding simple?’

“I presume he meant do I believe in a literal way? But that is hardly simple. Literal language is OK for baked beans and possibly sunsets, but it gets a bit thin when talking about most of the things that really matter such as love, sadness and wonder. It runs out of steam totally when talking of God. You can’t say anything literal about God!

“I was once in an argument about the new hymn book (I am afraid I get a bit grumpy about some of the alterations to ancient poems that we make and think that our desire to modernise the old is a little like the Christians who wanted to cover the modesty of the paintings in the Sistine Chapel). My colleague disliked the word ‘ineffable’ because he felt no one would understand it. There is a certain irony in that as you can imagine! Given that ‘ineffable’ basically means something we can’t understand, I would have thought it was a useful word to hang on to if we also want to talk about God. God is ‘ineffable’ – and that’s the point.

“That’s the point of Christmas. How does God communicate with us when words are not adequate? How can we even try to talk of God when literal language so lets us down? God’s answer is, of course, the ‘self sending’ – of a God who in Charles Wesley’s words is, ‘contracted to a span, incomprehensibly made man.’ What we can ever understand of God has to begin by taking account of God revealed in the person of Jesus Christ. Who is written about in Colossians 1:15: ‘He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation’ and verse 19: ‘For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.’

“The ‘Word’ is God, says John. Now this isn’t simple language either, but it directs you a kind of struggle to understand that is different from, for example, trying to get your head around Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity! Because it is truth revealed and held in a person, understanding and engaging with that truth is as much about love and obedience as it is about intellectual capacity and linguistic dexterity. We are not so much asked to assent to a philosophical or religious claim, ‘yes I agree that Jesus is the Son of God,’ but inhabit a story, the Christmas story, to live within ancient tale of human struggle and courage, of wonder and delight, of mystery and of angels declaring good news. Children get this much more easily than adults who want the whys and the wherefores of an extraordinary story which is far more than an odd biological claim on the Universe.

“Do I believe that Jesus is the Son of God? Of course, wonder of wonders, ‘Let earth and heaven combine, angels and men agree, to praise in songs divine the incarnate deity.’ I inhabit this ancient story and find it to be true. Wrapped in our clay we may not immediately recognise the creator of all things. But it is our life task, to discover a vulnerable God who is on a mission to finish the ‘new creation’ and is looking for followers.

“Happy Christmas!”

 

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Happy Christmas

A very Joyful Christmas to one and all. I’ll resist saying Merry Christmas, because I know it won’t be merry for some of you, facing grief, pain and difficulties. But in the sense that God’s joy can be with us even in sorrow, I wish that joy to one and all.

On a day like this, I am thankful for the gift of God in Jesus Christ. I shall spend the morning ‘at work’ proclaiming this.

But of course I am by no means the only person who will be working today, and at least after my services are finished I can relax with the family. Others will be working long hours today, and I want to pay tribute to them – those providing meals and company for the lonely, the emergency services and so on. A member of one of my congregations will be spending the day volunteering in the A & E department of a local hospital.

In particular, I remember a Christmas about six ago, when one of our then rather small children was running a near-feverish temperature. How grateful we were for the staff at NHS Direct who were available at the other end of the phone to give us medical advice.

So a Joyful Christmas to you all. And particular blessings to those of you who are struggling, and those of you giving up your time to be available for others.

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