The Feast of the Nativity, Year A
The Rev. Nigel Taber-Hamilton, Rector
I found myself wondering, the other day, about why we come here tonight. That might seem like a silly question, but I don't think so. Some of us come, of course, because we are regular members here and not to come would be rather odd, this being on of the three great festivals of the Christian year along with Easter and the Day of Pentecost.
But to say that the reason is only out of habit is to miss the reasons that all of us come at this time. It occurs some of those reasons are pretty basic:
- We've come to hear the old familiar story that's part of identities - the story that, Christian from birth or not, we have grown up with.
- We've come to sing the songs that we associate with that story, songs that have the ability to move us in really profound ways - so that we feel as if we are in Bethlehem, standing beside that manger.
- We've come to be a part of a like-minded community - to share that old familiar story and those old familiar songs with others.
- And we might even be here not so much because of ourselves but because others we care about wanted to come and we came with them.
In that sense we are all here tonight(today) with a common purpose.
But what is it about the story that's important to us? It can't surely be because it's about a child, even if the humanity of the story touches our paternal and maternal hearts. After all, the dire circumstances surrounding the birth in Bethlehem aren't unique. When I watch the evening news I see stories about babies that are born in much worse circumstances: in the slums of our
cities, in rural poverty, or, overseas, in those places where the child mortality rate is through the roof. The mere fact of those births doesn't move me to get up off the sofa and head out to some sacred place at nearly midnight with joy in my heart in response!
Of course, every birth carries some meaning beyond the literal facts. The birth of a child is always, in some way, a statement that love is possible. It is, in some way, a declaration of possibilities and of hope, a commitment to the future - in fact, a belief that there will be a future.
Yet it has to be that there is something about this birth that makes it more than just any birth, as powerful as each birth is for at least some. It has to be that this particular birth's loaded with meaning in ways far beyond the simple facts of the story, far beyond a long journey in deep winter and a birth in difficult circumstances to an un-wed teen mother.
It has to be that what draws us is a deep-down recognition that this birth is different, is beyond the love and the hope and the possibilities that accompany each new birth - that it's more real, and more significant, and more powerful.
On some level I believe we all know the answer. Maybe not in a way we could express it, but the awareness is there.
Christianity has attempted to put this profound and mystical reality into words in the most recent version of the Nicene Creed's most recent translation that says, simply that in Jesus God "became truly human." so it is that we human beings seek words to describe the indescribable.
Tonight is about God and us and God-with-us, isn't it!? To quote a book title, tonight has to be about "Life, the Universe, and Everything"!
In this birth we have a symbol and metaphor for a profound truth - the most profound truth conveyed to us in a personal message to each of us that God is not "out there", or "in heaven" but came - and continues to come - into our reality, sharing our existence.
In this event, in Bethlehem, God graces human identity and purpose with the something of the Divine - with God's own self.
Why, I wonder, would God do that? After all, when we look around we see a world that seems to be in a pretty bad state - war, and poverty, hunger and death. It might seem that we've really messed up! And isn't that one view of all of human history? We don't really deserve such a gift.
Here's the explanation of one poet (Max Lucado):
Jesus humbled himself
"He went from commanding angels to sleeping in the straw.
From holding stars to clutching Mary's finger.
The palm that held the universe took the nail of a soldier.
Why? Because that's what love does."
This birth is saying something pretty profound in the face of our screw-ups, pretty significant in the face of flawed human identity: it is saying "we are loved and cherished and embraced by God" - all of us.
The message we hear tonight (today) from God is: "I love you." Later, on a dark Friday, that message will be repeated: "Come home. All is forgiven".
The wood of the manger and the wood of the cross are inseparable - cut from the same tree - just as the Christmas story is inseparable from cross and empty tomb: what we celebrate tonight is only the beginning of the pilgrimage, not its conclusion. The world might 'get over Christmas' in about seven or eight days, but for us it is a place of departure, and when you go on a journey there are things to think about on the way - there are consequences to the decision to
come here tonight (today) if the Christmas story is really to have meaning for us.
Here, in the words of Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, is one such consequence: "...at Christmas," Williams observes, "God shows that he is not ashamed to be with us. He has heard our cries of weakness and self-doubt and unhappy longing, he has seen our wanderings and anxieties, and he is not ashamed to be alongside us in this world, walking with us in our pilgrimage. And because he is content to walk with us, we are challenged about whose company we might be ashamed to share...."
After all, if God could choose a fourteen-year-old un-wed teenager to be "theotokos" - God-Bearer" - then no-one is excluded from the divine embrace.
So - as you leave this place tonight (today) having shared in the celebration of the birth of divine love in all of us - the invitation to all of you of Jesus' birth is to embrace the pilgrim's journey from manger to empty tomb.
So look around you not just now but every day and ask yourselves who it is that God has chosen for you as your fellow pilgrims.
And decide - if faith means anything to you - if you are willing to make the journey with them.
For if God embraces all of creation - "the failing and the fragile world of human beings" (ibid) then the only faithful place to stand is beside the manger, and at the foot of the cross, and by the rolled-away stone - stand there with each other and proclaim with Joy this great gift, and by our loving words and our compassionate actions to make real the meaning of the gift of "God
among us" - to show that this gift does make a difference in our lives and in our world.
That's our Christmas gift - not from someone else to us, but from us to our world.
Amen.
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