Who doesn’t find great joy at the birth of a baby? Especially if it’s your own? With the pain and sorrow of the labor having come and gone, you’re left with a precious little child in your arms. And you’re mesmerized by this precious gift from God – counting the tiny fingers and toes – analyzing the features of the baby’s face – the eyes and nose and mouth. What wonder – what excitement – what joy!
I’m sure a lot of this joy at the birth of a child feeds a lot of our thoughts and feelings about Christmas. We love that nativity scene – Mary holding her precious newborn son, Joseph hovering over them, ready to protect and to provide at a moments notice. As beautiful and serene as this scene is, it’s no wonder a lot of Christmas hymnody speaks of peace, silence, and wonder at the beauty of this sight.
Yet, like a newborn that suddenly awakens and screams due to hunger pains, the Gospel for this Christmas Day breaks the silence and awakens us to the truth that the baby in Mary’s arms isn’t just a lovely and cute son of man, He’s the eternal Son of God – who was in the beginning with God – who is eternally begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father.
He wasn’t just with God in the beginning, but He is God. Along with the Father and the Holy Spirit, He made all things: hanging the stars in the sky, giving the sun its light, creating the earth fit for plants and animals and human life, and designing the miracle of the human body. “All things were made through him, and without Him was not any thing made that was made” (John 1:3).
What wonder, what excitement, what joy, that this new mother and her husband would’ve had! Not only were they holding a precious newborn child in their arms, but they were holding the all-knowing, all-powerful, ever-present God! That means the tiny fingers and toes they would have touched were God’s fingers and toes. The face they gazed upon would have been the very face of God. What wonder! What excitement! What joy! What an amazing privilege to behold the face of God in joy and peace and not in terror and judgement.
Yet, why did God take such drastic measures? Why would He – the creator of the entire universe – lower Himself to become a creature? Why would the God of the heavens and the earth come into His creation and join Himself to it, when the world that He made didn’t know or acknowledge Him? Why would He come to His own when His own people didn’t receive him? God comes into the world through the flesh and blood of Jesus, so that “all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God…” (John 1:12).
He descended in this way, so that we could know Him in His mercy rather than in fear and judgement. Before we were made children of God, we were “by nature, children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3), as St. Paul writes in his Letter to the Ephesians. We are born according to the flesh in sin, spiritually dead in our trespasses, born under the curse inherited from our earthly fathers. This is hard, if not impossible to believe or understand, especially when you’re holding a precious newborn child when they appear quiet, sweet, and innocent. Yet, the words of Holy Scripture are clear. The will of man begets children of man, children doomed to disobedience and ultimately wrath.
Spiritually dead in our trespasses and born under the curse of our earthly fathers, we are unable to free ourselves from the condemnation we justly deserve. Therefore, God in His mercy and infinite love, Himself takes on human flesh and blood to come and rescue us. He comes to redeem our fallen flesh by His Holy flesh. To make us His beloved children and to give us the forgiveness and life that we desperately need, The Holy Word of God, the only begotten son of the Father, is conceived then born in the person of Jesus.
Being born of an earthly woman, Jesus is a true human: “man” like you and me in our usual functions, one needing to eat and drink and sleep, one who is subject to illness and even death. Yet, whereas you and I were conceived by the flesh of man, He was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Where your flesh and blood has been corrupted by sin, His flesh and blood is pure and guiltless and free from sin. Where we fail to keep God’s Commandments perfectly, He placed Himself under the Law and was obedient to His heavenly Father in every way, even unto death upon the cross. All this He does for you and your redemption!
Jesus is the baby born to face your death. Carrying your sins, your burdens, your sorrows, the eternal Son of God goes to the cross to suffer the Father’s wrath for your sin. And dying the death that you deserve, He who was once wrapped in swaddling cloths and laid in a manger, would be wrapped in burial cloths and laid in a grave for you.
While Jesus is the baby, born to die in your place, He’s also the baby, born to be raised and live forever for you. As the eternal Son of God who fulfilled the plan of salvation, the grave couldn’t hold Him. He has been raised triumphant over death and sin. Jesus, as true God, has proven that He is the fountain and source of life now and for eternity. He lives today and He continues to work through His Word and Sacraments to give you His forgiveness and life. All so that you may know Him by faith, and be made a child of God, no longer a child of wrath.
St. Peter writes that we’re born again through the abiding word of God” (1 Peter 1:23). He makes us His beloved child as the Holy Spirit works through His Word as it is spoken through preaching, Baptism, Absolution, and the Lord’s Supper. This is wonderful news! We can’t make ourselves worthy to be His children or earn His love. Just as a newborn can’t change his diaper or feed or care for himself nor give anything in return for their parent’s love and service, so we receive and are cared for by God free grace and loving mercy.
This is God’s good and gracious will for us. As we heard in the Gospel for this Christmas day: “to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”
Fellow children of God, we can celebrate this Christmas Day with all the wonder and excitement and joy that even the smallest of children experience as they open their presents. Our heavenly Father loves us and has given us the greatest gifts, which are redemption, forgiveness, and the hope of life everlasting through Jesus Christ His Son. This Son, our Savior not only came to dwell for 33 years upon the earth during His ministry, but He continues to dwell and abide with us. He comes to us to us to strengthen us as His children, to walk in His ways. He restores our faith and joy as He gathers us here together in His house to unwrap and receive His gifts each and every week where He speaks His Word and gives us His body and Blood crucified and raised for the forgiveness of our sins.
As beautiful and serene as the Nativity scene is, we get to experience and receive its fulfillment in Christ, here. The glory of God is present in Christ’s presence. This is where God’s peace continues to descend on earth to those with whom God is well pleased for the sake of Jesus. With the same tenderness that we imagine Mary and Joseph showed to the newborn Jesus, God shows to us now as His beloved children born again through the washing of regeneration in Christ. As the most loving Father, He turns His face to us and looks upon us and sees us as precious and beautiful for we have received the holiness of His beloved Son. This is the beauty of the words of the benediction that we don’t always appreciate. “The Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you, the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.”
He gives you His peace as He comes to you here in Jesus Christ. So justified by His Grace, let us continue to receive and rejoice in His tender mercy this Christmas Day and every day. Amen.
Pr. Aaron Kangas