Friday, December 27, 2019

The Nativity of Our Lord: Christmas Day


The Nativity of Our Lord: Christmas Day
December 25, 2019
Text: John 1:1-18
            And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14; ESV).  That is the Good News of Christmas.  The Incarnation… The enfleshment of the Son of God, the Nativity, the birth, of our Lord.  For you, and for your salvation.  The Word became flesh.
            The Word: This is His Divine Nature.  He is the Son of the Father, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity.  The Word who was in the beginning with God.  The Word who is God.  The Word through whom all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made.  The Word in whom is life, which is the light of men, the Light that comes into the darkness of sin, death, and the devil, and the darkness has not overcome it.  The Word who walked with Adam in the cool of the day.  The Word who came to patriarchs and prophets, who spoke with Moses face to face as to a familiar friend, who gave to His people the Torah and the Sacred Scriptures.  The Word who is the revelation of the Father as a God of love; a God who makes the sacrifice for sinners, His own Son, given into death; a God who forgives; a God who saves; a God who is for us and not against us.  The Word who imparts the Spirit of the Father, that you may believe.  It is this Word who is spoken by the angel into Mary’s ear and takes up residence in her womb.  The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.
            Flesh: A rather offensive word, particularly with reference to God.  This is our Lord’s Human Nature.  Our God is a Man!  A flesh and blood Man.  At just the right time, when the fulness of time had come, He is born of a woman, born under the Law, to redeem those under the Law, that you and I and all who believe in Him, who are baptized into Him, might be adopted by the Father as God’s sons, receiving the Spirit of the Son into our hearts, so that we may call upon God as “Abba,” as “Our Father who art in heaven” (Gal. 4:4-5).  In His flesh, the Son is one with us, so that He fulfills God’s Commandments for us, in our place.  In His flesh, He becomes all that He redeems, flesh of our flesh, bone of our bone, born of the Virgin Mary, a Baby, a Child, a Man.  Flesh so that He can suffer.  Flesh so He can bleed.  Flesh so He can be nailed to the wood of the tree.  Flesh so God can die.  For you, for the forgiveness of sins. 
            And so that this flesh, dead and buried in a tomb, can rise from the dead, defeating sin, death, the devil, and hell, forever.  This flesh and blood God, Jesus Christ, seen and heard and touched by many for forty days after His resurrection, has now ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.  A Man, like us, reigns over all things.  He works all things for our good and for our salvation (Rom. 8:28).  He intercedes for us before the Father.  He sends His Spirit.  He is our access to the Father.  We pray through Him, in His Name, and in His Spirit, this flesh and blood Man who is God’s beloved Son.  And He is coming back, this Man born of the Virgin, our Savior and Brother, to raise us, to judge us, to give us life forever in His Kingdom.  The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.
            His dwelling: That is, He tabernacles among us.  Jesus is the new and greater Temple.  He is the dwelling place of God with and for His people, the one Mediator between God and men, the Man, Christ Jesus.  And He is with us always, to the very end of the age.  Not in some ghostly, ethereal sort of way, but in the way He came, and in the way He will come again.  In the flesh.  The Word made flesh.  Our Lord Jesus Christ, born among us this day, dwells among us with His flesh and blood.  He speaks in Scripture and Preaching and Absolution.  He tucks you into His flesh as He clothes you with Himself in Holy Baptism.  He tucks Himself into you as He feeds you with His true body and blood in the Holy Supper.  Flesh and blood God dwells in you, and you in Him.  Sins forgiven.  Life everlasting.  You behold His glory.  And from His fulness you and all of us receive, grace upon grace.   
            And that is why we feast and sing this day with great rejoicing.  The great Christmas Gift is God’s salvation, His own Son, all wrapped up in flesh and blood.  The whole accomplishment of our salvation depends on Christmas: The birth of God, who is a Man, Jesus, the Son of Mary.  The Word became flesh.  He dwells among us still.  Tidings of comfort and joy to the world.  The Lord has come to make His home with you.  Merry Christmas!  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.   

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