2nd Day of Christmas, 2021 - As Many As Received Him

“Good news of great joy,” the angel choir sang when announcing the birth of Jesus to the shepherds. But the birth of Jesus was not good news to everyone. His coming was not welcomed by everyone.

His lack of welcome is a theme found in all three accounts of his birth.

In Luke’s account, there was no room in the inn for the expectant mother so Jesus was born out back where the animals were housed. His first bed was a feed trough used to feed the animals. They were in Bethlehem, far away from their home in Nazareth. There was no room for Jesus there. There was no one there to welcome him other than his mother and father. In Matthew’s gospel, Herod was disturbed by the news of a newborn king and all of Jerusalem with him (Matthew 2:3). The news of his birth led to a plot to destroy him that resulted in the slaughter of all male children under the age of two who lived in the region (Matthew 2:16-18). John’s prologue said it most succinctly. “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him,” John 1:10-11.

The lack of welcome recorded by each gospel writer foreshadowed the resistance and rejection Jesus would experience in his ministry, leading ultimately to his death on the cross.

The reason Herod did not receive him is obvious. This infant who was called the newborn king of the Jews was a rival for Herod’s throne as King of the Jews. He was a threat to Herod’s power, his place, his privilege, his affluence, his very identity. The same could be said of the religious leaders who opposed Jesus and plotted his death. Jesus’s proclamation of forgiveness undermined the authority of the priests to dispense forgiveness through the Temple and its sacrifices. Jesus’s healing on the Sabbath undermined their law-focused, merit-based religious life. Jesus’s embrace of tax collectors and sinners undermined the status and privilege they enjoyed over those who did not live by the law. Jesus was a threat to their power, their position, their privilege, their affluence — to their very way of life and the identity they had crafted from it. For Herod, for the religious leaders, Jesus had to die if they were to maintain their way of life.

While each story recorded the lack of welcome Jesus received, each story also told of those who received him.

In Luke’s story, it was the shepherds — directed by the angels — who sought him out. Their response was one of joy — “glorifying and praising God,” Luke 2:20. They told everyone they met about their experience and about the Child (Luke 2:17). In Matthew’s story, foreigners — guided by a star — sought him out, bringing him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

In both stories, the most unlikely welcomed the birth of Jesus. Shepherds lived on the margins of society. They were “the lowly” of Mary’s song (Luke 1:52) whom God lifted up. They were commonly looked down upon and shunned. Yet they were the first to see the Christ Child and the first to witness to others about their experience of Christ. The magi in Matthew’s story were Gentiles — outsiders who did not even worship the God of the Hebrews. They were astrologers who studied the stars as a part of their religion. Yet they sought him out and paid homage to him, recognizing that he was someone of significance (Matthew 2:17). These unlikely characters — shepherds, foreigners astrologers — were the ones who welcomed the birth of Jesus.

“But to all who received him,” John’s gospel proclaims.

To welcome the Christ Child is to experience God’s grace. “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace,” (John 1:16). It is to know God. “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth,” John 1:14. To welcome the Christ Child is to live in relationship with God as beloved child. “But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God,” John 1:12-13. It is to experience God’s life as one’s own – what John’s gospel calls eternal life. To welcome the Christ Child is to be changed — transformed into the likeness of Christ.

I cannot explain why some welcome him and others do not. The only explanation I can offer is God’s grace.

But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.

Christmas Day, 2021 - Christmas Mystery

Most of us enjoy a good mystery — a “who done it” story. The twists and turns of not knowing keep us hooked in the story. At the same time, most of us don’t enjoy not knowing or understanding. We want to know. Remember what hooked the woman in the Garden story: “You shall be like God, knowing …” (Genesis 3:5). Knowledge gives us a sense of power. If we understand something, we can figure out how it works and — maybe more importantly — how to fix it when it goes wrong. Knowing helps us deal with the chaos of human existence.

The Christmas story presents us with mystery — something we can’t explain. We can only ponder it. But, like all who have experienced a call to proclaim God’s truth, I still attempt to speak to that mystery. This three part statement reflects my thinking about the mystery.

He became what we are so that we could become what he is and do what he did.

He became what we are.

The Christmas story is about the mystery we call the incarnation. That helpless, totally dependent, vulnerable infant lying in a feed trough was God in the flesh. God laid aside the trappings that go with being God and took on human flesh with all its frailty, needs, weakness, and struggle. The God who created the universe entered into that creation, becoming a part of it. He entered our experience, making it his own. Jesus is the in-the-flesh embodiment of God.

Words fail as we attempt to express what the mind struggles to grasp. Here’s how the biblical writers expressed it.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth, John 1:1-3, 14.

Though he was in the form of God, (he) did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross, Philippians 2:6-8.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, Colossians 1:15, 19; 2:9.

He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, Hebrews 1:3.

The incarnation is a mystery — something we cannot understand or explain — something bigger than our ability to grasp. It is something we are left to ponder.

But that is not all there is to the mystery. There is a second part of the statement.

He became what we are so we could become what he is.

Behind the incarnation was a divine purpose: to share God’s life — God’s character — with us.

We were created in God’s image (Genesis 1:26). A divine spark resides deep within us. God’s finger print is on our soul. Now, God is at work to awaken that divine potential and bring it to maturity. Through the Spirit, God is growing us up into a Christ-like maturity.

Here’s how some of the biblical writers expressed this part of the mystery.

To all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God, John 1:12-13.

All of us … are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, 2 Corinthians 3:18.

For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that (his Son) might be the firstborn within a large family, Romans 8:29.

He (God) chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love.  He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, Ephesians 1:4-5.

Until all of us come to … maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. We must no longer be children … but speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, Ephesians 4:13-15.

You were taught to put away your former way of life, your old self, corrupt and deluded by its lusts, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness, Ephesians 4:22-24. 

Seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator, Colossians 3:9b-10.

See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are. Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, 1 John 1:1-2.

He has given us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust, and may become participants of the divine nature, 2 Peter 1:4.

This process of transformation — what we call salvation, the transformation of our hearts and minds into the likeness of Christ — is a mystery. It is not something we can explain or understand. When we open our hearts and minds to who Jesus revealed God to be, when we choose to live in relationship with God as beloved children, something happens in the depths of our being. We are transformed … changed … healed … made whole. We begin to become like Jesus deep within, in the core of our being.

This process is not possible apart from the incarnation. Jesus — the Word made flesh — revealed God to us. “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son who has made him known,” John 1:18. In him, we see, learn of, and experience God’s grace and forgiveness. “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace,” John 1:16. From him, we learn God’s ways of self-giving, servant love. Through him, we are reconciled — brought back into relationship with — God, claimed as beloved children.

In addition, this process is not possible apart from the Spirit. The Spirit orchestrates and guides our transformation (2 Corinthians 3:18) — what is referred to as spiritual growth or spiritual formation. (I explore the work of the Spirit in my book that will be released in the spring of 2022 – Life in the Spirit: Reflecting on the Work of the Spirit in Our Lives.) The Spirit moves us beyond our old way of thinking and living, teaching us to think with the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16), empowering us to live the self-giving, servant ways of God. The Spirit who lives in us is the continuing incarnation — God-in-flesh. In the Spirit, the mystery of the incarnation continues.

He became what we are so we could become what he is.

And, now, for the other part of the thought: he became what we are so we could become what he is and do what he did.

To do what he did is to love as he loved. It is to see and embrace every person as a beloved child of God. It is to use our power — in its many forms — to serve and bless others. It is to be an agent of transformation and healing in the world — peacemakers (Matthew 5:9). It is to live the ways of God, helping to create a God-shaped world. It is to live as God’s partner in bringing the kingdom into reality on earth, here, now.

Doing what he did, loving as he loved is possible through the transforming, empowering work of the Spirit.

The Christmas story is not complete until we do what he did – until we love as he loved. As we do what he did and love as he loved, we — our lives — become a part of the mystery.

He became what we are so we could become what he is and do what he did.

It’s a mystery — something beyond our understanding, something we can’t explain. But if we could explain it, it would not have the power to attract us and captivate our hearts.

May the mystery of Christmas captivate your heart this Christmas so that your heart and mind can be transformed into the likeness of Christ!

4th Sunday of Advent, 2021 - Love

The fourth Sunday of Advent signals the approaching end of our Advent journey. The theme of this fourth Sunday reflects the destination of our journey: love.

The Advent journey ushers us into the celebration of the birth of Christ — Christmas. Christmas proclaims God’s love. It displays God’s steadfast, faithful love that never wavers, that never gives up on or abandons us. It demonstrates the lengths God will go when living out of the divine character of love. Christmas reflects the self-emptying, self-sacrificing nature of love as “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,” John 1:14. It proclaims the objective of love — the good of the other. Christ came that we might “have life, and have it abundantly,” John 10:10. God’s life is the life of self-giving love that seeks the good of the other at any cost.

The Advent journey leads us back to God’s love on display in a helpless infant, wrapped in strips of cloth, lying in a feed trough in the midst of a broken world full of hostility and violence.

The journey also reminds us that God loves us so that we, too, might love as God loves. In taking on our life, God shared God’s life with us — what John’s gospel calls eternal life. As we respond to God’s love, opening our lives to it, that love transforms our hearts and minds. The Spirit — the on-going expression of God’s self-sacrificing love — moves us beyond the anxiety-driven ego-centric self and its self-serving, what’s-in-it-for-me spirit. The Spirit frees us to give as God gives — unconditionally, generously, sacrificially, for the good of the other. The Spirit leads us into life. 

As we walk the final stage of our Advent journey, we once again walk into an encounter with love — a love that transforms our hearts and minds, setting us free.

3rd Sunday of Advent, 2021 - Joy

Joy is the theme of the third Sunday of Advent – joy in the face of challenges that are life-depleting. 

Joy, along with its companion peace, is the inner disposition of the people of God and the followers of Jesus. Joy and peace are the fruit of the Spirit — that which the Spirit produces within us (Galatians 5:22).

Joy and peace cannot be manufactured through human effort. We can manipulate circumstances to manufacture happiness or excitement or pleasure or entertainment. But we cannot create joy or peace. Only the Spirit can produce joy and peace within us.

Anxiety is a barrier to joy and peace. In writing to the Philippians, the Apostle Paul told them to rejoice in the Lord always (Philippians 4:4). He balanced this admonition with the exhortation “do not worry about anything” (Philippians 4:6). Worry is the mental gymnastics we do when we are anxious and afraid. It is our attempt to have control over something that we cannot control. It is always about the future. And it robs us of joy and peace in the present.

While we cannot manufacture joy or peace, we can place ourselves in a position for the Spirit to work. Paul told the Philippians (and us) how to do so.

The process begins with the recognition of the anxiety and worry. Until we recognize and name our anxiety, we will continue to worry. Our own thoughts keep the worry alive. Paul’s exhortation carries the idea “you are worrying; stop!” We are not powerless over our anxiety, fear, and worry. We can choose to move beyond them.

The way to move beyond our anxiety, fear, and worry is through prayer. “Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” (Philippians 4:6). Recognizing our anxiety becomes an invitation to pray. We share our anxiety and fear — those things about which we worry — with God. Praying shifts our focus from ourselves, to God; from our situation to what God is doing. Praying gives voice to our fear, getting it out of our head.

Our prayer is to be laced with thanksgiving. Thanksgiving involves remembering. It calls us to look back over our shoulder to when God was faithful in the past, to when God brought good out of a painful situation, to when God transformed struggle into blessing. Remembering and giving thanks for what God has done in the past reminds us that God can be trusted in the current situation. It invites us to rest in God’s love in the present moment.

Offsetting our worry with thanksgiving-laced prayer positions us to experience the Spirit’s work. As we rest in God’s grace, the Spirit produces inner peace. “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7).

This inner peace is what allows joy to flow from deep within. With the logjam of anxiety, fear, and worry removed, joy can flow in response to God and to the work of God.

This third Sunday of Advent reminds us that joy and peace are the inner disposition out of which the followers of Jesus live. From a posture of joy and peace, we can choose to love as Jesus loved.

Rejoice in the Lord!  Always!

2nd Sunday of Advent, 2021 - Peace

 “And there shall be endless peace” … so the prophet said (Isaiah 9:7) … peace of such nature that it permeates all of creation. “The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lied down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them” (Isaiah 11:6). Peace that displaces our default pattern of domination, destruction, and war (Isaiah 2:2-5).

Yet, it seems to me that the better adjective to describe peace is elusive rather than the prophet’s word endless.

Peace is the theme commonly associated with the second Sunday of Advent. In the face of peace that seems to be elusive, the season of Advent calls us to look forward in faith and hope to when the LORD’s promise of endless peace is fulfilled.

The prophetic vision of endless peace is always associated with the messiah – the long-awaited Davidic king who would rule with righteousness and justice. Peace would be the end result of this one’s reign. He (the king was always a man in that patriarchal culture) would establish a society and culture patterned after the LORD’s ways of righteousness and justice. To practice justice was to use power on behalf of the powerless — the widow, the orphan, the stranger or immigrant (Isaiah 1:17). (See Leviticus 19:33-34 along with 19:18b.) Justice was to provide for, advocate for, and empower these that Jesus called “the least of these” (Matthew 25:40, 45). Righteousness was the practice of justice. It was to live in faithful covenant relationship, i.e., rightly, with the most vulnerable. It was to be aware of them and to act on their behalf, including provide for them. The LORD’s ways of righteousness and justice stood in opposition to the normal human pattern of exploiting the powerless for personal gain.

Righteousness and justice are not the world’s way of seeking to establish peace. In contrast to the LORD’s way of using power on behalf of others, we use our power for our own benefit, including using power to protect ourselves from those we view as “the other” — the enemy. We seek to control the chaos that erupts when differences — differences of opinion, of practices, of outlook, of culture — collide. We establish laws and norms that identify the one acceptable way of doing things. When “the other” violates those norms, we use our power to control them and punish them. If necessary, we use our power to dominate and destroy those we view as enemies. War and violence are the end expression of how we humans commonly use power. We do all of this in the pursuit of peace. Yet this way of using power never produces peace. At best, it produces stability that benefits those who have the power, but always at the expense of the powerless. Peace remains elusive.

The Advent season reminds us that the promise of endless peace is linked to the birth of Jesus. In announcing his birth to the shepherds, the angelic chorus sang “on earth, peace” (Luke 2:14).

Jesus understood the prophetic understanding of the path that leads to peace. He wept over Jerusalem because the nation did not recognize “the things that make for peace” (Luke 19:42). He foresaw the destruction of the nation that lay ahead because they rejected the ways of God in order to follow the way the world uses power (Luke 19:43-44).

In addition to this endless peace in the world, Jesus also taught his disciples about a personal peace. “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you” (John 14:27). Jesus spoke of an inner peace that stilled the turmoil that lives in the human heart/psyche. “Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid” (John 14:27b). His words speak to our normal experience of fear — the anxiety driven turmoil of the human heart. Anxiety is an inherent part of our emotional DNA. It underlies and drives everything we do … until we recognize it and learn to manage it. Jesus’s words in the original mean “stop living with a troubled heart, stop being afraid.” The peace Jesus gives is a peace we can experience in the face of that which stirs anxiety and fear — the chaos of the world. It is a peace that displaces the fear and anxiety.

It seems to me these two different experiences of peace — endless peace in the world and personal peace deep within — are interrelated and inseparable. Learning to live out of the inner peace Jesus gives contributes to peace in our society, culture, and world. When we fail to live out of this inner peace … that is, when we live out of our anxiety and fear, we contribute to the chaos of our world. Our anxiety and fear become the lens through which we view life and others. They determine our perception of life’s events and others. They govern how we react to life’s events and others. When we live out of anxiety and fear, we naturally use our power for our own benefit, often against others. The unresolved inner pain with which we live — the pain we fail to face, name, address, and resolve — gets dumped onto others, sabotaging our relationships and creating chaos. This pattern is reflected in Jesus’s command about not judging. “Do not judge … Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the long in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:1, 3). Judging others — a critical, faultfinding spirit — is evidence of our own unresolved stuff and the anxiety that surrounds it. Our lack of inner peace contributes to the external chaos with which we live. The opposite is also true. When we live out of inner peace — the peace Jesus gives through the Spirit — we contribute to the healing of relationships and, thereby, to the healing of the world. The peace Jesus gives enables us to live as peacemakers in the world (Matthew 5:9). The peace Jesus gives is the key to a world of endless peace.

Each Advent season, we look yet again beyond what is — the elusive peace — to what will be — a time of endless peace. As we do, we are reminded that the promise of endless peace was made by the prophets in the face of international turmoil and war … when peace was seemingly as elusive for them as it is for us. And we are reminded of the peace the Jesus gives — that personal, inner peace that enables us to live as peacemakers in a world in which peace seems so elusive.