CHRISTMAS ONE SERMON

Let me begin by telling you a story :-

“Once upon a time there was a man who looked upon Christmas as a lot of humbug. He wasn’t a Scrooge. He was a kind and decent person, generous to his family, upright in all his dealings with other men. But he didn’t believe all that stuff about Incarnation which churches proclaim at Christmas. And he was too honest to pretend that he did. “I am truly sorry to distress you,” he told his wife, who was a faithful churchgoer. “But I simply cannot understand this claim that God becomes man. It doesn’t make any sense to me.”
On Christmas Eve his wife and children went to church for the midnight service. He declined to accompany them. “I’d feel like a hypocrite,” he explained. “I’d rather stay at home. But I’ll wait up for you.”
Shortly after his family drove away in the car, snow began to fall. He went to the window and watched the flurries getting heavier and heavier. “If we must have Christmas,” he thought, “it’s nice to have a white one.” He went back to his chair by the fireside and began to read his newspaper. A few minutes later he was startled by a thudding sound. It was quickly followed by another, then another.
He thought that someone must be throwing snowballs at his livingroom window. When he went to the front door to investigate, he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the storm. They had been caught in the storm and in a desperate search for shelter had tried to fly through his window. “I can’t let these poor creatures lie there and freeze,” he thought. “But how can I help them?” Then he remembered the barn where the children’s pony was stabled. It would provide a warm shelter.
He put on his coat and galoshes and tramped through the deepening snow to the barn. He opened the door wide and turned on a light. But the birds didn’t come in. “Food will lure them in,” he thought. So he hurried back to the house for bread crumbs, which he sprinkled on the snow to make a trail into the barn. To his dismay, the birds ignored the bread crumbs and continued to flop around helplessly in the snow. He tried shooing them into the barn by walking around and waving his arms. They scattered in every direction – except into the warm lighted barn.
“They find me a strange and terrifying creature,” he said to himself, “and I can’t seem to think of any way to let them know they can trust me. If only I could be a bird myself for a few minutes, perhaps I could lead them to safety. . . .”
Just at that moment the church bells began to ring. He stood silent for a while, listening to the bells pealing the glad tidings of Christmas. Then he sank to his knees in the snow. “Now I do understand,” he whispered. “Now I see why You had to do it.” ”

That was A Christmas Parable written by Louis Cassels many years ago, and is a simple but beautiful way to explain the mystery of Christmas.
Think of the many ways God has reached out to us to communicate with us since the beginning. The climax of God communicating with us in the Old Testament was when God formed the covenant with Moses on Mt. Sinai. God joined himself to us in a covenant and we were joined to God in a covenant. But we still sinned so God raised up prophets to call us back but only a small number of people paid heed to the prophets. Through one of the prophets, Hosea, God said that Israel has been like an unfaithful wife committing adultery by going after false gods. All through the centuries of the Old Testament God pursued us like a lover but we had broken the covenant and God had to make a new unbreakable covenant with us. For this new covenant, God would become flesh and bones like us, and shed his blood in the person of Jesus to convince us once and for all to accept his invitation to be his people. Jesus was the climax of God reaching out to us.
The Word was made flesh,
he lived among us,
and we saw his glory…

“Now I see why You had to do it” wrote Louis Cassels in A Christmas Parable. And indeed God had to do it, had to become one of us to make us understand because despite God’s best efforts throughout all the Old Testament we still didn’t get the message.
We are often slow to see and grasp what God has done.
Or we prefer to explain things away.
God coming and being clothed in flesh is the greatest miracle of all.
God Almighty becoming small for us is the most amazing story ever. If this does not animate us nothing will. And there is something gloriously defiant about Christmas.
A feast in the middle of winter is defiant of the winter. A fire blazing indoors is defiant of the cold world outside. It is a bold act of faith to have such a celebration when the circumstances are completely against it. It represents hope and fullfillment in the midst of all the dark circumstances of the world. Christ has come purposely into our disordered world.
And it is fitting that Christ should come in our “bleak midwinter.” He is the light that comes into a dark world. He is the hope that comes in the middle of despair. The lonely world has been crying out for him. And he has come. His name is Emmanuel. God with us. The darkness has not overcome the light. The brute cold has not overwhelmed us. The snow and rain have not quenched the flame. So of course we celebrate. And the celebration itself has warmed the whole world. Even the half-hearted heathens of the modern world, who avoid Christ, cannot help celebrating with Christians at Christ’s birth. They want to join the winter feast rather than pretend to prefer the cold. Christmas is lovable, and they know it.
But also as G. K. Chesterton has written : “Everything that is really lovable can be hated; and there are undoubtedly people who hate Christmas.”
But if those words from Chesterton shocked you a little, let me quote other words by Chesterton which sums up beautifully how God became small for us so that we could comprehend him.
Chesterton wrote :-
“The wise man will follow a star, low and large and fierce in the heavens; but the nearer he comes to it the smaller and smaller it will grow, till he finds it the humble lantern over some little inn or stable.”

God has spoken to us, the Word has become flesh, the Word has become finite.
And i love this quote from St. Therese of Lisieux
“A God who became so small could only be mercy and love” –
Let us behold God in the Christ Child – in the babe in the manger – in the smallness – and the more we realise how God became small for us the more we will sing with the angels GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGHEST.