We just heard Luke’s story about the birth of Christ, but this past week I’ve been reflecting more on John’s gospel where he writes:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God....And the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.”
I’ve often thought how important the truth of these verses are. Had the Word not become flesh, we could have completely controlled the “Word” with a doctrinal statement. Better yet, we could have encased it in a beautiful book and guarded it in our own Holy of Holies, seeing it not as something accessible, but something to be kept at a distance from the likes of you and me.
But that wasn’t the Word’s plan. Instead, god too the un-imanageable step of becoming flesh – flesh, just like you and me. and I say un-imagineable because we have been taught the flesh will lead to sin, not to God. We’ve all heard screaming preachers pound pulpits, and yell scary words that the flesh is nothing more than a slippery road to hell. In fact, the words “sin” and “flesh” have so often been joined together, that even on this night when we celebrate our God becoming flesh, some find it difficult to associate the word “flesh” with “grace and truth”.
That shouldn’t be surprising. Historically, outside of the documents of the Second Vatican Council, our church has always tended to focus on Jesus as Spirit, not as flesh. While always teaching the vertical and horizontal aspects of our faith, the vertical has always been emphasized, as if there was some kind of danger in believing that God is in this world like one of us.
We see that struggle surfacing again in the new translation of our Mass texts. From what I can see, most of the horizontal has given way to the vertical. As a friend said, God has become more holy and our flesh as become more wretched.
At any rate, as I read the scriptures, I can picture God pacing the corridors of heaven burning with the hope that we would see the world as God sees it. But look what happened: God created humankind and put them in a beautiful garden, but we didn’t get it. God sent the floods as a warning. We didn’t get it. God sent prophets. We didn’t get it. God gave us laws through Moses. We didn’t’ get it. Finally, finally, God sent flesh, The Word, his own flesh, hoping we would finally get it. Think of it. Through flesh, the body of a woman, God’s own Son took on our flesh in the body of a man, and from that day on God has chosen to move into our neighborhoods and to live among us. Surely God thought, now we would get it. Now, with a love we can touch, with a life full of grace and truth living in our midst, how could w not get it?
All we had to do was to observe and listen and learn and follow the Word’s example. He touched broken bodies with healing. He fed hungry bodies. He clothed naked bodies. He blessed and hugged children’s bodies. He led oppressed, broken, rejected, hurting and lonely bodies back into community. He laughed. He grieved. He wept. And finally, He sacrificed his own boy, leaving us with the words: “This is my body, broken for you.”
Here tonight, in this place, as we reflect on the moment God took on flesh, let’s vow never to forget that our flesh, made in his image and likeness, is like his, full of grace and truth, and promise never to reject our flesh or to see it as sinful or a block to communion with God, but to see it as the precious gift it is, and to use it as he used his: doing all that we can to draw the outcast, the hurting, and the oppressed into the embrace of his loving arms. And let’s do it as he did: by rejoicing and grieving and laughing and weeping and loving and hugging and healing and forgiving, and so welcome them into the embrace our loving arms where they will experience God.
Then the Word will not have become flesh in vain.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God....And the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.”
I’ve often thought how important the truth of these verses are. Had the Word not become flesh, we could have completely controlled the “Word” with a doctrinal statement. Better yet, we could have encased it in a beautiful book and guarded it in our own Holy of Holies, seeing it not as something accessible, but something to be kept at a distance from the likes of you and me.
But that wasn’t the Word’s plan. Instead, god too the un-imanageable step of becoming flesh – flesh, just like you and me. and I say un-imagineable because we have been taught the flesh will lead to sin, not to God. We’ve all heard screaming preachers pound pulpits, and yell scary words that the flesh is nothing more than a slippery road to hell. In fact, the words “sin” and “flesh” have so often been joined together, that even on this night when we celebrate our God becoming flesh, some find it difficult to associate the word “flesh” with “grace and truth”.
That shouldn’t be surprising. Historically, outside of the documents of the Second Vatican Council, our church has always tended to focus on Jesus as Spirit, not as flesh. While always teaching the vertical and horizontal aspects of our faith, the vertical has always been emphasized, as if there was some kind of danger in believing that God is in this world like one of us.
We see that struggle surfacing again in the new translation of our Mass texts. From what I can see, most of the horizontal has given way to the vertical. As a friend said, God has become more holy and our flesh as become more wretched.
At any rate, as I read the scriptures, I can picture God pacing the corridors of heaven burning with the hope that we would see the world as God sees it. But look what happened: God created humankind and put them in a beautiful garden, but we didn’t get it. God sent the floods as a warning. We didn’t get it. God sent prophets. We didn’t get it. God gave us laws through Moses. We didn’t’ get it. Finally, finally, God sent flesh, The Word, his own flesh, hoping we would finally get it. Think of it. Through flesh, the body of a woman, God’s own Son took on our flesh in the body of a man, and from that day on God has chosen to move into our neighborhoods and to live among us. Surely God thought, now we would get it. Now, with a love we can touch, with a life full of grace and truth living in our midst, how could w not get it?
All we had to do was to observe and listen and learn and follow the Word’s example. He touched broken bodies with healing. He fed hungry bodies. He clothed naked bodies. He blessed and hugged children’s bodies. He led oppressed, broken, rejected, hurting and lonely bodies back into community. He laughed. He grieved. He wept. And finally, He sacrificed his own boy, leaving us with the words: “This is my body, broken for you.”
Here tonight, in this place, as we reflect on the moment God took on flesh, let’s vow never to forget that our flesh, made in his image and likeness, is like his, full of grace and truth, and promise never to reject our flesh or to see it as sinful or a block to communion with God, but to see it as the precious gift it is, and to use it as he used his: doing all that we can to draw the outcast, the hurting, and the oppressed into the embrace of his loving arms. And let’s do it as he did: by rejoicing and grieving and laughing and weeping and loving and hugging and healing and forgiving, and so welcome them into the embrace our loving arms where they will experience God.
Then the Word will not have become flesh in vain.
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