Sermon for the Second Sunday of Christmas

January 4, 2009

Jeremiah 31:7–14
Psalm 147:12–20
Ephesians 1:3–14
John 1:[1–9] 10–18
Year B
I.N.I. (In the name of Jesus)

If you were here at 10:30 pm on Christmas Eve, and heard the gospel of John’s story of Jesus’ origins right before the candlelighting, pat yourselves on the back.

If you were here at 10:30 am on Christmas day, and heard the gospel of John’s story of Jesus’ origins as the gospel for the day, pat yourselves on the back.

If you’re here today on the tenth day of Christmas, and heard the gospel of John’s story of Jesus’ origins as the gospel for the day, pat yourselves on the back. Clearly, it’s a story worth telling during Christmas.

I have been blessed with windows in my office, here at Christ the King and in my prior years in Vermont.

In each office there were two framed glass squares from which to look out at the world outside.

Here in Nashua, I face due west. My main point of reference is the parking lot. Based on either my quirky brain or what God has given me (depending on your perspective), on a Sunday morning, for special events, or before a meeting I watch cars arrive and in many cases identify who’s coming to church based on their vehicle. There’s Dick Ledoux in his pick-up, Janet Waugaman in her Buick, and the Yons in their new Toyota van. I do the same thing for Chapel School families, though there are too many vans to count. I like seeing the parking lot fill up, because on Sunday it means that we will have a community in the flesh gathered around God’s Word and Meal soon. And in my office, on a sunny day, come mid-afternoon, I have to shutter up the light streaming in if I want to look at my computer screen.

In Rutland, Vermont, the church I pastored stood on top of a hill, famous for its sledding. My office stood right outside the sledding hill’s summit, where screaming kids and adults would push off. When a colleague of mine in Connecticut, Bill White, knew I was coming to Good Shepherd in Rutland, he said that I would have the best view in the whole synod. That’s because beyond the sledding hill, the Pizza Hut and McDonald’s, beyond Route 4 and the new High School, forming the backdrop to my view was East Mountain. And on any given day, depending on the light, gazing on the Fall foliage, the Winter’s snow, or summer’s greenery, I would be treated to a splendid piece of God’s creation. East Mountain was peppered with a mix of evergreen and maple trees, and just over the other side was the local skiing place known as Pico Mountain.

I love looking out windows and thinking about my place in the world. I love noticing the changing hues and scenery, and most of all, how important light is to mark the days and nights in my life and ministry.

Light is a featured image in the telling of Jesus’ birth. In Luke’s account, the glory of the Lord lit the sky when the angels were singing their song, Glory to God in the highest, and peace to all people on earth.

In Matthew, the stars were studied by the astrologers known as magi, and one particularly bright light guided them to the stable where the child of promise was born.

And in today’s gospel John, where there is no baby Jesus, no shepherds, no stable, and no wise men, there is plenty of light. Light more than almost anything else describes the incredible presence of the divine, of God self. And in this very beginning of the gospel, the writer pushes the hearer to understand right up front how connected to God Jesus was, how Jesus’ origins were from God, and therefore how his presence in the world connected others to God. There’s no question that Jesus is the one described as the divine Word, and the light.

Here’s how the very stylistic Hawaiian Pidgeon New Testament translates the beginning verses of the poetic prolog of John, today’s gospel. Listen carefully (John 1:1-5):
Da time everyting had start, had one Guy, “God’s Talk,” dass who him. Dat Guy an God, dey stay togedda, an da Guy stay God fo real kine. Dass day Guy, da time everyting had start, him an God stay togedda. God wen mak everyting, but da way he do um, he tell dis Guy fo do um. No mo notting dis Guy neva make. He da Guy, if you like come alive fo real kine, you come by him, cuz dat kine life come from him. Wen peopo come alive lidat, jalike dey stay inside one place dat get plenny light. Den dey can see an undastan. No matta stay dark, da dark no can pio da light. Everytime get light.

In all the other gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus’ presence and even his birth have divine origins. In the gospel of John, Jesus unmistakably, without a shadow of a doubt, is the window to God. Every time he talks, every time he acts, it is as if there is a sharp light that beams from him.

Let me be clear: God creates both light and darkness. There is no superiority in light to dark. God is present both in the dark and in the light. But the image of light in biblical and theological imagination helps us to better know and understand the God whom we cannot see.

So God in Christ, the unique son of God, is as we say in the Creed eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one Being with the Father; through him all things were made.

For us and for our salvation he came down. He took on flesh and lived among us. In his baptism, in the water changing into wine, in his feeding the hungry, in his giving sight to the blind, through his conversation with the woman from Samaria, at the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, by washing the disciples’ feet, and on the cross, Jesus shows us God’s heart of hearts.

God in Christ still makes a home with us. I see him in those who arrive with their cars in our parking lot. I see him as we share the meal of bread and wine, and take Jesus into ourselves. I see him in the Christians in Palestine who abhor unnecessary and wanton violence on the part of Hamas and Israel, and who preach the gospel of peace with justice. I see him as we at Christ the King share our stories about our own lives, where love, forgiveness, and acceptance has surprised us. I see him as next week we join celebrate the baptisms of Juan Suarez and Faith Cestrone and count them as brothers and sisters to us and to Jesus.

Where are the windows in your lives that you look out on? Where do you see Christ? Take a look around here, today, and put a mirror in front of yourself.

Or in the words of John again from the Hawaiian Pidgeon,
Dat “God’s Talk” Guy, he wen come one guy jalike us guys. He wen stay wit us. We wen see how awesome he stay. He awesome, cuz he da one an ony Boy dat come from da Fadda. He like do plenny good stuff fo us, cuz dass how he stay. Everyting he say bout God, stay fo real.

On this tenth day of Christmas, dear followers of Christ the Bright and Morning Star: shine for all to see. And with those who count themselves as followers of the light, let us praise God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as awesome and fo real.

I.N.I.

The Rev. Timothy J. Keyl, Pastor
Christ the King Lutheran Church
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