The celebration of Christmas is the celebration of the Incarnation:  the birth of Jesus Christ, the human manifestation of the living God.  But when reflecting on this incredible event, I all too often fail to realize its full significance.  Certainly, it was critically important for God to become human so that He might fulfill prophecy and die for the atonement of the sins of his people.  But in doing so, God did not simply make His presence known to us in a tangible form; He entered a human body so that He might experience what it is to be fully human. 

St. John of the Cross, a 16th-century Christian mystic, once elucidated the nativity story thusly in a romance on the Gospel verse, “In principio erat Verbum” (“In the beginning was the Word”):

But God there in the manger
cried and moaned;
and these tears were jewels
the bride brought to the wedding.
The Mother gazed in sheer wonder
on such an exchange:
in God, man's weeping,
and in man, gladness,
to the one and the other
things usually so strange.

When God was born to human parents, He gave himself into our care as a helpless infant.  This year marked the births of several children among friends of mine, and I have a new appreciation for the utter vulnerability of infants, even having spent only relatively minimal amounts of time with them.  In the Christ child, God made Himself altogether subject to the care of lowly human beings, and He sacrificed and limited His power that He might truly know the meaning of “pain,” “sorrow,” “discomfort,” “hunger,” “exhaustion” and a host of other feelings.  In a move that would surely insult the more self-righteous among us, God chose shepherds, the lowest of the low in that society, to be the heralds of His glorious birth.

Just as God gave Himself into our care as a human child, He also allowed those who wanted him dead to do to Him as they chose.  He assumed a human body and in doing so, experienced not only every bit of pain but all of the temptation that the rest of us often fall victim to.  But Jesus Christ was not brought down by the things of this world as we so commonly are; Jesus rejected Satan even when he offered Christ the world on a platter.  Satan further offered Jesus a chance to be saved from death on the cross, but again He refused.  The Lord’s destiny was to be killed, and with full knowledge of the fate that awaited Him, He willingly submitted to it.  Pause a moment and let that sink in, and it should give you pause.  When He set foot among men, God—the omnipotent and omniscient—submitted to all of the suffering and humiliation which He fully knew lay before Him.  Indeed, humility is to me the most remarkable aspect of Jesus’ character.  Perhaps even more astonishing is the stark disparity between Jesus’ meekness and our own foolish and unwarranted pride.  It’s no coincidence, too, that our arrogance is the one and only thing that will always prevent us from accepting the free gift of salvation that Jesus offers to each of us.  I can speak from experience here because conceit caused me to turn my back on the Lord for seven long and lonely years of my life.

The earthly life of Jesus was marked by dissent and struggle.  He always stood at odds with the powers at be, from the moment of His birth when King Herod plotted to kill Him by systematically murdering all of Bethlehem’s male children until He was unjustly put to death at the hands of the chief priests and the teachers of the Law.  Jesus came to bring a sword (Mt. 10:34), not to acquiesce to the wicked status quo of the era.

This coming year, will we choose to remain comfortable?  Or will we choose to endure some discomfort for the greater good?  Will we decide to pick up our own crosses and be willing to assume our share of the burden and make a positive difference?  In Christ, God came to live among us and in doing so He scattered the darkness of our world.  Will we pursue the task presented in the benediction given by Jesus during his last moments on earth and allow ourselves to become lights for the world, or will we let our truth be snuffed out by the wind of complacency?

  This Christmas, though we mustn’t neglect to reflect on the suffering Jesus Christ went through in service to us, let us take care to not gloss over the gift of joy that was given us in the Christ child.  Let us instead recall St. John of the Cross’s words and remember that great exchange between heaven and earth:  in the personage of Jesus, God learned our pain that he might teach us the very meaning of joy.  Friends, I’m praying that each and every one of you experience nothing but joy and happiness during the coming new year... and it doesn’t matter whether you believe in the power of prayer, because I’m certain of it.