Christmas – Every year it comes around, but do we remember what it is really about? Time off work - Shopping - gift-giving – traveling – seeing family. So much is going on – always busy – Christmas can become something of a cultural event.– But do we stop and think about what really happened on that night in Bethlehem? It is not just a cute story, or abstract idea - we recall a concrete moment in time, in a particular place, to particular mother, in a particular empire, with a particular culture and particular events going on, – there in the 42 year of the Emperor Caesar Augustus, when a census was taking place for the sake of tax rolls – Christ is born, in the small town of Bethlehem, in a manger to his mother, Mary. “Today … a savior has been born for you who is Christ and Lord.” But saved from what?
A child in a manger does not seem the best candidate to be the savior - A better candidate for a savior seems to be in Rome –– Rome - where Caesar Augustus is Emperor – Legions at his command – Decades of civil war ended – borders expanded and secured - a peace has been brought to the empire and to the known world - the Pax Romana – the peace of Rome -
Yet the Pax Romana is not salvation, while it lasted over 200 years, it was temporary – and while there was the absence of significant wars - it was hardly a peace at all – held together by the strength of the Roman Legions – rebellions being suppressed - no Jew in the first century would have called Roman rule “peace.” Caesar can only try to save through his legions – from which no salvation comes – For it is not invasion or military rebellions that we need save from – but something far deeper. What did Christ come to save us from?
The Baltimore Catechism, which some people here might remember, asks the questions, “Why did God make you” with the answer – “God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve him in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in the next.”
At the Chapel at Kings College in Cambridge, every year on Christmas eve, they have the festival of lessons and carols. – and the first lesson is always from Genesis, - the first sin of Adam in the garden. Sin had entered the world - the world itself is wounded – Peace is denied as the world is separated from God – the purpose of being with God make seemingly impossible.
Yet this sin is the first act in the drama of salvation and the first act of the Christmas story - for - God acts to save creation for the wounds of sin. – and this is what Christ came to save us from, not from armies, unrest, or poverty.
And so it is, Christ, the Son of God - existing from before the world was made – is born this night. Born in a manger without wealth, armies, or renown. But it is not that he does not have them –– He has all the armies of heaven at his command. He king of the universe – all things are his, he has wealth beyond all telling - yet he let that all go to be born– born as a powerless infant in a lowly manger. And he does that, so that he can bring us back to God, to himself.
This is the marvelous exchange, so important to the Church fathers, Christ, God, was to become Man, so that Man might become like God. And Christ does not merely take on human nature but also takes on all of its frailty - born, powerless as a baby – wrapped in swaddling cloths. It truly is a marvelous exchange – that God becomes man so that we might be like God. Christ comes to us, such that, through him, we can go to God.
In the words of one of the prefaces for Christmas – I don’t know which one Fr. Charlie is using today – “For through Him the holy exchange that restores our life has shown forth today in splendor: when our frailty is assumed by your Word not only does human mortality receive unending honor but this by this wondrous union we, too, are made eternal.”
A baby in a manger might not be what one expected for a savior, But it is only in Christ's humble birth that we find salvation, that we are brought back to God, that creation is healed.
As we gather with families, exchange gifts, hopefully, enjoy some good food, make sure that we can slow down a bit, and reflect on what Christ did, becoming man, in history, to a particular mother, in a particular place. Let us be surprised by Christ again; remember what he has done for us in his birth – the length God will go so that we might be with him. That God became Man, that we might become like God.”