Have you heard the story about the head of a Hindu Temple in Belfast who had someone come up to him and say "All I want to know is, are you a Protestant or a Catholic." He was a bit puzzled by this and said, "you don’t seem to understand. I’m a Hindu." But undeterred, his questioner said, "Yes I know that, but are you a Protestant Hindu or a Catholic Hindu?" I’m sure there’s little truth in that story, but it does highlight one of the realities of modern life. We live in a multicultural world, what’s been referred to as a global village, where the distinctions between religions are often blurred or poorly understood. Anyone who’s lived in Surrey Hills or Box Hill for the past 20 or so years will have noticed a marked change in the makeup of their suburb in that time. What was once a predominantly western European population has now diversified to include people from all parts of the world, especially of course, Asia. You only have to walk through Box Hill and look at the restaurants: Chinese, Vietnamese, Italian, Indian, Greek. There’s an incredible variety, and of course over the past 20 or 30 years we’ve discovered that these cultures have an enormous richness that we didn’t know or appreciate before.
But along with that richness of culture has also come an ambiguity about belief. We’ve discovered that these people of other cultures are often as religious, sometimes even more so, than we are. We’ve discovered that the religions of other cultures are often as morally rigorous, often as loving and caring, as Christianity. My wife, Di, did some study a few years ago on the search for enlightenment, looking at mysticism in different religions, and found that in all the world’s great religions there have been people who have been spiritually attuned, whose lives have been focused in a special way on God and on the search for spiritual experience
So the question that faces us as Christians, it seems to me, is what’s so different about Christianity? Is ours just one of the world’s great religions, or is our claim to uniqueness justified? This is particularly so at Christmas of course when we celebrate the birth of Jesus, the founder of Christianity. Is this just an example of the arrogance of Christians, that we insist on celebrating Jesus’ birth with a national holiday? In our Anglican Synod this year there was some debate over whether we should call on the government to ensure that the Christian festivals of Good Friday, Easter, and Christmas be kept as public holidays, or whether those who are not Christians should be free to carry on their trade as usual those days. The Americans have virtually given in to this. There, this is called "the Holiday Season" rather than Christmas, for fear of offending those of other religions?
Well, the answer, I think, lies in where our religion comes from. The opening verses of Hebrews expresses it like this: "Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets." If you think about it, most religions have come about in one of two ways: either from people observing the world and working out some overriding principles by which they think the universe operates, or else they’ve come about as a result of one or more people claiming divine revelation in the form of prophecy of some sort or another. This last way was certainly true of the Jewish religion. God had revealed himself to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to Moses and Joshua, and to the Judges; and then he’d spoken to them over the centuries through a long line of prophets. But in a sense that was only second hand. Although the truth of their revelation was borne out by what God did through them, it wasn’t really enough. A Muslim, if there’d been one around at the time could have said, "Well, so what, we believe God has revealed himself to us through Mohammed. What’s so unique about your religion?"
But the writer goes on: "But in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son." Here is something different, something amazing, something absolutely unique. The claim of Christianity is that God has spoken to us in the person of his Son. Not just a prophet, but his own Son. John 1 describes him as being the eternal Word, the Word that spoke at creation, through whom all things were created, the Word that was God. This Jesus whose birth we celebrate today is God’s own Son. He is God speaking directly to us.
In fact that’s exactly what the writer to the Hebrews says, v2: "in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom he also created the worlds." It’s hard to even imagine how a little child, lying in a cow trough, could be the same being through whom the worlds were created. There’s something almost ludicrous about it isn’t there? Yet that’s what we find here. This child, small and insignificant as he appears, is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being. We saw this in Colossians 1 a few weeks ago; "He is the image of the invisible God ... In him all the fullness of God dwells in bodily form."
One of the common features of the religions of the world, is that God is unseen. No-one has ever seen God. Oh sure, there are plenty of representations of God. Most religions apart from those that derive from the Judeo-Christian tradition use pictures or carvings to represent God, but I don’t think any of them would ever claim that that was what God actually looked like. No, no-one has ever seen God. Yet one of the things that have occupied the minds of religious people throughout the ages has been the question, "what is God like?", particularly his glory and majesty. And people have made all sorts of attempts to describe what God might be like, or what it might be like to stand in God’s presence. But here we see that Jesus has shown us God’s glory, in his dwelling among us. The pages of the gospels show us a picture of Jesus which gives us in turn a picture of God. As John 1 tells us "No-one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known." What an amazing thing! That God would make himself known, not just by speaking to us through prophets and such, but by coming himself in the form of his Son, Jesus.
And if Jesus is the likeness and representation of God, he’s also God’s agent in sustaining the universe by his powerful word. This is an extension really of his role in creation. Just as all things were made through him, so now he continues to uphold and sustain all things by his word. It seems to me that that’s a hard thing for us to grasp. We have such a mechanistic view of the universe that we think it just keeps going like clockwork. We think of the universe as being governed by laws and principles. But what is it that our so-called laws of nature describe? It’s not some random relationship between inanimate objects, but the sustaining work of God’s Son, keeping all things operating as God designed them to be.
But the writer to the Hebrews tells us that Jesus’ coming does more than just reveal God to us in all his glory and power. He also makes it possible for us to be brought into the presence of God without fear. Again, one of the things most of the world’s religions have in common is an awareness of the fallenness of human beings and the need for forgiveness or moral improvement in some form or another. Some deal with this by imagining a process of gradual improvement through a series of lives lived out on earth, that is, by a process of reincarnation. Others have a system of sacrifices or offerings to the Gods to appease them or to earn their favour. But none of them reveal the solution to evil and wickedness in the world that Jesus brings.
You don’t need to look back far to see the degree of evil and wickedness in the world do you? The last few weeks have seen the deaths of young people in car accidents, of fire fighters in a bushfire, of nurses in an aeroplane crash. Wasted lives, untold sorrow and suffering for the survivors. In other places we see countries building stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction and others doing their best to destroy them, we see terrorists doing their worst to upset the peace process in various countries of the world, we see powerful leaders using their power to make themselves rich at the expense of their peoples, and so the list goes on. And we wonder what can be done to overcome all this evil and suffering we see all around us? V3 tells us what can be done. It says that Jesus has made purification for sins. What does that mean? Is might simply mean that he tells us he forgives us for what we’ve done wrong? Like you were told to do when you were young? Do you remember? "Now Johnny tell Peter you’re sorry." "Sorry, Peter." "Now, Peter, tell Johnny you forgive him." "I forgive you, Johnny." "Now shake hands and be friends again."
No it’s a bit more serious than that, because the problem is so far deeper than that. You see the world we live in has been totally changed by our rebellion against God’s rule. By what we call sin. It’s not just a matter of individual wrongs being righted any more, though that is important. Those people who died in that bushfire or on that plane or in those cars weren’t being punished for something they’d done wrong. No, they were simply suffering as a result of living in a world gone wrong. In a world where evil has changed the very fabric of life; with the result that the world needs a radical solution. It needs sin to be wiped away completely. It needs the world to be purified from the stain of sin. And that’s what Jesus came to do. To live and die, so that by his death on the cross, all sin could be removed from the world. As we well know, this hasn’t happened yet, but God has promised that he will renew the world, when Jesus returns to rule it in justice and equity. The book of Revelation speaks of that day like this: (Rev 21:1-5 NRSV) "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; 4he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away." 5And the one who was seated on the throne said, "See, I am making all things new." Also he said, "Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true."" God will remove evil and suffering from the world when Jesus returns. And the proof that this will happen, that Jesus has achieved what he came to do, is that death couldn’t hold him. He rose again, and ascended to heaven where "he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, 4having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs."
The fact that he’s now able to sit down at God’s right hand, indicates that his task is complete. Purification for sins has been obtained for all people, past present and future. On a personal level this means that Jesus has made it possible for each one of us to have our sins wiped out: to be made pure again, so we can come into God’s presence without fear. John 1 puts it like this: "to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God." Jesus’ death and resurrection, do you see, means that we can call God our Father. It means that we can make a new start in life. When we talk about people being born again, that’s what’s meant. It’s as though we’re given a fresh slate, but this time we start out as God’s children, as Jesus’ brothers and sisters. Now can I say that if that’s not your experience, if you haven’t experienced new birth as one of God’s children, then what better day is there to start than on this day when we celebrate the birth of God’ s only begotten Son. How do you do that? By believing in Him. By receiving him John says. That is, by accepting Jesus for who he claims to be: God’s only Son who has come in human form to speak to us from God. If you’d like to know more about that speak to me later and I’ll tell you more.
But for those of us who are already children of God, how do we respond to God speaking to us by his Son. Well a verse that came to me as I was thinking about this idea of the Word made flesh, was the verse we read here a few weeks ago from Colossians 3: "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God." If we truly believe that God has spoken to us directly by his Son then we’ll take his words and absorb them into our being. We’ll dwell on them so they dwell in us. We’ll encourage one another with them. We’ll use them to shape our lives together. That’s what it means to teach and admonish one another with all wisdom. Using God’s word to us to show us where to go and where not to. Also we’ll use them to sing praises to God together, so we’re built up by one another. So that God’s word in Jesus grows as it becomes God’s word in us. God has spoken to us through his Son, but now we’re also God’s sons and daughters. So one of our tasks as God’s sons and daughters is to speak God’s words to others.
Let me ask you, what are we celebrating today? Some people might be celebrating a time for giving. Some might be celebrating a time for families. Others will be celebrating the Holiday season and I don’t just mean Americans. The big stores are celebrating record retail sales although I think they spell celebrate with an S and two Ls. But what are we celebrating? Is it the birth if the baby Jesus? Well, yes, though I hope it’s more than just that. Is it the start of a new religion? Well yes and no. You might want to argue that Christianity starts with Christ, but I think I’d want to go back a couple of thousand years more to find the real birth of Christianity, back to the original message God sent via his prophets.
No, what we’re celebrating today is the foremost event of all time, the coming of God in human form, to speak to us directly. What we’re celebrating is the amazing news that God has spoken to us, not through a prophet or an intermediary, but through his own Son. What we’re celebrating is God sending his Son to us to provide a way for us also to become his sons and daughters.
I hope that as you sit down to your Christmas dinner today wherever you are that you might have time to reflect on the glorious uniqueness of the Christian Gospel that we’re celebrating: that God has not just revealed himself to us in his creation, that he hasn’t just spoken to us through the mouths of prophets, but that he’s come to us in the person of his Son; that he provides the way for the world to be renewed and for us to become his own children through the purification of our sins; and that all that he needed to do is now complete.
And as you think on all of that, may this word of Christ dwell in you richly this Christmas day and in the year to come.
For more sermons from this source go to www.sttheos.org.au
