Christmas
Isaiah 9:6
What exactly does the prophet mean?
He means there is hope--always hope.
A child is hope. We see potential. We see possibility. We see glimpses of things to come. But we also see a wait. Time will bring a child to fruition. Our care, nurture, and nourishment will actualize the promise and the possibility.
So it is with the Gospel. It is a promise. It is a promise that will only be kept if we who accept it make it so in our lives. Jesus said it clearly in the Gospel of Matthew--he will be in each hungry person fed, each naked person clothed, each prisoner visited--in our service, we bring the promise to life.
Jesus' authority is the greatest within the world. In light of the world as it is, that seems a ridiculous statement. Yet, it stubbornly remains true. Like a Zen koan, it is proven by its inherent paradox. Jesus' power is the power of love. We see this power revealed when we see the power of love to transcend and transform a moment of suffering into joy. Several of our churches within the presbytery open their doors to the homeless throughout these coldest months of the year. It goes well beyond the basic food and shelter. The homeless become known by name, and they know churchfolk by name. The power of our names is inescapable. It means someone knows us. They know us as a real person. And that is real and actual power.
Then come the titles--
Wonderful Counselor--Jesus is the wisdom of human existence. His compassion is not only a good work. It is the true way into being fully what a human being is supposed to be. We are most fully who we are to be when we open fully to others.
Mighty God--Jesus is God with us. His compassion is the witness to the reality of God. God is a verb. God is a relationship in and of God's own being. God is love. Jesus brings that love to each of us.
Everlasting Father--Jesus meets us with compassion, grace, and mercy that feeds our souls. That is the best of nurture and nourishment any parent can offer a child--to feed them so deeply that souls are fed. A child blossoms. In Christ, we all blossom.
Prince of Peace--Jesus is the best promise our world can hear at this moment. In Jesus is the path to reconciliation so true and so profound that even sworn enemies can sit at table together in perfect fellowship (Matthew and Simon the Zealot). That communion in the Twelve is the communion possible when we lose ourselves in Christ and actually see the human face of every person before us, not what we have been told to see (which becomes an ugly caricature of what God created).
I confess my own wandering from each point of this good news of great joy in a world that alarms me, discomfits me, and leads me to want nothing more than to hide under the covers until the tide shifts.
There is so much yet to be done.
Yet, a child is born to us. There is hope. Always hope.
I pray I live into it.
Join me.
What exactly does the prophet mean?
He means there is hope--always hope.
A child is hope. We see potential. We see possibility. We see glimpses of things to come. But we also see a wait. Time will bring a child to fruition. Our care, nurture, and nourishment will actualize the promise and the possibility.
So it is with the Gospel. It is a promise. It is a promise that will only be kept if we who accept it make it so in our lives. Jesus said it clearly in the Gospel of Matthew--he will be in each hungry person fed, each naked person clothed, each prisoner visited--in our service, we bring the promise to life.
Jesus' authority is the greatest within the world. In light of the world as it is, that seems a ridiculous statement. Yet, it stubbornly remains true. Like a Zen koan, it is proven by its inherent paradox. Jesus' power is the power of love. We see this power revealed when we see the power of love to transcend and transform a moment of suffering into joy. Several of our churches within the presbytery open their doors to the homeless throughout these coldest months of the year. It goes well beyond the basic food and shelter. The homeless become known by name, and they know churchfolk by name. The power of our names is inescapable. It means someone knows us. They know us as a real person. And that is real and actual power.
Then come the titles--
Wonderful Counselor--Jesus is the wisdom of human existence. His compassion is not only a good work. It is the true way into being fully what a human being is supposed to be. We are most fully who we are to be when we open fully to others.
Mighty God--Jesus is God with us. His compassion is the witness to the reality of God. God is a verb. God is a relationship in and of God's own being. God is love. Jesus brings that love to each of us.
Everlasting Father--Jesus meets us with compassion, grace, and mercy that feeds our souls. That is the best of nurture and nourishment any parent can offer a child--to feed them so deeply that souls are fed. A child blossoms. In Christ, we all blossom.
Prince of Peace--Jesus is the best promise our world can hear at this moment. In Jesus is the path to reconciliation so true and so profound that even sworn enemies can sit at table together in perfect fellowship (Matthew and Simon the Zealot). That communion in the Twelve is the communion possible when we lose ourselves in Christ and actually see the human face of every person before us, not what we have been told to see (which becomes an ugly caricature of what God created).
I confess my own wandering from each point of this good news of great joy in a world that alarms me, discomfits me, and leads me to want nothing more than to hide under the covers until the tide shifts.
There is so much yet to be done.
Yet, a child is born to us. There is hope. Always hope.
I pray I live into it.
Join me.
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