12/21/22
I realized Sunday afternoon that, while trying not to get lost in the historical background, I had skimmed over something important in my sermon. We read in Isaiah 7 of a panic-stricken King Ahaz being threatened by the much larger nations around him. The Lord gives King Ahaz a sign that will remind him that God is with him through whatever is coming: “A virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Immanuel.” A woman in the King’s court, a virgin at the time of the prophecy, would conceive a child in the usual way. She would name him “God with us” and the name would be a reminder of her faith and of the king’s lack of faith. Before the child is old enough to know the difference between right and wrong, the King’s problems would vanish! And about 3 years later, the prophecy was fulfilled; it all happened just as the Lord said it would. I call this the small “f” fulfillment — small, because it’s a dim shadow of what God has planned for the future!
This prophecy in Isaiah 7 pointed toward an even greater Fulfillment —what I called the big “F” Fulfillment. Some 700 years later another Child is born. In his gospel, Matthew starts off with a long genealogy to remind us of the failures and disappointments — including King Ahaz — that litter the descendents of Abraham and King David. The last one on the list is Joseph, the husband of Mary. Now, had God not intervened — had Joseph and Mary conceived in the usual way — nothing would have changed and God’s people would have stumbled along as they had for the previous 1,000 years.
But God did intervene.
This new Child would be named Jesus (meaning “God saves”) because “he will save his people from their sins.” But wait! There’s more! Because he is conceived by the Holy Spirit, he will be the One in whom God would visibly be present to His people, he will be Emmanuel: “God with us!” The child in Isaiah would remind them of God’s presence but the Child in Matthew would BE God’s presence!
Nowadays, the virgin birth is a stumbling block to a lot of people. But if you were a Greek or a Roman, it wouldn’t be that surprising. The gods were always intervening or interfering in human life. If you read the Iliad and the Odyssey in high school or college, then you remember these books were full of tales about the gods messing around in human affairs — including having affairs with humans.
For example, 300 years before Jesus, Alexander the Great supposedly had a miraculous conception. His mother, Olympias, was asleep on the night before her wedding, when a bolt of lightning struck her womb, and she became pregnant by Zeus. . . at least that’s what she told Alexander. And her husband. So, according to legend, Alexander was born of a virgin and was the son of a god.
But there were others . . . lots of others: Hercules, the son of Jupiter by a mortal mother Alcmene, Queen of Thebes. Bacchus, the son of the god Jupiter and a mortal mother, Semele. Perseus, son of the god Zeus by the virgin Danae. Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were born of a vestal virgin whose father was Mars the god of war. And that’s only the Greco-Roman legends!
The story of Mary miraculously conceiving wasn’t exactly new or novel.
But this isn’t the Iliad or the Odyssey! This isn’t the gods of Greek and Roman mythology messing around in the affairs of mortals. We’re talking about the One who created us in His own image — the One who, from the days in the Garden of Eden, actually wants to be with us. When the gods of the Romans and Greeks got involved with humans, it was for revenge or to make another god jealous or because they were bored. When the God of the Bible comes down to intervene in human life, it is always a matter of Love: “for God so LOVED the world that he gave . . .” This is love that redeems us, cares for us, and even, through the Holy Spirit, dwells in our hearts.
While doing research for a sermon a couple of years ago, I found myself on the Richard Dawkins message board. Dawkins is the famous British ethnologist, author of The God Delusion. While still dismissing Christianity, referring to Jesus as “the Jesus myth,” one writer did acknowledge the great innovation of Christianity is that, “unlike the ambivalent gods throughout the Middle East and the pagan Roman gods up to that point, the God of Christianity loves His creation.”
And this story of Mary conceiving is the story of God’s Love, not just for Mary but for all humankind. God loves His creation! And in order to restore His fallen creation, God does what most people consider inconceivable: God comes to us in the form of a Baby in a manger.
It’s almost Christmas! This Advent we’ve heard: It’s not enough to light a candle of Hope, we have to be the candle of Hope in the world. It’s not enough to rejoice over the Spirit bringing life to a dead stump, we have to be people of the Spirit, not people of the stump. It’s not enough to sing “Joy to the World,” we have to bring joy to the world — just like Jesus coming down, we’re not to leave the world the way we find it. Finally, the God of Love will never leave us. No matter what we face in this life, we never have to face it alone — and not only that, but as people in whom the Spirit of God dwells, we’re to bring the Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love of God to those who need it, pointing them toward Emmanuel: God with us.
Blessings,
Pastor Terry
PS - This is one of my favorite Christmas traditions. I hope you experience the joy of the little boy at about 2.39 this Christmas!
Hark the Herald Angels sing