Sermon Midnight Mass

Sermon. 25.12.15. Christmas Midnight Mass. St Mary's, Great Ilford.

John 1.1-14

I am wondering whether I should begin with a double apology. First, I might apologise for not being Fr Gareth, not being your parish priest. I know he'd love to be with you himself.

Second, I may have to apologise for another thing you don't quite get this evening. You don't get the story of the birth of Jesus. You don't get angels and dreams and annunciation and a census and journeys and full inns and a manger and more angels and shepherds and wise men. None of that. At least not in our readings. Nothing from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Instead the Gospel is from John. In fact it is the Prologue of John, where there is not so much a story as such, but a reflection on what is going on in and behind all the stories of Jesus. Since I know you have had to drop some of your pre-Christmas events, you may be feeling especially deprived of the angels and the manger and the shepherds. If so, I do apologise.

But I add: it has to be this way. I mean: the one gospel-reading you absolutely have to have at some point on Christmas Day is today's gospel, is the Prologue to John. That's the rule. And in truth it is not too hard to see why. In the words at the centre of the gospel we have what many a carol service will have introduced as 'St John unfolds the mystery of the Incarnation'. These words:

'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Gd, and the Word was Gd...

and the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory.'

'The word became flesh'. We can actually say this summarises all Christian teaching about Christ.

We can take these words from the creed as being the same idea, using different words:

'For us men, and for our salvation he came down from heaven, he became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man.'

I'll just say that, actually, a better translation of the underlying Greek and Latin, is:

'For us human beings, and for our salvation, he came down from heaven, he became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became a human being.'

But exploring all the implications of that is for another time!

The word became flesh. Gd the Son became incarnate and was made man. 'Incarnate' is just the Latin way of saying 'became flesh'. This is the story behind the Christmas story. Which is why tonight we will, if we can, not only bow but kneel at those words in the creed.

But do we let these words trip off our tongue? Are we proud of them, as if they were a badge of our Christian identity? Do we find them moving, as they are Christmassy, like a little donkey, but not something requiring much attention or reflection? Gd forbid!

You see, there is a problem. There is a problem with flesh. You are flesh. So you will know what I mean. The problem with flesh is that it corrupts. It deteriorates. It is mortal, and there comes a point when it decays. What is more, flesh is vulnerable. It can be invaded by bacteria and viruses and countless other things. It is, then, prone to disease, and so pain and misery and dislocation. Flesh is also limited. It comes, sometimes, without limbs, or even without working organs. Again, a fleshly baby needs other human beings to care to him/her, and if the carers get it seriously wrong over a long period of time, that too can do lasting damage. Yet again, flesh is soft, and if someone wants rid of a fleshly human being, and is determined about it, they can be rid. Fleshly beings are not only mortal, they can be killed before their time.

This is what flesh is. It is mortal, vulnerable, needy and weak. So there is no getting round this: when we say that the Word became flesh, or that Gd the Son became incarnate, we are saying that Gd became mortal, vulnerable, needy and weak. And if we ever forget this, we are not taking the very words seriously. We are not taking Christian faith seriously.

Since this is so, we may well be asking: why? Why on earth did Gd the Son become flesh? Well, I'd say that actually the Church is not very good – no, let me say it, the Church is absolutely hopeless – at working out for itself precisely why Gd did anything. In a way, the 'why question' is always a non-question. (Think about it. If Gd had to do something, then that means there was some kind of force compelling Gd to do something, and so Gd is not Gd. If Gd didn't have to do something, but chose to do it anyway, then the only answer is 'because Gd chose to', which doesn't give us any new information.) So: why did the Word become flesh? In truth, we do not know.

But that is alright. For the Church is not really a place where our 'why questions' are answered. The Church is, in the first instance, a home not for the 'why' but for the 'wow'. Wow! The Church is where, by Gd's grace, we begin to find a way to articulate our awe. We are in the presence of something awesome. And here I mean 'awesome' in the full sense of the word, not the modern sense (where, you know, we might say: 'that cup of coffee was “awesome”' - no, not that). Here awe means our godly bewilderment, that we are overwhelmed by the closeness of Gd, by the solidarity of Gd with us. Gd is with us who are mortal, vulnerable, needy and weak.

Gd, at Christmas, and at every single moment, says this:

'I know that you are mortal, vulnerable, needy and weak.

These things are not as terrible as you may think they are,

though they are all in different ways painful, or tied up with pain.

I want to be with you in all of this,

in all the pain and mess of the world.

I want to be with you, not as magician,

putting things right, by a wave of a divine hand.

It's together that we'll put things right, when we can.

But, first, I want to be with you as helper and friend

(a true friend – one who along the way will tell you how it is without decoration)

- as friend.

I wonder if we can hear this glorious and truly awesome message. Here is the very glory of Gd. The Word became flesh – was flesh in the same ways that you and I are flesh - and lived among us – because he wanted our company - and we have seen his glory – the glory of the promise of that company throughout space and time, if we but make it our own.

Merry – awesome - Christmas.

Amen.