The Rev. Virginia W. Nagel
Ephphatha Parish of the Deaf
Episcopal Diocese of Central NY
Today is the last Sunday before Christmas, the Fourth Sunday of Advent. We are all very busy preparing for Christmas, for the celebration of the birth of Jesus, the Son of God...and the Son of Mary.
Most people know that Advent is a time of preparation and a time of waiting. We prepare to celebrate Jesus' first coming, and we await with anticipation, and probably with some fear or dread, his second coming at the end of the world. But there is a great deal more to the celebration of Jesus' birth and the anticipation of his coming as Judge and King, than most of us have ever stopped to think about.
I would like to quote from a homily preached by a monk called Bede, in the late seventh century. He gives us much to ponder as we await the coming of Jesus. Here is what he said, in a homily he preached on Christmas Eve, many years ago:
Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and he will be called Emmanuel, a name which means God-with-us. The name God-with-us, given to our Savior by the prophet, signifies that two natures are united in his one person. Before time began, he was God, born of the Father, but in the
fullness of time he became Emmanuel, God-with-us, in the womb of his mother, because when the Word was made flesh and lived among us he deigned to unite our frail human nature to his own person. Without ceasing to be what he had always been, he began in a wonderful fashion to be what we are, assuming our nature in such a way that he did not lose his own.
And so Mary gave birth to her firstborn Son, the child of her own flesh and blood. She brought forth the God who had been born of God before creation began, and who, in his created humanity, rightfully surpassed the whole of creation. And Scripture says that she named him Jesus...according to the angel's explanation, it means "one who is save to his people from their sins."
May Jesus Christ fulfill his saving task by saving us from our sins; may he discharge his priestly office by reconciling us to God the Father, and may he exercise his royal power by admitting us to his Father's kingdom, for he is our Lord and our God, who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit forever and ever.
I wonder, as we prepare to celebrate that wondrous event, how Jesus himself prepared to come among us in our own human flesh? How does God prepare to become man?
I wonder how Mary prepared for the birth of her child, after hearing the angel tell her that he would save his people from their sins? Certainly she did more than make baby clothes!
I wonder how Joseph prepared to welcome the baby that Mary was expecting? How does one raise a child who is God?
I don't know the answers. But I am pretty sure that their preparations had nothing to do with shopping, baking, decorating or wrapping gifts, or travelling for holiday reunions.
During that amazing night when for a blinding, glorious instant heaven touched earth and angels proclaimed the coming of the One who is both God and man, what did Jesus experience? What did Mary see? What did Joseph understand? And what did they pray, what did they say to the Father about what was happening that night in the stable, in the cold where the stars glittered and shone with a heavenly light?
I do not know. But I do know that I will join with other Christians, these last few days before that holy celebration, in thinking about what it really means, for the world and for myself, and for all mankind.
