Incarnation
based on John 1:1-18
by Richard Gehring

The text for today is not one that most of us would probably think of as a Christmas text. There are no shepherds, no wise men, not even a baby in a manger. All of those symbols that we usually associate with Christmas are missing. Yet it is this text that is read in millions of churches around the world on Christmas Day and today, the Second Sunday after Christmas. For this text, perhaps better than any other, explains what really happened at Christmas when "the Word became flesh."
This introduction to the Gospel of John is most likely based on a very early Christian hymn. And unlike the Christmas accounts in Luke and Matthew which tell us about things like the decree from Caesar Augustus and the virgin birth and the flight to Egypt, John's account is not particularly concerned with when or where or even how the birth of Christ occurred. Rather, John's gospel is primarily concerned with the theological significance of that event. Just who was this Jesus anyway? That's the question our text today addresses.

The hymn that is quoted in our passage speaks of the Word. Way back in the first chapter of Genesis, God spoke and God's words caused the new creation to spring forth step by step. What we know today as the Ten Commandments were known in John's time as the Ten Words. The prophecies recorded in our Old Testament very often begin with the clauses such as "The word of the LORD came to such-and-such a prophet, saying. . . ." Again and again the Hebrew Scriptures affirm the vital, life-giving power of the Word. It is this divine Word, then, that the fourth gospel tells us "became flesh and lived among us."(John 1:14)
That is a very radical statement. It is a statement that many early Christians found hard to believe and which many people today still have a difficult time with. Perhaps the very first heresy in the church was one which declared that Jesus was not really human. He only appeared to be human. He only seemed to be human. For, you see, many people simply could not accept that a perfect, spiritual God could have possibly soiled himself by taking on such an imperfect, physical form.
It is this claim that Jesus was not really human which John 1 clearly disputes. The text states quite explicitly that the divine Word took on mortal flesh. The all-knowing, all-powerful, eternal Creator of the universe became an average, limited, finite human being. Without this basic premise of who Jesus was, the rest of his life—his teachings, his healings, his death and, yes, even his resurrection—lose much of their meaning.

For if Jesus was not truly human, if his physical appearance was merely some sort of illusion, then we can't take his life seriously as an example for our own lives. We can't be expected to live up to the high standards he established in his teachings. Perhaps we can follow them some day when we go to heaven. But for now we mere mortals can't possibly be expected to live our lives the way that the divine Messiah did. For he can't have possibly faced the same trials and temptations we do. He can't really have known just how difficult it is for us to struggle with sin and with the limitations we all have. So to try to follow his example is, at least for the time being, completely unrealistic.
On the other hand, if Jesus was not divine then he was just another person who lived a good life only to have it cut short by evil people. Frankly, history is littered with people who have died trying to accomplish some good in the world. In much more recent times, Deittrich Bonhoeffer was executed by the Nazis for his resistance to the Third Reich. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated because of his work for racial harmony. Oscar Romero was gunned down by a death squad after calling the repressive regime of El Salvador to observe basic human rights. If Jesus is just one more in a long list of martyrs, why should we pay so much attention to him?
And if Jesus were not both human and divine, then even an incredible event such as the resurrection itself becomes an almost routine event. For if he wasn't truly mortal to begin with, then he couldn't have really died anyway. And if he was just another ordinary person, then we could simply add his account to all the other reports of near death experiences that seem to be so popular these days.

But the fact is, as the writer of John so clearly tells us, that Jesus was in truth the Word of God in human form. And that unique blending of divine and human when the Word became flesh—an event we know as the incarnation—that's what Christmas is really all about. That is the reason for the season. That is what makes the life of Jesus so special. And one cannot really comprehend the cross or the empty tomb unless one appreciates the remarkable event that happened first in the manger.
So why is it that we can decorate our homes and churches with crosses any time of the year, but the manger is packed away most of the time and dragged out only for a specific season? Why is it that we can sing about the blood shed on Calvary any Sunday but we can only sing about the baby born in Bethlehem during these few Sundays of Advent through Epiphany? And why is it that so many Christians are happy to talk about how Christ died for us, but we so rarely hear that he actually lived for us?
Incarnation, the Word becoming flesh, is the unique and radical claim of Christianity. There are many religions that worship gods who have appeared in human form. There are some other religions that worship a single God who created all things. But as far as I know Christianity is the only religion which teaches that the one God who created the universe entered into that creation as a real human being. It is this God whom we worship.

And I believe that this radical message of God becoming a human being is so important that we shouldn't proclaim it only at a certain time of the year, particularly a time as busy and hectic as the Christmas shopping season. The incarnation is something we should proclaim and praise God for all year long.
The truth is that none of the gospel accounts actually say what time of year Jesus was born, anyway. December 25 was chosen as Christ's birthday around 300 years after he died. The date had been a pagan holiday celebrating the Unconquered Sun as the days begin to grow longer once again. It wasn't until after the Christian faith became a legally recognized religion in the Roman Empire that the celebration of this rebirth of the sun became instead the celebration of the birth of God's Son. Somehow over the centuries, though, the church has become increasingly focused on this one particular date to such an extent that the message of the incarnation, of the Word becoming flesh, is hardly ever heard in churches during the rest of the year.

But the proclamation of the fact that the Word became flesh is not something we do only here in church. And the praise we offer to God is not limited to singing Christmas carols. For if we truly believe that in Jesus the Word became flesh, then we, too, are called to give flesh to God's Word in the world today. If the Creator of the universe was able to be so humble as to become a member of creation, then we should be able to take the much smaller step of humbling ourselves in service to our fellow humans. If God reached out to us, we must reach out to one another.

Christmas is a time when there is special emphasis on doing just that. There are many people who take time out during the hustle and bustle of the Christmas season to collect and distribute toys to poor children, to visit nursing homes and sing carols, or to serve a special meal to underprivileged families. Some of my own fondest memories of Christmas come from doing these sorts of things.

I remember very clearly the time when my third grade class visited the local nursing home and I got to know a wonderful older man who had a hobby of making toys. I also remember the Christmas just before my 16th birthday when my brother, a college student, was traveling in Europe and we opened our home to another college student from Thailand who needed a place to stay during Christmas break. And what I remember most about these and other, similar experiences of sharing at Christmas time is that I expected to have to give a lot but ended up receiving far more.

This outpouring of warmth and hospitality is what makes Christmas such a special time, but what happens to this compassion the rest of the year? And what happens to the poor and the elderly when the rest of the world goes back to its daily routine? In the middle of summer when the decorations are packed away and the presents from last Christmas are already forgotten or worn out, the message of the Word becoming flesh is still jus tas valid. But while many of us are enjoying ourselves on vacation or a day at the lake, the people in the nursing homes and the penitentiary and low income housing units are still there. And we cannot afford to forget these folks any more than God has forgotten us just because it's not the right season.

The joy and the compassion of the Christmas spirit do not end once the Twelve Days of Christmas are over. Living out the message of the Word becoming flesh is something that never really goes out of season, no matter what decorations are up in the shopping centers. And praising God for the Word which became flesh is appropriate no matter which banners we may have hanging up here.

Just as the Word was in the beginning with God, so the Word is still active today. The light still shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not yet overcome it. Indeed we can and must still say along with the author of the Gospel of John, "The Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14)