sermon

Enlightenment is seeing God’s light of hope in the baby, at the cross, not in spite of them, and then radiating that light into the world yourself.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Epiphany of Our Lord
Texts: Matthew 2:1-12; Isaiah 60:1-6 (with reference to John 1)

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

Are you here seeking enlightenment tonight?

Light is a powerful image for humanity. Every part of this globe every day is partially covered in darkness. Even those on the equator have half their days in darkness, and even though those near the poles have times when the sun barely sets, they still have moments where there isn’t enough light to see by.

So we have learned to use light to help us see. To overcome our fear of the darkness, where things invisibly threaten us. We learned to burn wood, we learned to put a piece of string in the wax bees make and light it, we eventually harnessed God’s electricity for light whenever and wherever we needed it. So we don’t stumble in the dark, bruise our shins, break our legs. So we aren’t afraid.

But we also learned this about light: it’s a helpful way to describe understanding. When we are confused, lost, afraid, and come to understand hope, or direction, or clarity, we say we are enlightened. Our minds now have light in them, we say, shining so we can see – not with our eyes but with our hearts and our minds and our spirits.

So I ask you again, are you hoping for enlightenment tonight? Is that why you came?

Maybe the Magi were seeking enlightenment, too.

They famously read the skies and interpreted the movement of planets and suns millions of miles away as indicating truth of something on earth. We’ve long since abandoned that idea. How can the rotation of our solar system, let alone distant galaxies, say anything about who we are, what God is doing?

But even in the Magi’s day, astrology was pretty subjective. Different cultures believed different things about what they saw in the skies, and it wasn’t like the star they followed came with an instruction guide. Somehow, they came to believe it was important that they go in a certain direction and see what they believed this heavenly body was indicating. But even as they arrived in Jerusalem, they didn’t know where to go.

Maybe they were looking to be enlightened as much as we are. So, they showed up at a house and saw a baby in the night, just as we’ve showed up in this house and heard about a baby in the night.

And Matthew says they were enlightened. They were overwhelmed with joy. What they saw opened their eyes, their hearts, their minds, to God’s grace coming into a dark and frightening world.

That’s an enlightenment we’d love to have.

Where is God in a world where children are killed by wicked rulers who feel their power threatened, 2,000 years ago and today? Where people are permitted to destroy the climate and wreak havoc on innocent humans, animals, landscapes? Where so many of God’s children are homeless and starving? Where powers that work evil and suffering seem nearly invincible?

We truly are here once again, as we always are, to ask of God: where is the beauty of your light in the darkness of the world? Where is the One whom we seek to be found, we ask like the Magi, and how will that One bring light?

And here is the light that John tells us shines in the darkness and cannot be overcome: God comes in a human child.

But anyone who saw the baby Jesus might not find it obvious that God was in this child for the healing of the world. Our Christmas movies always have a glowing light surrounding the Holy Family, presumably so the shepherds knew where to look, and the Magi knew where to kneel and set their presents.

But God’s truth is hard to grasp in this baby. If Matthew said a great warrior hero was God-with-us, maybe that’d be easier. Where is John’s promised light in this poor little family, this poor little baby?

But Matthew and John know the truth. The light of God, the heart of God the Son came to reveal, God-with-us, is only seen in this humility, this vulnerability.

That’s the enlightenment you need: not believing God is with us in spite of looking like a baby, but believing God-with-us can only be known in this little baby. You can’t understand God-with-us if you don’t understand this baby.

You see, God’s light is the humility, the vulnerability. God’s light is the suffering and death on the cross. Whatever the Magi saw, whatever the centurion on Golgotha saw, look for that: God isn’t known in spite of vulnerability and humility, but because of it.

See this and be radiant, Isaiah says, and then your heart shall thrill and rejoice.

You can be overwhelmed with joy at God’s coming this way, like the Magi, when you see this is the only light that makes sense in the world’s darkness. That this vulnerable baby and this dying Jesus on a cross is  the true light that actually can conquer evil. God’s plan of healing starts with vulnerability and always remains vulnerable, to reveal how evil can be dismantled forever. Not with power and might, our human approach. But with radical, self-giving love, modeled by the Creator of the universe.

You see that when you see this vulnerable child. When you look at the cross, and then at the empty tomb. That’s where you find enlightenment, when you finally understand the power of power-releasing love, the light of self-giving that cannot be extinguished by the worst evil.

And then, Isaiah says, you will also become light for the world.

See and be radiant, Isaiah says. Go be light.

You might not get the attention of whole nations and kings, as Isaiah promises, but what if you imagined that God meant that promise for you? What if you trusted that the light of Christ shining in you, the enlightenment you have received in God’s epiphany that this path of vulnerable love is the only light that can pierce all darkness and end it, what if you trusted that God would make that light shine from you? From your eyes, your face, your words, your actions?

This is the enlightenment to pray for: that God helps you see not only God’s light in this baby, in all that Jesus is and does, but also God’s light in you until you, too, are burning brightly as a candle in the night. Showing God’s hope, God’s love. And lighting others. Until eventually the promised dawn of God’s healing and life brightens for all the creation.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The creation is good. You are good. That’s God’s word from the beginning, in Christ’s Incarnation, and now incarnated in you.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Second Sunday of Christmas, year ABC
Texts: John 1:1-18 (with Genesis 1); Ephesians 1:3-14

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

In the beginning, God said, “This is good.”

The holy and eternal God spoke a Word into the chaos and called a universe into being. Incarnated a creation in the heart of the life of the Triune God, within God’s inner dance.

And on this planet God made water and seas, plants and creatures of all sizes, heavenly bodies to give light and hope, land and mountains and valleys and deserts and gifts abundant. Minerals, fruits and vegetables, sunlight and grass, beautiful breezes, all for God’s creatures to dance and play and thrive. And God said, “This is good.”

And God made human beings, too, in the beginning. In God’s own image these creatures were made. And God said, “This is good, too.” You are good. God said so.

You may not have heard that message often from people of faith.

Somehow that song of God was waylaid. People were told they were not good, not beloved, sinful from before birth. But in this time of celebration of the Incarnation of that creating Word of God, where God’s Word took on our human body, gave us a face and a voice to know God’s own Triune heart, this is the only song that makes sense: God said humanity was good in the beginning, and in taking on our own body, God said, “This is still good.”

“Did you not hear me in the creation?” God asks at Jesus’ incarnation. “I meant it then, and I still mean it. You are good enough for me. Good enough for my life to live within you, to be born as one of you.”

John says this Word in our flesh, whom we know as Jesus, reveals God’s true heart to us. Not our view of what God must think. God’s true heart. And God’s true heart is that you, and this whole creation, is and always will be good.

Paul sings this song with joy and gladness today.

Did you hear it? You were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, Paul sings, in the beginning, to be holy and blameless before God in love. You are destined for adoption as God’s own child, Paul delights.

Take a moment to absorb that: before the foundation of the world – you were chosen. Your destiny has always been to be God’s child. You are good, in God’s heart, from before you even were, you have always been God’s hope and dream. Your adoption has been God’s plan from the beginning, to draw you, along with the whole creation, into the Triune God’s heart and life.

I call you good, God says in Christ’s coming. Beloved. My child.

But you say, “what about sin? Am I not sinful?”

Of course you have sinned, and sin grips your life at times. You can and do feel stuck and unable to change. You can and do feel guilt and shame over thoughts, actions, inaction. But the Incarnation of Christ Jesus tells you this truth: sin is not your core identity. At your core, you are God’s beloved, God’s child. And God says, “you are good.”

Maybe as Lutherans we got waylaid by Martin’s own experience. Luther felt deep pain at his sinfulness. He had a voice inside him – and some of us hear this voice, too – a voice that said, “You’ll never be good enough for God, you deserve punishment now and in eternity.” And the Church repeated that Word to him. And when he discovered that the Word of God in Scripture said something completely different to him, it changed him forever, changed the Church. He found God’s grace, God’s welcome, God’s love. Whatever was broken and flawed in him was covered by God’s wholeness and completion. Nothing could separate him from God’s love in Christ.

Our problem is we’ve developed a theology that tries to get everyone to feel what Martin felt, the shame, the guilt, the fear, before declaring to them that God loves them anyway. That was a mistake. For centuries we’ve focused on making everyone believe their core identity is sin, that they are worthless and bad. And then somehow trying to move from that to saying, “But good news – God loves you!”

A friend of mine who’s struggled with pastors and other Christians telling her this for years put it this way to me recently: “It’s like a parent putting their child to bed, and every night giving them a kiss, tucking them in, and saying, ‘Good night. The most important thing you need to know is that I love you and you don’t deserve it.’” Even we human parents know that sounds like abuse. But how often have you been told that’s God’s view of you?

Jesus and Paul speak of sin, but not as your core identity.

They speak of it much more as we might use modern language of addiction. It’s not your true self, but it does stick to you. Sin can be life-long habits that are extremely hard to break. Addictive behaviors, where you keep repeating your sins over and over again, and seemingly can’t break free. Paul called this living by the way of the flesh, and somehow we misunderstood and said, “our very humanity is sin, and hateful, and bad.”

But that’s not the heart of God Jesus showed you. That’s not the rich grace Paul talks about in Ephesians today, a grace that gives us, gives me, forgiveness of sins, but in the context of being chosen from before the foundation of the world to be God’s beloved.

Do you sin? Yes. Are you stuck in sin at times, like an addiction? Yes. But sin is, as many wise believers have said for centuries, a disease. And disease is not the core reality. Disease is what you want to get rid of, cure, heal. So that you can be your true self.

And God’s Incarnation in our human life is exactly that healing.

In Greek, the word “salvation” also means “healing.” So Jesus says to you, always: “God loves you. I, God-with you, see you as beloved. I forgive all that needs it. Now come, follow me.” Entering into God’s life that Jesus reveals heals you so you can be who God truly sees in you.

And God means the whole world to know this joy. True salvation for God, true healing, happens when all God’s children hear “you are good, you are beloved,” and believe it and live into it. As Paul says today, this is mystery, but it is God’s will, and God’s good pleasure – it pleases God, Paul says – “to gather in Christ all things in heaven and all things in earth – all things – in the fullness of time.” To draw all things into God’s life of love, and heal all things, transforming suffering and pain, forgiving sin, giving hope. And God will only be satisfied when the whole creation is gathered in.

Good. That’s what God said in the beginning.

That’s what God said again in Christ’s Incarnation. That’s what God proved in the cross and resurrection of Jesus. And that’s God’s message to you today in this season of celebrating the Incarnation.

And God is still incarnate, but now in you. Because you are good enough for God to live in. Good now. Good always. So you incarnate God’s love in your life, and God’s love and life heals your sin, breaks you free when you’re stuck. To be what God says you are: good.

And then you get to join Paul’s song and reveal this hope and joy to the rest of God’s beloved creatures, and to God’s precious creation.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen