Christmas is the feast of the incarnation.

This poem at the beginning of John’s gospel places the incarnation within a larger framework.

That larger framework is the

Trinitarian life of God.

You see, in the poem, there is the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.  And from the Word was born life and light.  And that light enlightens everyone, and draws everyone in relationship with God.

You see, there’s a Trinitarian flow in this poem.  A give and a take.  A dance really between God and Word and Word and light and light and God and God and the Word.  And back and forth.

It’s a circle dance.

The poem reveals a God who lives in community within God’s self.  But not only that, but also a God who desires to be known.  A God who wants all of creation to participate, to have a taste of, to dwell in this inner community of God.

God wants to be known, and God wants to be in relationship with us

And that is the meaning of this poem; it is an invitation into God’s own inner life.

You know that word “The Word” is this Greek work “logos.”

Perhaps some of you have heard too many sermons about that word Logos, so I will keep this brief.

But that word logos in the Hebrew tradition is understood as God’s own inner wisdom.

And in the Greek tradition, Logos is the reason that binds and holds all things together.

So you can understand this word “logos” as God’s inner wisdom that binds and holds all things together.

This inner wisdom of God took flesh and lived among us.  It took on flesh as Jesus of Nazareth

So that this inner wisdom might dwell among us, might be in relationship with us, so that we might come to know this inner wisdom.

We worship a God who not only do we long to know, but God longs for us to know God’s self.  And is pursuing us with love.

God is always coming, and coming, and coming through the material world, through flesh, through Jesus of Nazareth, so that you might know God.

Might know God’s own inner wisdom.

Why?  Why does the inner wisdom come to us in the person of Jesus?

Well in the poem, it isn’t because we’re so bad, so horrible, so awful that we need some kind of bloody sacrifice to make things right.

Rather, in this poem, God’s inner wisdom comes among us as Jesus so that we might become Children of God.

Yes, so that we might be incorporated into this inner community, this inner dance, this inner flow of God’s own being.  So that we may become children of the Divine.

We may become part of the Trinitarian life.

What happens when you become part of this Trinitarian life?

What happens when you become part of this dance?

You become a new person.

That’s what the poem says when it says “all those who believe in him become children of God…no longer born of the will of man but of God.”

You become a new person.

You are no longer a person born of the will of humanity.

You are no longer a person who chases after wealth and fame.

You are no longer a person who chases after worldly power and domination.

You no longer pursue war and conflict.

You no longer pursue the goal of winning and being the best…

of being on top and being the most honored and greatest.

No,

Rather you become a child of God.

Which means you become a child of hope

You become a child of joy

You become a child of peace

You become a child of love.

That’s right, the love that resides in you when you become knit into the Trinitarian life, the love that is in you is God’s own love which is continually pouring out, and into you, and through you out into all of creation.

This love becomes complete and whole in you, which not only transforms you, but transforms everyone and everything around you

You become a vessel and conduit for this Trinitarian life.

The word becomes known yet again in the flesh, in your own body.

Perhaps not as complete or as whole as it was in Jesus of Nazareth.

But it becomes known yet again for a new generation through and in you.

And through and in all of us as a community.

That’s what the great tradition means when it calls our community the body of Christ.

You see, Christ’s body is not dead and gone.

Christ’s body comes again and again through us as a community

And through you when

You go out and care for the poor

You go out and tend to the sick

You go out and befriend those you disagree with

You go out and show compassion to those who have wronged you

When you go out in the name of love and you seek and serve God’s love in all persons, respecting the dignity of every living being.

That love transforms not only you but transforms the whole world

That is the great promise and great joy of the incarnation.

It is this joy that God’s love, God’s own inner wisdom of grace and truth, God’s own inner being has come to you in the person of Jesus

So that you may be knit into this Trinitarian flow of God and Word and Light.

You are invited into the dance

And this poem is moving you to take those first dance moves.

Here at the end of the sermon,

I want to bless you and give you a blessing to send you out into the world to be the embodiment of this incarnation, to celebrate the mystery of God’s Word becoming known yet again through the flesh.

Here is my blessing to you:

The world now is too dangerous

and too beautiful for anything but love.

May your eyes be so blessed you see God in everyone.

Your ears, so you hear the cry of the poor.

May your hands be so blessed

that everything you touch is a sacrament.

Your lips, so you speak nothing but the truth with love.

May your feet be so blessed you run

to those who need you.

And may your heart be so opened,

so set on fire, that your love,

your love, changes everything.