Christmas Eve
Luke 2:14
24 December, 2012
Emmanuel Lutheran Church—Dwight, IL
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
One of the most enduring parts of the Christmas story is a short, eleven word hymn of praise that the angels’ sang to the shepherds the night Christ was born. It’s the basis for more than a couple Christmas hymns of the season. More importantly, it serves as one of the five great pillars of the Divine Service—one of the texts that Christians have sung since time immemorial. For just as Christ came down from heaven to take on human flesh at His nativity, He comes down from heaven again in the Divine Service, in flesh, to the manger of your heart by way of the Holy Sacrament.
The hymn of the angels is the Gloria in Excelsis.
Glory in the highest for Godand upon earth peace,among men favor Luke 2:14In this sweet verse, the entire mystery of the nativity of our Lord is summarized in three-part harmony. Glory. Peace. Favor. The birth of Christ is the counterpoint between heaven and earth, an interplay of the strains of divine and human in one infant Man. The multitude of the heavenly host praise God with their song, but also
THE ANGELS’ HYMN PROCLAIMS CHRIST’S BIRTH FOR YOU
I.
A precise translation of the angels’ opening line is, Glory in the highest for God. What do the heavenly host mean by glory? It’s a word that’s often used as a pious exclamation by Christians—Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! goes one refrain—but it’s seldom used in its correct sense.The word for glory is related for the word, “to know or understand.” God’s glory is the way in which He makes Himself known. In the Old Testament, it was the Glory of the Lord—the cavod YHWH—that showed when the Lord was leading the Israelites in the desert or when His presence was in the temple. It’s what covered the mountain when Moses spoke with God. God’s glory is when He makes Himself known—the visible manifestation of the presence of God.
Why would God need to make Himself known? In the beginning man and God walked together in the garden. God knew man and was known by him. But man desired a different knowledge, a better knowledge he thought—the knowledge of good and evil. Because Adam knew God, he knew only good, but with one rebellious bite he got his wish and knew evil. And it was himself.
God had put a warning on the fruit of the tree of knowledge: In the day that you eat of it, you will surely die. But as the fruit’s juice ran down Adam’s beard, death did not come. Adam’s heart kept beating; his brain maintained activity. But something had changed. What God had called good, Adam had made bad. There was now a conflict, a discord between God’s holy intention and Adam’s new reality.
God removed Adam from His presence, or rather removed His presence from Adam. But it wasn’t because He was disgusted with him, that He wanted him out of His sight, but because He loved his creature. As God would tell Moses generations later, You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live (Ex 33:20). Adam’s death wasn’t a result of the fruit’s toxicity, but because he gave up his original righteousness. And what is not righteous before God cannot live. So God obscures Himself for the sake of man. He hides Himself, removes Himself from sight—so that man would not die.
You are of the same stuff as Adam, born with the knowledge of good and evil. You cannot see God as He is, because in your unrighteous state, you cannot stand before God and live. God hides Himself from you, obscures Himself from your sight. Yet, He reveals Himself—in places you don’t expect to find God.
The angels proclaimed glory on the first Christmas, and that glory was for God’s advantage. He doesn’t make Himself known in great and terrifying displays of power, but in the weakness of a newborn baby boy. God’s advantage on Christmas is that you would come to know Him not as a strict judge sitting high above the heavens, meting out punishments and curses, but in the flesh, as a humble servant. His glory is that He is made known by the love that is in Christ, love that would exchange the wood of the manger for the wood of the cross.
II.
The angels’ lofty hymn of the highest heaven sweeps down to earth in its second movement to praise the result of Christ’s birth. And upon earth peace. The opposite of peace is war, discord, strife, division. Without the Christ, that is precisely the situation of man. By nature you are an enemy of God. This is not something that is self-evident—we all fancy ourselves friends of God—but God reveals otherwise. The passions of the flesh wage war against the soul and the things of God (1 Pt 2:11). But God did something most unexpected and Himself took on human flesh, though without the mark of sin. Divinity and humanity are united in the flesh of the Babe of Bethlehem. God and man are reconciled. Jesus Christ came to earth to put Himself on the front line of the battle, to bear the brutal assaults of the devil and of evil men. And that was their undoing.
Christ’s resurrection is the signature on earth’s peace treaty. It’s a peace that surpasses all understanding. It’s a peace that proceeds from His precious wounds, carried along by the breath of the Holy Spirit. It’s a peace of Holy Absolution. Christ is the reconciliation of God and man, and all who are baptized into Him are rescued from the losing side of the heavenly battle.
III.
The final theme of the angels’ magnum opus zeros in on the crown of God’s creation: among men favor. Not the earth. Men. Humanity. The Son of God did not take on the form of a goat, or a bull, or a dove, or rocks, or waves, or clouds in order to be the sacrifice or reconciliation for mankind. He became a man. The same flesh that houses your self. The same blood that runs through your veins. The Son of God is the Son of Man, and He lives, walks, breathes, and talks among men. He shares your joy. He shares your sorrow. He shares your sickness. He shares your temptations. He is in every way like you, except He is without sin. He lives a perfect life according to the Law. He is the apple of His Father’s eye.
Despite having every claim to superiority, He sets it aside to become a servant. Your servant. To the point of death. He is the One who stands to accept your condemnation, the One who takes your lashes on His back, the One who opens His palms to receive your nails.
Because He lived the perfect life, and suffered the punishment of all mankind, He alone has the Father’s favor, His good pleasure. This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased (Mt 3:17). Where Jesus is, there is the Father’s favor. In the manger as a baby, in the temple as a boy, in the Jordan as a man, on the mountain teaching, on the cross bleeding, from the tomb breathing, at God’s right hand interceding.
Christmas isn’t a celebration of past events, remembering when Christ used to be among men. He is still among men—though not as the babe of Bethlehem, nor as the teacher of Nazareth. He is the risen, ascended Lord, who still comes to the Church today, cloaked in bread and wine, speaking through His Word.
Where Jesus is, there is the Father’s favor. Jesus is here therefore the Father’s favor is here, among men and women in Dwight, IL. He has come to bring peace, not as the world gives peace, but by Holy Absolution. Your sins are forgiven. Glory in the highest for God.
In + Jesus’ name. Amen.
Rev. Jacob Ehrhard
VD+MA
