Archbishop Peter Jensen's Christmas Sermon: God Becomes our Neighbour

Christmas, 2011
St Andrews Cathedral

‘And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth.’ John 1:14

The success of the whole human enterprise depends on knowing God. That is the condition for us to have what the Bible calls ‘eternal life’, the fulfilment of all human hopes and aspirations in this life and in the world to come. Getting to know God is the central ambition and task of your life. Do you know God?

You may well reply, how can we meet God? We are incompatible. He is spirit; we are flesh.

I have to say, these questions makes sense.

Flesh. You and I, we know about flesh. Flesh is how we exist. Flesh is necessary, although flesh fails us. It perishes and we perish, for we are made of flesh. We have too much flesh, and then it dissolves and we are no more. We do not have eternal life. But flesh is also the way we know each other. Invisible persons, or spirits, are beyond us. Flesh and blood bodies are what we need to recognise each other, to know each other, and to deal with each other. Flesh we understand.

That’s the problem with God. He is not flesh, he is spirit. The Bible itself says, ‘no man has ever seen God’. How can flesh meet spirit? How can we see the invisible? How can we know God? Where do we meet him?

After all, doubt is plausible. God is not tangible – he does not show up in flesh so that we can touch and hear and see him. Why should we believe in him? If he has no body, does that mean that he is nobody?

And its not just that we can’t see him.. Real doubt also comes from anguished experience. Where is God when I need him? What about the moments when we have troubles? What about the breakdown of my relationships? What about my unemployment? What about my runaway children? What about my addiction? What about my loneliness? What about my failure? What about my guilt? What about my sickness and my death? What good to me is the God no one can even see, in my hour of need?

There is more to create doubt. He is such a big idea, God. The more we know about ourselves, about the world, about the universe, the more we see that if he made all this he must be the mightiest spirit there is or could be – the wisest, most powerful, most ingenious, most...if we can’t find another word...most glorious. Would you want to see God if you could? Would that resolve your doubts?

Well, yes, in order to be sure that there is a God; yes because the sight would be like none other in the whole universe; but no, because you would be completely overwhelmed and overthrown by his sheer glory. He is not like us; he is all powerful spirit, we are feeble flesh; worse, he is all righteous and in our flesh we are corrupt with sin. To see such a holy God in our state would not be an ultimate touristic experience; it would be terror beyond imagining; in the presence of such brightness we would scuttle, we would flee away. Indeed, why should so great a God have any interest in my relationships, my unemployment, my children, my sin, my addiction, my loneliness? What are they to him? What am I to him?

One of the great philosophers of the ancient world penetrated sufficiently into reality to realise that there is only one God. But he stopped there. For him, the one true God was a self-absorbed being, with no interest in the world and certainly no interest in you as an individual. He simply did not care.

This was where reason led, and it seems to make sense. The gulf between God and us is unimaginably vast. We don’t know, and we do not experience, him and we should not expect to. It is hopeless, and we are helpless.

Crashing into this helpless, hopeless world comes an almighty, astonishing revelation: ‘And the Word became flesh...’ Did God create the whole magnificent Universe? Yes he did. But he did it by speaking, through a personal Word, the Word who was with God and was himself God. And now, in an action which dwarfs even the creation itself, this Word of God, this Son of God, has become flesh. He has become one of us. He has crossed the gulf, from his side to ours. He has taken on our very flesh. He was born, he lived and laughed and loved and spoke and ate and slept...why he was even put to death. He who is God became man, because God so loved the world.

Can you see God? No man has ever seen God. But God takes on our humanity so that you may in fact see him. For Jesus said, ‘he who has seen me has seen the Father...’ We can no longer claim that God is invisible; he has made himself visible so that we may humans see him and know him. Indeed, the Word of God has set up home amongst us, has become a neighbour to us. He lives in our suburb. At this point, to say that we know nothing about God becomes mere evasion.

But what about the glory of God, the brightness which makes us flee from him in fear? We can see it, we can stand in its presence, we can even hope to share in it, because it has been focused on this one man, this person Jesus Christ, this neighbour of ours who is also the only Son of God. When we see him by hearing his story – and in particular when we hear about the way in which he died for us on the cross - we see not shame and humiliation, but the very glory of God. For the central heart of the glory of God is not so much his brightness, power and might, as his inward being, his grace and his truth.
God’s grace is his special love for people like us, who do not deserve his love, forgiveness and mercy. Even the greatest acts of human kindness and mercy are but a pale shadow of the grace of the God who so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that those who believe in him should not perish but have everlasting life. This is the glory of God.

God’s truth is his utter faithfulness and reliability. In a world of ignorance, confusion, deceit and lies, God stands by his word, clear and true. This is the Word through whom the world was created and by whom it is sustained. Good news! glad tidings! : At the very core of the Universe there is truth and righteousness. In a world in which you experience so much deceit and fraud and betrayal and confusion and ignorance, that you don’t know who to trust, God speaks the truth and that truth is Jesus Christ. You can entrust yourself to him. This is the glory of God.

We are mere flesh, you and I. Vulnerable flesh and in our flesh we cannot see the God who gives eternal life. But the Word of God became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth. Such is the joy of that great event, that today the world stops still, in order to celebrate and to sing the praises of God. For your deepest fears and anxieties are not petty and trivial to this God; your worst sins are still forgivable; he is not aloof – he has entered the world to make himself known and to draw us to himself as beloved children.

You wish to meet God? I trust so, because in knowing him is the way to eternal life. Then take heart. God has made the first move. He has made himself open to you. He has one unique Son; his name is Jesus Christ; he joined in himself both true God and true man; if you come to God through him you will meet God , you will know God and you will have eternal life. No wonder the chief note at Christmas is one of joy.