“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.”
Cosmology, as we know it, did not exist during the time of the Old Testament or the New Testament. Now, we understand that that around 13.7 billion years ago the Big Bang exploded from a tiny particle into the whole universe. The amazing photos we see from the Hubble telescope fill us with a sense of both grandeur and humility. Grandeur, because the universe is so intricately and amazingly beautiful, and humility, because we understand now how remarkable it is that we exist as living beings on the only planet we know with life.
Father Thomas Keating, a very wise and wonderful Trappist monk, refers to our earth as ‘ a forlorn little planet in the middle of nowhere”.
And on this little planet, in the little town of Bethlehem, was born the baby Jesus. “The light, which enlightens everyone,” has come into the world, as John tells us in today’s Gospel reading. The Word has become flesh and lived among us. Life began on earth some 4 billion years ago, and just 2000+ years ago, Jesus walked amongst us, taught us, healed us, and introduced us to the Kingdom of God, which is not a place, but a state of consciousness. We all are invited into the transformative act of becoming, by taking on the heart and mind of Christ, acting from the spirit of God within us, as the primary motivating force in our lives. That is the invitation to us, as Christians, that we may become light bearers at work in our challenged and challenging world. What an invitation!
Yet there are many who resist the invitation. Of the nearly 7 billion human beings who live here on planet earth, some, in whatever faith journey they are born into and accept, choose to believe in God, some choose not to believe in God, and many are still deciding.
Only Christianity has Jesus, the incarnate Son of God, both human and divine, who walked and talked and lived and healed amongst us. From a small group of disciples, the faith spread, as the Good News of Jesus’s message took hold. Small sects of Christians emerged. We all know the early stories of persecution and martyrdom of the early Christians, until the Emperor Constantine adopted Christianity. At Nicea in the 4th century, the common tenets of Christianity were formulated, but not until after considerable discussion and dissension, as the finally agreed upon Nicene Creed was written.
Here at Christ Church we feel very free to come and worship, to share our faith, and to speak openly about our faith, wherever we may be living and working in community. At our Thanksgiving Interfaith Service, Dr. Jena Khodadad, the President of the Winnetka Interfaith Council , referenced our remarkable freedom to worship, here in the United States, as she and her family, who are members of The Bahai Community, had to leave their native Iran, where the Bahai are severely persecuted.
And with the whole sad reality of religious persecution, as a background, I’m now going to switch gears and share with you a conversation recently I had with a friend. Her uncle had long been intrigued by the Christmas Carol, The Twelve Days of Christmas. He was feeling baffled, as what in the world do leaping lords, French hens, swimming swans, and especially the partridge in the pear tree have to do with Christmas?
Looking into the history of this favourite carol seems particularly appropriate today, as we are in the 12 days of Christmas, up until Epiphany, on January 6th, which celebrates the visit of the Magi to the baby Jesus.
My friend’s uncle did some research and sent her these results, which she kindly shared with me.
It appears that from 1558 until 1879, Roman Catholics in England were not permitted to practice their faith openly. Someone during that era wrote this carol as a catechism song for young Catholics. It has two levels of meaning, the surface meaning plus a hidden meaning known only to members of their church. Each element in the carol has a code word for a religious reality, which the children could remember.
-The partridge in a pear tree was Jesus Christ
-Two turtle doves were the Old and New Testaments
-Three French horns stood for faith, hope, and love
-The four calling birds were the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
-The five golden rings recalled the Torah or Law, the first five books of the Old Testament
-The six geese a-laying stood for the six days of creation
-Seven swans a swimming represented the sevenfold gifts of the Holy Spirit-Prophecy, Serving, Teaching, Exhortation, Contribution, Leadership, and Mercy
-The eight maids-a-milking were the eight beatitudes
-Nine ladies dancing were the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit-Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self-control
-The ten lords a –leaping were the ten commandments
-The eleven pipers piping stood for the eleven faithful disciples
-The twelve drummers drumming symbolized the twelve points of belief in the Apostles Creed.
It makes beautiful sense, doesn’t it? That well loved carol has within it a secret code expressing vital elements of our shared faith.
We are indebted to all those many Christians, over the centuries, who kept the stories and the wisdom safe, who continued to worship in private, and later in public.
And we are reminded again of John’s Prologue, when he wrote, of Jesus “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him: yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his people did not accept him.”
We accept him. We do know him. We know Jesus both in his humanity and in his divinity. As I said a few moments ago, ‘We all are invited into the transformative act of becoming, by taking on the heart and mind of Christ, acting from the spirit of God within us as the primary motivating force in our lives.”
So, let’s go back now and look at what Father Thomas Keating called our earth, ‘a forlorn little planet in the middle of nowhere’, in a vast universe of billions of stars and suns. Astronomers estimate there are about 100 thousand million stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way alone. Outside that, there are millions upon millions of other galaxies.
Recently, I was talking with my eldest son about the state of our world. We do so enjoy these conversations. He observed, “If creatures are out there in the cosmos watching our planet, it’s the ultimate reality show ever.”
Now, yes, that makes us smile, but it is so very true. Those of us graced to be alive at these amazing times, when everything seems to be changing and shifting, and we’re all so aware we’re all now in it together, we know that Jesus came, not only to dwell among us, but also in us. He is one of us.
The French composer, Oliver Messiaen, wrote: “The Word became flesh and dwelt in me.” This is the breathtaking truth we celebrate each Christmas. We are pioneers of God’s ultimate plan to transform us.
The true light, which enlightens everyone, has come into the world. Let us be bearers of that light, so that the presence of Jesus abiding within us will help transform our planet earth into a vibrant and healthy little planet. We can begin to live the moments of our lives filled with the indwelling spirit, open to the full reality of the Eternal Word. We, too, can be bearers of the light. Thanks be to God.
