The Habitation of the Divine
Christmas Eve 10:00 p.m.
Luke 2:1-20
12/24/09
Lorraine Ljunggren

        On Christmas Eve when the organist plays the first notes of the hymn O Come All Ye Faithful, that is when Christmas comes for me. Like other clergy, church staffs, and worship volunteers, I live constantly in what feels like different time zones. Before ever Advent arrives, we are looking ahead to Bible readings and hymns, to Eucharistic prayers and four purple candles. Before ever Lent arrives, we consider the reality of having ashes smudged on foreheads and of Great Litanies being chanted, of confessions followed by absolutions. Holy Week arrives well before its appointed time in the world of church staffs, always finding us re-living the events in Jerusalem before the calendar says the time has come. And so, it is a relief that when these pivotal times in the church year actually arrive – we are privileged to live in the moment with you. All the anticipation bears fruit in the moment we sing a particular hymn, hear a particular reading from scripture, and break bread set aside for a particularly holy purpose.

        So here we find ourselves again. The familiar strains of O Come All Ye Faithful calling us to gather – to gather under the roof of a space set aside to worship God who made us, to be reassured that the Spirit of God is ever present, and to acknowledge and celebrate the birth of a baby whose life changes the landscape of the world – a baby called Emmanuel, God with us.

        I love hearing the reading from Luke's Gospel and imagining what it would be like to be in the story – to be among the travelers to Bethlehem or to be huddled inside a stable-cave when, exhausted from their journey, Mary and Joseph and their little donkey arrive. There is something miraculous about every birth, but my heart warms easily at the prospect of young Mary bringing forth the life within her – a life whose Source some say is impossible but that, with faith such as Mary's, proclaims that with God all things are possible. I like to imagine sitting on a Judean hillside, gazing up at the firmament of heaven, seeing a night sky thick with the tiny pinpoints of light we call stars – only to be caught by surprise when the very heavens seem to come alive with God's glorious message of Good News for all the people, especially the people in need of Good News.

        I like contemplating what it is like for Mary to be the habitation of God and to sit in awe and wonder, pondering the ways God inhabits each of our lives. For this night is about God hoping against hope that we will spread the Good News of God's eternal and powerful love we find in Jesus. Whenever and wherever we the faithful are called, we are to be the habitation of the Most High God. We are to incarnate, to embody here and now, in our lives God who is revealed in and through Jesus. Some two millennia after Jesus' birth there is still Good News of great joy to share with all the people.

        We celebrate Christmas every year to write again in our hearts, minds, and spirits the truth of God's love for us and for all the people. If God cannot depend on the faithful or those seeking the gift of faith, where is God to look?

        In a world afflicted with strife and division, with war and conflict, with hunger and homelessness, with sorrow and grief, we are called to be witnesses to another Way. The faithful who claim the name of Christ are to walk the Way of Jesus and to call others to the Way where peace supplants war, where reconciliation ends conflict, where the abundance of the earth held by a few fills the bellies of the many who are hungry, and where resources hoarded by some give shelter to the multitude in need, where sorrow is comforted and grief is shown how to hope again.

        These changes will only come to pass when we ordinary human beings begin truly to participate in the Incarnation. “The mystery of the Incarnation comes to ordinary people living ordinary lives. All that is required is openness to do God's will, willingness to respond to God's call.” (Dianne Bergant in America, 12/15/2003)

        In other words, we are to take to heart the ministry of the baby who's coming into the world we celebrate on this holy night. There is a larger purpose, a life-giving purpose to our being here this night and every time we gather as a faith community. Christmas comes so that we might believe in our heart of hearts that God will give us the will, the courage, and the determination to walk the Way of Jesus, to embody in small and large ways the powerful and life-giving way of God's love for us and for all of creation.

        This past week you embodied the way of Jesus when you took the food cards provided by donations to our Clergy Discretionary Fund and gave those cards to friends and strangers alike who need help putting food on their tables. All over Raleigh, in the places where you live or work or pass-by, God's people who received the food cards were given a small – perhaps in the grand scheme of things, but powerful in the here and now, token of God's love for them. That was Love Incarnated through you.

        The Missioner for Youth Ministries for our Diocese, Beth Crow, tells the story in this week's Please Note that when they took to the airport the youth visiting recently from our Companion Diocese of Botswana, God's love was embodied in three strangers to the youth. Remember we participated in donating supplies for day care centers in Botswana? The project, led by the youth of our diocese, resulted in ten suitcases of supplies for the Center in Botswana. There was only one problem – no one knew the airline changed its policy on how many free bags could be checked. So, when the Youth Missioner found out at the ticket counter, she decided she would pay for the bags, not wanting the supplies to remain here. A woman in line asked what was going on and when she found out about the extra, unbudgeted fees, said she wanted to pay for the bags to go on the plane to Africa. So she and her husband did so. A great irony is that they are Episcopalians in a church in this Diocese.

        Then, in weighing the bags, the group discovered one weighed 65 pounds which meant another $50 fee. So Beth started to take some supplies out of one bag. The young man behind the counter working for the airline stopped her and said not to take anything out, that it was okay. The young people from Botswana were crying at the generosity of these people they had never met. Beth says the young people from Botswana met the angels of Christmas at the airport.

        I would add the young people experienced first- hand the life and ministry of Jesus, they experienced the Incarnation of God's love.

        And so do we whenever and wherever we respond to God's call to embody, to incarnate the love of God met in the life of the baby born in Bethlehem of Judea. We are to take to heart the ministry of this baby who's coming into the world we celebrate on this holy night. There is, my friends, a larger purpose, a life-giving purpose to our being here this night and every time we gather as a faith community. Christmas comes so that we might believe in our heart of hearts that God will give us the will, the courage, and the determination to walk the Way of Jesus, to embody in small and large ways the powerful and life-giving way of God's love for us and for all of creation.

        O come, all ye faithful, be the habitation of the Most High God. Alleluia. Amen.

©2009 Lorraine Ljunggren