+ The Nativity of Our Lord, Midnight – December 24th, 2024 +
Series C: Isaiah 9:2-7; Titus 2:11-14; Luke 2:1-20
Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church
Milton, WA
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In 1849 the French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr wrote about society and technology that “the more things change the more they stay the same.”
In 1971 Roger Daltrey, Pete Townsend and The Who sang about politics, “Meet the old boss, same as the new boss…we won’t get fooled again.”
These are really just new ways of saying something that’s not so new at all. Something Solomon said long ago in Ecclesiastes, describing life apart from, or outside of God’s saving promises.
What has been, it is what will be,
And what has been done, it is what will be done.
So there is nothing new under the sun.
The more you read history the more you find yourself agreeing with Solomon. There’s nothing new. Wars come and go. Empires and rulers rise and fall. Generations come and generations go. And the grave is the great equalizer. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
But then one day, the angel Gabriel appears to a Virgin and announces that God is doing something truly new. “Do not be afraid, Mary… And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus…The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.”
Long ago, Solomon asked, “Is there anything of which one might say, “See this, it is new”? Ecc. 1: 10.
Well, tonight there is. Tonight God answers Solomon’s question with a gracious “yes” that echoes in the heavens and comes down to earth. In all of the world’s ages, in all of the years of human history there is only one new thing that has happened. Christmas. Christ’s incarnation. The birth of God in the flesh. God is man, man to deliver.
Tonight, God sends his angels to the shepherds to declare the good news, “Behold I am doing a new thing.” For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.
Tonight, the monotony of history and all the sameness of sin and death is undone, for the Christ Child born has come to make all things new.
Tonight there’s something new happening under the sun. For behold, someone greater than Solomon is here.
A Virgin conceives and bears a Son.
God is made man.
The Son of God makes his home under the sun to make all things new by his dying and rising.
The Lord of all becomes a little child.
The King of creation humbles himself to be born of a Virgin. Here in Bethlehem in the manger and in Mary’s arms we find our swaddled God. A diapered divinity. Mary’s little lamb is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
Christ’s incarnation is the grand miracle. A gracious mystery. And a moment that changes all history.
All the sameness of sin. All the oldness of death. All our guilt and shame that never seems to go away. The nagging worries. The hurts and pains. They’re all undone.
For The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
on them has light shone.
For unto us a child is born.
Christ’s birth for you is the beginning of his saving work to make all sad things come untrue. Christ’s birth for you means that God has come to earth to rescue you, suffer for you, bleed for you, bear sin and sorrow and sickness for you, to die for you, be buried for you. To do another new thing. To rise from the dead for you. Behold, I make all things new.
Christ’s birth for you means that something new has happened. The Son of God is born to make you children of the Father. For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people.
And the Son of God has done something truly new under the sun. Christ is born to save for you.
A blessed Christmas to each of you…
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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