Christmas is for Children

. . . born of the Virgin Mary. -Apostles Creed

Christmas is for children. The children of men, and the children of God.

And now I offer you this simple phrase for kids aged 1 to 92, and for all human flesh under the sun from the time of Adam Eve until the end of the age.

This simple phrase is offered to Giovanni Pierce Colglazier, born into this world this past Wednesday as one of the Children of men who, God willing, will soon by virtue of God's Holy Baptism of him, be under the care and discipline of Christ Jesus, whose birth in human flesh we now anticipate with joy and wonder.

This simple phrase is also offered to Walter Erick “Frit” Sanders, who departed this world this past Thursday at the age of 92, as one of the children of God who, being delivered of the burden of the flesh is now in joy and felicity resting from his labors, now having perfect consummation in the eternal glory of Christ Jesus.

This simple phrase is offered to children yet unborn, conceived in their mother’s wombs, and even to those yet not conceived.

This simple phrase is offered to those who have reached an old age, even old Methuselah, who reached the age of 969 years and to those who will reach an old age in the future.

The simple phrase of which I speak consists of only five words, drawn from the Second Article of Apostle’s Creed as you have known it from a child, the Article concerning your Savior, Jesus Christ. Those five words are: “. . . born of the Virgin Mary.”

Thus you can count on only one hand what the mighty hand of God has done for you, provided you have five fingers on each hand as Jesus does.

First is a four-letter word: Born.

That is to say He, in His flesh, departed the relatively dark, warm, quite recess and comfort of His mother’s womb to breathe your poised air and to hear with his ears and to see with His eyes the very same world in which you live.

Apart from the fact that He is true God, which we will talk about in a moment, it is a miracle in its own right whenever a tiny human comes into the world, for the very first time to make use of the reason and senses as they have developed while inside the mother’s womb.

Everything is new. The child is new to the mother and father. The mother and father are new to the child. The whole world is new to the child, and the mother and father’s world is turned on its head. It is not as if this child were not a person before birth, but now that the child has entered into time and space in such a way as to experience it in all its fullness.

This is what Jesus did, too, and of course it is for you that He does this and all things well. He is born.

Second is a two-letter word: of.”

Unless you are a character in a video game you do not pop up out of nowhere and disappear. In fact, even if you were a character in a video game, there would be a cause for your appearance, and a cause for your disappearance.

In the case of your Christ Jesus Who is born of the Virgin Mary, He is at the same time the expression of every cause and purpose as given by God the Father, just as you are taught by the Holy Spirit.

No one is born without a source of being. This pertains to you, and this pertains to Jesus who carries you in His being and body through the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life in His name.

So it happens that you do not live to yourself, and you do not die to yourself, but you live and die to the LORD who is the source of all things.

Third is a three-letter word: the.

English teachers call this the “definite article.” There is only one definite article in the English language, and that is the word “the.” There happens also only to be one Virgin Mary.

Not only is she unique as a person who was also born of a mother just like you were, and just like you are a unique person, but she stands as the only mother in all of history to be a part in fulfilling what was spoken by God to Adam and Even at the fall, what was spoken by the prophets of hold, like Isiah who said by the Holy Spirit that a Virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and we shall call his Name Immanuel,” in patient continuance under the burden of a pregnancy announced to her previously by the angel of the LORD.

We do not have many LORDs and gods, but only one true God. Likewise we do not have many Virgin Marys, but only one Virgin Mary. We do not worship her, but we most certainly marvel at how she believed what was spoken by the Lord and it was done unto her as she believed. She, as we observe and celebrate with great joy, gave birth to Christ Jesus, the Savior of all the children of men and all the children of God.

Forth is a six-letter word: Virgin.

“[F]or the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.”

Dear children, this is what makes the conception and birth of Christ Jesus such a great joy to behold and ponder. It is by virtue of the Holy Spirit that Christ Jesus will bear in His own body before the face of God all the sin and transgression that has ever, and will ever, occur under the sun as brought about by the sin of Adam and as continued to this day.

Where by nature you have done nothing other than continually heap transgression after transgression upon yourself and others, He, for your sake, will walk in the paths of righteousness not only for His Name’s sake, but also for your name’s sake.

Do not think that because Christ Jesus is born of a Virgin that you are somehow left out. Do not think that because Christ Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit that you are somehow left behind because you are not born of a Virgin.

On the contrary, it is this Christ, born of the Virgin Mary, Who has seen to it that you also, in your very own body, are conceived and born of the Holy Spirit in your Baptism, and in His teaching and discipline of you, even as He feeds you with the same body and blood wherewith He suffered, dies, and rose again for you.

No other creature could do this for you. He must be born. He must be conceived by the Holy Spirit. He must suffer, die, and rise again, as the rest of the Apostles Creed and Sacred Scripture teaches you.

The fifth and last word is a four-letter word: Mary.

To this day “Mary” is the most common name given to girls in the United States. There are nearly 4 million girls and ladies by that name in the United States today.

The next most common name given to girls in the Unites States has slightly over one and a half million bearers. That name is “Patricia.”

So the name, "Mary," is common.

Short of the fact that God chose Mary to be the bearer of His only begotten Son, she was common, too. As the choir is about to sing in the Magnificat, God had “regarded the lowliness of His handmaiden.”

He is to be the Savior of all people; therefore He is to be the Savior even of those who are of low estate. The lowest of the low. Even those who are burdened with sin and death.

Even those who hold ordinary jobs like garbage man, refrigerator repairman, and engineer. Even those who have no job. The homeless. Those in prison. The fatherless. The widow. The policeman. The nurse. Through this Christ Jesus born of the Virgin whose common name is Mary, God exalts them all, because He, whose birth you now celebrate, is God in human flesh, come to save you.

And then there is this thing about mothers. Every mother gives birth to a first born child, just like Mary did. Dr. Luther thought and wrote about this quite a bit. What was Mary supposed to do? Here she is in a strange place – Bethlehem was not her home – she had no place to stay but a stall where cattle are fed, and now she has this baby boy, who, if he is anything like my brother, Charles Frederick Seyboldt who was born three years ahead of me, was quite something to deal with as a person.

Yes, as we said at the start, a new and real person.

The world of that mother and father are turned upside down. I have yet to meet or know a mother who was not truly worried and concerned about bearing and raising children. This is their own flesh and blood under the creative hand of an almighty and merciful God, yet it is apart from them. There is no remote control. There is some guidance and wisdom that comes from others, yes, but there is also so much of it sometimes that a new mother might just as well throw up her arms in despair.

And then there is the business of being a father, too, often saying yes and no for the child when it does not matter, and not saying yes and no when it really does matter.

Yet, through this Child Christ Jesus, all mothers and fathers - indeed all who are born of a woman - are invited to rest in His mercies from everlasting to everlasting, for He knows your frame. He knows that you are dust, and subject to every weakness, even sin and death.

That is why, for your sake, He came into this world to be weak and to suffer on your behalf.

He has not changed. He still lives, and He will take you to be with Himself forever. He will be the Host and Imperishable Food for you in His Supper this night at this altar.

“[B]orn of the Virgin Mary.” That is why Christmas is for children. The children of men and the children of God, and that is why we say, at this time of the Holy Church year, many times and many ways: “Merry Christmas!” Which is to say, “Rejoice with me, insofar as God has undertaken to visit us through His only Son, Who has come to save us from our sin by His innocent suffering and death, by His resurrection from the dead, and by His Holy Spirit who has called us into the very life and being of God for all eternity.

+ + +

Anticipated Light Arrives

She gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus -Matthew 1:25b

Of all the ways to pass time, standing next to railroad tracks and waiting for a train turns out to be one of the more dramatic. Minutes, even hours go by, and there is nothing but the sound of birds ["You are more valuable than many sparrows."], the wind, perhaps some traffic, and maybe your own feet as you shift from one direction to another, looking to the left, looking to the right, looking at the steel rails you hope will bring a train before your very eyes. For what seems to be a very long time there is nothing much to see.

Then it happens. You look down the tracks in one direction, and there is the unmistakable pinprick of light - the headlight on the engine - announcing without question that a train is approaching. It will not turn aside. It cannot turn aside. It may take a while, but soon it will pass by only feet away, bring its massive engines and cargo before your eyes and ears with a roar that tightens your stomach and tons of cargo that shake the ground.

Oh that You would rend the heavens and come down,
That the mountains might quake at Your presence.

Of all the Gospel readings to hear during the holy season of Advent, St. Matthew’s account of the birth of Christ Jesus turns out to be one of the most dramatic. Your Father in heaven would have you hear of the birth of His only-begotten Son even while in the midst of this time of patient waiting for the holy season of Christmastide. He is intent on rending the heavens to come down so that you might be in His presence.

For now it is as if there is not even a headlight on the horizon, but the inevitable entrance of God into human flesh in order to save you has already taken place – not so that He might pass by in a display of power and glory to impress you, but to that He may fulfill what was spoken to Adam and Eve, not minutes, or hours, or ages from the time they estranged themselves from God by their disobedience, but immediately and in person.

Not even a headlight on the horizon. That is how it must have been for Joseph when he found out his betrothed was found to be with child. He did not have the benefit of an angel of the LORD to tell him what was up. For all he knew, and he had only this to conclude: His beloved was unfaithful to Him, much like you have been unfaithful before God in thought, word, and deed, by what you have done and by what you have left undone.

As Joseph turned in for the night to go to sleep he might as well have been mourning in lowly exile like God’s ancient people who were punished for their disobedience. He looked ahead and all he could see was a divorce. Even a quiet divorce would not be without pain and sorrow. He looked behind and all he could see was unfaithfulness. Someone very close to him betrayed him.

“What are they going to think and what are they going to say when they find out my beloved is pregnant and we are not even married?” And if that were not enough, it weighed upon Joseph, the Son of David, what the LORD God has commanded from the beginning: “You shall not commit adultery.” Fact of the matter was, as he tossed and turned in his bed at night, that his betrothed was, by all indications, a fornicator. It is not merely what people think or say when it comes to fornication, but it is the most holy God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in whose presence no one can stand whose sin is not covered and whose iniquity is not taken away.

And so God rent the heavens and came down for Joseph by His Word through the holy angel, just as He intervenes for you this day through His called and ordained servants of the Word. “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.” All things are new for St. Joseph and for you, for this Child conceived in her womb is conceived by the Holy Spirit so that He may come into the world to save all people from their sin.

Like a train making its way with absolute determination to the destination for which it is bound, the holiness and rightness of God is delivered among men through Christ Jesus, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, in order to fulfill that which was spoken by the prophets. “Behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear a son.”

There is no stopping it. The LORD God rends the heavens and comes down, not in pomp, power, and glory, but in the flesh of Christ Jesus given into death for your sin, and raised up from the dead so that you who believe and are baptized are raised up into the heavenly places together with Him, even now as you share in His body and blood at this altar.

What is delivered to you here is the complete and full forgiveness of sins, not by the light of the locomotive, but by the Light of the Word of LORD as spoken from the beginning and enduring forever. This little child whose body will soon digest His mother’s milk and then curds and honey is the same body delivered up unto death on a Cross for your sake, so that His wisdom and strength and honor and glory may be delivered also into your body this day, a body that one day was destined for the pit of hell, but now is set apart in holiness, innocence, and blessedness, even though you wait long days and hours filled with trouble, pain, anxiety, worries about bills, worries about what other people say and think, even disease and death. All of those things that make you toss and turn like Joseph the Son of David did.

The grace and peace of Christ Jesus are upon you now, not because of your own life and the drama that comes with it, but because God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ undertakes to meet you face to face precisely where you are at all times and in all places.

So it happens that such days as have never come since the day that Ephraim separated from Judah are upon you. The strong and wicked are cast away. The weak and righteous find their refuge in Christ Jesus, God in human flesh, born of the Virgin Mary to save them from their sins.

You know, the business of kings and nations have been interrupted on account of this salvation delivered to you in your baptism and in the Supper of Christ’s body and blood this day. Where youth may be inclined to reject wisdom from on high as in the day of King Ahaz, saying, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s loins!” the wisdom of God encompasses all of creation in having your Christ Jesus conceived by the Holy Spirit for you, and then fulfilling all righteousness for you. Again, like a speeding freight train that cannot be turned aside or stopped, the heavens are opened and the righteousness of God is delivered to you this day.

Therefore, beloved, do not wait upon the LORD as those who have hope, but as one who, by faith, has seen the bright light of His Resurrection, according to His Word and promise to you. Wait in the peace of His Gospel; watch unto prayer, as He has taught you to pray and has promised to hear you; and work in those labors of love to which He has called you in this life.

Do not lose heart when your place in life is hard to bear, when your job is difficult and long, when your work seems pointless and under-appreciated, and when all your labors appear to be in vain.

Do not lose heart, nor give up hope, though you are tested and tried and frankly tired of waiting.

Do not grow weary of doing good, even if you feel like it doesn’t really matter what you do or don’t do, or whether you do anything at all. In truth, your works of love mean a great deal because they are the works of Him who ate curds and honey at the time He knew enough to refuse evil and choose good; they are significant in the same mysterious and hidden way as all the Signs of Christ are hidden under His Cross — because they are His good works of love in you, and they fly in the face of sin, death, the devil and hell. When everything is so hard and seems so hopeless, and it only keeps on getting harder and worse, no matter how much you try, and yet you persevere in faith and love, by God’s grace in Christ Jesus, then you are boldly confessing His Resurrection from the dead.

That matters. Not because you are saving yourself, but because your obedience of faith and your persistent labors of love are the fruits of Christ’s Cross and genuine Signs of His Resurrection.

Therefore, wait upon the Lord and hope in His Word, for His mercies are new every morning, and with Him there is plenteous redemption. Quiet your nagging doubts and fears with His Gospel, His Word of forgiveness, and with His sure and certain promises to you.

If you speak, then speak as God speaks: Confess what He has spoken to you by His Son. Pray as He has spoken, also, with the words that He has given you, in the sure and certain hope that He does help you in your weakness, and knowing that He Himself prays in you and prays with you and prays for you continually.

You cannot see it now. Your eyes will deceive you, as will your sinful heart and mind, your changing feelings and up-and-down emotions. Yet, even when you see and feel death, take hold of the Cross of Christ by faith, and behold your King coming to you with grace and favor through His innocent suffering and death, and through His resurrection from the dead.

Hear His Word to you now, and taste the Signs that He thereby gives to you and pours out for you: His holy Body and His precious Blood. If He has eaten curds and honey in the Promised Land, so do you eat and drink a better Milk and Honey in His Kingdom, even now in His Church on earth. Even now at this altar. Even henceforth and forevermore as the LORD God through Christ Jesus prepares and fulfills all things for you unto life everlasting.

+ + +

The Image of God

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. -Colossians 1:15

It is nothing short of astonishing that, if one wants to know what God looks like, he need look no further than Christ Jesus, Who in His human body laid down His life for poor sinners.

If any man wishes to become the man whom God intends for him to be, let him turn away from his own fallen desires and instead turn to Christ Jesus to receive His baptism, body, blood, and absolution.

Only in Christ Jesus - the Son of the Father Who is God in human flesh, also created in your image - is there life, light, and salvation; only in Him is there a way to be lifted up above one's own passions and desires that would lead away from God.

He is not a God who is afar off, but the only God, Who has drawn near to make Himself available where His Word and teaching are purely administered, through which He is given in full measure with all His benefits.

+ + +