Christmastide #1 of 2: Christmas Day:

The Word became Flesh

(John 1:14)

On this Christmas morning we celebrate that day when God the Son became baby Jesus. The church fussed some about when we should celebrate God becoming flesh and dwelling among us. Some thought it should best be celebrated at Jesus’ baptism, when the Holy Spirit descended like a dove and “a voice was heard from heaven” saying, “This is my beloved Son.”  At adulthood, when Jesus did miracles, that’s when the Word became flesh, they would argue. But, eventually the church settled into the Gospel Story, that baby Jesus was Immanuel—God in a manger.

When you gather today to read again the Christmas story; notice how human it is, almost as if there was nothing supernatural about it. Just an ordinary couple; Mary, with child, on a donkey and Joseph leading them south towards Bethlehem because of some arbitrary decree by Roman power. Yet, at the same time there’s the angels’ song, and that star in the east. That’s the way the Bible is. The human story of the Holy Family is never lost in the Divine story of God’s dealings with us. Christmas, the most Divine story ever told; is, at the same time, the most human story ever told.