The Word became flesh

“St John unfolds the great mystery of the Incarnation”.

So reads the traditional introduction to the final reading (John 1:1-14) at services of nine lessons and carols.

So let us, on this Christmas morning, reflect on that “great mystery”

“In the beginning was the word”

It sounds so simple: “In the beginning was the word”

But its implications are profound

“In the beginning”

So there was a beginning

A point of origin

A time when there was and before that a time when there was not

Such that what we have in this world should not be taken for granted – because it has always been this way – not at all

this world is not a given, but a gift

“In the beginning”

There was a point of origin, a single point

And because we all come from that single point, we are all related to one another and, in particular, to that which created us out of that single point of origin

“In the beginning”

Or as someone else put it: “A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…”

So begins a story

Our story

And through our common beginning we are all part of that one story

And as our lives are part of a story then they have a beginning, a middle and, indeed, an end

Our lives have a pattern, an order, a purpose

In the beginning was the Word

Because that story had a teller, a narrator, an observer, a creator

And there was a word – there was a plan, an order, a purpose

This was not an accident – but a deliberate act

In the book of Genesis – which itself means “beginning” – the world is spoken into being through the Word of God.

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.” (Gen 1:1-3)

So we have a purpose

But what is it?

Mankind has been struggling to determine the answer to that question for at least as long as there has been records of his thoughts

I recently visited the exhibition “Troy: myth and reality” at the British Museum.  It’s worth seeing

Troy is famous because it is recorded in the Iliad and the Odyssey, works ascribed to Homer and written around 3,000 years ago making them some of the most ancient writings on the human condition

Some of Homer’s most famous quotations are written up on the wall as part of the exhibition

Over a 19^th Century statue by Filippo Albacini, The Wounded Achilles, where the great Greek hero is shown clutching the poisoned arrow which has mortally pierced his eponymous heel, it reads:

“As is the generation of leaves, so is the generation of men”

In Greek this is: οἵη περ φύλλων γενεὴ τοίη δὲ καὶ ἀνδρῶν. (Iliad 6:146)

I know this because it is one of the few quotations I can remember from my four years of study at Oxford

I learned this because that is what the ancient Greeks thought – that there was no purpose to humanity than to live, have children and die – like so many leaves.

As such we are amusements, playthings of the gods.  All rather grim!

The Christian message is different.

That our lives matter and make a difference.  That our lives have a purpose

Like the other Gospel writers John says that for the answer to the question “how shall we live” we need to look to the revelation of God in Jesus Christ – the Word made flesh

For the Christian perspective it that we are far from being playthings of the gods, but rather that God has lived as one of us

Through Him, we know the creator and we know our purpose

In a reprise of that original creative act, through Jesus’s words to us, the Word is spoken again into the darkness

And what were these words of the Word made flesh, these words that overcome the drakness?

In Jesus’s last words to his disciples he told them to love one another

A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so also you must love one another.  (John 13:34)

And if we follow the light of these words, do what Jesus says and love one another then we have a great future:

as many as received him, to them he gave the power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

For then we understand that we are born of one creator, with one purpose

Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

If we are born of God then that explains why there is that within us which is divine, which cries out for relationship with all other created things, with our fellow human beings and especially with our creator

Whom we can know, and serve and love,

As we know and serve and love the sign of God’s love,

The one who gave himself for others and so fulfilled all the words of the law and the prophets

In whom all these words found their meaning …

The one born on this day – Jesus Christ,  our Lord

—

And so at some point in all the hurly-burly of this Christmas festival

Take a moment to be still

Look for the light – to see the direction in which you should go

Listen for God’s word – his purpose for you

Know profoundly, deep inside you, that you are loved, that you are important, that God dwells within you

and that your purpose is to love your neighbour and your God as He loves you.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Amen

Sermon Preached by Rev Christopher Hancock at St Mary’s Headley, Christmas Day, 2019