When my godchildren were little, I went back to Minneapolis for Christmas every year to see them. I left the Christmas morning service just as soon as Jesus’ birthday cake was cut (I did take a piece to eat in the car) and took off for the airport. The plane was always on time and I got off the plane simply brimming with anticipation. But the first time I made the trip no one was there to meet me.
Well, to make a long story short, I did finally hook up with the children’s father, and arrived at their house at about 4:30 in the afternoon, and found, to my total astonishment, that they hadn’t opened their presents yet. They had waited for me to arrive. Those of you who have children know what a sacrifice this is. My godkids were 10, 8 and 6 - and to wait until after 5 in the afternoon to open their Christmas presents? I know some grownups who can’t wait that long. Now, mind you, they had emptied their stockings when they got up, and they opened their grandmother’s gifts when they went there for lunch, but the packages at home hadn’t been touched. I was awed.
Of course, the minute we got in the door there was a mad dash for the tree. They did let me get my coat off. And then the phone rang, and it was their godfather Don saying he was coming over too, so we actually waited until he got there. But you can just imagine the level of excitement in those kids. Not to mention their godmother. I have to admit I was excited, too.
You see, when you have been waiting a long time for something you really, really want, it’s not enough just to know that it’s there. Especially if you know it’s something terrifically special, but you’re not really sure of the details. You want to take it out, touch it, use it.
And that’s what things were like, back then, in around 30 A.D., when John the Baptist started calling for the people to repent and be baptized. They had been waiting a long time for the promised Messiah, and when John pointed at Jesus, that morning on the banks of the Jordan, saying “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” some of his listeners left John and followed Jesus, even though he wasn’t quite what they had expected. He didn’t come gift-wrapped, so to speak.
Some of the audience didn’t even take a second look. Or if they did, they lost in-terest when they discovered that he wasn’t what they had expected, kind of like my 10-year old godson Ted when it turned out that the computer game I got him wasn’t what he wanted. He was remarkably polite, I really had to push him to admit that he’d like to exchange it for a different one. But you can always tell when a kid likes a present.
Listen again to verses 7-11 of today’s reading:
[John] came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.
That’s an enduring mystery, why some people come toward the light, and others flee it. That’s the way it was then, and that’s still the way it is... some people flee from the message of salvation as if it were a tidal wave.
We know that faith is a gift - Paul writes: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God – not the result of works, so that no one may boast.” [Eph 2:8-9] If it were not for God’s grace, we too would flee from the light as if it burned. So we’ll take that as a given (and I DO mean given).
God has presented us with this incredible gift that most of the world doesn’t even recognize. And when that gift is new - as those of us who remember the day of our conversion, or rebirth, our awakening to Christ, can remember - we’re just like kids at Christmas. But all too often, after a while, the gift goes back in the closet, or on a shelf; we take comfort in knowing that it’s there when we need it, we think placidly, “Yeah, I have one,” but somehow lose the joy and wonder of the first moment. What is it that God has given us, that present to the world? Let’s look again at verses 12-14:
But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.
“The Word became flesh and lived among us.” This is the supreme revelation. The logos, the Word, meant different things to the Greeks and Hebrews. To the Stoics, it was the rational principle by which everything exists, the ideal perfection behind all that is and of which everything else was a copy. To the Hebrews, the Word, dabar, was the power of God’s self-expression in creation. It was deliverance and judgement. So to all John’s hearers, the idea that this Word, whether abstract perfection or the very presence of God himself, could become embodied as a human where we could see and touch it, was absolutely incredible. Remember when Moses asked to see God’s face? God hid him in the cleft of a rock so that he would not be consumed by the presence, and the people begged Moses to be their intermediary with God, because they knew that to come into God’s presence meant death. Since the days of Moses no-one had come face to face with God and lived. And every time Moses met with God, his face shone with an unearthly radiance that was unmistakably the very radiance of God.
This radiance is the glory that John proclaims, that became flesh and lives among us. John and the other apostles saw it, lived with it, they ate and drank and laughed and wept with the glory of God.
Think about it. Is this awesome reality something you take for granted? I have to confess that sometimes I do. But we should not. When God spoke to Moses from the burning bush, he told him to “... Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” [Ex 3:5] Muslims remove their shoes when they enter a mosque. Sometimes I think that we should, too, because we are indeed standing on holy ground. But actually each morning when we get out of bed we are also standing on holy ground, because Jesus, Immanuel, God with us, is still with us. “Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age,” he said. Do you realize that your bedroom rug is holy ground? Your bathmat? You may laugh, but I am quite serious.
But if everyone could see Moses’ face shining with God’s reflected glory, why didn’t Jesus - who didn’t just reflect God’s glory but embodied it - wander around Galilee surrounded by a kind of luminous glow that would leave no doubt that he wasn’t just your ordinary mortal? It’s very clear that Jesus’ glory was not perceived by everyone. Only when he performed a miracle did he openly reveal his glory, so to speak, and even so only the eyes of faith could see beyond the miracle to the glory itself.
So what is this glory that lives among us? What characterizes it? What’s in the package?
“Full of grace and truth.” This phrase, when used in conjunction with God’s glory in the OT, is usually written “mercy and faithfulness.” The Greek words, and thus the English, mean something a little different, but not much. Grace is any free gift of God, and this God is “merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin....” [Ex 34:6-7] Jesus is the very embodiment of that loving-kindness. And it is a true indwelling, not something put on for the occasion, but genuine, consistent, unchanging all the way through. And furthermore: Jesus displays the very truth about the nature of the universe, a truth by which all of us are measured, and in the face of whom our shortcomings are all too apparent, and yet that truth gives both comfort and hope. And truth is always faithful, it doesn’t mean one thing one day and something else the next. Truth doesn’t play gotcha games with you; it’s the same on the inside and the outside, and truth holds up when you lean on it.
For the very first time in history, from the gift of Jesus dwelling among and through his Spirit within us, the glory of God has become something internal, changing us from the inside out, rather than resting on us from the outside, and fading away. The glory Moses saw, the glory Moses reflected, has given way to a new glory, a new gift, one which will not fade.
From [God’s] fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. [v. 16-17]
It is God’s nature to overflow with grace, with gifts. God has given us first the cove-nant, then the law, and lastly his own self, his own glory, to live among us and within us.
What have you done with your present? It’s not one you can exchange. Jesus is, you might say, the very last Word in grace. What have you done with your present? Is it mislaid, or on a shelf? Does it need new batteries, a fresh coat of paint, replacement parts? Or have you even really unwrapped it at all? When you first took a good look at it, and realized that the fine print said, “Some assembly required,” did you put it on a shelf to get back to some day when you had time?
I got a 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle for Christmas a few years ago. It hasn’t been opened yet. It takes too much work, too much time, too much space. There are other easier, more fun - probably even more important - things to do.
Jesus is a 1,000-piece mystery, too. To put it together, you need to set up a clear space in the middle of your life, put the picture right out there in the open where you can see it every day, and sort through the pieces and start putting them together. And nothing is more important.
It is only as we do this that the glory of God’s presence actually takes shape in our lives, becomes a visible, tangible reality.
Is God’s incredible gift still in its original shrink-wrap, sitting on a shelf waiting for you to have time?
