Christmas II

John 1-18

1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. 4What has come into being in him was life and the life was the light of all people. 5The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

6There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.

10He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

14And 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. 15(John testified to him and cried out, ‘This was he of whom I said, “He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.”’) 16From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.

Sermon (Martin Warner)

Timing is not accidental in the unfolding of events that contribute to the plan of our salvation: it belongs to God’s deliberate self-revealing. In a similar way, the story of the Exodus from Egypt seems to be deliberately timed. God hardens Pharaoh’s heart until the moment is right for the revelation of a mighty act of liberation. The message from Old and New Testaments is simple: the timing of salvation is not in our hands.

This brings us to the Gospel reading itself, and the most significant expression of continuity: “The Law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” Here John is again showing his Jewish roots. Moses, who leads Israel out of Egypt, is the rabbi par excellence.

When, however, at the end of John’s Gospel, Mary Magdalene acclaims Jesus as “Rabboni”, teacher, she is not simply offering a personal judgement, she is articulating a profound truth. Jesus is the new Moses for all places and people, and for all time.

When John says that “grace and truth” came through Jesus Christ, he is using a phrase that every Jew would have understood as a description of the Law. The new Law is not a written code: it is a person.

This, surely, must be the point that today’s Gospel invites us to ponder most carefully. What animates our engagement with the global society in seeking to be ready for the new Exodus is a vision of the human person, not a rule-book. The human being who bears the image of God is where we read the perfect law of God as Jesus has revealed it.

As we seek to shape the contours of our history, it is not, ultimately, our own decisions that bring in the Kingdom of God. A familiarity with the wisdom of God, born of stillness rather than neurotic activity, will bring us closer to that Kingdom.

We need the attention span of Mary Magdalene, a steady gazing at the God who knows us by name, if we are to learn the perfect law of God that John the evangelist sees in the Christmas crib.