Welcome the Word Made Flesh
[Editor's note: This Advent season, we published a series of reflections on the Bread Blog from the San
Francisco Theological Seminary. The reading for this post is John
1:1-14. This is the final Advent reflection from SFTS.]
By Rev. Dr. Jim McDonald
Welcome the Word made flesh!
At
Christmas we celebrate not only Christ's birth, but also the
possibility of our rebirth. The Incarnation speaks eloquently about what
we can become
as well as what God has become. As Christina Rossetti put it: "Love came
down at Christmas, love all lovely, love divine."
John's
Gospel (and our own experience) tells us that one of the responses
people make to Christmas is to resist it. We resist because the life we
have
is the only life we can imagine. We see our lives as do-it-yourself,
progressive improvement projects. Every day, every year, we do a little
bit better, achieve a little more, advance a little farther, add another
feather in our cap. We do our duty and fulfill
our goals, until slowly but surely we achieve something—wealth, fame,
power, security, whatever. And we reject anything that interferes with
"our little project"— including "God with us."
But
"progressive improvement" is a fantasy, a figment of our imagination.
Life is not linear or predictable. It surprises, amazes, frightens,
troubles—moves in quantum leaps and on cautious tiptoe, with twists and turns,
like a glacier or at the speed of light, greeting us with unanticipated
moments of wonder, discovery, joy and delight, scarring us with
uninvited moments of grief, disappointment, emptiness,
and hurt.
The
birth of Jesus Christ is God's ultimate affirmation of our humanity,
and of life itself. The gift of God invites us to open ourselves to a
new
relationship with the God of love, one that will change all our
relationships, making us more humble, appreciative, generous, kind,
forgiving, and compassionate-in other words, more God-like and more
fully human, all at the same time. Once again, Christina
Rossetti:
Love shall be our token,
Love shall be yours and love be mine,
Love to God and everyone,
Love for plea and gift and sign.
Merry Christmas all!
Rev. Dr. Jim McDonald is president and professor of faith and public life at San Francisco Theological Seminary.
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