December 1998 Issue

In this Sunday's sermon on the birth of Jesus the preacher might continue to address some of the popular Christological aberrations that keep flitting about in today's culture. One popular heresy is an updated version of what was probably the first, docetism. Under the teaching of Marcion in the second century, C.E., the docetic heresy denied Jesus' humanity, claiming that Jesus was God incognito—disguised in human form. Jesus only appeared to be human, and his suffering and death were an illusion.

The practical denial of Jesus' real humanity persists in popular thinking. It is difficult to hold two contrasting ideas at once, and in popular thought, given the alternatives of Jesus as truly God or as truly human, the former is the most attractive. Matthew's account of the virgin birth of Jesus supports this belief, the supernatural birth offering proof of the supernatural life.

If the doctrine of the Incarnation is to be an operative part of the belief system in today's church, the humanity of Jesus must be taken seriously. In Jesus, God became a human being. He did not appear to be human or masquerade as a human but was human. Ernest Campbell, when he was preacher at Riverside Church in New York City, once preached a Christmas sermon that asked, "Did the Baby Cry?," to which Campbell gave what should be the obvious answer: yes, the baby did cry. The baby did all the things that real babies do. Moreover, one can imagine that the stable the baby was born in did not in the slightest resemble the renditions that typically appear on Christmas cards: fresh clean straw, a crib-like manger, freshly groomed animals, and halos all around. That is the idealized setting for Martin Luther's little Christmas song: "The cattle are lowing, the poor baby wakes; but little Lord Jesus no crying he makes." The "perfect" baby wakes up smiling!

To the contrary, it could well have been that, during those first days stuck in that barn on the back side of nowhere, Mary and Joseph were hard pressed to regard their newborn son, whom they were trying to make happy and keep fed and clean, as anything other than human. You wonder if they wouldn't have agreed with Mark Twain's observation that "a soiled baby, with a neglected nose, cannot conscientiously be regarded as a thing of beauty."

Is it irreverent to suggest that Jesus went through normal experiences of infancy and childhood and growing up? That occasionally he got under foot in his father's furniture shop? That he went through the terrible twos? That he was not omniscient and omnipotent at age four? "The child grew in wisdom and stature," Luke observes. This is the nature of all humans. Jesus developed. He learned. He did not appear with a ready-made philosophy. He was not a boy evangelist, a super-child. Jesus learned at synagogue school, at family prayers, at worship on the Sabbath.

Yet Matthew is concerned to underscore Jesus' unique kinship with God as well. The Ebionite heresy, which denies Jesus' divine nature, can also show up in popular thought. The miraculous aspects of Matthew's story—the angel's appearance to Joseph and the virgin birth—certainly infuse the scene with signs of divine presence. But an even sharper sign is the prophetic name Matthew's account gives to Jesus: Emmanuel, "God is with us." Generally, the theological emphasis is placed on the "is with us" part of the name. That is appropriate enough, and today's sermon might well offer reassurance of God's providential presence to wondering congregations; that, through everything that happens in today's world—just as in Matthew's world—throughout everything, God is with us, present.

The christological significance of the name, though, is found in the first word of its meaning: "God is with us." It should matter to today's congregations that it is God who is at work in the world, not merely some memory of God, who on a Christmas long ago entered our world through Jesus. The post-apostolic church often used the title "Emmanuel" in its liturgical prayers; it provided the church with the needed emphasis on the post-Resurrection/Ascension activity of God in the world.

It is at the point of God's historical presence that the other lections of the day supply homiletical support. In the Isaiah text God stuns the faltering King Ahaz with the promise of Emmanuel: A virgin shall conceive! God was "with us" then, says Matthew, when Judah was in deep trouble, God is "with us" now, even as Jerusalem lies in ruins. The preacher might take up the affirmation: God in Christ is "with us still," in the midst of today's troubles.

In the Romans text, Paul does not use the name Emmanuel for Jesus, but he does provide a sweeping summary of God's
mighty acts in history through Jesus Christ—up to the present point and, by implication, on into the future. Paul is writing to Christians in a church he has never visited who need to be convinced that they, too, are included within the sweep of God's ongoing providence.

What does God's providence consist of? What can it assure? Good health? Prosperity? Freedom from suffering? The right person to marry? Winning the election? Or the lottery? Different communions (not to mention televangelists!) offer quite a variety of answers as to the specifics of providential theology. Underlying them all, though, is this great common denominator coming from Matthew's birth story that assures us that we are not alone and at the mercy of a hostile universe. God has given us a sign: Emmanuel, "God is with us."

Paul B. Brown