Christmastide

John 1:1-18
 
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. What has come into being 4in 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.
 
6 There 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.
 
10 He 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.
 
14 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. 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.

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John 1:1-18
​We are still in the season of Christmastide, the 12-days in the Christian Year that celebrates the Birth of Jesus. This season is pretty short, running from December 25th to January 5th every year. But by today, the Second Sunday in the Christmas season, most of us have already moved on from Christmas reflections. We’ve begun taking down Christmas decorations. We’re no longer listening to Christmas Carols. With New Year Day taking place just a few days ago, we’re ready to move into a new year, set some resolutions, make changes, get moving.
 
It seems like today’s confounding gospel lesson from the book of John has moved on as well. Gone are the mangers, shepherds, and angels. They are replaced by the complicated prologue to John’s gospel. Divine, pre-existing Word, the means of all creation, Wisdom, rejection, incarnation, divine grace, and the concept of mediation are just a few of the theological concepts that are densely packed into these verses. This passage is really thick, and it seems to be better suited for the ivory towers of abstract theological debate in far off seminaries than the stuff of Sunday morning worship and reflection.
 
But that’s not what the writer of this gospel intended. In fact, these verses are an early Church hymn whose form and content come from even older sources. It is styled as a hymn, so everyone could learn its message, even those who could not read. Its purpose was to convey a worldview that sets the foundation of the gospel and the story that follows. 
 
Within the gospel’s community and other parts of the ancient Near East, there was a myth regarding Wisdom. Wisdom, Sophia in Greek, existed at the beginning with God and was the means by which God created all things. Three hundred years before our gospel’s writing, the Books of Sirach and Enoch tell a melancholy story about Wisdom. The German theologian Ernst Haenchen summarizes this story well:
 
The world in which we live was created by divine Wisdom. Wisdom was at the side of God from the beginning, and when he began to create, Wisdom served him as supervising architect. For that reason, everything could and would be truly good. [However] humanity shuts itself up against divine Wisdom. No one anywhere wants to know anything of Wisdom. So, Wisdom has to wander always further since no one wants to accept her. The outcome of all this was that Wisdom returns to heaven.
 
It’s a sad story that was told over and over long ago. Likely, Mary told Jesus this story growing up or sang it to him as a hushed lullaby when he slept. Like all folk songs, it conveyed a strong message:
 
The world was made to be virtuous and loving, filled with wise people making wise decisions for the good of all creation. But humanity either rejected wisdom’s tenets or forgot about them. Violence, and war, oppression, and corruption reign because people have forgotten to look for the wisdom that’s woven into the cosmos. Sure, Wisdom shows up and prompts thoughtful action and loving-kindness every once in a while, but those places are fewer and farther between these days. Continued rejection has caused Wisdom to retreat to heaven. And that’s why the world is so hard these days.
 
This story is always on our gospel author's mind as he writes his account of the story of Jesus Christ. Generally, he’s less interested in the who’s and what’s and when’s of Jesus’ life and more interested in exploring what Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection reveal to people about God. He wants to think through why all of these stories of a Galilean holy man matter and what good they might do if told once more. So, he takes this sad story about Wisdom, swaps out Sophia for logos, or “wisdom” for “word,” and makes the ending a little happier.
 
When humanity failed to follow the virtuous principles revealed to all people throughout the centuries, the virtues took human form in Jesus Christ, and witnesses experienced God’s grace and truth by experiencing this person.
 
In its way, then, John chapter 1 is a nativity story, a story about something new taking place in a hostile world. God loves this world and wishes to impart on it grace and truth, wisdom and love. Thus far, God’s been a little too abstract with these lessons, so God restructures the curriculum, appearing to humanity in another form, one more recognizable, more personable, one more tangible.
 
There is a quote attributed to Benjamin Franklin, though, like John’s prologue, it likely comes from more ancient sources. It’s found in Franklin’s “Poor Richard’s Almanack”:
 
Tell me and I forget.
Teach me and I remember.
Involve me and I learn.
 
I’ll repeat it:
 
Tell me and I forget.
Teach me and I remember.
Involve me and I learn.
 
If I could take today’s gospel passage and all of its language traps and theological prepositions and boil it down to something short, it would be this:
 
Tell me and I forget.
Teach me and I remember.
Involve me and I learn.
 
John’s gospel adds something valuable to the story of Christmas. It reminds us that we are involved in it. All of us. We are involved in an incredible and still unfolding story, one that’s authored by a God that loves us and is willing to meet us where we are as we are in tangible ways. Our faith is not some abstract set of dogmas or a list of seventeen virtues that we either follow or rebel against. We can read about faith without having it, and watch Youtube videos about Christian charity without practicing this virtue. But when we are involved in our faith, when we are invited into the work, and when our teacher is gentle and wise, guiding us as we try our best, then, maybe, we learn. When God, our teacher, is present with us as we try to better ourselves, as we try to recover from 2020, and plan for a better world in 2021, we become involved in this great story.
 
May you feel the presence of God dwelling among you and those around you in 2021. May you hear in this year's Christmas story God’s invitation to get involved in this developing story of redemption. And may we seek wisdom, and virtue, grace, and truth this year as we place awfully high expectations and hopes on what 2021 has in store for us and the world. Amen.