The Second Sunday After Christmas
The lectionary passages for this Sunday have a shared theme. "Common to all these texts is not only the assertion of human helplessness and hopelessness apart from God, but also the proclamation that God has already invaded the world and caused a new world to come into being. . . . The gospel is not God's afterthought in response to a problem: it is deeply rooted in God's nature to act on behalf of creation" (Presbyterian Worship Planner (78).
Jeremiah 31:7-14: The first part of this text (7-9) comes from a time late in the life of Jeremiah.
The prophet, born about 627, had seen convulsions take place in the life of his people Judah. As a young man, he had put his hope in the reforms taking place under King Josiah, the king who caused the "Second Law" (Deuteronomy) to be read regularly every seven years in the presence of all the people. But Josiah had died in battle, and Jeremiah's hope for reform in Judah died with him. Jeremiah then saw Judah tossed back and forth as a pawn between the nations. Jeremiah put his hopes first in the power of Egypt, but the Egyptian army was destroyed by the Babylonians in the battle of Carchemish in 604. After that, the armies of Babylon moved freely in the outskirts of Judah and the delta of Egypt. Jeremiah called the people to repent and put their trust in God, but he was pessimistic that they would do this. Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, besieged Jerusalem in 597 and took some of its citizens into exile in Babylon. Jeremiah announced that opposition to Babylon was really opposition to God. But Judah continued to opposes Babylon, and in 588 their armies return to besiege the city once more. The city wall was breached and the city fell to its enemies. Its leading citizens were taken to Babylon to join those who had been led there a decade before.
Jeremiah was not among them. He remained in and around the ruined city. His message began to change from one of "tearing down" to one of "building up," as was said to him in his call. He began to prophesy that God was about to establish a "new covenant" with God's people. It would not be like the old covenant that was written on stone. This one would be written on the hearts of the people. This covenant would proclaim forgiveness for all the peoples' sins. God would again be their God, and they would be God's people. The passage before us comes from the time of Jeremiah's change of heart and is one of the poems that lead up to the proclamation of the new covenant.
Sing salvation for the people of Israel, says the prophet. God is going to save those of the people who remain. God will bring them from the land of the north. God will gather them from the farthest parts of the earth. The blind, the lame, those pregnant - the most vulnerable of the people - will march together with a great company of people in this magnificent return. They will weep tears of sadness and of joy. But I, says God, will lead them back. They will walk through the desert, but in the desert will flow brooks of water. They will march over rough lands, but I will bring them in a straight path upon which no one will stumble.
Then comes the most daring part of the prophesy. "All Israel is my child." That seems a commonplace to those who know the Bible, but it was not. In 587 or 586 when Jeremiah composed his poem, Israel had been dead for a century and a half. In 722 the Assyrians had destroyed the kingdom and scattered its people among the nations. Now God proclaims that he is the father of Israel and will restore them along with Judah. The poem is daring also for the time it was written. Judah was being torn asunder. Would God restore it? Could God redeem it? Jeremiah announces that it is so. From the land of exile and longing, God would restore the people to the land God had given them and would again be their God. It is for this reason that this passage is a text for the post-Christmas season.
The remainder of the lection is a poem that was written perhaps a century later than the time of Jeremiah, which was put into this place by the editor of Jeremiah's writings. The later writer would refer to what had happened in the intervening years. God, who had scattered Israel, like a good shepherd was now gathering it together. God, who had brought Judah into Babylon, had now ransomed and redeemed the people. God had brought them back to Zion, and in God's goodness had given them grain, oil, wine, the young of the flocks and the herds. The young women and the young men shall dance, and the old will be glad in their joy. Their mourning will turn to joy, their sorrow to gladness, and the people will be satisfied with the bounty of the Lord. Many of these things had happened by the time this later poet wrote, and he or she believed that God would complete what God had begun to do. Again, this is a text for Christmas. God has sent us ransom and redemption in Jesus Christ. That which has been begun in Christ will be completed at the day of his coming. God has promised this, and we God's people can sing aloud for gladness and raise our shouts of gladness before all the nations.
Psalm 147:12-20: In the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, these verses constitute a psalm of their own. It speaks of God giving peace to the people and gifts from his earth. In other words, God is the God of creation (gifts of creation) and the God of redemption (peace to Jerusalem), simultaneously.
The two themes interact with each other. Verses 13 and 14 speak of the "peace of Jerusalem" in a stunning manner. God delivers Jerusalem by strengthening the bars of the gates and granting sons that can protect them. That is deliverance. But in the midst of the deliverance is an act of creation: the wheat that grows in God's fields also feeds God's people. Then the psalmist merges acts of creation into acts of redemption. God gives snow, and God scatters frost like ashes. Who can stand this cold? So God sends out his word and melts the frost and snow, and the waters of spring flow once more. Creation and redemption are part of the same divine action. "As the warm spring winds blow to melt the ice and snow of winter, so the Spirit of God melts all that is frozen in human life." ( Presbyterian Worship Planner)
It is "God's word" that is the one constant in this psalm. God's word brings peace. God's word turns winter into spring. God's word declares God's statutes and laws to the people of Israel. To know God's word is to know God's will and, indeed, God's very self. There is only one appropriate response to God's word, says the psalmist: "Praise the Lord, Jerusalem! Praise your God, O Zion! Praise the Lord!"
John 1:1-18: We have dealt with these passages from John's Gospel earlier in this Christmas season. To refresh your memory of what was said, I will reproduce some of the earlier interpretations.
This passage is called "The Prologue" to the Gospel of John. It contains in miniature the message of the whole gospel. More than likely, the passage is poetry rather than prose, although to my knowledge it was never printed that way in any extant copy of the gospel. Some scholars have suggested that the passage was originally a "Hymn to Wisdom,: to which the references to Jesus were later added. Personally, I consider it a profound construct written by the author of the Gospel of John, a moving frontispiece to the most thoughtful of the gospels. As it stands, it serves many purposes for the Gospel of John.
- It is John's Christmas story. Instead of the shepherds and wise men of Luke and Matthew, the story says, "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us."
- It introduces the main themes of John's gospel. It puts Jesus in cosmic perspective; "in the beginning was the word." It portrays Jesus as the revealer of the Father. It affirms that Jesus is an historical figure. It proclaims that through Jesus salvation comes to the people.
- It brings to our attention some of the main concepts of the gospel: light, life, grace, truth, witness, glory, world, only son of the father.
- It serves as John's story of the transfiguration. In the other gospels, the glory of God shines upon Jesus at a particular moment, and he is transfigured before his disciples. In John's gospel "the glory" is upon him from the moment "the word becomes flesh and dwells among us."
- The discussion unfolds according to the following outline: the relationship between God and the Word [the Logos] (1:1-5), John as witness to the light (1:6-8), the coming of the light into the world (1:9-13), and the Word become flesh (1:14-18).
"In the beginning." This immediately brings us to the opening words in the Book of Genesis. "In the beginning God." The Word is "The Word of the Lord" by which heaven and earth were made and which came to the prophets. But the same Greek word for "beginning" also means "in principle," and so the word is related to Greek thought as well as to Hebrew. It is the rational principle, long sought by the Greeks, which gives unity and significance to all exiting things. The expression means therefore "in the beginning of history" and "at the root of the universe." The congregations to which the Gospel was originally addressed was composed of both Hebrew-speaking people and Greek-speaking people, and they each had their own thoughts as they read these words. John is saying that "The Word" is the fulfillment of both Jewish history and Greek philosophy. Apart from "The Word," neither of these have ultimate meaning.
This first sentence tell us still more about the relationship between "God" and "Word." The Word which God speaks is not to be separated from God. It is not another God beside God. The Word is "in the presence of God." But it is not subordinate to God. The Word belongs to God; it is God's way of revealing himself to us. Whenever as Christians we say the name "God, we are to think of this Logos, the Word become flesh, Jesus Christ. Christ is not a God beside God. Nor is Christ subordinate to God. Jesus Christ is God in his action toward us. The great Christian thinker Augustine summed it up for us (Faith and the Creed ii3 p 355): "As by our words, when we speak truly, our mind lets him who hears them know something, and by signs of that kind brings to the knowledge of another what we hold secretly in our hearts, so wisdom whom God the Father begat is most appropriately called his Word, because through Him the Father who dwells in utmost secrecy becomes known to worthy minds."
In verse two the Greek article can be translated either "This" or "He." I prefer to translate it as "this." "This (the logos) was in the beginning with God, and what has been made has been made in no way without him." I do not want to get to the climax of the piece faster than John's Gospel does. As far as John is concerned, the great climax comes at verse 14: "The word becomes flesh and dwelt among us."
1:4 "In him was life." C. H. Dodd in his commentary on John's Gospel (144-151) pointed out that in Jewish usage the word "life" has three meanings:
1) "life" as contrasted with death.
2) "life of the age" as contrasted with life of time, an indefinitely long rather than strictly an infinite period.
3) "life of the age to come" as contrasted with the
life of this age.
John means by life "life perfect and absolute, timeless in quality and therefore exempt from death. John conceives it as possible for us here and now, but it will be realized in its fulness only beyond the grave."
The second of the great concepts introduced in this verse is that of "light." He who has "life" also brings "light." The difference between light and darkness is primarily the difference between security and danger. To the Hebrew, "darkness" was a time of danger, distress, dread, and terror. Night is the time when wild beasts, evil doers, demons and all mischievous things are at work. "Light" is the time when people go about their lawful business in peace and safety. This was the quality about Jesus Christ that made him attractive to others. Life was in him, authentic life, and this life had an ambience that lighted up the lives of other people.
The amazing thing about "light" is that the darkness cannot overcome it. The word translated "overcome" had a myriad of meanings. Charles Moffatt's translation of this passage reads, "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness does not master it." Another scholar translated this, "The darkness does not appreciate it." Rudolph Bultmann wrote, "The darkness does not grasp it." John was a writer who delighted in the double and triple meanings of words. More than likely, by using this word he meant to express all these things.
In verse six John's Gospel introduces John the Baptist. In this gospel there is nothing of John the prophet of judgement or the preacher of righteousness. Here the Baptist serves two purposes. He is the herald of the coming of Christ, and he is the witness to that coming, "a man sent forth as a testimony to the light that was coming into the world."
John's Gospel does not do justice to the person and work of the Baptist. We know from the other gospels that he was an uncompromising preacher of righteousness who died at the hands of the governor of Galilee because he challenged what the governor had done. We know that he called together a group of followers, some of whom continued to practice for centuries thereafter the faith John had taught them. He also established the rite of "baptism for repentance of sins" that is still part of the Christian faith today. Important as he was in his own time, John's Gospel sees the Baptist in two roles only: a herald of Christ and a witness to the coming of him in whom came God's grace and God's truth.
The "world," as John uses the word, is a paradox in this gospel. It stands for the organized and responsible world of humankind which is the object of God's love. But as H. Richard Niebuhr wrote in Christ and Culture, it also designates "humankind in so far as it rejects Christ, lives in darkness, does evil works, is ignorant of the father, and rejoices over the death of the son. The problem is, of course, that "the world" has become perverted. God loves the world in his creating and redeeming actions. The world responds to that love with denial of its actuality and with hatred toward God's word. It is the only Son who responds to the father as all humankind should. He obeys the father's will and does the Father's work. He honors and glorifies the Father, loves the Father, bears witness to the Father, and draws his life from him.
The next verses, 10-13, tell the bad news of Christmas and the good news. The bad news is that Christ is in the world, yet the world does not know him. He came to his own people, and his own people did not accept him. The good news is that to those who do receive him (the word means welcoming a traveler back to his rightful home) God has given them the power (it could be translated as "right" or "authority"; you recall how John's Gospels delights in the double and triple meaning of words!) to become children of God. C. H. Dodd tells us that the phrase "believing in his name" probably came from the service of baptism by which one became a participant in the Christian movement. "To be baptized into the name of Christ," said Dodd, "is to take the step by which one passes into the absolute ownership of Christ and from then on owes allegiance to Christ alone." The new birth comes not from "blood" (Greek physiology said that the seed of the father mingled with the blood of the mother to produce the child) or "the will of flesh" (the sexual impulses that draw man and woman together in union) or "the will of a man" (the desire of the father for a child and an heir). The new birth occurs only because God wills it, only because God has sent his "only son" into the world to invite into the family of God those who have forfeited this relationship because of human sin.
Then comes the grand climax of the passage: "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of the only son of the father, full of grace and truth." We need to pick out almost every word of this sentence for comment.
"The Word became flesh" "Flesh" is that which gives body to all of life, animal as well as human. As "the word becomes flesh," this shows God concern not only for humanity but for all things that God has created in this world. The implications of this for our environmental thinking are staggering; God is not only concerned with humanity but with everything that God has created. God is so concerned for the whole creation that God has sent his son into the world to redeem all of it. "Flesh" also means that part of human nature which is associated with frailty and evil, human nature as distinct from God. It connotes weakness and mortality. The "word" took on that aspect of the human personality, as well. This is the greatest of all the acts of God: to send his only son into the world to share fully in the life of the world.
"And dwelt among us." God in Christ "pitched his tent" among us. This is the exact meaning of the word, but it calls into mind all kinds of images. "Pitching a tent" is an act of temporariness. A tent that is put up one day can be taken down the next day and moved to another place. The ministry of Jesus will be a short duration. He will be with us a little while, and then he will return to his father. Pitching the tent reminds us of the tabernacle in the wilderness. This was the "tent of meeting," so called, where God met with Moses and the elders of the people. The implication of this is that again the Tabernacle of God is in our midst; God through Christ is present with God's people.
"We have seen his glory." The Hebrew word for this is "shekinah." The sign of God's shekinah is light, all-pervading light. The shekinah was present with the people of God in the cloud by day and the fire by night that led the people through the wilderness. The shekinah glistened on the Tent of Meeting. The shekinah shone annually in the temple at Jerusalem, on that one day of the year when the rising sun blazed over the peak of the Mount of Olives and burst into the temple to indicate that God had come again to his temple. Where the shekinah is, God is present. When we see God's shekinah in Jesus Christ, God is present in Christ. In John's Gospel, the glory of God is in the cross of Jesus Christ. It is upon that cross of Jesus that we see God most clearly present among us.
"As of the only son of the father." Use of the phrase "only son" (in the gospels "monogeneis") has caused endless discussion in the church. What the phrase originally meant was "the one who bore God's power of attorney." It was used in the Old Testament for the king that ruled the people of Israel in the name of God. The word was used in New Testament times for a father granting his power of attorney to his eldest son (or anyone else he would designate, for that matter) in order that the business of the father could be carried out in a proper manner. Men in Palestine sometimes had business in Rome; we have many parables from Jesus about conducting business in "far countries." In that day of slow communication, how could they do it? They had to designate someone as their representative with full power of attorney to conduct the business. That person carried the title "the only son," the monogeneis. That person could speak for the father, he could act for the father, he could sign the father's name to contracts. This is a most striking image of the relationship between God and Jesus. God is that distant father who needs to conduct business upon the Planet Earth. To do this he sends Jesus to earth and designates Jesus as his "only son," granting him God's own power of attorney. Jesus can speak for God, he can act for God, he can sign God's name to contracts with other people. Whatever Jesus does bears the father's power of attorney, because God has given it to him.
"Full of grace and truth." As Lester Kuyper said in Interpetation (18 [1 64] pp 3-19) "The OT counterparts of grace and truth are hesed and emet. Hesed (grace) describes a relationship of loyalty and mutual responsibility to members within a covenant, and emet (truth) stresses the idea of faithfulness and dependability." Grace simply means unmerited good will, love in action for no reason except that it is love. The more we draw upon the grace, the more of grace we receive and the more confident we become of its source. "Truth" comes from a word that originally meant "firm, fixed, valid, binding." It was used in legal procedure, where it meant first finding the facts of the case and then making a judgement that corresponds with the facts and with legal standards. In religious terms "truth" means that which corresponds with "reality, genuineness, reliability." As Manson says in Paul and John (94-96), "Truth belongs to the sphere of character and conduct. In our natural state we cannot attain to this truth. We are under the domination of the lie. We can receive the truth as a divine act of self-manifestation. 'To speak the truth' means 'to put the Revelation into words.'" Truth means that we can rely on God, who does not change. It also means that God demands the same reliability from us.
Verses 15 through 18 were not dealt with before, but they are important. Fifteen breaks the train of thought of the prologue. It reproduces the witness of John the Baptist in 6 through 8 and looks forward to Jesus' baptism by John: "This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me ranks before me, for he was before me.'" Verses sixteen through eighteen turn again to the themes of the prologue.
In verse sixteen we are told the great news. There is grace in Jesus Christ. All the grace contained in the fulness of God is poured into Jesus Christ. He in turn pours it into us, so that we might receive grace upon grace upon grace upon grace - the treasure of the Christian faith.
Verse seventeen makes a contrast between Moses and the law and the grace and truth that comes through Christ. Moses was a particularly important figure in Alexandria of Egypt where the seeds of this prologue were first planted. Philo of Alexandria, resident in Alexandria about the time the prologue was in its first stages of composition, wrote extensively upon Moses. For Philo, Moses was the "greatest and most perfect" human being. He is said to have come near to God in a kind of family relation. Fully aware that Moses was a real human being, Philo could nevertheless speak of Moses' second birth, his association with the Logos, and his translation to immortal life. In one of Philo's writings (De somniiv 1: 164-165), there is even a prayer addressed to Moses. (R. WILLIAMSON, "Philo and New Testament Christology," Exp Times 90 [12,'79] 361-365). These verses attest to the gospel's recognition of the immense value of God's revelation to the Jews: "The law was given through Moses." But it also affirms that the old revelation had been superseded. While recognizing that the old covenant was indeed a gift of grace, John declares that the new grace in Jesus Christ is superior to the old.
Verse eighteen points to a figure of speech drawn from banqueting: "In the bosom of the father." Both Hebrews and Greeks reclined at table as they ate. The one who had the most honored position was the one who lay closest to the host. While reclining, he lay directly in front of the host, with his head approximately by the other's chest, and they could talk intimately to one another during the meal. So was the son with the father. The word "has made him known" had two basic meanings. It was used in Greek for the interpretation of dreams by a priest of the mystery religions as he spoke to the devotees of the mystery of life. It was used by the Hebrews to describe the interpretation of Torah, the law of the Jews. Perhaps Barrett put it best (Commentary): "The invisible God has now in Christ been manifested in his grace, glory, and truth."
Ephesians 1:3-14: This intricate and breathless statement is the longest single sentence in the New Testament; there is no break in it from beginning to end. To interpret this exceedingly complex passage, I will turn it into a litany, dividing it into its four natural parts. After each stanza I will insert the phrase that opens the section. At the end, I will add some interpretative material that may help to explain certain words and phrases in the text. Read it now, and enjoy it. This is one of those passages in the Bible that makes more sense when read aloud and enjoyed than it does in trying to understand each intricate moment in it.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in
Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
4 He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love. 5 He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in
Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace 8 that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and insight 9 he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, 10 as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in
Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
11 In Christ we have also obtained an inheritance, having been destined according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to his counsel and will, 12 so that we, who were the first to set our hope on Christ, might live for the praise of his glory.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in
Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
13 In him you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; 14 this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God's own people, to the praise of his glory.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in
Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
A few comments on individual words and phrases may help the enjoyment of our reading.
1:3 "In the heavenly places" - This was used 5 times in this epistle, though never used elsewhere. It may have been borrowed from astrology, which taught an ascent of the soul from sphere to sphere, with the highest spiritual blessing experienced when the soul has attained to the heavenly realm above the spheres. But the Christian faith has this belief to lose its significance. Christ has brought the atmosphere of heaven into the life of the earth, and we need no longer bother with astrological speculations. (Beare IB10:614)
1:5 There is only one natural child of God. That is Jesus Christ. He alone was obedient and trustful throughout his whole life and thus is designated "child of God." By our disobedience and lack of trust we have forfeited our place in God's household. But despite our forfeiture of our high status, God has adopted us once more into his family, so that we have all the rights and privileges offered to the natural child. Note the piling up of phrases by which Ephesians describes God's doing this for us: "according to God's good pleasure," "the praise of his glorious grace," "freely bestowed upon us in the Beloved."
1:7 "Redemption through his blood:" In the language of Paul's time this was not a price paid to an enslaving power. That concept entered later into Christian thought. For Paul blood was the symbol of the efficacy of sacrifice, of the life force set free through death that it may be effective for the benefit of others. (Beare IB10:617)
1:8 "Mystery": It signifies a truth once hidden but now revealed. It may have been borrowed from the mystery religions, but with this difference: Christian mysteries are freely communicated to all, and so the idea of secrecy disappears from the Christian faith.
1:10 Hidden under the phrase "as a plan" is one of the great words in Greek: Oikoumene. This word, from which our "ecumenical" comes, originally meant household management, or the office of household manager or steward. It moved on then to mean the management of an army or a state and so moved from the domestic sphere into that of political life. Then it came to encompass legal issues. At first is referred to a legal arrangement or contract and then to the document itself, the official contract that was drawn up. Finally it became one's last will and testament, the covenant sealed with seven seals which disposed of a man's property. It is in this sense that it is used in Ephesians, "the divine plan of salvation granted us by God and sealed by God's word." This idea became increasing important in the Gentile world as a substitute for "the kingdom of God" spoken of in the gospels. Such a concept conveyed not only the covenant theology of the Old Testament and of Paul but also the Stoic conception of the divine administration of the universe.
1:10 "to gather up": The Greek word, drawn from the language of mathematics, means "to sum up again, to condense into a summary." What Ephesians claims here startles us yet today. Ephesians says that God brings together to himself all things and all beings in the heavens and on earth. This includes humankind and all nature, those beings called angels and those called demons. All these vital forces are added together and made one in Christ, the focus of the universe. Formerly they were disunited by sin, but God calls them into one combined state of fellowship in Christ. Calvin in his Commentary on Ephesians remarked succinctly: "Outside of Christ all things are disordered, through him they have been restored to order."
1:14 "The pledge . . toward redemption." This fascinating word was coined by the Phoenicians, a people whose lives centered around commercial enterprises. It passed from them to the Greeks and then on to the Romans. It was used for that portion of the money for a purchase that was given to ratify the contract and to pledge full payment of it. We would call it "a down payment." Calvin understood this: "The metaphor," he wrote, "is taken from bargains, in which, when a pledge has been given and accepted, the whole is confirmed and no room is left for change of mind." In the theology of Ephesians, therefore, this means that God has promised to redeem his people. The down payment for that is the crucifixion and redemption of Jesus Christ. Because the down payment has been made, God will move in God's good time to fulfill the contract. As John's Gospel put the idea, "God sent his son into the world not to condemn the world but that through him the world might be saved."