Galatians 4,4-7 0524
Christvesper 5
Adam and Eve ✠ 930 years
Nativity of Jesus (lsb)
24. December 2023
1. ℣ Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given:
℟ And the government shall be upon His shoulder (Isaiah 9,6).
О Jesus, embrace us in Your love and preserve us in it, so that You we may have rest, peace, comfort, security and blessedness of soul. Now we are not lost because You were born a man. God is our Friend, for by faith we abide in You and You abide in us. Amen. (Starck 484).
2. »But when the right time had arrived, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, who redeemed those who were under the law, so that we received adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying: „Abba! Father!“ So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.«
3. Yahweh had promised mankind a Savior. This promise was first given to Adam and Eve. Throughout the centuries, this promise was given to Israelite patriarchs, princes and prophets. Abraham, David and Isaiah were a few of the many who heard or wrote about the advent of the Savior. Even the Gentiles were given this promise. »It is too light a thing that You should be My servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make You as a Light for the nations, so that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth« (Isaiah 49,6). Yahweh is not slow to fulfill his promise, but is patient toward us (2. Peter 3,9a).
4. So when the time was exactly right and perfect, God sent His Son. God has a profound relationship with men and women. He created us in His image and likeness; no other creature on earth has this distinction. He also locates Himself in the presence of people. A Burning Bush to Moses, a Cloud that filled the holy of holies in the temple and a still small Voice to Elijah, but His first manifestation among humans occurred in the Garden of Eden where God walked in the cool of the day (Genesis 3,8). The text seems to imply that God took this walk in human form. There is no ambiguity when He appeared to Abraham: God stood before him as a man (Genesis 18,2).
5. Jesus is the fulfillment of God interacting with people in the appearance of a human being. The Athanasian Creed describes it this way: He is God and man … not by conversion of the Divinity into flesh, but by the assumption of the humanity into God (32-33). The Creed is summarizing what Irenaeus wrote several centuries earlier: „God’s only-begotten Word, who is always present with the human race, united to and mingled with His own creation, according to the Father’s pleasure, and who became flesh, is Himself Jesus Christ our Lord, who did also suffer for us, and rose again on our behalf, and who will come again in the glory of His Father, to raise up all flesh, and for the manifestation of salvation, and to apply the rule of just judgment to all who were made by Him. There is therefore, as I have pointed out, one God the Father, and one Christ Jesus, who came by means of the whole dispensational arrangements [connected with Him], and gathered together all things in Himself. But in every respect, too, He is man, the formation of God; and thus He took up man into Himself, the invisible becoming visible, the incomprehensible being made comprehensible, the impassible becoming capable of suffering, and the Word being made man, thus summing up all things in Himself: so that as in super-celestial, spiritual, and invisible things, the Word of God is supreme, so also in things visible and corporeal He might possess the supremacy, and, taking to Himself the pre-eminence, as well as constituting Himself Head of the Church, He might draw all things to Himself at the proper time“ (Irenaeus Against Heresies 3,16,6).
6. Adam’s fall into sin had broken the communion between God and man; Jesus’ incarnation and birth has restored the communion between God and man. Athanasius once said: The Word of God manifested Himself by means of a body in order that we might perceive the Mind of the unseen Father. He endured shame from men that we might inherit immortality (Athanasius On the Incarnation of the Word 8,54).
7. Angels heralded the birth of the Son of G. Shepherds and Magi knelt before Him God in the flesh. Men and women acclaim Him tonight as Sleep in heavenly peace; Christ, the Savior is here; Christ, in Your birth (Stille Nacht lsb 363).
8. The venerable Anglo-Saxon poet Cynewulf describes the meaning of Christ’s Light and Glory this way:
Hail Morning Star, Brightest of angels Thou,
sent unto men upon this middle-earth,
Thou art the True Brilliance of the sun,
radiant above the stars, and from Thyself
illuminest forever all the tides of time!
And as Thou, God indeed begotten of God,
Thou Son of the True Father, wast from aye
without beginning in the heavens glory,
so now Thy handiwork in its sore need
prayeth Thee boldly, that Thou send to us
the Radiant Sun, and that Thou come Thyself
to enlighten those who for so long a time,
were wrapt around with darkness and here in gloom,
have sat the lifelong night; shrouded in sin
death’s dark shadow had they to endure.
Hopeful now we trust in the salvation
brought to the hosts of men through God’s own Word,
which was in the beginning co-eternal
with God, the Almighty Father and is now
flesh void of blemish, that the maiden bare
to help the wretched. God was seen ’mong us
in all His sinlessness; together they dwelt
the Creator’s Mighty Son and the Son of Man
in peace on earth wherefore as it is meet
we may well thank the Lord of Triumph aye,
that He vouchsafed to send to us Himself (Crist 104-129).
9. May Jesus Christ be with you always, pouring forth the Holy Spirit upon you, so that you believe the gospel that promises you that your sins are forgiven, you are an heir of God, His son or daughter and He is your Light of salvation, now and always.
10. Welcome to earth, oh noble Guest,
Through whom the sinful world is blest!
You came to share my misery
That you might share Your joy with me.
(From Heaven Above to Earth I Come lsb 358,8 2021 Martin Luther 1483-1546).
This is most certainly true.
11. The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4,7). Amen and Amen.
12. Let us pray. O Lord, O God, to whom glory is sung in the highest while on earth peace is proclaimed to men of goodwill, grant that goodwill to us, Thy servants, cleanse us from all our sins and give perpetual peace to us, and to all people. Amen. (The Nativity of Our Lord, Vespers Collect 2. The Daily Office. Copyright © 1965 Concordia Publishing House.)
To God alone be the Glory
Gode ealdore sy se cyneþrymm
✠
All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4. Edition © 1990 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, Septuaginta, Vol. I and II 2. Revised Edition © 2006 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 28. Revised Edition © 2012 Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart.
Evangelisch-Lutherisches Kirchengesangbuch. Copyright © 2021 Selbständige Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche, Hannover.
Gibbs, Jeffrey A. Jerusalem and Parousia: Jesus’ Eschatological Discourse in Matthew’s Gospel. Copyright © 2000 Jeffrey A. Gibbs.
Martens, Gottfried. A sermon preached on 8. December 2013 | Revelation 3,7-13 | Advent II. Copyright © 2013 St. Mary Church in Berlin-Zehlendorf (SELK). All rights reserved. The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind, Tr. © 2023.
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