We are drawn together this morning, in worship and in song, to celebrate this day and to hear once again the story that touches our hearts to the very core.  The account of a baby born to a peasant couple, alone and far from home, is one we’ve heard every year for as long as we can remember, and the poetry of the story belongs to everyone, no matter who we are or the level of our faith.  The scriptures passages connect us with generations across 20 centuries who have sat, year after year, just as we do now, hearing it and making it their own.  There is a power in what we do this morning – it is the power of eternity touching a moment of time, the power of God becoming real for us again.

 

And yet, imbedded in the familiar contours of Christmas are a number of contradictions.  This season is, in so many ways, a paradox – simultaneously holding truths which seem to be in opposition to one another.

 

One paradox of Christmas is that while the season celebrates the birth of Christ, our culture seems to focus more on a jolly guy in a red suit.  The birthday bash has become so big, we sometimes forget whose birth it is that we are celebrating.

 

Another paradox is that while Christmas is celebrated as a family holiday, the truth is that many families are separated, whether by geographical or emotional distance, and they bear no resemblance to the happy scenarios depicted on TV.

 

And it is a contradiction that while Christmas is the season of joy, there are many for whom this is a hard time of year.  Some are reminded of the way life might have been, but never was.  Or we remember the way life used to be, but is no more.  There is an empty chair to deal with, a stocking that stays folded in the box.  Christmas is the season when we wait to see if the hurt has let up any since last year – and we want it to, so we can get on with our lives, and yet, we don’t want it to, either, because that might mean that we have stopped caring, or missing, or loving.

 

And there is much in the theology of Christmas that seems a contradiction.  First is the idea that the Creator becomes one who has been created.  How can divine omnipotence become human helplessness?  How can the God who called the worlds into being become a baby held in his mother’s arms?  And yet, both understandings of the Divine are true – the eternal, all-powerful God comes to us as a vulnerable baby.  God enters the envelope of time and space in an intersection of eternity and mortality.

 

And yet another paradox – in the midst of the deepest darkness of the year comes the Light of Christ.  Light enters darkness, not because we have struck a match or kindled a flame, but because the light of a child born of God comes, shining – eternal and inextinguishable -- wherever there is darkness.

 

And perhaps the greatest Christmas contradiction of all is the fact that while today we celebrate the birthday of Jesus, it is you and I who receive the gift – a gift that transcends all others.  The Scriptures said to look for One whose name would be “Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”  And then came the story of the Babe born in Bethlehem.

 

The world looked for a Conqueror.  But God comes to us, not amid trumpet fanfare and the pageantry of a royal court that we might expect of the King of kings, but rather, in a child born to peasant parents, miles away from home, in a hay-strewn cave – a place of poverty, rejection and lowliness.

 

God comes to us this way that no one might be excluded from God’s love.  When Mary laid the baby Jesus in a cold, dark, dirty manger, God gave us a sign that wherever we are, God is there, too; God comes to us, even in the coldest, darkest, messiest times and places of our lives, bringing peace and love and forgiveness and joy.  No person is too poor, or too uneducated, or too insignificant for the Christ child.  God comes for all of us as one of us, so that in this child, you and I might become one with God.

 

But the Christmas story is not complete until the gift given has been received.  If Christ be born a thousand times in Bethlehem, but not in your heart, then his birth is meaningless.  The purpose of God’s coming was not just to make this world a better place, but to make your life better.  God will fill your emptiness; God will give your life purpose; God will be your companion and guide in every joy and every sorrow.  But first, you must accept God’s most precious gift – you must let Christ into your heart.

 

And once we accept God’s gift to us, then our Christmas celebration will never end, because nothing will ever be the same, nothing can ever be the same.  No one who understands the meaning of this wonderful gift to us stays the same, because the reawakening of love makes each of us a new person, and the sharing of that love transforms the human heart.

 

It’s Christmas; Christ is born in Bethlehem and Christ is waiting, wanting, longing to be born in you.  On this radiant morning, let us accept God’s precious gift.  Let us open the door of our hearts to the God who decided to make a home in our arms.  Let us welcome the newborn Prince of Peace, that the miracle of Jesus’ birth might change us forever.  Amen.