We have heard the story—and what a wondrous story it is of God and the baby. We have sung the carols, muffled by masks, yes, but we sang them nevertheless, with a touch of defiance of omicron’s demand to be the story; we sang them reminding ourselves and each other of the bigger story, the wondrous story of God and the baby, the story of Jesus’ birth and the life that is nothing but life, the story we continue to tell with our lives.
Her name was Sharon, John Shea tells us.
She was five, sure of the facts, and recited them with slow solemnity, convinced every word was revelation. She said, “They were so poor they had only peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to eat and they went a long way from home without getting lost. The lady rode a donkey, the man walked, and the baby was inside the lady. They had to stay in a stable with an ox and an ass … but the Three Rich Men found them because a star lighted the roof. Shepherds came and you could pet the sheep but not feed them. Then the baby was borned. And do you know who he was?” Her quarter eyes inflated to silver dollars. “The baby was God.” And she jumped in the air, whirled around, dove into the sofa and buried her head under the cushion, which is the only proper response to the Good News of the Incarnation.[1]
Incarnation is a big word Sharon didn’t need in order to speak eloquently of the baby embodying God in the flesh, but the magnitude of what she had just said demanded some jumping and whirling around, and then some sofa-diving and cushion-digging. At five years old she knew what an awesome thing it is to say, “The baby was God.” Saying, “The baby was God” means that heaven and earth have not merely touched for an instant, but have come together in a human being. Saying, “The baby was God” radically changes how we conceive of and speak about God, and how we speak about and treat each other. The Word became flesh and lived among us and we have seen his glory, and he has changed everything.
The Christmas hymn, “Once in Royal David’s City,” contains the stanza,
Jesus is our childhood’s pattern,
Day by day like us he grew.
He was little, weak and helpless,
Tears and smiles like us he knew.
Thus he feels for all our sadness,
And he shares in all our gladness.[2]
We can assume that the infant Jesus was weak and helpless, and that “like us” he grew from infancy and childhood to adolescence and adulthood, with the full range of experiences, thoughts, feelings, and reactions that are part of growing up. But the biblical gospels are almost silent on those years. And that silence was a motivating factor in the emergence of Christian writings dedicated to Jesus’ childhood years. In one of them, Jesus was Sharon’s age, five years old, when he was playing by a brook. From soft clay, he shaped twelve sparrows. It was the Sabbath when he did this, and somebody went and told his dad about it. Joseph scolded him, “Why are you doing this on the Sabbath, which is not lawful to do?” But little Jesus clapped his muddy hands and said to the sparrows, “Go!” and they flew away chirping.[3]
The writer clearly wanted to show that conflicts over Sabbath laws in Jesus’ ministry were foreshadowed when he was but a little child—a child, however, resembling a young superhero from a comic strip rather than one who, “day by day like us he grew.”
Luke’s story of the 12-year-old Jesus in the temple is the only incident in the biblical gospels about the life of Jesus between infancy and the beginning of his ministry as an adult. Luke resists the temptation to paint young Jesus as “superboy”,[4] but the scene is similar to childhood stories found in ancient biographies of famous figures. “Jesus is twelve years old, a signal to the original audience,” writes Wesley Allen, “that he is on the cusp of adulthood as defined in the ancient world … His actions on this occasion, then, foreshadow his ministry and especially his relationship with God.”[5] Just as the adult Jesus will make one trip to Jerusalem on Passover, where he will encounter the teachers in the temple and finally give his life in obedience to the Father’s will, so the boy Jesus, near the end of his childhood, makes one trip to the temple, on Passover, where he encounters the teachers. To his family, he appears to be lost, but he knows he is exactly where he needs to be.
"Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" he says to his parents, sounding a little like a sassy pre-teen, while at the same time stating very clearly to them, to himself, and to us that his life would be about the household of God and the relationships defining it.
"Why were you searching for me? Did you not know …?” These are the first words Jesus utters in Luke’s narration of the gospel. They don’t sound like Christmas, do they? But they spell out why we celebrate Christmas.
Before I get to that, let me tell you that I do not own a Christmas sweater or a Santa Claus tie. Several years ago, though, I picked up a pair of Christmas socks at Target. Black, with little green Christmas trees and a jolly, fat Santa. Every year, I wear them once, and then they go in the laundry basket and eventually back in the drawer until next year.
Why am I talking about Christmas socks? Because the wonderful passage from Colossians for today talks about getting dressed. The baby was God. The Word became flesh. We have seen the glory of God in the face of Jesus. Now what?
As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
The baby was God, and with Sharon’s Three Rich Men we come to adore him and to offer our gifts—only to realize, be it suddenly or gradually, that Christmas is a reverse baby shower: new clothes for us. We’re invited to let ourselves be wrapped snuggly in layer after layer of all that Jesus embodies—compassion, kindness, humility, patience, forgiveness, peace.
We will soon put away the Christmas socks and sweaters until next year, together with the left-over wrapping paper and all the decorations. But the birth of Jesus isn’t about decoration, it’s about incarnation: the complete embodiment of the divine in a human being.
We know he didn’t come so we could have a day or two of merriment and nostalgia—beautiful and life-giving as such days are. He came to reclaim and fulfill all our days. He came to free us and to bind us together for good in the love of God.
[1] John Shea, The Hour of the Unexpected (Allan, TX: Argus Communications, 1977), 68.
[2] Cecil F. Alexander, “Once in David’s Royal City,” Chalice Hymnal No. 165.
[3] Infancy Gospel of Thomas 2:1-4; text available at http://gnosis.org/library/inftoma.htm and elsewhere online.
[4] Eugene Boring and Fred Craddock, The People’s New Testament Commentary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2004), 184.
[5] O. Wesley Allen Jr. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/first-sunday-of-christmas-3/commentary-on-luke-241-52-5