"The Virgin Birth, Fact Or Myth"

                               “The Virgin Birth, Fact or Myth?"

Some believe, some don’t where do you stand?   Just how important is it concerning who Jesus is for you?   How do you answer the question: “Who do you say I am?” 

Dec 27 2015   Psalm 148,   Luke: 2 41-52

Let us examine the passage from Luke 2: verses 41-52.  Luke clarifies for his readers that the boy Jesus was a very human person as well as having unusual spiritual insight and at least an elementary awareness of his divine mission.  The portrait we may have here is of a headstrong adolescent who disappeared from the company of Galilean travelers as they left Jerusalem after the Passover festival.  He went missing for three days, a terrifyingly long time for his anxious parents.  My wife and I can attest to this terrifying and anxious feeling as we lost our middle son at the local fall fair grounds one fall at the age of 3 while checking out the horse barn.   After a terrifying frantic search for what seemed like hours we found him with a friend who had seen him wondering around in the arena.  Mary and Joseph finally found Jesus in the temple questioning the learned scholars about spiritual matters. Naturally, Mary scolded him, as all mothers would.  Instead of submitting to her rebuke, he answered her back, “Why did you have to look for me? Didn't you know that I had to be about my Fathers business?  But they did not understand his answer.” The distance between the boy and his parents was already widening.  Who was this young adult who so mystified them?

The claim that Jesus was fully divine, meaning he couldn’t be a human being was not the belief of the early Christian Church.  The perspective fully divine began to take shape in the early part of the 3^rd Century after Jesus’ death and is still being taught as doctrine in some of the modern day Christian denominations.  We know from biblical records that this was contrary to the early Orthodox Christian church because Jesus was only known by the majority as a Jewish Rabbi, a very special Rabbi but yet, only a Rabbi.  Let us recall in John 20: 16 at the tomb of resurrection, Mary Magdalene encounters a gardener, after realizing the entity she is speaking with is not a gardener by Jesus himself, calls out “Rabboni!”  Meaning Teacher or Rabbi.   Jesus was never considered by the majority of his closest disciples to be God incarnate but was viewed by the early Christians as a unique agent of God with great spiritual insight and powers.   

The notion that Jesus was fully divine didn’t really come to light until some of the 1st and 2nd-century texts, written by Paul, were officially canonized to become part of what we now know as the New Testament.   At different points in his writings, Paul implies indirectly to the divine character of Jesus, but he never makes a direct connection to the claim.  To this very day, there is still scholarly debates going on as to whether or not we can call Jesus God.   I have to admit that I myself at one point in my faith journey could be quoted as publicly taking sides in the debate. 

It was the Apostle Paul within his generous contribution to the writings found in the Epistles of the New Testament that this theological perspective comes to light, Jesus as  “The Son of God”.  This also sparked a new theological perspective, Jesus as “The Son of Man” and the debate continues.   Was Jesus in fact God incarnate or was he just a man, or was he both Son of God and Son of Man, both divine and human?

It has been suggested that in some of the Christian churches today, to help prevent the total humanizing of Jesus, there has been an overemphasis of his deity.  In fact it appears that some theological camps or perspectives want Jesus to be only fully human and others want him to be only fully God.  May I suggest to you that to minimize the humanity of Jesus is as heretical as the overemphasis placed on his deity?  The writer Luke does not attempt to do anything more than tell his story and leave the reader to answer the crucial personal question which confronts us all: Who is this man we call Jesus?

Jesus himself often avoided a direct answer to this question all the way to his death.  When confronted he often turned his answer into the question: “Who do you say I am?”

Is it then heresy to question the age old story of a virgin birth as historical fact? 

Most of the ammunition to keep Jesus as divine comes to us from the virgin birth as historical fact, being conceived by the Holy Spirit not by human means.  Holding tightly to this view as historical fact clears the way for Jesus to be completely divine.  He would be void of a human nature, the nature that is prone to missing the mark.  Thus we have the perspective that Jesus was born outside the curse placed on all human seed allowing Jesus to be free from sin and fully divine.  

But there are many Christians who struggle with theology of the virgin 

birth and do not see it as historical fact, neither do they see it as a fairy tale but as historical myth.  Myth when used as a noun refers to  a traditional story, concerning the early history of a people that explains some natural or social phenomenon, and typically involves a supernatural being or events.  The historical myths of all ancient writings, including the bible always, have a hidden truth contained within the story.  It is up to the seeker to uncover the truth behind the myth. For example, a virgin birth would not prevent Jesus from experiencing the fullness of being human.   He was to experience everything we experience and be tested with every temptation of the human nature, see Matthew 4: 1-3.  The understanding of this theological perspective would allow Jesus to be full alive, fully human yet containing the full embodiment of the divine nature of God.   

May I suggest to you here that either way there is room for the understanding that Luke’s intentions in telling his version of the Christmas story was to provide a narrative which would start the debate that Jesus was both fully human and fully divine.  Let me leave you with the question that we all have to wrestle with in the development of our own faith.  The question Jesus asked his disciples:  “Who do you say I am”   

The Divine and Human as one, Incredulous!

Christmas Eve service 2016

I would like to tell you a story I heard recently about a nativity pageant, that like life itself didn't go quite as planned... The youth group at a city church was performing a manger scene.  Joseph and Mary and all the other characters were in place and ready.  They had practiced their parts with seriousness and commitment.   During the performance as the shepherds were proceeding to the altar steps, Mary and Joseph were looking earnestly at the straw in the manger, which contained a single naked light bulb that was playing the part of the glowing newborn Jesus, the light of the world.    With his back to the congregation, one of the shepherds said to the person playing Joseph, in a very loud whisper for all the cast to hear, "Well, Joe, when you gonna pass out cigars?"    Mary and Joseph's quiet snicker erupted into loud bursts of laughter.  This caused The chief angel, standing on a chair behind them to break out in laughter also.  She was laughing so hard that she fell off her chair and took the curtained back drop and many of the staged props with her.    The whole set was in shambles.   But do you know what?  The only thing that didn't go to pieces was that light bulb in the manger. ... it never stopped shining. --- Folks that baby in the manger is a light for the entire world.

We gather tonight to celebrate a birthday, but not just an ordinary birthday, for this birthday involves all of us here tonight and all those around the world who have come to accept, believe in, and practice the Christian religion.  In the beginning before our religion was formerly formed by the early apostils, we were simply know as People of The Way, followers of the light, the light that shines in our darkness days when things are not going as planned either.  The light of Christ is a light that shows us the way to wholeness.  For the early followers it was the same, they too struggled and tried very hard to follow in his way and abide by teachings.  Some began to see and understand that Jesus was not just an ordinary man, his extraordinary compassion for humankind, and his understanding of life and death seemed beyond their comprehension.  He performed many miracles, the lamb would walk again, the sick and possessed would be healed and set free, and the dead would rise.   Jesus did not teach from a pulpit within a synagogue or church building but simply went from community to community teaching on the hillsides, in the streets and in people’s homes.   His message was simply to Love God with all your heart, mind and soul and love your neighbor as you love yourself.  He choose just ordinary people like you and me to carry on his teachings, and his message of salvation and love throughout the world.  The Christmas Story was not meant to be a celebration for on one specific day or evening of the year, but was meant to inspire us to live as though every day was the last day of our lives.  To live with hope, for a new and better tomorrow, to love others as He loved us, to work for peace and justice in our personal lives, our community and in the wider world.       Jesus’ beloved disciple John, writes of a cosmic Christmas story in his writings found in the Gospel of John.  John doesn’t start with the human birth of Jesus but his gospel begins at the beginning of creation.  He uses the metaphor of the word, which in my perspective was an entity that we call the Christ.  The Word or the Christ became flesh and made his dwelling among us.  John goes on to say: “We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth”.  John’s Jesus is not confined to a manger 2000 years ago but rather reaches out to us from the very beginning of time itself.  Jesus was no ordinary man – Let us hear these words from the gospel of John   Chapter One:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was with God in the beginning. ³ Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

This is truly what we celebrate here this night.  A love and its story of cosmic prepositions. He was there in the beginning as the Christ, just as he is still with us in spirit now, the Spirit of Holiness who speaks only the truth to our hearts.  May your Christmas experience this year be a blessed one.   

"Human and Divine Together As One " Impossible?

That a child would be born into our world, who would fill his life so much with the love of God, that in him , thousands upon thousands would be moved to make the incredible claim that they had actually met their God in person. 

Dec 20 2015   Readings:  Psalm 80   Luke 1: 46-55

One of the great theologians and renowned author of our time, Karl Barth, was asked to be a guest lecturer at the University of Chicago Divinity School.   Dr. Barth being quite elderly, not well and quite tired, sat quietly after his arrival.  The organizers for the lecture thought after speaking Dr. Barth shouldn't be expected to handle the strain of the many question that were expected from students.  It was decided that the presider would ask one general question for all.  He turned to the renowned theologian and asked, "Of all the theological insights you have ever had, which do you consider to be the greatest of them all?    It seemed the perfect question for a man who had written literally tens of thousands of pages of some of the most sophisticated theology ever put into print.  The students held pencils right up against their writing pads, ready to note down the great insights of one of the greatest theologian of their time.  Dr. Barth closed his tired eyes, and he thought for a minute, and then he half smiled, opened his eyes, and said to those young theology students, "The greatest theological insight that I have ever had is this: "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the bible tells me so”

Karl is right folks, for the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the greatest love story ever written!  If it weren't for Christmas we might never have known the intensity of the love that God has for each and every one of us.

Mary and Joseph, far from home because of imperial rule, a peasant mother giving birth in unsanitary substandard conditions... There was no fanfare, no religious delegation and no royalty in attendance.  They just gently laid their newborn in that manger, amazed at the miracle of new birth, gauzing in joyful celebration as they looked at his little face, just like every new parent does.   But this child would be different for He was to be the sign of God’s true unconditional love for the world to see and to know personally. 

True love accepts us for who we really are; God chooses to love us precisely because we are all His and because we are all subjected to the human condition... Let us set aside the myth that we are loved only if we are good, for if that were true, none would be loved.  Let us also set aside the myth that if we are bad we are not loved, for if that were true none would be loved.   How come the same?   Mary and Joseph had nothing to offer but their obedience to a calling beyond themselves and that is precisely all we have to offer, a calling beyond ourselves.  It is an invitation to trust and surrender our lives over to the care and control of something greater than ourselves. 

Jesus was to be the Son, the true Son of God so patiently waited for, and now to be born into our world.  This child would be the ONE, the one who was willing to finally embody God’s unconditional love for all to see and experience.  Not just some of the time, not when it was convenient, but in every waking, breathing minute of every single day... It is the birth of that love into our world that we celebrate at Christmas.    It’s not about being bad or good folks.  It’s about a love so unconditional that its power transcends good and bad.   Who would have ever guessed that this crossing of paths, this intersection of the divine and the human, would take place in the remote village of Bethlehem?  That a child would be born into our world, who would fill his life so much with the love of God, that in him , thousands upon thousands would be moved to make the incredible claim that they had actually met their God in person.   On Christmas night God would sent out a love letter of cosmic proportions. This was the moment, in that little town of Bethlehem when God and humanity were joined as a bride and groom on their wedding day.  As Jesus grew and went out into the world, so our understanding of just how much God loves us also grew.   We find in Jesus that God's love doesn't demand perfection, that forgiveness isn't given away sparingly but recklessly and indiscriminately, that unconditional really means unconditional, and that God's love is completely and thoroughly inclusive.  Why was and still is, this profound truth so hard for the religious and non-religious to grasp and hold on to?   We find that even the likes of us gathered here this morning fall within the embrace of that love, and that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God found in Christ Jesus.   But I also know this folks,…. that.without Christmas my life would be positively unbearable!  ---  that for me, the baby in the manger is the light of my world, even when my world is in shambles...For in that baby the Divine and the human miraculously cross paths.   The infant Jesus is our living, breathing sign of the immeasurable love that God has had for all of us from the very beginning.

Christmas is the living promise that we are never ever alone.  No matter where we are in life, no matter in what condition we find ourselves, no matter how far we might stray away, or how unfaithful we are, God, the supreme lover, will pursue us in love for eternity!    It's a love that never stops shining.

May God bless each of you and those you love this Christmas. 
                               
                                  Bonny M sings Mary's Boy Child 

Still Still Still

"What Will It Be For You"

Happiness Verses Joy 

Often we think of happiness and joy in the same breath but are they the same?  What do you think?

  Dec 13 2015 Advent 3   Isaiah 12: 2-6   Philippians 4: 4-7

Have you grown up with an understanding that being happy or joyful are basically one in the same?   May I suggest to you that this notion might not be true.  Some scholars suggest that worldly happiness is fleeting and illusive and that it is a product of the mind, brought about by desire.  We think we feel happiness in our heart but it only resides in the head and doesn’t hang around very long either.  

In fact happiness comes and goes just like your pay check.  One minute you have it the next minute someone or some- thing has it.  Did you know that the Joy found through faith in God and taught by Jesus, does not require happiness as a companion?    Psalm 46: God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in times of trouble.  This joy is not of the mind it is a deeper joy, a knowing, something of the heart it doesn’t make you happy it makes you joyful.  When you accept this joy, it’s yours forever and no one can take it from you, although you do have the power to refuse, ignore or reject it.   Once you have accepted this joy, the words from all holy scriptures begin to speak to your heart.  Such as Psalm 27: God is my light and my salvation; whom then shall I fear? God is the stronghold of my life: of whom shall I be afraid.  Joy has the power to dispel fear.  Happiness has no power here. 

As strange as this may sound, the companion for biblical Joy isn’t happiness it is struggle or suffering.  Does that disturb you?!!   You can’t have one without the other, they are companions.  Now I ask you, try to make struggle or suffering a companion for worldly happiness.  No matter how you try it, making them companions just doesn’t seem to work.   Yet suffering and Joy as buzzer as it may sound to some, do go together, much the same as hot and cold, darkness and light, bad and good.  You cannot know one without the other.   Jesus’ conception and birth produced pain and suffering for both Joseph and Mary, yet brought them great Joy, just as Jesus’ suffering on the cross produced great Joy for our world.  The bible tells us that the Joy He offers us, would be a joy the world could not understand.  Somewhere deep down in our hearts we know that you can’t really appreciate light until you have been in the pit of darkness.  You can’t feel relief, unless you have experienced the pain.   Joy and suffering are companions, they go hand in hand.  You can’t really appreciate the joy of living that the New Testament offers us, until you have learned to work with the bitterness of life that the Hebrew Scriptures or Old Testament offer us.  We also know that continual happiness is a foolish dream, a fragment of our imagination and besides, it’s illusive.  Joy on the other hand can bring you something much greater than happiness, it can bring you contentment.  Meaning you can be happy with nothing.  Now I know that’s not good news for some of us especially those who have a lot to lose.   Here is a stranger thing about happiness and joy.  To maintain happiness, it requires you to hold on, to cling to someone or some “thing” believing you cannot be happy without it.  To maintain Joy, it requires you to let go, let go of “things” not clinging to anything you will receive the freedom joy offers.    Then something profound happens, it changes you.   Don't get me wrong I am not down on happiness we just need to understand its true purpose and limitations.  
I want you to think about this for a moment folks, the companion of worldly happiness is to gather and achievement not to be contented.  You have to do something, you have to achieve something in order to fulfill or attain worldly happiness, and we all know that this kind of happy feeling only lasts for a short period.   You can’t maintain it for long, soon we slip back into old patterns of wanting or needing more, just so we can be happy again.  It is a vicious circle of unending anxiety and confusion.   With happiness contentment is eluded.   On the other hand as strange as it may sound, the companion of Joy is to struggle.  As we struggle with the “things” of life and then let them go, contentment begins to find you.  Once you have experienced joy, no one can take it from you, but it is up to you to maintain it.  It doesn’t come from things, and it doesn’t just make you happy it fills an emptiness within you and when it happens, you begin to know and understand what the bible teaches us about the suffering that brings Joy.    One of the greatest examples I know of, especially for women is, pregnancy.  It’s scary at first, then you become uncomfortable, your body begins to loose it shapeliness.  Often rashes can brake out; there could be morning sickness, major mood swings can occur.  It doesn’t stop there either: soon you feel the pain and many suffer during the hours of labor, then it comes.   Mothers tell of the overwhelming joy, of great relief, and a wonderful sense of contentment. Now everything is changed, not just momentarily but forever.  This was the experience of Mary and Joseph on that wonderful night.  Joy did not mean that their troubles were over, and neither is ours, but the joy Jesus would bring to the world would last for eternity.  True Joy is the quiet confident assurance of God’s love in our lives no matter what.   God assures us, I will be there for you through the good and bad day of your life, all you need to do is trust in Me.  To have a relationship with His son is the most joyful thing you will ever do in your lifetime.  For He is truly the source of Joy, He is the Prince of Peace, He offers Hope to those who feel lost and loves us unconditional.   Isn’t that GREAT!!!  do you have this JOY!!!!

Did you know that there is such a thing as wasted suffering?   What I mean here is, suffering can get trapped as it become rooted in un-forgiveness or pride, revenge, anger, hatred, jealously, or good old conditional love, rendering it wasted.  The scriptures tell us about how destructive these things can be for us.  You know the old joke,   I paid dearly for my misery, and no one is going to take it from me.   The limiest test for unhealthily suffering is the absence of joy.  Again what is Joy?  May I suggest to you that Joy is the quiet confident assurance of God’s love in our lives no matter the circumstances.   Wasted suffering can only produce more agony if rooted in any of the things I just mentioned.  Pain is prolonged and intensified because of where it is trapped.   On the other hand suffering that is not wasted is rooted in a relationship with God in Christ.  Jesus teaches us that our suffering is not wasted if we can turn our suffering into compassion for others.  By serving others we not only bring hope to them, we begin to feel the Joy of serving.   When we can turn our suffering into forgiveness for those who have trespassed against us, we not only bring hope, we begin to feel the freedom our Joy offers us through the gift of forgiveness.   If I can look into a mirror and truthfully love the person I see, it fills the heart of God to overflowing and I begin to feel the contentment and Joy of God's unconditional love.   You are precious, unique and loved, may you remember that your name is carved on the palm of God hand, and God will never forsake or you.   

                                            Let there be Joy

"The Peace That Passes Understanding"

When you hear these words “The peace of Christ be with you”   What comes to mind? 

Dec 6 2015 Readings:  Advent 2 John 14: 22-27

This morning I would to take a moment and focus on the creation story as found written in Genesis 1.   In the beginning, Humankind existed in perfect peace and harmony with God the creator.  That’s the story.  Unfortunately, this perfect state of harmony and peace was rudely disrupted by the intrusion of something we know as free will and personal desire.  Well, we all know what happened then right?    May I suggest that deep within the human spirit is this great desire to re connect to that relationship of peace and harmony with our creator once again.   Thus we have the spiritual battle of personal desire and free will over the peace and harmony we once enjoyed.     In order for true peace to be restored in our lives once again, something has to change.   As I had mentioned on the first Sunday of Advent, Advent for the Christian is the season of transformation and change.   Many teachings in our world today believe that real peace is on the other side of conflict and can be brought about by human effort.   That humans can be the source of pure love, perfect peace, hope and true joy.  This is a false teaching because our world is plagued with domestic strife, political rivalry, religious separation, ethnic hostilities, emotional and economic instability and wide spread social disorder that continue to dominate our world.   All human efforts to restore us to this perfect state of harmony and produce a complete peace in our world, have failed.   Many peace treaties have been signed and many peace organizations are in search for peace but unfortunately there is no peace.  No parliaments can effectively legislate it and none of our laws from governments have been able to maintain it.  Here in lies a major question for us today?    Maybe we are looking in the wrong place for peace and maybe we do not understand that this state of harmony and peace was not meant for the world.  May I suggest here, that it is an inner peace we seek, not formulated in our minds and not of the world, but an inner peace that quenches the spirit?  We are not to look to the world for this peace but are to look to its source, to God, who offers peace of mind in harmony with the spirit.   If we look closely at the story found in Genesis 1, true peace only existed between the created humans in the Garden of Eden and God.  Our world, planet earth. had already been created from the kayo, know of as the big bang.  May I suggest that this is just another expression for our Creator clapping his hands together to bring order to creation?   Please note here I did not say bring peace to creation, only order.   For I believe, that peace we are talking about here cannot come from created order, the world, nor can it come from any other physical creation.  In the story of Genesis 1, peace and harmony only existed between the human and God while in Eden and continued until humans discovered their free will and the desire to exercise it.    Now I don’t know about you but free will and personal desire have gotten me into a heap of trouble over the years.   When people ask me today how are you doing Sim?  Often I say “just trying to keep out of trouble”.  Well what I really mean is:  I’m trying to set my will aside when dealing with others, all the while looking to God for guidance.   I did say trying right!!!!  

Therefore it seems to me that true peace cannot come from us.  True peace comes to us from that which created us, from God.  We  Christians understand Jesus to be the carrier of peace and our scriptures often refer to Him as the Prince of Peace.  As followers of his way we don’t say “my peace I give to you”, we say, “the peace of Christ be with you”, and our response back is “and also with you”   When we quote this, we speak the truth, for true peace doesn’t come from us, it comes to us, through surrendering our ways for the ways of the Christ.   In verse 2 of all of these writings: Ephesians 1, Philippians 1, or 2 Thessalonians 1:  they all make this statement “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”.   This genuine peace is a divine gift and for those who surrender their ways, for the ways of God, they will experience it.   They truly fear not. 

For the authentic Christian it comes as a result of taking Jesus into your heart, not you’re your head folks but your heart and there, accepting him as mentor and Master over your life.  You will then experience this peace in times of personal joy but also in times of suffering from deep grief, pain, or loss.    Somehow through the mystical power of surrender by entrusting whatever it is to the care and control of Christ, this extraordinary peace that passes all understanding will flood over you.  This peace has the power to defeat fear and anxiety.  It can quite the voices of jealously, anger, resentment or deep conflict.   You’ll feel lighter, more carefree, unburdened and you will have the strength to face all personal circumstances.   These entities can no longer take you over, they don’t hang around long and become for many just fleeting moments.   It is an inner peace experience, within your spirit and this amazing experience allows you to see the world around you and your circumstance differently, with less fear, more compassion, a greater calmness, and a sense of hope.    John 14: verse 27 is where Jesus first introduces us to his gift of peace.   “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you, I do not give to you as the world gives, do not let you hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”   

Hope, peace Love and Joy are gifts of the spirit that come to us not from the world but from God.    The world would have us believe that we can be the source of these gifts, but the truth is the gifts do not come from us, we are not the source, because we are flawed with conditions and personal agendas.   Worldly peace is also flawed in the same way.  God’s peace is a divine gift offered to all, packaged in grace and wrapped in 

God’s love, fully inclusive with no conditions attached.

 The Apostle Paul speaks of this peace as “the peace of God which transcends all understanding:   because it is not of this world.    Worldly thinking will never understand it, for it is a language of the spirit.   ” This kind of peace will enable Christians to live with a peace filled life, fearless in a world that is full of tension, turmoil and hostility.    God will not remove tension, hostilities or difficult circumstances from your life, but those who follow in the ways of Christ will remain unafraid and uninitiated by the raging tempest and hostility of the world around them. This unique peace that Jesus gives is transforming not just for your inner self but in your outer appearance as well.   As you surrender yourself and your way, for His way, the ways of God, you will be blessed.