January 1, 2023 – Circumcision and Name of Jesus                          Text:  Luke 2:21

Dear Friends in Christ,

    I am sure all you noticed the brevity of the Gospel lesson this morning.  “At the end of eight days.”  This is not an arbitrary time.  This is an appointed time with an appointed meaning.  Why is the eighth day so important?

“WHY THE EIGHTH DAY?”

    Why not some other number?  Why eight days?  Here is one thought:  the eighth day is the best day for circumcision because on it baby boys produce the highest percentage of vitamin K and prothrombin, which are necessary for coagulating blood.  Interesting fact, because we wouldn’t want all those baby boys bleeding to death.

    Beyond the physical benefits of the eighth day, there is probably a more theological reason.  When God gives the command to circumcise, He is making good on his promise to deliver his people.  This wasn’t just freedom from Egyptians and Canaanites; it is the triumphing over this sinful world.  A new heaven and a new earth.

    When God first creates, He does so in six days and then rests on the seventh.  This is the first creation.  But we have a new creation on the horizon.  This world will be destroyed and made new again.  God again is the architect, and this new work begins when Jesus rises from the dead.  He is the reason for the resurrection unto eternal life.

    Try to follow this.  Jesus died on Friday.  Saturday was the Jewish Sabbath.  Easter Sunday then came.  The Sabbath is the end of the week or the 7th day.  Jesus rises on Sunday which is actually the first day of the week.  Seven days plus one day = eight days.  The beginning of a new creation.

    This is why sometimes you hear of an eighth-day theology.  The Early Church shaped their baptismal fonts with eight sides – for in Baptism, like we witnessed today – something new is being brought forth.  It is also a reminder that eight souls were saved on the ark when the floodwaters came – Noah, his wife, three sons, three daughters-in-law.

    It all starts to make some sense now.  It is a foreshadowing of being made new, being added to the kingdom of God, rising together in the resurrection and inheriting a new creation prepared for us in Christ Jesus.

    “At the end of eight days . . . he was circumcised.”  If you have sons you have experienced their pain.  Most of us had it done in the hospital after their birth.  It was hard to watch the nurse take them away and you just cringed when they were gone.  It started a lifetime of hugging, kissing and love after they experienced pain.

    Joseph and Mary probably watched, which would be even more difficult.  They provided the comfort.  But the pain Jesus went through would be multiplied.  The shed blood of His circumcision would lead to the shed blood of Holy Week.  The blood of Christ is first spilled here in the circumcision.  It points to the purpose of His life.  He has come to shed His blood for all. 

    What pain have you felt?  What pain are you feeling?  What emotional hurt weighs on your mind?  The pain and agony that Jesus felt, like all those baby boys felt, will only be the beginning of what He must undergo for the redemption of mankind.  The life of Christ will be one of suffering.  It will be one where He submits himself to the will of His heavenly Father and thereby lays down His own flesh and blood for the life of all fallen mankind.  This was God’s plan since the fall.  Look at the name – Jesus – God saves.

    Jesus has come to hug and kiss and love us.  He provides the comfort in the midst of our pain.  He sympathizes with us because He experienced it.  Like our boys when going under the knife, do we cringe still at the Lenten/Easter story?  Do we still see the pain?  Do we acknowledge the agony?  Does the shed blood make us turn away because we know it is our sin that causes Him so much discomfort?

    That is how great His love is.  He is worthy of His name because He saves.  He saves you and I from discomforts that could be debilitating.  Would you ever want to go through the death of a loved one without hope?  By coming in the flesh, by shedding His blood, and by rising again on the third, that is the first, that is, remember, the eighth day.

    This Day of Circumcision gives us hope.  It encapsulates the curse of the fall, the promises of the Gospel in the Old Testament, and their fulfillment in the New Testament.  It even points us forward to the return of our Lord in glory, who at that time will consummate all things and make them new in the new heaven and the new earth.

    In the name of Jesus.

                Amen.    

December 24, 2022                                      Text:  Matthew 1:18-25

Dear Friends in Christ,

    Isn’t it interesting how life can play out depending on if you have a girl or a boy?  When the obstetrician said “boy!” both times in our life, we knew we had the rehearsal dinner.  And we do, in January, as Karson gets married.

    Another thing with the sex of the child is color.  We have always associated boys with blue.  So, let me say, I am not color blind.  I know the liturgical color is white for tonight.  But I am wearing the royal blue.  Why?  Because tonight we are going to talk about . . . 

“THE COLORS OF CHRISTMAS”

    Our first color for tonight is this beautiful royal blue.  When we have this color during Advent we all love it.  We have more positive comments on this royal blue than any other liturgical color.  Matthew states clearly that Jesus is not just another baby born in the squalor of the times.  He is a son, a male – royal blue.  He is a King.  The long-awaited Messiah.  Chosen by God.  Foretold by the prophets.  The one the apostles would proclaim.

    Jesus was not conceived like other children.  God showed His supreme authority over nature.  It was God entering into the human world to experience it in human form.

    The Kingdom of this royal blue baby was not of this world, but His infancy certainly was.  He was nursed and nurtured, caressed and cradled.  He hungered.  He needed a changing.  He slept.  He gave up his equality with God.  Paul writes, “taking the very nature of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.  And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a. cross.” (Phil. 2:7-8)

    Our second color for tonight is red.  Jesus, the wondrous Babe of Bethlehem, came to die the death of a sacrificial lamb.  He came to make a conquest of life and death with new life.  The red blood of the cross would lead to the hues of heaven.  Jesus came to offer our world hope and peace.  Jesus came so that our lives would be less “blue” and more royal.

    Our third color for tonight is black.  Dark.  Deadly.  Blots out the light.  The infant child would become the man Jesus.  He would experience darkness at His death.  He would enter the darkest, blackest place you can imagine – the din of hell itself.  He would go in our place.  He would enter in dark and come out in light.  He declared victory over the devil, He overcame sin for us, He has taken away the blackness of our own death.  We shall see the light when we enter the eternal palace.

    That leads us to our fourth color for tonight – white.  The liturgical color for both Christmas and Easter.  They are tied together.  Christ has to be born to die and rise again.  Christ had to become man to pay for the world’s transgressions.  Christ came in our place so that when we face death all we see is white.  The angels of heaven.  The brilliance of the Lamb around the throne.  White light forever and forever.  There is no darkness.

    This Christmas we are reminded that these are color swatches in time.  Christ grew beyond the shades of human coloring to be the vivid Lord of all.  From cradle to cross.  From Bethlehem’s cave to Calvary’s crucifixion.  Jesus painted an image of God’s immense love for us.  

    As we savor the goodness of His love in a simple wafer of bread and sip of wine, we recognize that Jesus imbues our lives with more than color – He offers forgiveness and love that never blur or fade or wash out.

    Let us, then, like the shepherds, savor the miracle of Christmas and experience the baby blue of God’s grace and His salvation.

                        Amen.