Christmas 1B – George Yandell
John’s gospel: The Word was God. The scholar’s version translates the first portion of the gospel this way: “In the beginning was the divine word and wisdom. The divine word and wisdom was there with God and it was what God was. Everything came to be by means of it; nothing that exists came to be without its agency. In it was life, and this life was the light of humanity. Light was shining in the darkness, and darkness did not master it.” [The Five Gospels: What Did Jesus Really Say? Harper Collins, 1997, p. 401] This mystical language sets Jesus in an entirely different light than the other 3 gospels.
Tradition has it that John, the disciple Jesus loved, wrote this gospel. Many scholars think it was put in its final form in Ephesus just before the end of the 1st century. Maybe it found its shape over a life-time of John’s preaching. A man who was a youth at the time of the Crucifixion could well have published the gospel in the nineties, when he himself was an old man, perhaps the last survivor of those who had known the Son of God and seen him resurrected. [Adapted from Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, vol. 2, p. 945]
The church historian Eusebius tells that the disciple John was expelled from Jerusalem around 40 CE. The young evangelist supposedly took Mary the mother of Jesus under his care, and took her to Ephesus with him. After Paul’s execution, it is thought that John took over the leadership of the church in Ephesus, and there wrote his gospel. After his death he was buried, according to his wishes, in the spot that now forms the center of the Church of St. John, a site of pilgrimage since the fourth century. I stood in the ruins of that magnificent nave on the brow of the hill in April of 2006. The centuries between John and me seemed to collapse and I felt awe at how he knew Jesus and made him known, known in that moment for ME.
What John tells us is truly unique in ancient religions- that the God beyond history had a co-eternal son who was God’s agent. The Son caused all creation to spring into being. John calls him the ‘logos’, the Word. We think of the Word of God as the Bible, we also think of the Word of God being delivered by the prophets. The Word is also the good news Jesus preached. But John expands this title to make us sure we realize that Christ was a fully divine being, who was also fully Jesus, the man from Galilee.
What do we make of such a claim? Do we ever really get it? I’m not sure we can. That’s what John drives us to do- to wonder at Jesus, to enter the mystery of his life, death, and resurrection/ and then to realize this Jesus truly was the Son of God.
The Church realized John’s gospel was entirely different from the gospels already in circulation. Some balked and said it wasn’t authentic. Why? Because the figure of Jesus is more sublime, less approachable. Yet the tradition of the church holds that John’s gospel firmly established that God was fully present in Jesus- Jesus was God on earth.
Don’t you think it’s strange that Christmas is such a home-oriented holiday when Jesus himself was such a homeless person? The paradox of the Incarnation is that by the Word becoming flesh and dwelling among us, it enabled us to be at home with God wherever we are. Jesus, the Light of the World, broke through the barriers of the human family and incorporated us all into God’s family. When we gather to worship God become flesh, we are not strangers. We are brothers and sisters in the family of God, this is home. …
A new community emerges when the Light of the World shines on the family of God. Surrounded by the darkness, we suddenly see friends. We find our night horizon dotted with the light of neighbors. We are no longer alone in the dark of night. The power of evil is broken by the strength of this loving community. Look around you now at the community gathered here… Welcome home! [Adapted from Deborah Cronin in Can Your DogHunt? Lima, Ohio: Fairway Press, 1995, pp. 30-31].
So imagine with me for a moment. John and Mary, telling and re-telling the stories of Jesus from their most intimate perspectives. They had made their home in the congregation at Ephesus. Why then is this prologue of John in such mystical, cosmic language? Because the faith in the hearts of Mary and John and their fellow Ephesians could not be contained in simple stories- their faith drove them to record in mystic poetry the truth behind the stories of Jesus in his earthly ministry- that’s the faith they bequeath to us today. In the quiet of this nave, consider Mary and John, living out their lives far from Galilee, but ever so close to the man they loved so dearly, whom they knew to be the Son of God. 2028 years ago, the Son of God was born. They knew him in his childhood, in his ministry, after his resurrection and in their hearts continuously. The Word is made flesh and dwells among us.