BLOG 12/23/13. SERIOUS CAROL: BE BORN IN US TODAY

BLOG 12/23/13. THIS IS A SERIOUS CAROL: “ … BE BORN IN US TODAY”

Allow me to toss this reflection to you before I sign off these blogs until after the first of the year. It is pretty normal to hear the Christmas carols so often that we sing them without a whole lot of reflection on what we’re singing. Some carols are pretty sentimental stuff. Others are loaded with gospel comprehension, such as the carol: Joy to the World. That carol may be as comprehensive a statement of the gospel of the kingdom as we have.

But I’m pondering the theme of my recent blogs on our calling to have Christ formed in us in knowledge, true righteousness, and holiness. The very reality that we have allowed our understanding of Christ’s calling to be something that leaves us passive in God’s design (which is to create all things new) underscores this endemic mindlessness that afflicts the church all too much. For instance, it is an interesting experiment to ask folk during this period in the church’s year to give a thoughtful understanding of joy, or peace, or good-will to men … to get much more than some inane and sentimental–certainly not a Biblical– response.

In the carol: O, Little town of Bethlehem is this petition: “O holy child of Bethlehem, be born in us today.” Have you ever wondered what in the world it would look like if the very life of God were incarnate in all who sing this—how convulsive and revolutionary it would be ethically, socially/civilly and economically were we all to be the flesh and blood expressions of the agenda of Jesus Christ. (It would make Pope Francis’ recent deliverance on the Gospel of Joy look tame!)

But it is such a formation of Christ in us that is precisely what God intends. Remember that Paul wrote: “ … my little children, for whom I am again in anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you” (Galatians 4:19).

To ‘cop-out’ and excuse oneself with the lame: “I’m only a layperson,” is near blasphemous. There is no clergy <> laity distinction in the New Testament. How long does it take to grow into maturity? The writer of the Hebrews rebukes, or shames, those to whom he is writing that when they should be teachers of others, they are still in need of being taught.

We have all too often been bamboozled by the excuse, or sophisticated lie, that some folk are sacralized and expected to be more knowledgeable and holy that the rest of us, i.e. ‘church professionals’ or ‘reverends,’ and so those to whom we are to defer. This is all so antithetical (inimical?) to the New Testament teachings that Christ is to be formed in all.

So be careful what you sing in these coming days.

And as a final shot, it is interesting that in the church’s liturgical year, Christmas day is followed on December 26th by; The Feast of St. Stephen the Martyr—a recent believer who gave his life in his conscientious declaration and defense of Jesus as God’s Messiah!

So, with that I’ll sign off until early in 2014. Go in peace! And the Lord be with you.

About rthenderson

Sixty years a pastor-teacher within the Presbyterian Church. Author of several books, the latest of which are a trilogy on missional ecclesiology: ENCHANTED COMMUNITY: JOURNEY INTO THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH, then, REFOUNDING THE CHURCH FROM THE UNDERSIDE, then THE CHURCH AND THE RELENTLESS DARKNESS. Previous to this trilogy was A DOOR OF HOPE: SPIRITUAL CONFLICT IN PASTORAL MINISTRY, and SUBVERSIVE JESUS, RADICAL FAITH. I am a native of West Palm Beach, Florida, a graduate of Davidson College, then of Columbia and Westminster Theological Seminaries.
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