Homily 621 – 26 APE
Holy Transfiguration, Ames, Iowa
December 22, 2024
Epistle:  (328) Hebrews 11:9-10, 17-23, 32-40
Gospel:  (1) Matthew 1:1-25

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God.

I’m struck this morning by the overall feeling that the Church wants us to have as we approach the incarnation of our Lord.  Beginning with vespers, we are overwhelmed almost with the sense of family.

The first Old Testament reading at vespers is the same reading we have when we remember the fathers of the Ecumenical Councils.  The second and third readings are from Deuteronomy, and remind us that we are part of God’s family, and God’s promise.  If you want to read those, the readings are part of the bulletin for this week.

Maybe we don’t think of it as often as we should.  God came to Abraham, and said “Go to a land I’ll show you.”  I don’t know, I may be the only one who thought this, but it always seemed that God was ordering Abraham around a bit.

As I go through life, though, and consider the events in context of this day in particular, I see it differently.  We know that God kind of said “Go”, but I almost think He was actually saying “Come.”  As in, come home.  Come join Me.  Instead of “Go” God tells Abraham, Welcome Home.

But as amazing as that is, maybe more amazing is that is what God is saying to us.  We are the people who God invites to join Him.  We are the people that Moses speaks to.  We are the people whom Moses said, behold, everything belongs to the Lord your God, and He is inviting you to share that with Him.

Plus, the Old Testament readings make quite clear that God doesn’t only invite us.  He invites everyone.  All of humanity is invited.  And as God reminds us, quote “And I commanded your judges at that time, saying: Hear cases between your brethren, and judge rightly between a man and his brother and the stranger who is with him. You shall not have respect to persons in judging. You shall hear the small as well as the great. You shall not shrink before any man’s person; for the judgement is God’s.”

And also, quote “the Lord your God is God of Gods and the Lord of Lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality, who takes no bribe. He executes judgment for the stranger, the orphan and the widow; and loves the stranger, giving him food and clothing.”

We sort of go into a mindset when reading the first books of Moses in the Old Testament.  We perhaps see it as being given the Law – which is true, of course – but also it is being given the “family rules” so to speak.  Here is how to live in God’s house, which is now our house.

St. Paul speaks of that affinity, that family, that we have with the ancestors.  We are all part of one family, the patriarchs and prophets.  There are not just characters in a drama.  This is our family story.  This is our family history.  And, as St. Paul reminds us, they were not to reach perfection apart from us.

We are all in this together.

Same with the Genealogy of Christ.  This is our genealogy as well.  In our history, in Christ’s history, we find all of humanity.  A mixture of holy and unrighteous.  Men, women, Jews, non-Jews, loyalists, traitors, powerful, humble.

All of humanity.  Kinda like what we see in the Gospels.  In the Gospels we see the rich, the powerful, the poor, the disabled.  And what God tells us is:  This is your family.

The entirety of humanity is our family.  There was a sticker that went around that just said “One Human Family.”  Exactly what we are.  Whether or not we understand it or admit it.  We are one human family.

The Nativity of Our Lord offers us the opportunity to recognize that God desires our presence and companionship and love so deeply, that He is willing to send the Second Person of the Trinitarian Godhead to become us, and help guide us back into the family.

Like the prodigal son, there was God, not just waiting patiently hoping for the return of their beloved lost sheep.  He wasn’t content to wait and watch.  He went looking.  He came to us, looking for us.

What we are going to experience is the invitation to rejoin the conversation.  To rejoin the family.  That is the essence of the incarnation.

Beloved, God wants us back.  We may say, “Well, why does He make it so hard?  All these rules, all these things I have to believe and do?”

Well, I’ll try to break this to you – we live in a fallen world.  We don’t know what life was like when everything and everyone followed the house rules.  We don’t know how wonderful life was.

But we refer to it as paradise.  The Garden of Eden.

I would make the argument that this world, regardless of how easy or hard, is not paradise.  He doesn’t make it hard to return – we do.  We make it hard to return because we have moved so far away, and really continue to distance ourselves from Him, through our own self-interest and our own will.

We have experienced life since the fall as one of selfish, please ourselves, type of life.  We want to make our journey back, if indeed we want to go back home, pleasant and carefree, even though we were led astray by following exactly that path.

Our repentance is difficult because we are so far away from God, and moving so far away.  The first step is to stop, and realize how far we have gone.  There is an old saying:  The first step to getting out of a hole is to stop digging.

Well, the first step in returning home is to stop running away.  Stop running from God, stop blaming God, and take Him at His word.

He loves you.  He loves us.  He wants us to love one another.  It is our opportunity to return to paradise, to return to the open arms of our Creator, and our God.

Beloved, it’s time to come home.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, One God.  Glory to Jesus Christ.