Sermons

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In the Name(s) of Love
December 22, 2002
Pastor Dan Baumgartner
4th Sunday of Advent

Matthew 1:18-25

It’s December 22, the fourth Sunday of Advent. For three weeks now, we have moved into our celebration of this most shocking and profound event in the history of humanity: God moving into the world in the person of Jesus Christ. For 4-5 weeks, we have been bombarded by the music, the lights, the mixed metaphors that our culture has thrown together around Christmas…until it is the easiest thing in the world to get hazy about what we actually celebrate. Jesus the Christ, the Holy One of God…starts to resemble something very different in this strange world.

After listening to 24-hour, 7-day a week Christmas songs on the radio, blending everything from “Frosty the Snowman” to “O Holy Night” to “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”…your head starts to spin. You read in the paper that the hottest item at Archie McPhee’s is the Jesus Action Figure (on wheels). You see the billboards advertising the “Jesus Huggy Doll,” and find out the manufacturer can’t keep them in stock. Your head spins faster. The Christmas cards come in, some merely celebrating only the Winter Solstice…What is it we are about? You set your egg nogg latte down and you say, “Who is Jesus, anyway…what are we celebrating? I thought I knew…but it’s getting a little hazy.”

That’s why we need Matthew this morning. Matthew is crystal clear. The gospel of Matthew, chapter 1:18-25.

Later in life, here at 44, I have become a fan of the Irish band U2. (It’s great to be a pastor! Once word gets out you are interested in something, you receive a lot of help! I’ve had CDs, books, song lyrics all roll in my door!) One of their songs has been in my head a lot this week. It is called “Pride,” but the chorus repeats the words “In the name of love…what more in the name of love?” Part of the song talks about Jesus…In the Name of Love.

Matthew gives us here TWO names of love.

The first name of love: Jesus. “You are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Now, the technical part of that name, JESUS, tells us that it means, quite literally, “God saves.” Who is Jesus? God-saves. In that one name, there is more theology than we could talk about in a week. There is the Jesus (form of name Joshua) which was a common man’s name, for Jesus was a man. But there is also Jesus, God-saves. There is the man and there is the God, and it has defied theologians to explain how the two possibly hold together…but it has not kept them from acknowledging that in Jesus…is God. For centuries, the church has wrestled with how it works. The Nicene Creed, written way back in the 4th century, says, “We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God…God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God.”

God-saves. Jesus is not a good guy, or an instructor or a guru or a teacher…He is God-saves. He does not assist us, or act in a helpful way, or enhance our lives or give us a positive outlook…he saves. He utterly rescues and liberates and saves.

Saves from what? Human history is full of liberators, of revolutionaries, a few of whom have even been called “saviors.” It always means saving from political oppression, or saving from an external enemy. Even Moses, in the Bible, is best known for what? Helping save the people Israel from oppression and slavery in Egypt. Not Jesus. We are not told that Jesus saves us from hurt. Nor that he necessarily saves us from our enemies. Nor that he will save us from the sins of others. What we are told is that “He will save his people from their sins.” God-saves…us from ourselves. I have met only a handful of people in my life of whom I say to others: “This person is someone…that Jesus has SAVED. Not just spiritually, but in every way.” They were on a course to self-destruct, in one way or another…and they met Jesus, and everything changed.

The biggest spiritual problem in the United States…is that we don’t know that we NEED a savior. We are drowning in a pool full of cars and houses and food and money and alcohol, we are barely treading water and all the time saying, “I don’t need anything.” And God looks at us and says, “I’m diving in…because I love them. They won’t make it without me. They need my forgiveness.” The Nicene Creed again: “For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven.” God-Saves.

The second name of love: Emmanuel. God-with-us. Or most literally, the “With-Us-God.” In the Old Testament, most of the time God is the “above us God.” In many world religions, God is the “above us God.” For many deists or agnostics, God is at best the “above us God.” Some others will go so far as to believe that God sent a messenger of some kind to communicate with us. But it is the most shocking, radical and utterly absurd thing in the world to say “Jesus Christ, With-Us-God.” We should be careful which Christmas carols we sing: “Come Thou long expected Jesus, born to set they people free, from our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in Thee.” Or “Hark the herald, angels sing, glory to the newborn king, peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners, reconciled.” We should be careful what we sing…lest we open our mouths to sing of “Emmanuel,” but don’t acknowledge with our minds and hearts and lives that God HIMSELF came among humankind, and now still resides in the Holy Spirit. In Jesus Christ, God has jumped into the pool. Why? Because of this deep, deep love for His people. For you. For me.

The novelist John Gardner once observed that there are only two plots to all the stories ever told: a stranger came to town, and someone went on a journey. In Jesus Christ, everything happens. In Jesus, God comes to town…and begins a journey that doesn’t end until the cross and resurrection. In Jesus Christ, both things come together. Jesus is the With-Us-God.

All of it begins at Christmas. When Matthew gives us these two names, the two names of love, he cuts through all the fuzziness that has perhaps built up in these weeks. Cuts through the action figures and the Jesus Huggy dolls and the roasting chestnuts. Reminds us not to concentrate on the construction design of the stable, the number of shepherds or the names of the wisemen. He doesn’t give us any extra details, no prose to dazzle us. He just invites us to sit quietly and receive the names of love: Jesus. Immanuel. God-Saves. With-Us-God…what more, in the name of love? Let’s pray.