Sunday after Christmas Fr. James Jorgenson

We, of course, are still in this beautiful period

after the birth of our Lord, the Christmas period.

I'm sure that you have noticed as well as I have,

how even in secular society, the birth of our

Lord has influenced it. all the festivities surrounding

Christmas, and everything that is, all the Christmas

carols, the joy of the season. But that is particularly

intense for us, this joy, for us who are believing

Christians. When we look at the crib and see

Who is that baby lying in the manger? I imagine

that most of you have some kind of a manger scene

or a crib scene, the one that we have in our

family. I remember when I was about eight years

old, my parents went to the store and bought

that crib scene, which I have, of course, inherited.

from them. Many fond memories. You look at this

Christmas scene whether it's in a stable as more

often maybe in the Western tradition or in a

cave as it's usually spoken of in the services

in the Byzantine tradition, the Orthodox tradition.

We see of course the shepherds who were there

because the angels announced to them to go and

see this thing which has taken place in Bethlehem.

The wise men, of course, journey from a star,

three of them traditionally because of the three

gifts that they offer. And then also, you probably

notice in that Cribsine, an ox or a cow, and

a donkey. Maybe you wondered, why are those animals

there? Of course, it was some kind of a stable,

a storage for animals. But also, at the very

beginning of the prophecy of Isaiah, Isaiah says,

The ox knows its master and the donkey recognizes

its master's crib. So because of this prophecy

from Isaiah, which I don't think is read in all

the prophecies we have surrounding Christmas,

but that's the reason why you have in addition

with the shepherds and the wise men that ox or

cow and the donkey who were peering at this baby

Jesus. Who is this baby Jesus? The Christmas

carols, of course, say that Hark the Herald Angels

Sing, for example, says that Emmanuel, God has

come to live and dwell among men. He who is God

and Lord of all deigns to become man. Another

Christmas hymn, once in Royal David City, which

is one of my favorite, stood a lowly cattle shed

where a mother laid her baby. for in a manger

for his bed. He came down from earth to heaven,

who is Lord and God of all. Our liturgical hymns

are so many that they cannot be recalled that

speak about who this person is. One of them that

is particularly dear to me is that he who spread

out the heavens as a curtain now is he who spread

out the heavens as a curtain now is wrapped in

swaddling clothes. Another, he by whom the birds

of the air are fed now is nourished by a little

milk from his mother's breath. Of course, in

our, not only our liturgical hymns, not only

in the Christmas carols and liturgical hymns,

but also in the creeds, the Nicene Creed, which

we are about to recite or sing in a few minutes.

We say that we believe in one Lord Jesus Christ.

God from God, light from light, true God from

true God, begotten, not made, of one essence

with the Father, by whom all things were made,

who for us men and for our salvation came down

from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit

of the Virgin Mary. The church's councils, And

creedal statements continue this thought. The

Council of Ephesus, the third ecumenical council

in 431, defines that Jesus possesses both the

human and the divine nature. He is both God and

man. Twenty years later, in 451, the Council

of Chalcedon defines that this Jesus who possesses

both the divine and the human nature is united

ineffably in that one divine person. This truth

is expressed in one of the theological truths

of the church's tradition, which is called the

communication of properties, or to use its technical

Latin term, the communicatio idiomatum. So this

means that because of the union of the two natures

in Jesus Christ, The attributes or the properties

of one nature may be attributed to the other

nature as well. So God, as we say in the Tupari,

the Kentuckian, if I remember, who is God and

Lord of all, lies in that manger. A marvelous

truth that we see in that simple manger scene.

Mary, the virgin mother of God, her incarnate

son, Joseph, the foster father, the shepherds

and the magi, and that ox and that donkey who

know their masters. where their master lay. We

as Christians know the same thing, where our

master is. The marvelous condensation of our

Lord to come down from heaven, dwell among us,

teach us, become one of us by taking our human

nature from his virgin mother, and then finally

suffering and dying on the cross for our salvation.

This is the one whose birth we celebrate. This

is the one who, like that donkey and ox, we recognize

as our master and Lord of all. And to him be

glory and honor with his Father and the Holy

Spirit forever and ever. Amen Christ is born