Humility of God — Homily by Rev. Bryan Biba

let us

pray Come Holy Spirit and recreate our

hearts in the image of your son

Jesus may this Advent Christmas be a

time of deepen Faith deepened trust

deepened obedience in you and in your

word

and may my words and my message not be

plausible words of human wisdom but a

demonstration of the spirit and of power

so that our faith may not rest in the

wisdom of men but in the power of

almighty

God we ask this through Jesus Christ Our

Lord

amen this week I was reflecting back on

my uh own first Christmas

Pageant uh I was probably six or S years

old at the church that I uh grew up in I

remember that I was a

Shepherd uh probably dressed like one of

our boys here and I remember I was given

one line which is probably not a

surprise if you know me my line was uh

look up

um it's so much fun for us to see our

children reenact the Christmas story and

it's very fun for children to reenact it

for us but As I Grew Older I kind of

soured on Christmas pageants you know

they can be really

sappy

sentimental just kind of

musy but I think at their best Christmas

pageants can reveal to us in a really

potent way one of the great Mysteries of

the

Incarnation in the Incarnation of Jesus

Christ we see the humility of

God in Jesus the almighty all knowing

Creator humbled himself the god of

Israel entered into his Creation in the

most unexpected way as a

child and as a a father of three young

children currently I could tell you

children are

vulnerable

dependent

messy

stinky

sticky Wild

and loud it's so easy for us to feel

sentimental about children but children

are a

mess and the god of the universe became

one of

them friends that is

humility the humility of God to become

one of the least and lowest to choose it

for us for our

Salvation I mean if I were the creator

of God and I wanted to enter into my

creation I would choose to be something

fully

grown you know like a great king or

maybe like a warrior with like a

Herculean physique or maybe like a

brilliant scholar with vast knowledge or

if I wasn't a human maybe I'd be like a

lion or a tiger you know but a

child Our God chooses to become a

[Music]

child this teaches us something about

God's character something that's

important for us to hear something we

can easily Miss during the Christmas

season as John writes in his first

letter God is

love not that God has love or that God

is loving but that God is love his very

essence is love and more specifically we

learned in the Old Testament that God's

love is shown to us as

Mercy Mercy is love to the undeserving

God shows Mercy not to the rich and

Powerful not to the strongest not to the

most intelligent he loves those who have

no merits of their

own children and he becomes one of

them many of us think we have to prove

ourselves worthy of God's love we go

through our lives believing that if

we're just good

enough just righteous enough just kind

enough then God will love love us but

the Christmas Pageant tells us a

different truth it tells us the gospel

that God comes first to those who don't

deserve it to those who need Mercy to

those who can offer nothing back in

return he comes to the weak the poor the

vulnerable and moreover as Jesus himself

taught as he grew up that if we want to

enter the kingdom of God that we can

only do do so by becoming like a little

child by receiving it as a

child that we grown strong wealthy

privileged adults need to become humble

and weak and vulnerable just like

Jesus so as we enter into the Christmas

season let us together meditate on the

humility of God the great mystery of the

Incarnation in what way are you trying

to earn God's favor to prove yourself

good

enough

stop remember the humility of God humble

yourself become a little child like him

and receive his

Mercy who in your life doesn't deserve

your

love who are your

enemies

stop remember the humility of God humble

self by showing

Mercy like the God who showed Mercy to

us his enemies while we were yet still

sinners Christ died for

us this friends is the good news of the

Christmas Pageant the good news of the

Christmas

story let us take a moment in silence to

invite the Lord to Humble us this

day for

create in all of us a clean heart oh

God renew a right Spirit within us this

Christmas amen