O God, who wonderfully created, and yet more wonderfully restored, the dignity of human nature: Grant that we may share the divine life of him who humbled himself to share our humanity, your Son Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
There’s nothing quite like Christmas in the Episcopal Church. That may sound snobbish, but I truly don’t mean it that way. Episcopalians celebrate Christmas better than the rest. Many of the essential Christmas hymns are English. The tradition of Lessons & Carols that everyone copies is thoroughly Anglican. If you want to attend Christmas worship when you’re away from home visiting family, the best bet is always the local Episcopal Church.
To
be clear – we’re not the best at everything, but Christmastide is a time we excel.
Roman Catholics, with their piety around Fridays and crucifixes, do a good Good
Friday. The Orthodox Churches are known for celebrations of Easter that make other
churches jealous. Protestants, like Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and
Lutherans, are known for strong preaching based on their emphasis on Scripture.
AME-Zion congregations have soulful singing that can make even the most timid
of us start to move in rhythm. When it comes to being moved by the Spirit and
celebrating Pentecost, well, the Pentecostals have the corner on that market. But
Christmas, that’s the season in which Anglicans shine.
This
is not a sermon about patting ourselves on the back for being a tradition that
does Christmas well. No gloating here. Instead, I want to explain why it is
Anglicans excel at Christmas. It’s because Anglican sensibilities, spirituality,
and theology are all deeply Incarnational. The rest of the sermon will be an
explanation of what I mean by that.
It’s
not only my opinion – if you survey scholars across the Church, you’ll find
that what makes Anglicans distinct, what gives us our quirks, what makes us us is
our Incarnational focus. Now, this doesn’t mean that other traditions don’t
have this doctrine or that they don’t celebrate Christmas well. Not at all. But
for Anglicans, the Incarnation, Christmas, is at the very center. More than the
Cross, more than the Resurrection, more than the sending of the Spirit, more
than particular practices of faith or the reading of Scripture, what fuels the
Anglican spirit is the Incarnation.
I
realize that “Incarnation” is a fancy word, so to make sure we’re all on the same
page – “Incarnation” is the central Christian commitment to the claim that, as
the Creed puts us “For us and for our salvation, he came down from heaven: By
the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was
made man.” Incarnation means that God took on flesh, living and dying a human
life. Perhaps you’ve been to a restaurant and ordered “carne asada” which is
Spanish for “grilled meat.” “Carne” means “flesh.” So “Incarnation” means “in
the flesh.” It’s not that God visited us in a vision, something like an angel. Nor
is it that Jesus was some sort of heavenly hologram, where he seemed to be with
us. No, the Incarnation insists that the Second Person of the Trinity, the
Eternal Word through whom all Creation was made, was really, and truly, and
fully human. God was embodied with all that goes along with it – splinters,
body odor, upset stomachs, headaches, hunger, ticklishness, laugher – all of
it.
That
is what at the very center of Anglicanism. It as the great Anglican writer, CS
Lewis, puts it: “Every miracle of our faith prepares for, exhibits, and results
from the central miracle of the Incarnation.” Creation, Exodus, Feeding of the
5,000, Crucifixion, Resurrection, Pentecost, and the Last Day all anticipate or
flow from the fact that the Word became flesh. Again, every other Christian tradition
affirms the Incarnation. They all celebrate Christmas, and many of them do it quite
well. But Anglicans are distinct in that we have Christmas at the very center
of all things.
For
the remainder of the sermon, I’m going to define, describe, and detail what
this focus on the Incarnation means for Anglicanism. I’ve already given the
dictionary sort of definition for Incarnation, but let’s get a bit more clarity
on the defining Incarnation. Trinitarian theology is both incredibly simple and
profoundly complicated. It’s simple in that the equation is 1+1+1=1.
Understanding how that works is complicated. The Incarnation only makes sense
when we trust that God is both One and God is, at the same time, Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit. What the Incarnation says is that the Son, who is God, but is not
the entirety of the Trinity, became human. So we are not saying that the Father
was Incarnate because it was the Son, the Second Person of the Trinity, who
came among us. And the Son is, as the Creed teaches us, “eternally begotten of
the Father, God from God, Light from Light, very God of very God, begotten, not
made, of one Being with the Father.”
This
is what John has in mind when he writes what is, for Anglicans, perhaps the
most significant sentence in all of Scripture, even in all of history – “And
the Word became flesh and lived among us.” To further illustrate how important
this verse is to Anglicans, perhaps you’ve heard of “The Chord.” Even if you’ve
not heard of it, you’ve heard it. In the final verse of the great Christmas
hymn “O come, all ye faithful,” there is a definition of the Incarnation: “Word
of the Father, now in flesh appearing.”
There is an arrangement
by the great musician of King’s College, Cambridge, Sir David Willcocks, of
this hymn that is widely used and uses a different notation on this final verse
when we sing “Word.” It is a half-diminished seventh chord that gives gravitas
and majesty to it. And this isn’t some obscure musical factoid, Church-nerds
have t-shirts with this chord printed on it. There was even a New York Times
article about it last year. I can’t explain why this particular chord is so
powerful any more than I can explain how it is that God became man, but my
inability to put it into words does not change the fact that the Word became
flesh. That is the definition of Incarnation – that in Jesus, God is with us.
Jesus is fully, completely, and without reservation the answer to the prayer of
Advent: O come, O come, Emmanuel.
Now, to describe what
this means. There are a few things that are true because of the Incarnation,
and they are the hallmarks of Anglicanism. The first is that the Incarnation is
Christocentric – it focuses on Jesus Christ. In no way does this diminish the
role of the Father or the Spirit, it’s just that at our center is the story of
the Gospels. You can see this expressed in our liturgy, as the Gospel is read
from the center of the nave with a procession. Our buildings are cross-shaped
in layout. As we heard in Galatians, it is through Christ that we are made
children of God. Anglican spirituality and theology are rooted in the person
and work of Jesus.
The Incarnation also
gives us a distinctive approach to Creation. This aspect of Incarnational and
Anglican theology goes all the back to the Celtic roots of our tradition. As the
former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, puts it, “The Incarnation does
not require a miracle, it reveals that Creation already was one.” In other
words, the Incarnation does not require an explanation because it is the
explanation for everything else. Because God has always intended to come among
us, the beauty and goodness of Creation are necessities. As we know from
another hymn, “Let every heart prepare him room and heaven and nature sing.” Nature
sings to receive her King. In Isaiah, we heard the prophet testify about a
garden springing up to life. Indeed, for us Anglicans, creation is the first
miracle which prepares for the coming of the Word in the flesh. It’s why
Anglicans focus on materiality and senses. Our worship is not intellectual, but
there are sights, smells, sounds, and tastes. There is a very physical aspect to
Anglican spirituality – you’ve noticed this in the crossing of ourselves in
worship and the kneeling, standing, and sitting. There is a goodness and
sacredness that infuses all of creation because of our Incarnational lens.
And this leads to the
next description of our Anglican identity. We are sacramental. Yes, we focus on
the Sacraments in worship, but we see all of life as sacramental. John speaks
about the light that came into the world at the Incarnation and how this light
enlightens everyone; transforming everything it encounters. What this means is
that Anglicans embrace mystery because we don’t draw a distinction between the
sacred and the secular. The whole world is charged with the grandeur of God;
every common bush afire with God. This does not mean that the Sacraments of the
Church are not special or holy – they are. They are sure and certain means of
God’s grace. But there is a sacramental character to all of life. Humanity and
divinity are intertwined through the lens of Incarnation. As Lewis puts it in
his Narnia books, Anglicans recognize that there is a “deep magic” that
sustains and undergirds all things.
The last description of Anglican
distinctiveness is that our theology is contextual and tangible. Isaiah said, “I
will greatly rejoice in the Lord,
my whole being shall exult in my God.” This is a very Anglican sensibility. It’s
why we insist on common prayer; prayer that is in the vernacular. There is an
incredible specificity to the Incarnation. The Son of God does not become
Incarnate once in every generation and on every continent. No, it was a very specific
and contextual event that occurred in the fullness of time. It doesn’t necessarily
mean that first-century Palestine is the best of all times and places, but it
was the right time for the Incarnation.
This is why Anglicans are
so resistant to things like doctrinal confessions and systematic theologies.
Our theology is what some call “occasional,” meaning we do the work of theology
when the situation calls for it, but we don’t do it in the abstract. This is
the frustration a lot of people have with Anglicans. You ask us a question,
particularly about politics or ethics, and we don’t respond with a ready-made
answer. We ask a follow-up: tell me more about the situation. This is why,
though we are united in common prayer, Episcopal congregations can have such differences
regarding style and formality of worship. Context matters and diversity is a blessing,
not something to overcome. This contextual sensibility is rooted in our
Incarnational center.
Briefly, I’ll point out
some details where you can notice how the Incarnation shapes Anglicanism. The
Incarnational focus on the sacredness of Creation helps us to understand why
our tradition prioritizes beauty so much. Whether it is architecture,
vestments, prayers, music, or liturgy – Anglicanism strives to express beauty
in all things because beauty is one way of encountering the goodness of Christ
in Creation.
The tangible and physical
aspect of the Incarnation explains why Anglicans are mindful of social justice
issues. As is expressed in our Baptismal Covenant, we prioritize the inherent
dignity of all people. This isn’t a liberal or “Woke” agenda, it is an
expression of an Incarnational faith. Bodies matter – so how we use and treat bodies
matters.
Because the distinction
between sacred and profane is blurred in Anglican spirituality, it means that
Anglicans have historically been avid supporters of the humanities and sciences.
We do not see science and faith as competitors, but rather as partners in
pursuing truth. The humanities of arts, literature, history, philosophy, and languages
are not seen as distractions or lesser fields to theology; instead, the
humanities are different ways to approach the God who is in all things.
Related to the concept of
Incarnation is humility, which is best expressed in a hymn of the early Church
found in Philippians – “Though Christ Jesus was in the form of God, he did not
regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.” Yes, Anglicans can
be as arrogant as any other tradition, sometimes more so. But that is a characteristic
of our sinful human nature, not our Incarnational nature. When Anglicans get
into trouble, we leave behind our humility and try to get overly theological. We
do our best when we pray and serve because that is about having God and others
at the center. Almost all of our problems arise when we get away from worship
and charity.
This sense of humility
brings us to the final detail about Anglicanism – and I’ve already mentioned
it: we embrace mystery. Humility reminds us that we do not know it all, and so
mystery is something that Anglicans are quite comfortable with. We realize that
sometimes beauty says more than a book. Good liturgy is more foundational than
a good catechism. Common prayer matters more than common thoughts.
Bringing this all
together is, hopefully not surprisingly, the Eucharist. No, we are not the only
tradition that values and centers the Eucharist. Again, there’s nothing uniquely
special about Anglicanism, only things that make us distinct. In the Eucharist,
all of this comes together. The Eucharist, like the Incarnation, is when time
touches eternity as God is with us in the body of Christ. The Eucharist is
centered on Christ, it comes from the grapes and grain of Creation, it is about
a sacramental transformation, and happens in specific celebrations across time
and space. The Eucharist is full of beauty, it urges us to make sure that all people
have a place at the tables of our world, it reminds us of our humble place
before God, and it is a sacred mystery. The Eucharist would have us behold the fullness
of our humanity that we might become the fullness of the love we receive in it. The Eucharist is an expression of our Incarnational nature as Anglicans.
It’s not at all a
competition, we just happen to do Christmas really well because the proclamation
of Christmas that “the Word was made flesh” is what makes us distinctively
Anglican. It is the specialty that we bring to the table of Christian
fellowship. Therefore, let us keep the feast.
