Johann Gerhard on Christmass [Christmass Day]

T E X T O N L Y

READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• Isaiah 52:6-10

• Hebrews 1:1-12

• St. John 1:1-14

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ—Amen
 
Please hearken to the historic proclamation of Christmass Day:
The twenty-fifth day of December.
In the five thousand one hundred and ninety-ninth year of the creation of the world
 
from the time when God in the beginning created the heavens and the earth;
 
the two thousand nine hundred and fifty-seventh year after the flood;
 
the two thousand and fifteenth year from the birth of Abraham;
 
the one thousand five hundred and tenth year from Moses
and the going forth of the people of Israel from Egypt;
 
the one thousand and thirty-second year from David's being anointed king;
 
in the sixty-fifth week according to the prophecy of Daniel;
 
in the one hundred and ninety-fourth Olympiad;
 
the seven hundred and fifty-second year from the foundation of the city of Rome;
 
the forty second year of the reign of Octavian Augustus;
the whole world being at peace,
in the sixth age of the world,
 
Jesus Christ the eternal God and Son of the eternal Father,
desiring to sanctify the world by His most merciful coming,
being conceived by the Holy Spirit,
and nine months having passed since His conception,
was born in Bethlehem of Judea of the Virgin Mary,
being made flesh.
 
The Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh.
 
On this day of our Lord’s Nativity (birth), instead of a sermon prepared by me, I share with you a short devotional writing from one of the many gifted theologians throughout the history of the church. Today’s selection is a snippet from a Christmas sermon by Johann Gerhard. Gerhard is revered as the greatest theologian of the seventeenth century Lutheran Church. In addition to being a Dr. of Theology, he was also a very fine parish pastor. 
 
What you will hear is a portion of one of his Christmas sermons. In this sermon, Gerhard, examines the message of the angel to the shepherds. He preaches a Christmas sermon on the very first Christmas sermon. This snippet is about the angel’s words: “For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior.”
 
The words of Johann Gerhard: 
For you today is born a Savior. All these words press for faith, for only through faith is Christ born in a spiritual manner within our hearts; without this spiritual birth the physical birth of Christ benefits us nothing. If a wild tree is to bear fruit, it has to be grafted into a fruitbearing, life-giving branch, so that it might receive nurture and strength from it; thus the human nature in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ became a Tree of Life. 
 
If we are to receive fruits from Him and be made alive, we must, through faith, be engrafted into Him, just as He comfortingly speaks of this in John 15:14: I am the genuine vine; remain in me, and I in you. Just as a tendril shoot cannot produce fruit of itself, except it remain on the vine; so also not you, unless you remain in Me.
 
Into His assumed human nature, Christ at the same time placed the fullness of divine grace and truth. If it is to benefit us, then we must partake of the self-same fullness; that takes place through faith (John 1:16). The Lord Christ became man in order that we men might become partakers of the divine nature; if that is to occur, then we must believe, as it is once more stated in John 1:12: He did give power to become God's children to such as who believe on His Name.
 
Our birth is unclean and unholy (Psalm 51:7): We were conceived in sin, born in sin. Christ’s birth was pure and holy; if we are to be redeemed from our sinful birth, then we must sink it into Christ’s holy birth. That takes place only by faith.
 
That’s why God has placed all the treasures that Christ brought along with His birth into faith, for through faith we fruitfully partake of the flesh of Christ. Through this same flesh of Christ is Life, and thus we come to the Father through Christ, as He says in John 14:6: No one comes to the Father, except through Me. And, the human nature of Christ thus becomes for us a door to deity, just as faith is a door for us to Christ’s humanity.
 
Accordingly, whoever grasps this word: “This little Child is born for you”, that is, “whoever receives and trusts this birth as if Christ had stepped down from heaven and was born solely on his account”, such a one will also find in Him a Savior and a Christ, just as the angel already here calls this little Child a Savior. If one then is saved from sins, he also is righteous before God; for where there no longer is any sin, at that point there is righteousness. If he is righteous before God, then the law will not be allowed to accuse him, for no law is given to the righteous (1 Tim. 1:9). 
 
If he is redeemed from the accusation of the Law, then he is in grace with God, for where God’s Law does not damn, there God does not fume in anger either. If one is in grace with God, he also has the certain hope of eternal life; for eternal life is nothing other than the eternally enduring grace from God and joy in God…
 
…Just as on that occasion the worthy little Child lying in the manger and wrapped in swaddling clothes was met by the shepherds, so He still has a crib and swaddling clothes in which one should seek Him. The manger is the Christian Church, which feeds us God’s Word; in that very same Word is Christ, in that very same Word alone is salvation.
 
Just as this manger has an outwardly insignificant appearance, so also it fares with the Christian Church and the Christian: In God’s eyes it is glorious, but in the eyes of men it is insignificant and despised. That’s why the Christian Church speaks in the High Song of Solomon 1:5: I am black, but indeed beautiful. She is outwardly black in the eyes of men, for the heat of temptation and trepidation has thus burned [her]; inwardly she is beautiful in the eyes of God.
 
Christ’s swaddling clothes are the Holy Scriptures, which are the paper swaddling clothes in which He has wrapped Himself for the entire Scripture promotes Christ; He is the kernel of Scripture. It is true [that] these little cloths [the pages of Scripture] have an insignificant appearance; it appears as if Christ is not in them. Human reason can also not find Christ in them; but when the divine Light comes to it, by which the eyes of our understanding become enlightened, one can in them joyfully find Christ—just as the shepherds already here found this little Child at Bethlehem in insignificant swaddling clothes.
 
Amen.
The peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus—Amen