READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
Isaiah 11:1-5
Galatians 4:1-7
- St. Luke 2:33-40
Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you.
Merry 5th day of Christmass in which we ponder
our Lord’s words from His Gospel, saying:
“Behold, this
child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a
sign that is opposed (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also),
so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.”
The world has no use for Christmass. Sure, it loves getting
to Christmass, but Christmass and its 12 days? None.
Why is that? Because, once the Lord Jesus is born to bring
peace between men and God, violence ensues. That is, as soon as the Christ
Child is found to be a threat, an inconvenience, just a clump of cells Who will
potentially overturn our sinful world, we begin, in our sin, to reject Him. As
we sing, “He prayed for those who did the wrong - Who follows in His train?”
(LSB 661).
Who follows in the Christmas train? On the 2nd Day of
Christmass, the Church celebrates St. Stephen, the first martyr. What follows
Christmass is the blood of a martyr, the first after the Resurrection of Jesus.
We celebrate St. Stephen not just to bless the poor, but to bless the poor of
the world. The poor that the world judges so poor, that it must be rid of them,
to death.
The third day of Christmass is St. John. St. John is a
martyr that lived to old age. That’s not a martyr, you say? Well, all of St.
John’s life is one of a martyr. He embodied the “living sacrifice” (Rom 12:1)
Jesus spoke of. You could say a martyr’s life is easy, being able to die
quickly. Spending your entire life as one, would be the hardest.
The 4th Day is the Day of the Holy Innocents. This appears
to be the most tragic feast day in the Christmass season, but only in the
world’s eyes. And even they are hypocritical, for while they would hate God for
allowing such a tragedy to happen, they will also say, in the same breath, its
good those babies got out of this world before more suffering happened to them.
They are the lucky ones.
We mention these who follow the Lord after His Nativity,
because of St. Simeon’s cryptic words to St. Mary in today’s Gospel: “and a
sword will pierce through your own soul also, so that thoughts from many hearts
may be revealed” (Lk 2:35). No, St. Mary will not die in a duel, however
cool that would have been. The sword has to do with the “thoughts from many
hearts”. So it is not a knights and armor “sword”.
She is also not in danger of losing her soul, she is in
danger of being divided because of her Son. The sword will divide her very
being, because she will be faced with a decision. Will she be troubled, as she
was in front of Gabriel, at the statement of faith that her son is God in the
flesh? Or will she submit and humble herself under the belief that the way of
Jesus is the way of blood?
Hear this prophesy about Jesus, from Ezekiel:
“And as for your birth, on the day you were born your
cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to cleanse you, nor rubbed
with salt, nor wrapped in swaddling cloths. No eye pitied you, to do any of
these things to you out of compassion for you, but you were cast out on the
open field, for you were abhorred, on the day that you were born. And when I
passed by you and saw you wallowing in your blood, I said to you in your blood,
‘Live!’” (Ez 16:4-6)
It is the natural way, that a baby is born in blood. Most of
it is the mother’s, but in the umbilical cord is some of his own. So we can
play God’s Word off as Him just being sensitive to the perils of childbirth. We
can even stoop down to metaphors again, and shrug it off as St. Simeon’s
commentary on the struggles of raising children, moreso that St. Mary has
Jesus.
However, when we see blood, we see death. You do not walk
into crime scene with blood and think, “Oh everyone is fine”. You do not walk
into a hospital emergency room, surgery room, or delivery room with all that
blood and say, “There’s nothing dangerous going on here”.
Blood means death. St. Mary is lucky to be alive, having
delivered in a stable, and yet we have survived giving birth in similar, poor
conditions. Now, we are so spoiled we can’t imagine anything but a hospital.
Hospitals are wonderful, don’t get me wrong, but they are not omnipotent.
At this point of danger, we can say that even Jesus’s birth
was a miracle of survival. Trust in God and faith beyond measure. And what was
on hand to swaddle Him? Only what they used for His delivery. Bloodied,
swaddling cloths. This is what set Him apart and why the angels were able to
use the swaddling clothes as a marker, for the shepherds in the fields. They
were covered in blood.
Listen to Hebrews 9:
“For when every commandment of the law had been declared
by Moses to all the people, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water
and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the
people, saying, ‘This is the blood of the covenant that
God commanded for you.’ And in the same way he
sprinkled with the blood both the tent and all the vessels used in worship. 22
Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and
without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.” (Heb 9:19-22)
The world wants your blood. “Blood, sweat, and tears”, as
the saying goes, and there is nothing to be gained in this world without them.
We may think we have sanitized them, in our modern way of doing things, but we
cannot get away from our own blood and what’s required to keep it.
Jesus is born in blood. Wrapped in it that His people might
find Him. Even today, if you look for Jesus, you must find the Blood. There is
no other way to the Son, and the Son is the only way to the Father.
Does God bleed? In Christ, He does. The sacrifices made in
the Temple, where Jesus is in Today’s Gospel, proves this. His circumcision,
which Jesus is receiving, shows this. But the sacrifices and circumcisions were
all shadows and pale in comparison to the Lamb of God. Because, God says, “the
life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to
make atonement for your entire being, for it is the blood that makes atonement
by the life” (Leviticus 17:11).
Our blood can die, it stops moving. God’s Blood can die and
come back to life again, so that it never stops moving. In Jesus, the life is
in the blood. If St. Mary believes the Word and says “Amen” to life being found
in Jesus’s Blood, she will have passed the sword’s test, and be united to her
Lord through Faith alone.
If St. Stephen and the Holy Innocents believe that the Blood
flowing through their veins is no longer theirs, but Christ’s Who Lives, then
they will never die. If St. John can but hold out for one lifetime, trusting in
the Promises of Jesus, that His will is a life of martyrdom, living the mundane
and being holy, and remaining in that Promise until He comes again, then the
Body and Blood is for St. John.
This, then, remains, in the Christmass Train of our Lord,
not footprints or a foot path, but Himself; Body and Blood. No longer on the
swaddling clothes, the Living Blood of the Living Christ now flows through His
Church, as He promised, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of
the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Mt
26:27-28)
Nothing but the blood of Jesus, right? Right. His Blood to
save. His Blood to wash. His Blood to feed. And He cares for His blood as a
head cares for the body. Where it goes He goes and where it dwells He dwells.
Not even death can separate Him from His Blood, for when He sees you in His
Blood, He says to you “Live!”
Even though the double-edged sword of His Word pierce you
and divide you from your sin, you will live. Even though it judge you, and your
thoughts in your heart be revealed to be sinful and short of the mark, and you
cannot rise to Him.
He comes from on high to you. He does not keep His Blood in
heaven. it is housed on earth in His holy house, which He has made holy for
Himself, by His Blood. “Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his
blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God” (Romans 5:9).
And today, if you seek Him, you will find Him in the same
way the shepherds did: wrapped in blood, clothed in flesh, given and shed for
you.
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