All Saints, celebrated 10 years last Sunday. And there was a story we used to tell here in this church, which was about a gorilla. And can we move to the next slide? And I’m not sure if you remember the story about the gorilla from Belfast Zoo. No. There’s lots of shaking heads there.
So that gives me an excuse to tell you this story. So Belfast used to have this really famous gorilla. And that’s not a, a live picture, but that’s a picture of his brother. Okay? And this gorilla draw a lot of attention. Lots of kids, lots of families would come. But then sadly, the gorilla died. But because it was such a, a great income earner for the Belfast Zoo suit, what they decided to do was, well, we have to do something.
And so what they did is that they asked one of their interns to go and put on a big gorilla suit. And to climb into the enclosure and pretend to be the gorilla. And so interns, as you know, interns have to do what they’re told to do. And so he put on the suit, went into the enclosure, just sat there for a few days and the kids would come in and come and he noticed how they would get.
Interested in him and then he would like start walking around. And then the children got really excited and he would start like beating his chest and things even more exciting. And then he decided to do the whole climbing thing. And then after he did the climbing thing, he decided to the swinging thing.
And then the swinging thing kind of became the wrong thing in that he swung out of the enclosure and landed in the one next door, which was the lion’s pen. And so. The intern in the suit saw the lion get up and start moving towards him. So the intern decided stuff this and started shouting out, “help me, help me; Get me outta here!” And then he heard it say, “Shut up. Or we’ll both be in trouble!”
Who was in the suit? Who is inside? Jesus, when you see that baby born in the manger, who is there? Many of you, of your babies with you today, is it simply a child, beautiful child, or who is there in the manger who is there that we, we gather and praise in a church like this when lots of people are not in a church like this, who is there?
John’s gospel doesn’t begin with his birth. Even though it’s miraculous and wondrous and the angels are appearing to Mary, the angels are speaking to shepherds. A group of shepherds are visiting baby Jesus. John doesn’t begin with that. He doesn’t also begin with Jesus ministry either. I mean, can you imagine writing a journal of like a year or even a month with Jesus?
I mean, like just thinking about what we already know. I mean, Jesus water changed into wine. Lots of it. Man paralyzed on bed, lowered through roof, walks out front door, doesn’t fix roof storms on the sea. Jesus sleeps through it, commands it to stop with a word, which it does. Later in another storm, he walks in.
The water raises 12-year-old girl from the dead. Awesome teaching. Your journal would just go on and on and on and on, but John doesn’t start there either. John starts somewhere else. At the beginning, but it’s a different beginning. In the beginning was a word and the word was with God, and the word was God.
He was with God in the beginning. And then a few verses, the verses on our screen, the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We know, don’t we? Who is in the suit? Who is Jesus in the manger? It is God with us. John is teaching us in a very clear, simple, yet incredible way, God with us in the manger, and perhaps it’s worth chewing maybe for a few more moments on those, those opening verses from John.
John says in the beginning, he chooses it deliberately. He would’ve known how that would take people back to Genesis in their mind. First book of the Bible. He deliberately chooses those words and he would’ve known why he wrote them in the beginning. Suggests a new creation comes with Jesus. Paul talked about that, didn’t he?
He said, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has gone, the new has come. Genesis, when you read it sees chaos being removed with order. We see how beauty comes out of, of just stuff. We see life comes outta nothing. As if John is saying all these things are possible with Jesus life outta nothing.
Beauty outta chaos, order outta disorder. But also in the beginning, John says, and he takes us back to when only God existed. And he said the word was with God and the word was God, not a God. There’s no article in the Greek there. Simply says word was God. It does not say the word became God. No, the word was God.
So whatever we say about God, we must say about the word. And the word is Jesus. The word became flesh. Before creation, the word existed. He was with God, and was God part of the trinity? But that word became flesh among us. What an incredible introduction. The baby and the manger that the angels sing about the baby.
The shepherd’s visit is God among us. Now we’re gonna do the sermon three parts, so can invite you to stand, we’re gonna sing, a verse in between each, each of these. So let stand, we’re just gonna split up.
You could say joy to the world. The Lord has come. That would be enough, you could say. But actually. There is more. John is, is throwing at us in, in this reading. He says through him, meaning the word, all things were made. Without him, nothing was made. That has been made. A Christian apologist and and scientist, John Lennox, talks about how to study the laws of physics is to search out the mind of God.
You may have places that you love to visit. Or you’ve got images still on your phone, maybe that could be something to do either during service or even during, over your lunches later to ask your children, if you have, if you’re a part of a family. What’s your favorite place in the last year?
You know, for me, I, I’m a person who just loves sea. I love snow. Don’t think I’m gonna see snow this month. Maybe never in the Netherlands. But, um, but I also remember. Lu in Wales, a reservoir, it was tucked up in the Welsh Hills, taking an hour hiking up to it, and you’re always alone. There was never anyone there, but you go there, the water was smooth, like anything, and it’d be stones, and we would just spend time just skimming stones across this huge reservoir up in the hills.
You know, all those places I love and, and there’s places you love, but John says, without him, without the word. Nothing that has been made without. So you could say that whenever you see that beautiful image that you really enjoy, remember that beautiful place where you were, that has the signature of Jesus on it, the fingerprints of Jesus on it.
I mean, just thinking about that would already be a good reason to bow your head. Or to boil to your knees, or if you’re biking past it just to say a prayer or praise out loud, thank you, Lord Jesus, that you made this. You made this. And when you think about the shepherds who are in those hills, watching those sheep, looking at that night sky, all that creation, all those animals, all that land, all those hills was made through the one they would come to visit in Bethlehem.
That is. Awe, inspiring the creator who made all those places you enjoy. He walked among us. He walked among us. The word became flesh, and throughout among us next slide, the word became flesh and made us dwelling among us. And that word. Dwelling can be translated as tent or as a message translation. Wonderfully translated.
He moved into the neighborhood. He moved into the neighborhood. I mean, again, think about that on this day, God with us, you know, when I think about my life, I’m probably somebody who gets too easily impressed by people and too overly awed. But to use a, a football analogy of arguably one of the greatest managers who ever, ever existed, imagine, sir Alex Ferguson, ever a move to live into Scot Horst, not Lewiston, but Scot Horst.
Okay. And I would think, wow. But then part of me would think, why are you living in Scot Horst? But why would I do that? Because. Yes, they’re a famous special person. Why would they live in Scot horse, even though I love living in Scot Horst. But why would they live there? But then think about that, the word, the creator.
Why would the word come and dwell among us? The majestic king come and dwell in this world. He set aside his majesty. He accepts the limits of humanity so that all who believe in him can be saved. That’s why he does it. Oh, there his great love. So we can be saved. No peace and have eternal life. And so, John, in those verses talks about the gifts Christ came to give, why he came among us, why he came.
As flesh, the gift of lights, the light of the world, who comes to dispel personal and community darkness, the gift of life he offers all of this abundant life, beginning with spiritual, eternal life with God. The gift of being involved in his purposes. The gift of of everyone gets to play. The fact of being sent, everyone is part of his kingdom purposes for his plans and the gift of belonging.
Somebody said to me once, no Christian. Is an orphan because we’ve all been adopted into the family of Heavenly Father. We are all children of God, and as somebody else said, each one of you is a prince or a princess for, you’re a child of the king, but no one’s forced to be royalty. Each person here has a choice to accept or reject him to let him reign.
So the joy of God being among us, but God among us doesn’t end there with Christmas or Jesus ministry. Before his ascension. As we read John’s gospel, we hear a lot about the Holy Spirit being mentioned, and we read how the Holy Spirit is needed for people to see who Jesus really is, that he’s more than just a baby born in a stable in Bethlehem.
As Nicodemus is told in John three, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they’re born again of the spirit. But then in John 14 to 16 there are five promises by the Spirit given by Jesus reminding us that the spirit comes to those who follow Jesus, and who is the Spirit? Well, Luke and Paul say the spirit is the presence of God.
God’s empowering presence. They say he’s the spirit of Jesus and Jesus himself. Those words in John said he would send another counselor to us. Another meaning one like him, the spirit will be the same as Jesus. So Jesus, the counselor is now sending a second counselor to us, which means the ongoing work of the Spirit will be continuation of the work of Jesus during the disciple’s lifetime.
So we have God’s presence with us. We have the gift of God’s spirit guiding and teaching us, but this is not the force. This is not like Star Wars. This is God’s personal, empowering presence with each of us. Jesus, the one who moved into the neighborhood as a baby in Bethlehem, now comes to live in us by the Spirit, and we can look forward to the day when we will see him face to face and be with him forever in person.
You know, it’s moving to think about the God up there became the God down here. You Jesus, chose to live in times when people died unjustly, that there was wars, there’s occupations, there was strange and cruel. Leaders, sickness, death, retirement, farming, fishing. He came down into all of that and those still, those things still remain with us today.
And he is still with us today by his spirit.
One of my best friends is called Jesse. And Jesse’s youngest son was born nine years ago, couple days ago now. 2016 was a, a very tragic year for Jessie and her family. Her husband’s sister died of cancer in her thirties. And the pregnancy was also very, very difficult for Jesse.
But when her son was born December, 2016, she called him Emmanuel Albert. And, I remember asking Jesse about why, why she called him Emmanuel. And she said she was very happy to tell her family and friends why she called her son Emmanuel, because she had chose that name deliberately for him.
Because it means God with us. And she knew God had been with them in the dark times, and he knew he’d be with them in the times ahead, and he knew that God did not leave her. And so her son Emmanuel, becomes a reminder of God’s faithfulness, past, present, and future. You know, God was with us in that manger.
God was with us. As he healed and taught and had meals with people, God was with us as he hung on that cross, and now he lives within us. So we’re never alone. But the challenge is belief, as John reminds us. See, in your testament, there’s this wonderful vision of how the tabernacle, the big tent, is being moved around now, cloud covered the tent of meeting and they knew God was with them, and when the cloud lifted, they would move on.
And they saw the Lord with them. And yet we look at Jesus, the word made flesh, the Lord is with us. Yet it takes eyes of faith to see that is more than just a person that is more than just a baby. It takes eyes of faith to remember that the Lord is with us by His spirit. Even when we feel nothing, he is with us.
You know, there’s a funny story, but I understand it is true. Um, there’s a church in, in Sheffield where the vicar told me of a man, whoever, so often he would go to a cafe for coffee and he would pull up two chairs and order two cakes, one for him and one for Jesus. And the vicar said this to me, in all seriousness.
It wasn’t mocking, they said, the guy said. Sometimes Jesus didn’t eat the cake and he’d have to eat it. Now, we may not want to copy that idea, but there’s something profound there. That man inspires us to have a tangible sense that Jesus was with him, not just in the spiritual stuff, not just in church, not even at the Bible, but he was with him day by day on a run, on a walk at the beach, sitting on a chair in bed.
He was never alone. Jesus never left him, and that’s part of the promise to take away from Christmas. That isn’t just a moment of God being with us, but there’s that promise for us believers by spirit. He is with us to the end of time by spirit. So who is in the close of Jesus? The word made flesh, that Word made us dwelling among us, and he continues to dwell within each of us by his spirit.
So let’s, affirm our faith. We’ve talked a lot about who God is. Let’s declare and also declaring today, remembering those Christians across the world who are celebrating with us. The word made flesh. We believe in one God, the father, the almighty, maker of heaven and earth of all that is seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God. Begotten, not made of one being with the Father. Through him, all things were made for us.