The Second Sunday after Christmas

Matthew 2:13-23

January 5, 2025

“The Light shines in the darkness.” That’s how John’s Gospel describes the birth of Jesus. He is the Light, and this world is the darkness. That darkness is not just around us. It is in us. It is both human and demonic. For man embraced the demonic. He listened to the satanic voice of pride and rebellion, and that voice is in our heads and in our hearts from birth.

It’s why at a baptism the baptizer says, “Depart, unclean spirit, and make way for the Holy Spirit.” The candidate for baptism is not possessed as one might see in a movie. Horror films are less frightening than the reality, if we had eyes to see. The human will is corrupt, and by nature does not like the angelic song, “Glory be to God on high, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men.” Only the Holy Spirit can convert our will. Only the Holy Spirit can call us by the Gospel. Only the Holy Spirit can teach us to embrace God’s good will, turning us from our innate evil will.

But all these words are in danger of being hollowed out for us. I was reminded again on Thursday how we lose the impact of the words. Familiarity breeds contempt – or at least indifference. But visiting one of our members who is now in a nursing home reminds me how astonishing the Gospels are. You see, her memory is failing. So when I read to her the Scriptures, it’s often like she’s hearing it fore the first time. On Thursday I read to her the Epiphany Gospel. She gasped when the Magi gave Jesus gold. “Gold?! Wow.” The last time I had visited her, I don’t remember what I read, but it was some miracle that Jesus did, and that was her same reaction: “Wow!”

She hates her forgetfulness, and I reminded her that because of Jesus, God chooses to forget our sins. “That’s very gracious,” she replied. In the fog of dementia, the Gospel is still there. Gracious is exactly the term God’s Word uses. It is only by God’s grace that we can be saved.

But I think I am more forgetful than this woman; for I read and hear the words every day, but I act like there is no “wow factor.” The world has become very flat for us, where the most important things are the value of our accounts, the cost of rent or the years left on the mortgage, what this coming storm is going to do, or if you can slog it out in your job another year.

When the Gospel is bereft of meaning, it makes the evil in the world seem senseless. That’s the word so often used when some mass shooting or terrorist attack happens: it’s called “senseless.”

It’s not senseless, as though it’s random or has no meaning. The world, and human nature, is under the sway of malevolent powers. In the prophet Isaiah the malevolence is called “darkness” and “the shadow of death”:

The people who walked in darkness

Have seen a great light;

Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death,

Upon them a light has shined. [Is. 9:2]

That Light is the Lord Jesus. “In Him was life, and that life was the light of man.”

In today’s Gospel we see demonic, malevolent power seek to snuff out the Light kindled in Bethlehem. Fear and suspicion corrupt man’s will with a hatred for God’s good will. What is truly senseless is our belief that technology or government or education or regulation can scatter the darkness. Our globe is illumined with artificial lights, yet the darkness has only grown deeper.

Herod has absolutely nothing on Planned Parenthood. No society that discards its offspring as rubbish can be called civilized. Today there are thousands of Herods, some with MDs, and others with PhDs, in prestigious universities of the lowest kind of education.

But what about you? Do you calculate the number of your children by cost and convenience? As though the God who made heaven and earth cannot bring forth coins from the mouths of fish, and rain bread from heaven?

Herod dispenses with a few baby boys, and we call it murder. Governments and businesses dispense with them by the millions, and we say with the philosopher-poet Bruce Hornsby, “That’s just the way it is.”

Yet there is this recurring term in today’s Gospel that tells us the way it really is: fulfilled. “That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord”; “Then was fulfilled what was spoken by Jeremiah”; and, “That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets.” God is taking all of this evil and turning it to good. And He is doing it according to His own plan. And it starts by Jesus redoing, retracing, recapitulating the journey of Israel. They were in bondage in Egypt, and Jesus will retrace that path. He is the true Son called out of Egypt, who will not stumble in the wilderness, who will not grumble against His Father at the arduous trial.

Witness in all this also the obedience of Joseph: The angel says to him, “Arise, take the Child, flee to Egypt, and stay there.” And Joseph rose up, took the Child, went away into Egypt, and stayed there.” These are simple sentences: Instruction, with four actions: rise, take, flee, stay. And then a simple response: Joseph rose, took, fled, stayed.

There is something profound in that simplicity: Total obedience to God. There are no meetings; no discussion, no analysis, no consideration of alternatives. Just obedience.

Joseph, as husband and father, is called to lead, provide for, and protect his family. He does so with no consideration for himself. He obeys God, and guards his family. Those are his two priorities.

Men of Immanuel, are they yours?

How easy to lose sight of our priorities, when hardship comes. When it seems the world, and even the church, is against you, what will you do? I came across these beautiful words of St. Augustine this week. They were most encouraging: “Let no-one be despondent and lose hope for himself. Let him cling to Christ, and his hope will not be deceived.”

Deceived is Herod, who imagines Christ’s birth is a threat. Anger drives Herod wild. Anger is a sin multiplier. It takes evil desire and flames it past the boiling point. What damage anger does!

So we are not deceived, the lessons of the church year don’t let us bask too long in the joy of Christmas. We get a short time of peace and goodwill, then we are reminded of the reality we still face. From Herod, and still today, we see “an explosion of horrific malice toward [Jesus], a malice which will never end and never weaken” until the day of judgment [Schmemann].

Should we then be surprised to encounter malice from the world? Herod was king in Jerusalem. Should we be surprised to find evil lurking even in the walls of Jerusalem, that is, in the church this side of glory? The devil hates Christ, and will work mayhem without and within Christ’s Church at every opportunity.

So we flee as it were to Egypt. Not because we are running away, but because we go where Jesus goes. With Him is protection. With Him is forgiveness. With Him are things that make us say, in a childlike way, “Wow!” With Him, in Him is life. That life is the light of men. So do not despair. Cling to Christ. He is life and light. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness shall not overcome it. +INJ+