Sermons
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Midnight Mass of the
Nativity
24th December 2011
Father David Wood
Parish Priest
Grace Anglican Church
Joondalup
Perth, Western Australia
Isaiah 9:2-7; Hebrews
1:1-4; Luke 2:1-1-20
In the lead-up to
Christmas ABC television
has been bombarding us
with cooking shows.
Evidently we lap up
cooking shows and
gardening programs and
home renovations because
these are things we can
control in a world out
of control. If we can’t
change the big picture,
we look closer to home,
devoting our time to
tinkering with domestic
arrangements. To this
end, we have had Nigella
Lawson telling us what
she imagines Christmas
is all about, and Rick
Stein asking everyone
from Cornish fishermen
to pastry-chefs what
Christmas means to them,
and, worst of all,
Heston Blumenthal
devising his perfect
Christmas dinner for the
rich and famous. This
meal included an entree
concocted from gold,
frankincense and myrrh,
and a desert served with
reindeer milk ice cream
– excuses for journeys
to the deserts of the
Middle East in search of
the Magi, and to frozen
Russia to visit a
reindeer farm. Some of
this is harmless enough,
and even some of the
predictably silly
definitions of Christmas
are no more than silly,
although the hugely
expensive extravagance
of the Blumenthal menu
seemed positively
blasphemous. If Heston
Blumenthal had charged
his celebrity guests
$5000 each, and given
the money to a shelter
for homeless men or to a
women’s refuge, well and
good, but he did nothing
of the sort. This was
just appalling
self-indulgence in the
face of a hungry world.
And the excuse for this
crazy escapade? Why, a
baby born in abject
poverty in the backyard
of the Roman Empire, of
course. This is the sign
given to us – not froth
and bubble, not some
great miracle, not some
razzle-dazzle Holywood
spectacular, but a
new-born baby wrapped in
swaddling bands and laid
in a manger. Nothing
extraordinary, nothing
over the top, just a
helpless child, who,
like all children,
depends on a mother’s
care. God’s sign is a
poor baby in need of
help. God’s sign is
absolute simplicity.
God’s sign is becoming
small for us. This is
how God rules and reigns
- not with power and
outward splendour to
overwhelm us or force us
or to stake out a place
in the world, but as a
child asking for our
love, as Love wanting
nothing apart from love
by way of return.
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