Not A Manmade God

ADVENT FESTIVAL OF LESSONS & CAROLS, December 19, 2019, Third Lesson - Gospel of St. Luke 2:8-20; Theme: Not a Manmade God

I am always so deeply moved when I think about the Christmas story we just heard from St. Luke’s Gospel. For I find in it something astounding, something beyond belief, something that cannot be ignored.  I see God, the one True God, Creator of our amazing vast universe, lying there as a human Child, a baby, an infant in the manger.

There He is…vulnerable…dependent…his first visitors being poor raged shepherds who were counted as outcasts among their people.   Yet there he is in the midst of them. God the Son come among us in the flesh. This awesome fact affirms for me that Christianity is indeed the true religion revealed by God because it is so totally opposite of everything we human beings would imagine or create concerning God and religion. 

If we look at history we see that when it comes to the various gods and religions, every culture and people design them as superhuman-versions of themselves. And so, the characteristics we give these manmade gods are magnifications of what we would want to be: powerful, unyielding, controlling, and self-serving. Look at ancient Greece and Rome, or examine the Vikings of Scandinavia or the Druids of the British Isles, or Far Eastern religions and see what manmade gods and fabricated religions look like.

But now look at the Child in the Bethlehem manger and try to see, if you can, any hint of power, prestige or position. Is this a god we would create to edify us, to empower us, to motivate us, to be our protector and defender? Or is this a God whose life story turns everything we humans have ever thought about God and religion upside down? 

There’s no way we would have ever imagined that the God who is almighty and eternal would love each one of us so much, so passionately, that it would break his heart to remain apart from us. There’s no way we would have dared to believe that this awesome God would yearn to become one of us and roll up his sleeves to get dirty with us in the messiness and busyness of living as a human being! Man-made gods just don’t act like that! It would be too far beneath them.

And when we look at the beliefs of man-made religions we see the same trio of power, prestige and position at the heart of their teachings. But this Child lying in the manger would grow up to teach us truths that are very different. He will teach mercy and forgiveness, compassion & generosity.  He will call his followers us to divest themselves of superfluous wealth and embrace a simple life.  He will inspire and instruct us to serve one another even to the giving up of our lives, which he himself would one day do to prove His great love for us.

So, you see, that’s why every time I look at a Nativity set or read St. Luke’s story of Bethlehem, with its Child in the animal’s manger, surrounded by poor shepherds, I am more and more convinced that there is just no way we would have ever come up with this on our own.  My faith becomes more and more deepened and it makes me want to share with others the message that the angels announced at that first Christmas: “I bring you good news of great joy…today in the city of David, the Savior has been born for you who is both Christ and Lord.”