Christmas Day December 25, 2019 The Nativity of our Lord

Christmas Day
John 1:1-18
December 25, 2019

“Our ‘Flesh and Blood’ Brother”

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

I just saw a short little Christmas video the other day where two brothers reunited. It was one of these videos where they’re trying desperately to make you cry. And they almost got me. The long lost brother who had obviously done something really bad came back home for Christmas and gets into it with his brother. Christmas is about to be ruined. But it ends with repentance and forgiveness and hugs and smiles and Christmas dinner. All was well.

Christmas definitely makes us all think of family. We intuitively think we should be with our family. Some of you probably won’t be with family for many and various reasons and it probably hurts. Friends have a way of coming and going, but family—your flesh and blood—is always supposed to remain. And that goes even if you’re adopted. It becomes your flesh-and-blood family. We should never forget our family, our own flesh and blood.

You see a bit of this in Joseph and his brothers. After Joseph’s dreams and his preferential treatment by their father, his brothers were absolutely ready to kill him. When they see him coming from a distance they make their plans to murder him. But first the eldest brother Reuben says, “Hold on a minute. We can’t kill him.” So they throw him a pit while they consider what to do with him. Then when they see a caravan of Ishmaelites coming, brother Judah says, “Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.”

You shouldn’t kill your brother, your own flesh. And yet, of course, it didn’t stop Cain. That’s where we get it from. Cain’s jealousy, anger, and then hatred were enough to make him shed the blood of his own flesh and blood. You see, he shed his own blood, his own brother. This is how great and terrible is our sin—that even our own flesh and blood aren’t safe from our jealousy, our anger, our hatred, our coveting, our lies.

Now take that a step further. All of humanity is our family. We are all, if you go back far enough, flesh and blood relatives. We’re all from the same parents, Adam and Eve, and more importantly from the same Father, God in heaven. None of us ever ought to murder one of our own family. Every culture knows this truth, “You shall not murder.” The law is written on our hearts. We know that we shouldn’t get angry with one another, be jealous, hate, lie, covet, and generally mistreat our brother. You can kill a cow or a pig for food, you can euthanize a pet, you can cut down a tree—but you don’t murder your brother!

And yet we do. The way we talk about others in our human family is shameful. There’s no respect of our human brothers and sisters. We slap a label on someone—conservative, liberal, Republican, Democrat, feminist, homosexual, racist, bigot—and then we hate them and wish them dead. Our own flesh and blood! Lord, have mercy on us.

And He has had mercy on us. What if there was someone who was our flesh and blood brother and yet didn’t have the sin and hatred and murder of Cain in His heart like we do? What if there was someone who was our own flesh and blood humanity who had perfect love for every single member of humanity, his own brothers and sisters? What if this person was not only our human brother, but was also God Himself, that He might give us new hearts that are full of His same love?

And there He is lying in the manger on Christmas morning! We’re like Adam when God took one of his ribs and made Eve. He exclaimed, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.” That was before sin, of course. Adam delighted in her. He loved her. They were both naked and not ashamed.

That’s the way we are when we see this sinless baby in the manger. “This at last is bone of our bones and flesh of our flesh!” Our brother! He is without sin and perfect and holy. He’s our brother and yet at the same time our God. And through His forgiveness and His new life, we are naked before Him and not ashamed.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus is our brother. He says to us from the manger, “You’re my flesh and blood! You’re my brother! You’re my sister! I love you and have come to redeem you from all evil, from death and from hell and to bring you into My heavenly family with God My Father as your Father.”

Hebrews chapter 2 explains it beautifully, “He is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, ‘I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.’…Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery….Therefore He had to be made like His brothers in every respect, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”

“You’re my flesh and blood!” Jesus says. I will keep the entire law perfectly for You. My perfect obedience will be your perfect obedience. My perfect righteousness will make you righteous. And then I will take the full punishment for all your sins on the cross—because I’m your brother and I love you. And I will die your death and rise on the third day so that you too may be raised from death to life and live with Me and My family eternally in heaven.

And now, as your Brother, I will continue to bring My flesh and blood to You in the Lord’s Supper so that You and I may be one and I may live in you and you in Me. And I, your Brother, will bring all your prayers to the Father’s throne in heaven and I will intercede for you. You’re my flesh and blood! And I will rule over all Creation and the Church so that you can rest assured that all things will work together for good for those who love Me. And I, your Brother, will come again to judge the living and the dead and to bring you into the inheritance prepared for you from before the foundation of the world. You’re my flesh and blood!”

This all is what it means that Jesus is your flesh and blood Brother. Family sticks together! Jesus is perfect Love and He perfectly loves you, His brothers and His sisters.

Now this Christmas, ought we to consider then from the love of our Brother Jesus Christ how we ought to love our fellow humanity, our own flesh and blood brothers and sisters. If Jesus was willing to take on the flesh and blood of all humanity and raise us up to the heights of heaven, we also should be willing to love our brothers.

So 1 John chapter 3, “For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. …Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.”

When you see your brother in need you should know, “That’s my flesh and blood.” When you are tempted to call your brother a name or be jealous or hateful, you should know, “That’s my flesh and blood.” We are a family. Christ came and died for all and to you who have believed in Him, He has given the right to become children of God. You are God’s child and Christ’s brother! A true family Christmas!

In Jesus’ name. Amen.