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The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14).

Or again as Eugene Peterson puts it in The Message: \u201cThe Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.\u201d

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Yup, same text again today.\xa0 There\u2019s one more thing I\u2019d like to say about it before we move on.

Our faith can sometimes become spiritualized in a bad way.\xa0 We think of a heaven that\u2019s puffy and abstract.\xa0 We talk about high ideals like love, faith, and hope.\xa0 We participate in studies and sermons where we learn all sorts of good stuff about God.

But do all these words of our faith, our learning, and our Christian ideals become flesh and blood?\xa0 Do they become concrete and take on life in our neighbourhood?

We say that they did once.\xa0 We say that the very Word of God leapt off the page and out of the mouth and mind into real, living, breathing existence in the dirt and grind of this world.\xa0

The Word of God pooped and had its diaper changed.\xa0 The Word of God took on a gendered pronoun: \u201che/him/his\u201d (and dropped the impersonal, dead-on-the-page pronoun of \u201cit\u201d).\xa0 The Word of God fell and skinned his knees. \xa0The Word of God learned a trade and put in some sweat equity.\xa0 The Word of God knew what it was to watch his adoptive father die and he grieved with his family.\xa0 The Word of God wept at the graveside of a friend too.\xa0 The Word of God got thirsty.\xa0 The Word of God made and drank wine and feasted around tables with reputable and questionable folks alike.\xa0 The Word of God danced at weddings.\xa0 The Word of God touched real prostitutes, leapers, and other sinners, healing them.\xa0 The Word of God got angry at injustice and rioted about it, flipping over tables.\xa0 The Word of God was nailed to a plank by soldiers, a government, and a religious establishment who had had quite enough of the Word of God\u2019s action in their world.\xa0 The Word of God forgave them.

The Word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighbourhood.\xa0 And when He did, things happened in that neighbourhood.\xa0 Things changed.

Does the Word of God still get up and put pants on one leg at a time in our neighbourhoods?\xa0 I\u2019m not asking if Jesus is still walking among us.\xa0 But He gave commands, including follow me.\xa0 The Word tells us that we are His hands and feet in this world, to be judged upon the cups of cold water we did or did not physically, practically bring to those in need.\xa0 The Spirit is in us to bring the dry bones of our faith to life so that we really can be those hands and feet in the life we live right now, today.\xa0

The Word of God was not only the Word of God at church.\xa0 Jesus was not only Jesus in the synagogue.\xa0 He was the Word of God always.\xa0 While playing, eating, working, studying, speaking, traveling, buying, drinking, resting.\xa0

Does the Word of God live in your flesh and blood neighbourhood like that?\xa0 In all those places and activities?\xa0 It seems to me that if we\u2019re to follow Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, then it should. \xa0

So on the ornament today, I\u2019m going to invite you to draw a picture of whatever you\u2019re going to be doing today\u2014because that is the place where God is inviting His words to be lived out in the flesh and blood of your life today.\xa0 You can write \u201cWord made Flesh\u201d on your ornament to remind you.

And as for action: well, that\u2019s for you to discern.\xa0 How is the Spirit inviting and prodding you to turn the words of your faith into your life and living today?\xa0 Pick one and do it.

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