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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: “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.”

Yup, same text again today.  There’s one more thing I’d like to say about it before we move on.

Our faith can sometimes become spiritualized in a bad way.  We think of a heaven that’s puffy and abstract.  We talk about high ideals like love, faith, and hope.  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?  Do they become concrete and take on life in our neighbourhood?

We say that they did once.  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. 

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

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

Does the Word of God still get up and put pants on one leg at a time in our neighbourhoods?  I’m not asking if Jesus is still walking among us.  But He gave commands, including follow me.  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.  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. 

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

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

So on the ornament today, I’m going to invite you to draw a picture of whatever you’re going to be doing today—because that is the place where God is inviting His words to be lived out in the flesh and blood of your life today.  You can write “Word made Flesh” on your ornament to remind you.

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