The Episcopal Bishop of Atlanta’s 2012 Christmas Eve Sermon

Posted by Kendall Harmon

What is God like? God is like Christmas! It’s just like God to get the good news to the shepherds first. Who were these guys? They were working the late-night shift. Day laborers but at night. Guys trying to make a buck. No pedigrees. Outside of the city.
Outside of the system.

That’s who gets the light show, the angelic choir concert and the word first. By right the announcement should have happened in the temple, with all the people like me standing around. But it doesn’t. And we can’t tell God how God should be God. Isaiah said it best, “Our thoughts are not his thoughts; neither are our ways his ways.” What can God possibly be up to by this? It has to be that God wants to jar our sense of order so we might finally be open to his order, “to a more excellent way.” And new ways and new openness are born in the imagination. God wants our imaginations. That’s got to be it.

Read it all.

Filed under: * Anglican - EpiscopalEpiscopal Church (TEC)TEC Bishops* Christian Life / Church LifeChurch Year / Liturgical SeasonsChristmasParish MinistryMinistry of the OrdainedPreaching / Homiletics

11 Comments Posted January 4, 2013 at 7:29 am

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