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Christmas Message of His Eminence to the Western Archdiocese USA

Christ is Born! Glorify Him
God Locates Himself
CHRISTMAS DAY, 25, 2022

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was at the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him, nothing was made that was made... And the Word became flesh and dwelt within us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." Jn 1:1-5; 14

Dearly beloved faithful
We learn in the Holy Bible that God loves to locate Himself somewhere specific so that His people can find Him and receive His gifts.
In the ancient days of the Old Testament, God desired to be with His people. He let the people know where they could and would find Him. God ordered Moses to build a tent for Him called the Tabernacle. He would be there to receive prayers, and in that very place, He would shower His forgiveness, grace, and truth.

Later, God located Himself somewhere more permanent: The Temple Solomon built in Jerusalem. God would be there to receive their praise and worship, their prayers, supplications, and offerings. God would locate Himself in that place to give out His gifts of salvation – His glory, grace, and truth.

But the people abused both the Tent and the Temple. They thought that since God promised to locate Himself for them at that specific spot, they went their own ways instead of faithfully following Him and receiving the gifts He would give. They thought they could worship Him in any old way they wanted, using any ancient statue or image they might make or choose. So, God decided to abandon the Temple. Ezekiel (570 BC), the prophet, saw the glory of the Lord leaving the Temple. It was a sad sight. The cloud of glory picked up and moved out of the Temple, out from the city of Jerusalem. Then it hovered for a few moments on the Mount of Olives, as if sadly looking back, and then it disappeared [Ezekiel 10:11]. He was gone. And no one at the Temple even noticed.

But God is not just a God "out there" somewhere. He does not want His presence, glory, grace, or truth to be un-anchored and unlocated. The Tent or Tabernacle was merely pictures and shadows of a greater reality that God was planning yet to come and be seen in the flesh. God would inaugurate His new reality within the man that He created. He took a man's body and appeared in a cave in Bethlehem more than 2000 years ago.

A Baby is born of Virgin Mary; she gave birth to her only Son. But this is no ordinary Child. This Child is none other than the Eternal Word of God the Father – by Him, all universe was made. He still holds all things together in Himself; He who is "begotten of His Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father." That is who this Child is. And the very flesh of this Child becomes the actual Tent of God. God located Himself within man. From that moment of conception, from that holy Birth, and for all time to come, anyone who wants to find God will find Him only in the flesh of the Man-God Jesus.

St. John, the apostle, said, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt within us." St. Paul, the apostle, made a statement saying: "God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person," Heb 1:1-4.

And in his gospel St. John, the apostle also says, "And we have seen His glory." Glory goes with the Tent and the Temple. "Glory" that Moses and the Children of Israel saw in the wilderness, hovering over the Tabernacle. It's the same glory that the Apostles saw in the flesh of the God-Man Jesus on the top of the mount. They knew He is "the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth."
But they did not see that glory at Bethlehem. There wasn't much glory at Bethlehem anyway. The miracle of Bethlehem is that this Baby is the true God and true Man, but we have no Biblical hint that any glory was visible there. A baby wrapped in swaddling clothes may sound like a precious sight, but it's no different than wrapping a baby in a warming blanket in the hospital today.

After all, it is our flesh that this Baby has identical to ours. And this flesh stuff is glorified in Christ Jesus beyond all imagination.
Today on this beautiful and joyful occasion that the eternal Son of the Father has given to us in the flesh, as newborn Baby in Bethlehem, we wish whole humanity in general, and His Holiness, the patriarch, the head of our Syriac Orthodox Church, in particular, a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year—asking the Newborn Lord to extend His life and their Eminences, the prelates of the Church, with good health and prosperity.

I also wish our esteemed faithful, clergy, and all organizations of our Western Archdiocese a Merry Christmas and a blessed New Year.

Christ is Born! Glorify Him.