Welcome, All Wonders in One Sight
Christmas Eve / Isa 9:1–7; Titus 2:11–14; Luke 2:1–20
Introduction
Anglicans use a Latin phrase to describe how our worship relates to our theology. That phrase is lex orandi, lex credendi, which means, “the law of prayer is the law of belief.” This phrase explains why we Anglicans have no formal doctrinal confessions other than the historic creeds.1 If you want to understand what Anglicans believe, you don’t need to read a theological statement of faith. Instead, come pray with us.
Because our theology is oriented through the prayer book, I find it fascinating that the Common Worship Christmas service begins not with a trinitarian invocation (“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”) nor with a sentence of Scripture appropriate for the day. Instead, it begins with the words of a mid-17th-century poem.
Welcome, all wonders in one sight!
Eternity shut in a span.
Summer in winter, day in night,
Heaven in earth and God in man.
Great little one whose all-embracing birth
Lifts earth to heaven, stoops heaven to earth.
These words are from Richard Crashaw’s “In the Holy Nativity of Our Lord God: A Hymn Sung as by the Shepherds.” The words of this poem point to something inherently true in the biblical accounts of the incarnation, but something that requires poetic language to express fully. Namely, the truth that this night, this mystery that we celebrate this evening, is full of impossibility.
We have all heard the Christmas story so many times that we are in danger of allowing what should amaze us to become commonplace. But listen again to Crashaw’s words: “Welcome, all wonders in one sight.” The miracle of the incarnation holds together what might seem impossible or contradictory, but these miraculous and mysterious wonders aren’t contradictions. They are wondrous impossibilities held together forever in the person of Jesus Christ.
Tonight, I want us all to feel the wonder that Crashaw describes. I want us to look together at three “wonders” or impossibilities of the incarnation that should astonish us and (hopefully) keep us from ever treating the Christmas story as familiar or commonplace.
Eternity Shut in a Span
The first impossibility is this: eternity shut in a span. Tonight, the infinite God becomes finite. The eternal one enters time. The creator becomes a creature.
Luke tells us:
And [Mary] gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn (Luke 2:7).
Swaddling cloths and a manger are how God enters the world—not in power, not in great glory, and certainly not as the world defines glory, but as a helpless infant who cannot feed himself, who cannot speak, who cannot even hold up his own head. The one who spoke the universe into existence now cries for his mother’s milk. The one who holds all things together now feels the need to be held in his mother’s arms.
The prophet Isaiah had promised:
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace (Isa 9:6).
Do you hear the paradox? A child will be called Mighty God. An infant will be the Everlasting Father.
For the child born in Isaiah’s day—likely Hezekiah—these words were a metaphor and a sign, as in Isa 7:14. But in Christ, the metaphor has become reality. This child, born of Mary, is the God who created our ancestral parents, and yet now he has become one of their descendants.
Crashaw captures this beautifully. In his poem, one of the shepherds named Thyrsis says:
Proud world, said I; cease your contest
And let the mighty Babe alone.
The phoenix builds the phoenix’ nest,
Love’s architecture is his own.
The Babe whose birth embraves this morn,
Made His own bed ere He was born.
The infant lying in the manger created the manger. The baby wrapped in cloths created the fabric. The child born in Bethlehem created Bethlehem itself. Through him all things were made, and yet now he lies helpless in a feeding trough.
This is the first impossibility of Christmas: eternity is shut in a span.
Summer in Winter, Day in Night
The second impossibility is this: summer in winter, day in night. With this child, light breaks into darkness, and glory appears where we least expect it.
Luke tells us:
And in the same region there were shepherds out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear (Luke 2:8-9).
Notice where the glory of God appears—not in the temple in Jerusalem, not in Herod’s palace, not even in the broad light of day. The glory of God comes to shepherds working the night shift in a field outside Bethlehem. These aren’t religious leaders or political powers. These are working men doing their jobs, and suddenly the glory of the Lord breaks into their darkness, just as Isaiah had prophesied:
The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined (Isa 9:2).
Crashaw’s shepherds bear witness to this light. One of them, Tityrus, says:
Gloomy night embraced the place
Where the noble Infant lay.
The Babe looked up and showed His face;
In spite of darkness, it was day.
It was Thy day, Sweet! and did rise
Not from the East, but from Thine eyes.
The light that should come from the sun rising in the east comes instead from a child’s face. Night becomes day not because the sun has risen but because the God who spoke the sun into existence is now physically present in its solar system.
And then Thyrsis adds:
Winter chid aloud; and sent
The angry North to wage his wars.
The North forgot his fierce intent,
And left perfumes instead of scars.
By those sweet eyes’ persuasive powers,
Where he meant frost, he scattered flowers.
Winter becomes spring. The cold wind from the North brings warmth instead of frost. Where death should reign, life blooms. All because of who this child is.
This is God’s pattern. He reverses the order of things. Exile leads to New Exodus. The curse turns to blessing. The first becomes last, the last becomes first. The humble are exalted, the mighty are brought low. Glory comes not to Caesar Augustus, who claimed the title of savior and Lord, but to shepherds in a field. Peace comes not through Rome’s sword but through a child in a manger. Light shines not at noon but in the darkness. This is the second impossibility of Christmas: summer in winter, day in night.
Heaven in Earth and God in Man
The third and last impossibility is the greatest: heaven on earth and God in man. This miracle is the heart of Christmas and the mystery at the center of our faith. God has become a human being.
The angel announced to the shepherds:
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord (Luke 2:11).
Pay attention to those titles: Savior, Messiah, Lord. These aren’t metaphors. These aren’t signs. The baby in the manger is the rescuer of the world, the promised Messiah, and the Lord God himself. Paul writes to Titus:
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people (Titus 2:11).
“The grace of God has appeared.” Not just spoken, not just promised, but appeared—visible, tangible, real. In the Incarnation, God’s grace, God’s love, and God’s mercy take on human flesh and blood. You could see it. You could touch it. And despite what the hymn says, you could hear it cry. The incarnation isn’t God visiting earth for a brief time. It is God becoming human forever.
This is an essential aspect of New Testament Christology. Jesus became a human being forever. He did not go on to be a disembodied spirit after his crucifixion. He rose again from the dead bodily and then took that body with him into heaven at the Ascension. The Son of God will never cease to be human, which means that the definition of God and the definition of humanity are forever inextricably linked. The incarnation was not some cheap parlor trick to be cast aside once the salvific task was complete. In the incarnation, our creator God united himself to his creation once and for all. Heaven in earth, God in man—forever.
Crashaw captures the double movement of the incarnation in one powerful line:
Great little one whose all-embracing birth / Lifts earth to heaven, stoops heaven to earth.
This is the exchange that happens at Christmas. God stoops—he takes on flesh, enters time, becomes mortal, subjects himself to hunger and cold and pain. And in his stooping, God lifts—he brings humanity into union with himself. The distance between creator and creature is bridged not by us climbing up to God but by God coming down to us. It’s because his light has come into our world that now we can truly see.
The shepherds in Crashaw’s poem bear witness to this truth:
We saw Thee in Thy balmy nest,
Young Dawn of our eternal day!
We saw Thine eyes break from Their East
And chase the trembling shades away.
We saw Thee; and we blessed the sight,
We saw Thee by Thine own sweet light.
The shepherds saw Jesus and recognized him for who he truly is. They saw by his own light—not by their wisdom or insight, but because Jesus himself opened their eyes to see. And their response was simple: “We blessed the sight.”
This is the third impossibility of Christmas: heaven in earth and God in man.
Conclusion
Three paradoxes. Three impossibilities. All meant to draw us into wonder. Eternity shut in a span. Summer in winter, day in night. Heaven in earth and God in man.
The shepherds too wondered at what they had seen, and look at how they responded:
And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them (Luke 2:20).
The shepherds went to Bethlehem. They saw the child. And then they returned, glorifying and praising God. They became witnesses to what they had seen. Once they had seen the child, they couldn’t keep silent. That doesn’t mean that they understood all that the child was and all that he would accomplish. They saw the child, and they worshipped him. We don’t have to understand everything thoroughly to look at Jesus and worship.
Crashaw’s shepherds said it beautifully:
We saw Thee; and we blessed the sight,
We saw Thee by Thine own sweet light.
Tonight, Christmas invites us to do the same. We are not here to solve these paradoxes because they cannot be solved. Nor are we here to explain them away because they cannot be explained. We are gathered here tonight to see him in his own sweet light and bless the sight, to lay our eyes on the child and, like the shepherds, to go back to the places from whence we have come, glorifying and praising God.
If these things are true—if eternity really entered time tonight, if God really became human, if heaven really came to earth—then everything has changed. But the question of Christmas isn’t “Can you explain this?” But instead, “Will you see and bless the sight?”
Welcome, all wonders in one sight. Our God lies in a manger. Darkness has given way to light. And God is with us, forever.
Amen.
Life Group Guide
Intro Prayer
Heavenly Father, as we gather tonight to reflect on the wonder of Your Son’s birth, we ask that you open our hearts and minds to receive what you want to teach us through your Word. Help us see beyond the familiar Christmas story and grasp the profound mysteries and impossibilities made real in Jesus Christ. May we approach this time with the same wonder and awe as the shepherds who first saw the Christ child. Prepare our hearts to be transformed by your truth. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
Ice Breaker
What is one Christmas tradition or memory from your childhood that still fills you with wonder or excitement today?
Questions
Which of the three impossibilities mentioned in the sermon (eternity in a span, summer in winter/day in night, or heaven in earth/God in man) resonates most with you and why?
How does viewing Jesus as both the Creator and the created child in the manger change your perspective on the Christmas story?
The sermon mentions that God’s glory appeared to shepherds rather than religious or political leaders. What does this tell us about God’s values and priorities?
How do you think the shepherds’ lives were different after encountering the Christ child, even if they didn’t fully understand everything about Him?
Fr. Michael says we don’t have to understand everything to worship Jesus - we just need to ‘see the child and bless the sight.’ How does this challenge or comfort you in your faith journey?
In what ways do you see God bringing light into darkness in your own life or in the world around you?
How does knowing that Jesus will forever remain both God and man affect your understanding of his relationship with humanity?
The shepherds ‘returned, glorifying and praising God.’ How can we carry the wonder of Christmas back into our everyday lives?
Life Application
This week, dedicate a few minutes each day to intentionally marvel at one aspect of the Incarnation. Whether it’s the humility of God becoming a helpless infant, the light he brings into dark situations, or his eternal union with humanity, spend some time in wonder and worship. Like the shepherds, let this awe overflow into how you relate to others, becoming a witness to the miraculous truth that God is with us.
Key Takeaways
The Incarnation contains three profound impossibilities: eternity shut in a span, summer in winter/day in night, and heaven in earth/God in man.
God’s pattern is to reverse the order of things - bringing glory to the humble, light to darkness, and life where death should reign.
The Incarnation is permanent - Jesus will forever remain both God and man, bridging the gap between Creator and creation.
We don’t need to fully understand these mysteries to worship; we simply need to see the child and bless the sight.
Like the shepherds, encountering Christ should change us and send us back to our lives glorifying and praising God.
Ending Prayer
Lord Jesus, we thank you for the wonder of your Incarnation - for becoming one of us while remaining fully God. Help us to always remember the awe and mystery that should surround your birth. As we leave this place tonight, may we carry the same joy and wonder that filled the shepherds’ hearts. Transform us with the truth that you are Emmanuel - God with us - not just for a season, but forever. May our lives testify to the impossible made possible through you. We pray this in your holy name, Amen.
The 39 Articles obviously exist, but that confession isn’t treated in the same way as something like the Westminster Confession.