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 Are we surprised?
God always chooses to the poor. God sides with the oppressed. Why?
Because God’s involvement with humanity is about liberation.
Incarnation is liberation. Not restoration. Or even reformation.
Faced with tyranny with the empire’s knee on the necks of the
oppressed, God hears their cries and responds. Intervenes. Enters
history to move a powerless people to a place of promise.
Liberation. The Incarnation calls you and me—calls out to us—to
suffer with God against evil in our present age.
We are midwives to another world. Co-creators with the Creator who
chose us.
In the face of injustice, just as God did not sit aloof up there, so
we must not be aloof down here. The story of the Divine goes
Creation, Liberation, then Incarnation.
Creation. Liberation. Incarnation.
Incarnation does not mean simply that God became Jesus; God said,
“Yes,” to the material universe. The Incarnation is the Divine’s
“Yes,” here and now.
The Incarnation is political, because it is historical. In the
Incarnation comes a renewed way of ordering ourselves, which is what
politics means. The Divine in Christ didn’t come with pomp and
circumstance but instead came quietly and humbly to an oppressed
people. In Christ, we see Herod, and Rome, and all empires since
then — who have made promises to make the world great again —tremble
in fear, because the reign of God is one that rules with love, mercy
and moves us towards justice and peace. The Incarnation declares God
is Lord, not Caesar or any president.
The Incarnate One’s agenda was countercultural; it went against
status quo. From the beginning of his campaign the Incarnate One
said, “I’ve come to proclaim good news to the poor…proclaim release
to the captives…recovery of the sight of the blind…to let the
oppressed go free.” That’s more than a yard sign. It is a statement
about the politics of God in Christ, the Incarnate One.
Status quo and niceness aren’t good news. The declaration of the
Incarnation is good news, for it means liberation from the suffering
of this world. It means salvation here and now. Salvation is
liberation. Until all are free—truly free—then salvation has not yet
come. The Incarnate One told his disciples (and tells us) to “pay
attention—now. Stay awake—now. Keep alert—now.” Salvation is here,
now. If our work in salvation is not tied up with the liberation of
the poor, oppressed, and imprisoned—then it’s no salvation at all.
The Divine didn’t come to the powerful, but to the lowly. The Divine
is found in the least of these. The Incarnation points towards God’s
liberation of a people. It focuses our attention on what God has
done, is doing, and will do to defeat the principalities and powers
of evil.
Incarnation. Liberation. Salvation.
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The Incarnation proves the Divine isn’t a spectator
to the suffering of humanity. The Divine’s self-disclosure in the
Christ is to liberate the oppressed from social and political
bondage. Just as the Divine did with the exodus. Just as the Divine
is doing now… if only we would have eyes to see and ears to hear.
Christmas demands we prepare for the arrival of the
Divine. Our preparation must lead us to struggle for the liberation
of the little ones. To welcome the Christ child is to welcome the
call to struggle for justice — social and political, both of which
are spiritual — a part of that moral arc that bends towards
fairness, inclusivity, equity.
According to the New Testament, God became human in
Jesus Christ, and defeated decisively the powers of sin, death, and
Satan, thereby bestowing upon us the freedom to struggle against
suffering which destroys humanity. God chose the poor and the
oppressed by being born into a poor Jewish family. God is not merely
sympathetic with social distress of the poor but became totally
identified with them in their agony and pain. The heartbreak of the
oppressed is God’s lament, for God takes on their suffering as God’s
own, thereby freeing them from its ultimate control of their lives.
In choosing the oppressed, the Divine identifies with them. As the
infant Christ grows into the prophet who spoke truth to political
power, we see the call of the Church — to incarnate the love of
Christ in our struggle to liberate the suffering from their pain.
The manger affirms the poor, and the cross liberates them to fight
against suffering while not being determined by it.
The Divine is with those then who fight for the realization of
humanity — the Incarnation of God in Christ. And those are the ones
who believe in creation, liberation, incarnation—and resurrection.
All of which are necessary for salvation.
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