Joseph and Mary have been winding their way to Bethlehem. The baby she carries has been making himself ready to enter the world he created. She is heavy like a sweet pear, ready to let go of the branch and land in the grass with a soft thud. Everything is just about still, breath bated, waiting.
O Emmanuel, our King and our lawgiver,
the hope of the nations and their Saviour:
Come and save us, O Lord our God.
It won’t be long now until the God who loves us becomes God-with-us in a way that changes everything, an outrageous, real, rule-breaking miracle of God, not only reaching into our world, but moving in, next door, in the middle of all the mess and the muck and the misunderstandings. God, depending for his life on a first-time mother, the yield of the farmers fields, the shoal of fish below Peter’s nets, the warmth of a fire, the rest, the company, the kindness of strangers.
The Word becomes flesh and dwells among us. God from eternity past, almighty, holy, crowned with splendour, blinding us with the light of glory, invisible, omniscient… God moves in to our street, to our condition, to our world where things tend toward decay, where most good things are utterly temporary, where pain and sorrow and sore feet are all part of the journey… It is into this very world that God comes to visit us with his salvation, it is these hearts, divided, slow to understand and trembling, that he enters as Emmanuel to become once again King, to be the lawgiver of our lives, the hope of nations, our Saviour…
He is coming soon. In fact, in the original Latin version of these antiphons, the first letter of the Messianic title ordered from the 23rd back to the 17th spell out a short phrase in Latin. Emmanuel, Rex (King), Oriens (Morning Star), Clavis (Key), Radix (Root), Adonai (Lord) and Sapientia (Wisdom) = Ero Cras, which means Tomorrow, I will come.
Jesus came, and Jesus will come again to fulfil all that God has promised. Jesus is still today coming into every heart that consent to his arrival and his increasing presence. Indeed as the old carol puts it.
What can I give him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb.
If I were a wise man, I would do my part,
yet what I can, I give him, give my heart.
As Jesus moves into your heart more fully, he also moves into your neighbourhood more fully, and from there, he comes more fully into the world. You too carry Christ, just like Mary did. You too get to help Jesus be born into the lives of others and you get to help bring salvation: Here and now freedom, here and now justice, here and now peace and equality and love – and even more of it later.
Emmanuel, come and save us, O Lord our God.