And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.
(St. John 1:1)

Christianity is a religion of fact and truth &mdash not a religion of speculation and fantasy and legend as some contemporary intellectuals and Episcopal bishops would have us believe. The Bible promises that we can depend on God because He planned and created the world. And in the end, all things will come out in the manner in which God created them to come out. God has no crystal ball; He simply knows the end of all things because He willed things to work out the way He intends them to come out. This is both foreknowledge and sovereign authority.

So, it is tremendously important for us to bear in mind that the manner in which God chose to come to earth is to be believed, not because men wrote it up the way they did, but because God willed it to be that way. Furthermore, He told about the coming of Christ through the Old Testament Scriptures, beginning two thousand years ahead of time (provided men had eyes to see and ears to hear). This is why unbelievers try, in their own manner, to demythologize the Bible by odd speculations. Men of unbelief would have you believe what they teach is true — but God — God does not speculate about His nature and the reason He chose to come to earth.

To come as an infant born in Bethlehem of a virgin of the House of David and to inaugurate a New Covenant with man was the manner which best suited God's plan for the redemption and rescue of the human race. As St. Paul confesses, "All things were written aforetime for our understanding that we through Scripture might believe." The real question then is, "Do we trust God or do we trust men?" The Gospel of St. Luke tells us that the angel of the Lord stood before a frightened fourteen-year-old Mary, and what He told her troubled her soul. Why should she, of all the girls in Galilee, yea, of all the women in the world, why would she be chosen to share the secret of the Most High God?

Mary knew the answer because she had been taught by her parents, Joaquin and Ann, what God expected of every Hebrew child. God's plan was open to everyone through Holy Scripture — so every Jewish girl grew up with the expectation she might be the Handmaid of the Lord, the Chosen Vessel, the Mother of the Messiah. God had planned beforehand that there would be a new Eve, obedient to God's will, even as the old Eve had encouraged rebellion against God. Even though sin entered into the world through the collusion of the serpent and Eve, God foreknew that Mary would be the Mother of God, perfectly true to what He had created all women to be — in perfect harmony with man and God. The serpent — that old dragon of Revelation — was to be destroyed by the offspring of the Woman who bore Jesus — whose destiny was the Cross where He might free men from Adam's bondage.

If we think about it — though the Archangel Gabriel's announcement to Mary was startling, at. the same time it was reassuring because it testified that with God all things are possible. The archangel was sent by God to tell Mary the exhilarating news that God was sending the Messiah, forever uniting the divine with the human.

"Hail Mary, who art highly favored, the Lord is with thee. I Am is with thee, and I Am shall be born in thee." "Incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary," the Creed confesses. Mary wasted no time in her quiet acceptance, "Be it unto me O Lord, according to thy word," was her reply to the Almighty. Mary trusted God, and He trusted Mary, as all men were born to trust Him. She could not broadcast the good news. Who would believe her? There was no one to trust but her cousin Elizabeth — an old woman who was past childbearing age — one who was even now going through an incredible transformation in her physical body because God also had need of her to bear a son; a son who would be born for the purpose of being the forerunner of the Messiah — to announce Messiah's coming as we are all called by God to fulfill His will for us.

You see, Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, was also a chosen vessel of the Lord. God had also prepared her to be Mary's confidante, a kindred soul mate. Who would ever believe either of them — a fourteen-year-old virgin and a sixty-year-old woman? Two miraculous births? When Mary had asked the angel how was it possible for her, who knew not a man, to be with child, the emissary of the Lord had said, "With God all things are possible."

The overpowering miracle by which every other miracle must be judged is that God can accomplish the impossible, regardless of how men judge Him or how much they deny Him.

Mary, despite all the snickers and gossiping of her neighbors, was obedient to the will of the Lord, she did bear the Christ Child. She did name Him Jesus. Through Him we sinners who have done everything contrary to the will of God are forgiven. The real miracle is that God now looks upon you and me as His sons and daughters and declares that we walk with Him in Holy Communion, reconciled.

In Christ, God reconciles the world to Himself and Himself to the world. The miracle of birth itself always testifies the love of God. but today we celebrate God's precious gift to us — His only begotten Son takes on our humanity. And through Him we are made joint heirs with Christ. Even we — fallen sinners who have earned God's wrath and condemnation — are redeemed by who this Child will become and what He will accomplish. In God all things are possible. As John Baptist cried to the Jews, "Do ye not believe that God is able to rise up children even from these stones? My brethren, as the Gabriel said to Mary , "With God all things are possible — Unto you this day is born in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord."

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us...