“Each of these people of faith died not yet having in hand what was promised, but still believing. How did they do it? They saw it way off in the distance, waved their greeting, and accepted the fact that they were transients in this world. People who live this way make clear that they are looking for their true home.” Hebrews 11:13-15. (translation,The Message, Eugene Peterson).
I wonder if our culture has become prostrate with promises, losing hope for the kingdom of heaven because we have waited too long with too little evidence of a messiah. We are divided into camps that believe: that the messiah has come once and forever, or that he will come again on a definite schedule, or that he will come only at our death, or that his due date has long expired. None of these expectations compare with the faith of the writer to the Hebrews in the above quotation.
In Chapter 11 of Hebrews the writer rattles off the list of those living with unfulfilled promises, but instead living “by faith:” Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Rahab. Moses even saw the Promised Land without entering it. The implication is that we, too, can live by faith without a glorious vision of the kingdom and our messiah.
Perhaps Christmas is our attempt to rejuvenate the promise, to recover from prostration, but it often feels like celebrating the past, the Messiah who miraculously came, lived, died, and rose again. What happened to the kingdom since then? What promises can we still count on? What evidence do we have of that kingdom coming, with the messiah lingering behind or “tarrying,” as my father used to say?
In the Gospel of John there is a vibrant Nativity story that evokes a kingdom still in progress. What, you thought John skipped the Nativity, passing over the shepherds, the wise men, and visions to Mary and Joseph? Yes, he did omit that story, but he told another story, more succinct and more future-oriented.
He came to his own people,
but they didn’t want him.
But whoever did want him,
believed he was who he claimed,
and would do what he said,
He made to be their true selves,
their child-of-God selves.
These are the God-begotten,
not blood-begotten,
not flesh-begotten,
not sex-begotten. (1:12-13)
Eugene Peterson wanted to de-mystify the Bible in this modern translation, so he tried to make the “God-talk” more contemporary. He unpacked the translation “become the sons of God” (v. 12) to say “to be their true selves” and stressed the ongoing change happening in us by saying we are not “blood-begotten, flesh-begotten, or sex-begotten.” We are not what our DNA pre-ordained, we are what God has made and can make of us, our “true selves.”
This is a pretty wonderful promise, even if you have lived as long as I have, because I still struggle to reconcile my many selves: the husband self, the retired professor self, the Facebook self, the sports-fan self. These selves are often in conflict with each other and with my Christian self, which I want to embrace all of them. God promises to shape me into my “true self.”
Perhaps this promise is more modest than a kingdom coming to earth, but it is a promise I can visualize and live day by day, becoming my true self, my God-begotten self. When I pray “thy kingdom come,”I try to participate in the coming kingdom, try to make it visible to others. I imagine God orchestrating the kingdom coming through millions of others finding their true selves and try not to presume how it will all come together. Just that I will participate, not obstruct.
The rest of John’s Nativity story also tells of the true self, the identity of a welcoming and merciful God, “Like father, like Son.”
The Word became flesh and blood,
and moved into the neighborhood.
We saw the glory with our own eyes.
the one-of-a-kind glory,
like Father, like Son,
Generous inside and out,
true from start to finish. (1:14)
John’s Nativity Story is all about being true to our identity, whether the identity God created for us or the identity of God, who has always been and will always be, “generous inside and out.”