Sermon at Matins on Christmas Day 2016

What’s in a name? The famous quotation from Shakespeare assures us that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Well yes, I suppose it would. But do we really think that a rose would smell as nice if it were called a turnip? The point is that we associate the word ‘rose’ with beauty. The label means something to us.

Names are important. When we hear the name of someone we know, it summons up a picture of them. Many names have meanings, especially those derived from the Bible. My own name, Jane, seems to be related to the male name John, which means ‘gift from God’. Names can also give us our place in a family and society. My other names are Elizabeth and Margaret, the names of my grandmothers – I was not named for royalty, I hasten to add!

In the Bible, names have a deeper significance. They tell a story. Take Abraham, for example, whose name means ‘father of many’ and who was destined to be the ancestor of a great people; or the prophet of this morning’s reading, Isaiah, ‘God is salvation’.

This morning’s Old Testament reading is all about names. It comes from a time when the country around Jerusalem has become part of the Persian empire. God’s people no longer have a king, or the freedom to rule themselves. But God has not abandoned them, the prophet says. It may seem that God is asleep, but far from it. He loves his people no less than before. And the sign of that is the giving of new names. Instead of the names ‘Forsaken’ and ‘Desolate’, they are going to have new names which will place them in a committed covenant relationship with God, a relationship like a marriage. They will be called ‘My Delight is in Her’ and ‘Married’. That is the promise given to God’s people, that God will show his love for them as a bridegroom loves his bride.

Today is the day when that love takes shape, when God’s love comes into our world as a human baby. As we hear Matthew’s version of the announcement of his birth, we find significant names, names that tell us what we need to know about this child. First, Matthew calls him ‘the Messiah’. The Hebrew word ‘messiah’ means ‘anointed’. It was the term used of the kings of ancient Israel, the ones chosen by God to rule on his behalf. But as it became clear that all human kings were inadequate for the task, the term ‘messiah’ began to take on a new meaning. It came to be a hope, a promise, of a better king, one more in tune with God’s own rule, one free from the human weaknesses that had marred even the most successful reigns.

Now, says Matthew, after so many years, when hopes have faded, now that anointed one has actually been born, and in a most unexpected way. An ordinary man in the village of Nazareth finds that his wife to be is pregnant. He decides to do the decent thing and call off the engagement quietly. But an angel intervenes, and Joseph obeys. He is to bring up the child, a boy called Jesus. Nothing too unusual about the name – it is the Hebrew Joshua. But its meaning is ‘God saves’. In this case, the name is more than calling a baby ‘Grace’ for example. This Jesus will ‘save his people’ says the angel. The Jewish people had been hoping for a saviour, to rescue them from the domination of the Romans and enable them to live freely in their own land. This saviour is different, though. ‘He will save his people from their sins,’ the angel says. Not, then, a political or military saviour. This is not to be the birth of a benevolent emperor. Something different is happening

He will be an anointed king; a saviour. Finally there will be some hope for God’s people, a remedy for their sense of being forgotten by a God who has gone silent. But there is more. Matthew reminds us that this child fulfils Isaiah’s ancient prophecy. He will also be named ‘Emmanuel’, God with us. How can a human child save God’s people from their sins, if not by the presence of God himself?

So today we celebrate once again this earth shattering event, this birth that is truly magical. An anointed king might be useful, and a saviour even better. But God with us – that changes everything. God does not wait for us to reach out to him, but comes to walk the earth with us. It is the ultimate demonstration of God’s intimate and personal concern for humanity and the world.

From that day onwards, God’s people are never more to be called ‘Forsaken’ or ‘Desolate’. For the Messiah, Jesus, Emmanuel is born, and God is with us.