You may recall last week I spoke about how the author of this hymn, Ambrose, and a heretic, Arius, were dueling hymnists. I even hesitantly called it a hymn-off, like a sing-off or a dance-off, but I wasn't quite sure I could call it that. Since then, I've kept my ears open to hear about other duels like these, and heard there is actually a new reality show that is all about a sing-off. It may even be called the Great American Sing-off. Different groups will be singing a cappella, that is, without accompaniment, and seeing which one is the best in the nation. A sing-off. I figured it wasn't such a bad idea for me to call this a hymn-off, then. I've seen this happen in books and articles, where one person fires off a response to what someone else had said and you have a duel of ideas, but I hardly doubt that was actually happening with the hymns. It helps us remember this, if we see it that way, though. Both Arius and Ambrose knew that music was a great way to teach, and both used it to advance their teachings. And so we will call these two, dueling hymnists, like dueling banjos.

You may also recall Ambrose did not write this hymn for Christmas. Rather, he wanted to bring out the idea that Jesus is truly God. He was teaching the incarnation, that is, God had become flesh. Arius, on the other hand, denied that God had become flesh. We see some of his ideas when we find churches that deny the real presence. That's because they have trouble with the idea that the body could actually have divine characteristics. They don't deny Jesus is God, but like Arius, still have trouble with the idea of all of Jesus the man, being all God.

Ambrose did not. Because he wanted to make the point that Jesus is truly God, and that His flesh was where the divine presence was located, a crucial element is Jesus' conception. Let me say that in a little bit different way. Where you find Jesus' flesh, you find God. If you find Jesus' flesh is in a virgin's womb, that is none other than the place where you find God.

Is it any wonder then that Elizabeth and her unborn son react the way they did? I love this passage because it talks about faith in an unborn child, but what was that faith grasping?

What did John's faith know, that other people didn't? When Mary left Nazareth to go down to the hill country to visit her relative Elizabeth, did people see the young, pregnant Mary and fall down in wonder and praise? Did they say to each other as she passed by whispering to each other, "She is carrying the Messiah, God's own Son, conceived by the Holy Spirit?" No, I'm sure not. As the young lady left Nazareth under a cloud of shame, having been found out she was pregnant, she probably became the subject of the juiciest gossip. I can hear it at the local coffee shop. "Mary! Can you believe it? And it's not even her fiance's Joseph's child. I never would have thought that about her." She probably wasn't showing when she made the trip down to the area of Jerusalem, so nobody could tell by looking, but some probably knew.

I don't know what it is, but women have this uncanny ability to know when another woman is pregnant. Guys, we don't dare ask. I've learned that. I won't say anything about a pregnancy until I've been directly told or I've been called to the delivery room. But women, they are a different story. They could probably tell Mary was pregnant, but she wasn't with the father, and that probably would have had the old hens cackling.

Not when she got to Zechariah's house. Elizabeth's baby leaps the moment Mary speaks and Elizabeth whips out a quick song. "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb." And then she asks, "How is it that the mother of my Lord should come to me?" It is a question of faith, just like Solomon's question at the dedication of the temple. I know this is so, but why am I so privileged? She knows Mary's womb is the place where God is to be found. The Almighty God, the Creator of the universe is wrapped up in a tiny ball with a little life cord attached to His human mother, Mary, eating what she ate and drinking what she drank, just like any other child in his mother's uterus.

How could Elizabeth not treat Mary a little differently? How difficult it must have been to relate to her like she would have a couple months prior. A couple months before, Mary was just a kid, now she was soon to be the mother of God become flesh. Elizabeth probably could barely contain herself from laughing and dancing with joy, and Mary could hardly avoid joining in--two pregnant women, one six months further along and many years the senior, and the other barely showing, barely old enough to be pregnant, laughing, dancing and singing the glories of God, and inside her, the child, the God/man is growing and developing.

Elizabeth's question and Solomon's question is the same one we ask. "How is it that God has come down to earth?" We talked about it last week, would we become a cockroach to save someone we loved? Would we become a cockroach to save someone who didn't love us? Our question would be the same as if the cockroaches were to say to us, "You would do that for us? You did this for me?" And we say to our Lord, "Who am I, that you should do this for me?" And yet, in that question, is the sure and certain confidence, "Yes, it has been done, and although I could never understand it, it was done for me."

Yes, God has become flesh. God has come down to this earth. The infinite one pours Himself into a human body, and this body at the time this happens is probably smaller than a fist. Yet, this is the location of the Omnipotent God, the One to whom look all the eyes of all creation to be sustained. And now He is a virgin's womb.

Ambrose took pains to bring that out in his hymn. Arius doesn't deny God, but he denies Jesus is God. Ambrose wants to bring out the very thing that makes Arius choke. God was conceived and was to be born like any other child, but was still the majestic God. He writes it in his hymn: "Here a maid was found with child, Yet remained a virgin mild. In her womb this truth was shown: God was there upon His throne." His throne. The place of a king. Mary's womb has become the throne room of God.

If we missed Ambrose's not too subtle point that Mary's womb was the site of God's presence, just as the temple had once been, the next stanza makes it unmistakable. "Then stepped forth the Lord of all From His pure and kingly hall; God of God, yet fully man, His heroic course began.

We don't usually consider a delivery as stepping out. "If only," I can hear the mothers say. But listen to that line again: Then stepped forth the Lord of all from His pure and kingly hall. The second person of the Trinity had already entered the womb by the time we get to this point in the song. That was covered back in the second stanza. By the time we get to the fourth, nine months has passed. He is ready to be born. He steps out of His pure and kingly hall.

This is none other than Mary's womb. Not infected with sin, since there was no human father, the womb is pure. Having housed for nine months the King of kings, her womb was also royal and kingly.

It's interesting to note the Latin and the German was translated differently in the 1941 Lutheran Hymnal, the one we were using here at Zion up until a couple years ago. In fact, you won't even find the 4th stanza in TLH. The part about the pure and kingly hall was left out. Why this is, I don't know. Why it was included again, I'm not sure, but I know I can tell you why it is a good thing.

Christian churches in America are undergoing some big shifts in their view of worship. It's not just the instrumentation they use or even the words of the songs. It's a change in the whole view of worship, reflected by these.

We know worship is primarily God coming to us. When we talk about worship, we know this is where we go for God to serve us His gifts. It's not about us singing, praying, or giving our offering but rather us receiving. Just like we had said on the first Sunday in Advent, worship is about God giving to us. Us receiving, instead of us giving.

This is so easily demonstrated by my position as I face you or face the altar. Since I face you most of the service, any service, but especially the Divine Service, it is seen as your receiving. God is giving you His gifts, because I am turned to you so that it may be given to you. When I face the altar, with my back to you, that's when I'm offering something on your behalf. That doesn't happen as long as I'm facing you.

The worship in a lot of churches, don't have that--facing you, facing the altar. They see worship as mostly them giving to God. They have come to worship to give Him praise. They see it as a purely spiritual activity. We see it as an earthy, material thing. They understand worship as taking place in heaven, and here's where another big difference comes: they spiritually ascend into heaven. That's not what we do. The message of Christmas goes in the opposite direction. God comes down to us. Jacob's ladder was firmly planted on the ground. The angels ascend and descend on the Son of man, standing on the ground. God reaches down. This is what He has done at Christmas.

This is what He does at worship. He comes down to us. He brings heaven to us--not we go up to heaven to meet Him. These other worshipers see it that way, because they don't think there is really anything here on earth when it comes to worship. They don't believe God is here in the flesh when His Word is preached and the sacraments are administered. They believe that Jesus ascended into heaven and stays there. Therefore, we must come to Him. They deny the real presence. They believe that Jesus' flesh just doesn't do that. Their worship is very spiritual, whereas the church's historic worship has been earthy and material. We confess very clearly, God is here, because His flesh is here. Like the ones who followed Arius, though, they don't see His flesh doing this.

This, unfortunately, is the predominant view of worship, and it threatens to crowd out the proper one. This view which sees the worshiper going into heaven spiritually does not offer the confidence of what God's word says. Think about what this offers as opposed to what God gives. Wherever we have His Word proclaimed and the sacraments administered, there we have the flesh of Christ. We have that assurance: God is here. Whereas, when we think in terms of us reaching into heaven, we may not always make it. We may falter in our spiritual ascent. The worship leader may not be able to give us the feeling that we have actually reached the most holy place.

This is what we have in His Word and Sacrament. We have the most holy place. This is the place where God is found. In the time of the Old Testament, one priest, once a year got to go into this place, also called the Holy of Holies. If the glory of God were to break out against the priest and kill him, they would drag Him out by the rope tied around his ankle. You didn't mess with God's holiness. Now, that Holy of Holies is wherever the Word and Sacraments are found. It doesn't seem so awe inspiring, and yet it is the same thing. This is the Holy of Holies, come down to earth, that we may not only stand in God's presence, but for Him to bless us, and know this happens every time.

Because this view has come to be in jeopardy of being lost, only in these last couple decades, and replaced with a false one which is also clearly inferior, the guys who put this hymnal together wanted to make sure Ambrose's original stanzas were included again. They wanted to make sure we heard clearly where Jesus is found, the majestic God is there. The sticking point for Arius is what needs to be brought out again, so us sinners, crying out for mercy, can know we have the Almighty merciful God here to forgive us. We know God in the flesh is here to bless.

AMEN