Glancing through the Caller-Times one recent Saturday, I happened upon the Births. I am sure you have seen the column. It appears every week and lists the children who have been born at the hospitals in our area. On that particular day, more than 60 families had or would soon go home with newborn babies. There were 60 families who would be welcoming a new addition or two to their lives.

I had to wonder, "Do they have any idea what they are getting into? Do they know what is about to happen to their lives?"

If they are first-time parents—and even if they are not—their lives are about to change. Take sleep, for example. It will never be the same.

• When our first son was born, we spent the first few nights wide awake, going into his room, leaning down close to watch him breath, all just to make sure he was OK.
• Months later, after our initial uncertainty passed, his mother would wake me in the middle of the night, wondering aloud if she should wake him from his peaceful sleep to feed him.
• Now our youngest son rises in the night, makes his way to our room, and climbs into our bed—at, of course, a 45 degree angle so that his feet are firmly planted in Mom or Dad’s back.
• And, of course, it won’t be long before we will find ourselves only half sleeping, waiting for one of them to come home from a high school ball game or date.

Of course, that’s just a baby’s effect on sleep. They affect more than that. When a baby comes home to stay diets change. Adults discover the nutritional value of Chicken McNuggets and French fries. Finances change as parents discover that every school, sports team and other group to which your child belongs want you to buy something or sell something or both. And relationships change. Mom and Dad quickly discover that time for "just the two of us" is hard to come by.

When a baby comes, life changes. The habits we have developed, the patterns we have formed, and the routines that we have adopted all get challenged. The assumptions we have made, the priorities we have set, the plans we have prepared all find themselves under siege. When a baby comes, a new way of life emerges—it has to.

What is true when a couple brings a baby home is also true when humanity welcomes the baby, Jesus, into its midst. To welcome him, to bring him into our lives, changes everything. How could it not? For in him, nothing less than God comes to dwell.

John knew that when he wrote the beautiful prologue to his Gospel.

Most of the time John tells a story about Jesus or records one of his conversations, then follows it with religious reflections, offering insight into the implications of what has taken place. For example, John tells the story of the wedding of Cana, where Jesus turns water into wine, then he points out that his miracle "revealed [Jesus’] glory and the disciples believed in him."

But the opening verses of John are different. No story of Jesus’ birth. No angel’s appearing. No shepherds in the field. No magi wandering after a far off star. John immediately leaps into the implications of Christ’s birth. The Word—what the Old Testament refers to as the wisdom of God, the very wisdom that created the world—has become flesh, lived among us, and revealed the glory of God. God has become human being, moved in with us, and reveals himself to us.

John begins his Gospel with this reality, then goes on to show how everything, everything, is changed by it. He goes on to show how ancient divisions between Jews, Samaritans and Gentiles are overcome, how broken bodies are healed and broken hearts mended, how both the physically and spiritually hungry are fed, how the spiritual and physical thirst is quenched, how the oppressed are liberated, the sinful forgiven, and the dead raised. John goes on to show us how Jesus lived the life God intends every life to be lived—and how it changed every reality, every life it touched.

That was the experience of the disciples—a motley crew of fishermen, tax collectors and zealots. When Jesus entered their lives, began to dwell with them, everything changed. They left their homes and jobs to share in his life and ministry. They abandoned the security they had known for the life-risking adventure of faith. They went from people no one would have ever heard of or cared about to people whose names and lives will never be forgotten. It all changed because the Word became flesh and lived with them.

While Jesus is no longer with us in the flesh, his continuing presence still changes the reality of those who welcome him into their lives.

Dan had succeeded beyond anyone’s expectations and even beyond his own imagination. He had all the symbols of success—the house, the car, the corner office. And he enjoyed it—all of it. In fact, he had come to a point in which he didn’t even give it much thought. But one Sunday, soon after he and his family joined a popular church near Dayton, Ohio, a member of the congregation came to see him. He figured the church wanted money or wanted him to serve on the finance committee, after all that was his expertise. But that was not the invitation that was extended. The church had a program where its members served as mentors for some intercity youth. Mentor and youth would get together each week, share a meal, talk about life, maybe play a game of ball or walk the mall. It wasn’t exactly Dan’s cup of tea, but the visitor was persistent and Dan felt a strange urge to do it.

Within weeks, Dan had been paired with a fatherless youth from a poorer side of town. Visiting him was an experience. Dan saw folks hanging out in doorways with nothing to do and mothers far too young to have the children they carried in their arms. Dan’s newfound faith, his new sense of Christ’s presence with him, began to change him. Extra time he had easily given to his pursuit of success began to be redirected toward a charity working in the neighborhood where his young friend lived. The money he had gladly spent on his every whim became money he used to meet the needs of others. The skills that had helped him succeed in business became redirected toward organizing ministry and getting others to share in it. Oh, he had the job, the car, the corner office, but the longer Christ dwelt with him and in him, the less they symbolized what mattered in life.

Tonight we have gathered to celebrate the birth of Jesus—to worship the one who became flesh and dwelt among us, the one who still lives with us. And I suppose it is possible to come here, sing the hymns, hear the message, share in the table, and go away no different--but that would be a little like taking home a baby and ignoring it. If we embrace the child who has come, if we welcome him into the world and into our lives, then tonight our priorities and our values, our attitudes and our loves change. And we will leave here different, better, because we will have begun to follow The Word, the wisdom, that is no less than God. Amen.