"Words Words Words! I'm so sick of words!" cried Eliza Doolittle in the production... 'My Fair Lady.'

Words -

We're bombarded with them from the moment we're born until the day we die.

You've heard several thousand of them just since you got here tonight.

Words are used to teach and to preach
To scold or to encourage
To build up or to belittle
To inform or to mislead
To make fun or to honor
To babble or to be profound
To bless or to curse
To offend or to inspire
To be genuine or to be phony

Words can bring clarity or confusion, laughter or despair.

Words are sometimes chosen carefully and too often carelessly.

Words can be used to persuade or can be used against you in a court of law.

Words are used to proclaim your vow of unending love and sometimes words are used to take it all back.

Words are powerful to either build up or destroy.

We sing them,
we say them,
we write them,
we type them,
we read them,
we hear them,
we shout them
and we whisper them.

You cannot escape words... because even when you close your mouth and plug your ears, you think them in your head.

We cannot avoid words.... And with all of them swimming around in our minds, we may be tempted sometimes to cry out like Eliza Dootlittle... Words words words... I'm so sick of words

As much as we are exposed to words throughout our lives from our parents, our siblings, our friends, our enemies, our teachers, our neighbors, our co-workers, on the TV, the radio, in books, magazines and the internet... you would think we would all be experts at using and understanding words.

And yet, in spite of a lifetime of practice and exposure to words, we see them misused time and time again.

Like the words on a sign in a store window:

"Ears pierced - while you wait"
or
"We pierce ears - half off"

Even after years of hearing and using billions of "words"... we often misuse them. We fail to communicate effectively... we fail to say what we really mean and fail to understand what others mean.

Maybe that's why people become artists... to draw or paint pictures or carve sculptures - to avoid having to use words.

After all, they say a picture is worth 1000 words...

If that's the case, you may be thinking "I wish he had just held up a picture"...

Well I'm no artist, but on this Christmas Eve night, we pause to consider one
whose word is always true,
whose word is all powerful,
whose word is eternal,
who has the first and last word in all things... and
who yet, didn't leave it at that... but instead painted a picture with His presence.

In John 1 we read God's Word:
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning....
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

God, who spoke the cosmos into existence, whose Word cannot be distinguished from Himself, didn't merely communicate with us using words...

Instead His Word became one of us.

He didn't merely send a telegram or a text message.

He didn't merely sing a song or write a poem.

God demonstrated His love for us by being present with us.

For God so loved the world that he gave His WORD to become one of us...

He came to us as one at first unable to speak a word and yet as one who IS THE WORD.

Jesus is the logos... the Word become flesh. Emmanuel - God in the flesh.

God didn't merely throw words at us, but instead painted a picture worth a trillion trillion words... by sending the WORD to us.

Christmas is the beginning of the painting... it is the canvas upon which the whole picture appears.

Jesus throughout his life with every brilliant brush stroke demonstrated for us God's love, and plan, and mission of redemption.

With his life, Jesus masterfully painted us a picture
of grace and truth
of compassion and forgiveness
of justice and love

And to complete the picture, His final brush strokes were painted with His own blood when he could finally say of his masterpiece "It is finished"

It's a picture that speaks to us, it changes us, it transforms us, it gives us life.
The Word Became Flesh...

to all who received (the Word), to those who believed in his (Word), he gave the right to become children of God

Amazingly then,...
The Word became a picture that changes the words we think and feel and imagine.

Now instead of having words swimming around in our heads like the words of guilt, shame, anger, revenge, bitterness, loneliness, destruction and despair...

... Our own words are transformed into words like peace, joy, forgiveness, hope, fellowship, blessing and eternal life.

Because the Word came to us, our words have changed and have new significance and meaning.

Now all of a sudden instead of angrily exclaiming "words! words! words! I get so sick of words" ... we are delighted in THE WORD.

Tonight celebrate the truth that the WORD has come to you.

Merry Christmas!