Steve Lindsley
John 1: 1-5, 14

The “For Sale” sign appeared rather unceremoniously in the front yard one day.  It has been awhile since anyone lived there.  Those in the neighborhood had grown accustomed to its empty state, the lack of a car parked in the driveway or children running on the front lawn.  Everyone had gotten used to the absence.  But that, as the “For Sale” sign indicated, was about to change.  Something new was coming.  They just didn’t know who or when.

And then one day, everyone came home from their busy jobs and busy school and busy lives in the world outside the neighborhood to find the “For Sale” sign replaced with one that said “Under Contract.” Someone, it appeared, had decided to make this their new home.  And so in the weeks that followed, the house saw more activity than it had in quite a while.  The lawn, prone to overgrowth in the spring and fall, was now cut with regularity.  A landscaping crew trimmed bushes, spread mulch, planted a dogwood tree.  A roofer repaired a few loose shingles.  A new water heater was installed.  All to get the house ready for its new owner.

Which naturally led everyone in the neighborhood to wonder: who?  Who was moving in?  Was it a family with young kids?  A newly-married couple?  A retiree?  Would they have dogs running around in the backyard, would they serve on the HOA board the first time they were asked, were they the kind of neighbor who’d collect you mail for you when you were on vacation?  Who? No one knew for sure, not even the self-appointed “neighborhood mayor” who always made it a point to know these things.  All they could do was wait.

And wait they did.  Days, weeks went by, still no one.  Some surmised that the financing had fallen through; others gravely wondered if something had happened to the buyer.  Still, the “Under Contract” sign hung in the front yard, so they assumed the best.  But everyone kept wondering – how long?  How long?

And then one day, on a December evening, a moving truck backed into the driveway.  Two movers hopped out of the cab and made their way to the back, and rolled up the door.  They climbed in and began carrying items out of the truck and into the house: a sofa, a bed, a kitchen table, a TV.  The two worked well into the night, long after curious neighbors had shut their curtains and gone to bed.

And when they woke the next morning, they saw a car parked in the driveway, and a thin trace of smoke trickling out of the fireplace chimney, and a new doormat placed at the foot of the front door that said: Welcome.  This Home Is Full Of Love.

And the Word became flesh and lived among us.

Friends, it is on this holiest of nights, this Christmas Eve, when these words from the writer of the gospel John hit home for us.  And the Word became flesh and lived among us.  These are special, sacred words; words that go deeper than we may realize.  That’s because the Greek word we translate “lived among us” literally means “to pitch a tent.”  Like we did back on family camping excursions – driving into the wilderness, choosing a campsite