Make paper snowflakes. Why did we make paper snowflakes today? What can these paper snowflakes teach us about God and faith?
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
Notice how John’s Gospel begins at the beginning – with Creation. John wants to make it clear that our relationship with God, our relationship with Jesus, doesn’t start with his arrival as a baby in a manger. God, and Jesus are present in the beginning, and are revealed in and through Creation.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The words are John’s poetic way of saying that God is present in the snowflakes, in the rain, in sun and moon and stars. God is present in the plants and animals. God surrounds us and teaches us in and through all things. We are connected to all that God has created and to God through this wisdom.
What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
Jesus is one way in which this relationship between God and God’s Creation is embodied. It starts in the beginning. Jesus is present in the beginning. That presence becomes even brighter as Jesus becomes fully human. In Jesus, God brings a light to the world, a light that shines through the life of a fellow human being – someone who understands what it is like to experience living in this world as we do. Jesus comes as one of us to show us how much God loves us and wants to continue to teach us and help us to live out the best of who we have been created to be.
Jesus, the unique and beautiful human being who enters the world as a baby through Mary, offers us a way to connect to an infinite God who understands snowflakes, rain, sun, moon, stars, planets, plants, animals, and humans in ways that are more than we can ask or imagine. God knows us and wants to have a relationship with us, God’s beloved Creation and will go to incredible lengths to enable that to happen.
And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth.
Jesus, God with us, has been in the world from the beginning. Jesus will be with us for eternity. Just as we cut out our snowflakes today, God continues to work with us, supporting us in our becoming, our growing, our learning, our transforming. May we continually embrace the possibilities as God reaches out to us in snowflakes, in mangers, and beyond. This we pray as we sing: 122 In the Bleak Midwinter