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“The Name the Angel Had Given Him” Luke 2:21 *Click for Audio* Pastor Kevin Vogts Trinity Lutheran Church Paola, Kansas The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord—January 1, 2019 In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Have you got your calendar yet for 2019? If you want some fun in the New Year, look for a calendar that lists all the wacky commemorations each day. National Pickle Day on November 14th; World Yodeling Day on January 30th; International Bagpipe Day on March 10th. There isn’t a day that goes by that doesn’t have at least two or three of these “official” yet wacky commemorations. Why are WE here TODAY? WHAT IS IT we are celebrating? Because of a series of Biblical and historical coincidences, each year on January 1st TWO celebrations collide: the secular holiday of New Year’s Day, and the Christian holy day of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord. From the earliest days of Christianity, there was a deep desire for Christians to commemorate every year significant events in the earthly life of our Lord: his birth, death, and resurrection. Because the specific date of his birth is not recorded in the Bible, many people assume that December 25th was just a wild guess, arrived at arbitrarily. But, there actually was method to the ancient church’s madness in picking December 25th as the day to celebrate The Nativity of our Lord. Although the Bible doesn’t give the date of his birth, because Jesus’ death occurred on Passover we know it must have been the 14th of Nissan according to the Jewish calendar. The early Christians calculated that was equivalent to the 25th of March according to our Western calendar. So, that’s the date they started with, assuming Jesus died on March 25th. The next step was a widespread belief in the ancient world that famous people, who had a big impact on the world, such as emperors and kings, would be conceived and die on the same date. Of course, for Christians the most famous person ever, with the greatest impact of all, was the King of Kings, Jesus. So, to the early Christians, it seemed obvious that if Jesus died on March 25th, he must also have been conceived on March 25th. One early Christian writer said: “Therefore our Lord was conceived on March 25th, which is the day of both the passion of our Lord and his conception. For, on that day he was conceived, and on the same day he also suffered.”* This is why the church festival of the Annunciation of Our Lord, when the angel appeared to the Virgin Mary to announce to her that she would give birth to a son, doesn’t occur during the Advent or Christmas seasons, but on March 25th, which most years falls during the middle of Lent. So, the first step for the early Church in deciding when to celebrate Jesus’ birth was the date of his death on the 14th of Nissan, which they reckoned was equal to March 25th. Then was the assumption, according to the widely held belief in the ancient world, that if he died on March 25th, he must have been conceived on March 25th. After that it was simply a matter of adding the customary nine months to arrive at the assumed date of his birth: December 25th. As the early church father St. Augustine wrote: “For he is believed to have been conceived on the 25th of March, upon which day he also suffered. . . . therefore he was born, according to tradition, upon December the 25th.”† Now, we don’t know if that’s really correct. Because, the Bible itself does NOT say that Jesus was conceived and died on the same date. That’s just an ancient tradition they had about famous people. And the Christmas story says simply, “the days were accomplished that she should be delivered,” but not whether it was exactly a nine month pregnancy. So, the odds of December 25th actually being the day of Jesus’ birth are probably about 1 in 365. But, the ancient Christians wanted to pick a date to celebrate his birth, and there was method to their madness for the date they chose. December 25th was not arrived at just arbitrarily, or because it was close to winter solstice, as many people assume. It was really based, from their perspective, on logical deduction—from the one date they did know, the date of his death at Passover on the 14th of Nissan. After thus arriving at the date upon which Christians traditionally celebrate The Nativity of Our Lord, the next step which resulted in another Christian holy day falling today, on January 1st, comes from two verses in today’s Old Testament and Gospel Readings. In Genesis, the Lord commands Abraham: “For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised . . . this is my covenant with you and your descendants after you.” Circumcision was commanded by the Lord as a vivid, inescapable, ever-present reminder to the Hebrew people, on the very bodies of their menfolk from generation to generation, that the Seed of the woman prophesied to Adam and Eve; THE Descendant promised to Abraham, through whom all nations would be blessed; the Star of Jacob; the Branch of David; the Sun of Righteousness, with healing in his wings; Immanuel, God with Us; the Messiah and Savior of the world, would be born among their Hebrew people. As Paul says in Romans, “For from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all.” And so today’s Gospel Reading begins: “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.” So, the church observes the holy day of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord on January 1st because he was crucified on the 14th of Nissan; which was calculated to be March 25th; which was assumed according to ancient custom to also be the day of his conception; which makes December 25th nine months later the day of his birth; and from December 25th the eight days prescribed for Hebrew boys to be circumcised is today, January 1st. Now, except for his death on the 14th of Nissan, we don’t know if any of those dates are correct. But, that’s the logic the early Church followed in setting the dates which have been passed down to us for commemorating these events in the life of our Lord. As the Augsburg Confession and Apology of the Lutheran Church declares: “We gladly keep the old traditions set up in the church . . . among them being certain holy days, festivals, and the like.” The custom of celebrating The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord on January 1st each year goes back nearly two thousand years. A MUCH more recent observance on this same date is New Year’s Day. We take it for granted that the New Year begins on January 1st. But, historically, the new calendar year has started on all sorts of different dates. Of course, we still have the separate Jewish New Year and Chinese New Year, but even among predominantly Christian nations there was long disagreement about when the New Year should begin. Just after the Reformation, the pope declared from then on New Year’s Day would be January 1st, and that was adopted in Roman Catholic countries. But, Protestant countries, including Colonial America, weren’t going to follow the pope’s decree. So, until the 1700’s the British Empire, and Colonial America, and most other Protestant countries stubbornly resisted and stuck with the old date for starting the New Year: March 25th. The Russians and their Orthodox Church held out even longer, not adopting January 1st as New Year’s Day until after the Russian Revolution in 1918. So, although we now associate January 1st almost exclusively with the secular holiday of New Year’s Day, that secular celebration is actually a latecomer to January 1st, and the new kid on the block. As a matter of fact, this year marks the 100th anniversary of the universal observance of New Year’s Day on January 1st. But, our Christian holy day of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord has been celebrated on January 1st for nearly two thousand years. So, that’s how these two celebrations came to collide on January 1st, the Christian holy day, and the secular holiday. At first glance, commemorating each year The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord may seem a bit like celebrating one of those offbeat, wacky holidays, like National Pickle Day, or International Bagpipe Day. But, the deep spiritual significance of this event is summed up in the appointed Gospel Reading: “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.” In Greek, the name “Jesus” is pronounced like the Spanish, “YEAH-zeus.” And the Greek is really a form of the Hebrew name Joshua, pronounced “Yeshua” in Hebrew. That was actually Jesus’ name, what he was called during his life on earth: “YEAH-zeus” in Greek, or most often the Hebrew “Yeshua.” Many of our English names originated with the person’s occupation: Smith for a blacksmith, Baker for those who did baking, Taylor for those who made clothes, Miller for those who milled grain. It’s the same in Hebrew, most of the names have a meaning. Ezekiel means “God Is Strong,” Isaiah means “The Lord Is My Salvation.” And Joshua or “Yeshua” means “The Lord Saves.” “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.” Jesus’ very name literally tells us who he is, and what he does: “The Lord Saves.” As the angel told Joseph in a dream, “You are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” His very name tells us he is the Lord, who saves us from our sins. The book of Hebrews says, “Without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness.” That’s the meaning for us of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord, the holy day we are commemorating today: Already at just eight days old the first shedding of our Lord Jesus Christ’s blood, for your salvation. As the Apostle John says, “the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from every sin.” So, it’s just a happenstance of history that New Year’s Day and The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord fall now on the same day of the year. But, it is a fitting coincidence. Because, on New Year’s Day we often look back over the year now past with regret and sorrow, over our failures, weaknesses, sins. But, The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord is a reminder to us of the Good News proclaimed by his very name: “The Lord Saves.” You go into the New Year with a clean slate before God. Your failures, weaknesses, and sins of the year now past are all wiped away. For, “the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from every sin.” “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived. . . You are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” Amen. *Andrew McGowan, “How December 25 Became Christmas,” Bible Review, Vol. 18, No. 6 (December 2002), p. 46. †“On the Trinity” Return to Top \| Return to Sermons \| Home \| Email Church Office

“The Name the Angel Had Given Him”
Luke 2:21

Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord—January 1, 2019

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Have you got your calendar yet for 2019? If you want some fun in the New Year, look for a calendar that lists all the wacky commemorations each day. National Pickle Day on November 14th; World Yodeling Day on January 30th; International Bagpipe Day on March 10th. There isn’t a day that goes by that doesn’t have at least two or three of these “official” yet wacky commemorations.

Why are WE here TODAY? WHAT IS IT we are celebrating? Because of a series of Biblical and historical coincidences, each year on January 1st TWO celebrations collide: the secular holiday of New Year’s Day, and the Christian holy day of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord.

From the earliest days of Christianity, there was a deep desire for Christians to commemorate every year significant events in the earthly life of our Lord: his birth, death, and resurrection. Because the specific date of his birth is not recorded in the Bible, many people assume that December 25th was just a wild guess, arrived at arbitrarily. But, there actually was method to the ancient church’s madness in picking December 25th as the day to celebrate The Nativity of our Lord.

Although the Bible doesn’t give the date of his birth, because Jesus’ death occurred on Passover we know it must have been the 14th of Nissan according to the Jewish calendar. The early Christians calculated that was equivalent to the 25th of March according to our Western calendar. So, that’s the date they started with, assuming Jesus died on March 25th.

The next step was a widespread belief in the ancient world that famous people, who had a big impact on the world, such as emperors and kings, would be conceived and die on the same date. Of course, for Christians the most famous person ever, with the greatest impact of all, was the King of Kings, Jesus. So, to the early Christians, it seemed obvious that if Jesus died on March 25th, he must also have been conceived on March 25th. One early Christian writer said: “Therefore our Lord was conceived on March 25th, which is the day of both the passion of our Lord and his conception. For, on that day he was conceived, and on the same day he also suffered.”*

This is why the church festival of the Annunciation of Our Lord, when the angel appeared to the Virgin Mary to announce to her that she would give birth to a son, doesn’t occur during the Advent or Christmas seasons, but on March 25th, which most years falls during the middle of Lent.

So, the first step for the early Church in deciding when to celebrate Jesus’ birth was the date of his death on the 14th of Nissan, which they reckoned was equal to March 25th. Then was the assumption, according to the widely held belief in the ancient world, that if he died on March 25th, he must have been conceived on March 25th. After that it was simply a matter of adding the customary nine months to arrive at the assumed date of his birth: December 25th. As the early church father St. Augustine wrote: “For he is believed to have been conceived on the 25th of March, upon which day he also suffered. . . . therefore he was born, according to tradition, upon December the 25th.”†

Now, we don’t know if that’s really correct. Because, the Bible itself does NOT say that Jesus was conceived and died on the same date. That’s just an ancient tradition they had about famous people. And the Christmas story says simply, “the days were accomplished that she should be delivered,” but not whether it was exactly a nine month pregnancy. So, the odds of December 25th actually being the day of Jesus’ birth are probably about 1 in 365.

But, the ancient Christians wanted to pick a date to celebrate his birth, and there was method to their madness for the date they chose. December 25th was not arrived at just arbitrarily, or because it was close to winter solstice, as many people assume. It was really based, from their perspective, on logical deduction—from the one date they did know, the date of his death at Passover on the 14th of Nissan.

After thus arriving at the date upon which Christians traditionally celebrate The Nativity of Our Lord, the next step which resulted in another Christian holy day falling today, on January 1st, comes from two verses in today’s Old Testament and Gospel Readings. In Genesis, the Lord commands Abraham: “For the generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised . . . this is my covenant with you and your descendants after you.”

Circumcision was commanded by the Lord as a vivid, inescapable, ever-present reminder to the Hebrew people, on the very bodies of their menfolk from generation to generation, that the Seed of the woman prophesied to Adam and Eve; THE Descendant promised to Abraham, through whom all nations would be blessed; the Star of Jacob; the Branch of David; the Sun of Righteousness, with healing in his wings; Immanuel, God with Us; the Messiah and Savior of the world, would be born among their Hebrew people. As Paul says in Romans, “For from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all.”

And so today’s Gospel Reading begins: “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.” So, the church observes the holy day of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord on January 1st because he was crucified on the 14th of Nissan; which was calculated to be March 25th; which was assumed according to ancient custom to also be the day of his conception; which makes December 25th nine months later the day of his birth; and from December 25th the eight days prescribed for Hebrew boys to be circumcised is today, January 1st.

Now, except for his death on the 14th of Nissan, we don’t know if any of those dates are correct. But, that’s the logic the early Church followed in setting the dates which have been passed down to us for commemorating these events in the life of our Lord. As the Augsburg Confession and Apology of the Lutheran Church declares: “We gladly keep the old traditions set up in the church . . . among them being certain holy days, festivals, and the like.”

The custom of celebrating The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord on January 1st each year goes back nearly two thousand years. A MUCH more recent observance on this same date is New Year’s Day. We take it for granted that the New Year begins on January 1st. But, historically, the new calendar year has started on all sorts of different dates.

Of course, we still have the separate Jewish New Year and Chinese New Year, but even among predominantly Christian nations there was long disagreement about when the New Year should begin. Just after the Reformation, the pope declared from then on New Year’s Day would be January 1st, and that was adopted in Roman Catholic countries. But, Protestant countries, including Colonial America, weren’t going to follow the pope’s decree. So, until the 1700’s the British Empire, and Colonial America, and most other Protestant countries stubbornly resisted and stuck with the old date for starting the New Year: March 25th. The Russians and their Orthodox Church held out even longer, not adopting January 1st as New Year’s Day until after the Russian Revolution in 1918.

So, although we now associate January 1st almost exclusively with the secular holiday of New Year’s Day, that secular celebration is actually a latecomer to January 1st, and the new kid on the block. As a matter of fact, this year marks the 100th anniversary of the universal observance of New Year’s Day on January 1st. But, our Christian holy day of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord has been celebrated on January 1st for nearly two thousand years.

So, that’s how these two celebrations came to collide on January 1st, the Christian holy day, and the secular holiday. At first glance, commemorating each year The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord may seem a bit like celebrating one of those offbeat, wacky holidays, like National Pickle Day, or International Bagpipe Day. But, the deep spiritual significance of this event is summed up in the appointed Gospel Reading: “On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.”

In Greek, the name “Jesus” is pronounced like the Spanish, “YEAH-zeus.” And the Greek is really a form of the Hebrew name Joshua, pronounced “Yeshua” in Hebrew. That was actually Jesus’ name, what he was called during his life on earth: “YEAH-zeus” in Greek, or most often the Hebrew “Yeshua.”

Many of our English names originated with the person’s occupation: Smith for a blacksmith, Baker for those who did baking, Taylor for those who made clothes, Miller for those who milled grain. It’s the same in Hebrew, most of the names have a meaning. Ezekiel means “God Is Strong,” Isaiah means “The Lord Is My Salvation.” And Joshua or “Yeshua” means “The Lord Saves.”

“On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived.” Jesus’ very name literally tells us who he is, and what he does: “The Lord Saves.” As the angel told Joseph in a dream, “You are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” His very name tells us he is the Lord, who saves us from our sins.

The book of Hebrews says, “Without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness.” That’s the meaning for us of The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord, the holy day we are commemorating today: Already at just eight days old the first shedding of our Lord Jesus Christ’s blood, for your salvation. As the Apostle John says, “the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from every sin.”

So, it’s just a happenstance of history that New Year’s Day and The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord fall now on the same day of the year. But, it is a fitting coincidence. Because, on New Year’s Day we often look back over the year now past with regret and sorrow, over our failures, weaknesses, sins. But, The Circumcision and Naming of Our Lord is a reminder to us of the Good News proclaimed by his very name: “The Lord Saves.”

You go into the New Year with a clean slate before God. Your failures, weaknesses, and sins of the year now past are all wiped away. For, “the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from every sin.”

“On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived. . . You are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

Amen.

*Andrew McGowan, “How December 25 Became Christmas,” Bible Review, Vol. 18, No. 6 (December 2002), p. 46.

†“On the Trinity”

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