Foundation for Reformed Theology

Greetings!

Here is an excerpt from another sermon by Karl Barth, "But Take Heart," which he preached at the Basel prison on December 24, 1963.

And yes, I realize that it is a Christmas sermon, but it is so good that I could not wait that long to share it with you!

"In the world you face anxiety; but take heart, I have conquered the world." John 16:33

"I have conquered the world. That is the message of Christmas. I! The Child in the manger of Bethlehem says this to us--with the greatest humility, but also with the greatest power and emphasis. I, the Son of God, the almighty father, the creator of heaven and earth! I, whom he has given to you men as a son of man like yourselves, so that he may be your God and you may be his people--so that the salvation, the peace, the joy of this covenant may come upon you! I have conquered the world. Not you wicked men, nor you good men either, not you foolish nor you clever men, not you believers nor you unbelievers. No Pope and no Council, no government and no university has done this, no science and no technology--even if you were to succeed the day after tomorrow in sledging along the Milky Way. I have done it.

"I have conquered the world. The world is involved in the Christmas message. The world: our great dwelling-house, built and arranged so well and so splendidly as God's creation--and now for all that so full of darkness, a place of so much wrong and sadness. The world: ourselves, we men, also created well by God and intended from the beginning to be his children--and now for all that fallen away from him, his enemies, and so enemies of one another, and so each his own enemy. It is this very world that God loved so very much and in such a way that he was willing to bestow on it, and did bestow on it, me, his son--that's what the child of Bethlehem says.

"I have conquered the world, says this child. A great Lord was needed to do this. Yes, but that is what he is. A strange Lord indeed, quite different from the other great lords who claim to be able to conquer this or that continent, subdue it and bring it under control by cunning and violence. A Lord who as the child of poor people was born abroad in a stable, who was laid in a manger beside an ox and an ass--and who knows if the wood of his manger was not taken from the same forest from which wood was later hewn again to build a cross? For this child has conquered the world by letting himself be delivered up for its sin and guilt to the death of shame. This way he snatched it from ruin. This way he reconciled it with God. This way he won it for God. This way he restored it. This way he gave us men back to ourselves more splendid than before.

"I have conquered the world, we hear. Not: I shall do it some day! but: it is finished, it has happened. I have done it. All you need to do now is to notice, and get ready to accept the fact, that you are living in a world conquered by me--and are already men conquered by me.

"That is the Christmas message. To hear it, to let it take effect, to digest it, to live by it--this is what we wish to prepare ourselves for together on this Christmas Eve: I have conquered the world."

Karl Barth, Call for God: New Sermons from Basel Prison (London: SCM Press, 1967), pp. 106-107.

To read excerpts from other sermons in this collection, click on these links:

"My Time Is in Your Hands"

"My Grace Is Enough"

What about the Other Fellow?

Read them, believe them, and learn to preach!

Dr. James C. Goodloe IV
Grace and Peace,

Dr. James C. Goodloe IV, Executive Director
Foundation for Reformed Theology
4103 Monument Avenue, Richmond, VA 23230
(804) 678-8352