The ‘business’ of our world – the planet’s orbit, the weather and seasons, our births and deaths – does not reflect our special occasions such as Christmas (or any other religious observance). The business of our world happens. We can understand the world physically, chemically, empirically – and we also do so philosophically and theologically. For Christians, we live in a world we have plagued with sin and death and all sorts of evil and Christmas is the account of God entering the world’s stage to rescue us from the consequence of our behaviour and to be with us so that we might live ‘the full life’ irrespective of the planet’s orbit, the weather and seasons, geopolitics and how we treat each other – and even should we die. It means that Jesus is our best Christmas present!
It’s relatively easy to write those words and you to read them when life is pretty ok for us. I suspect no one ever expects the ‘perfect’ life – however that is defined – so yes, we’ll get colds, sniffles, a bone might break we might even have surgery, or work can be a pain at times, or some of our relatives are will always require our forbearance – but that is all part and parcel of life when so much overall goes right for us than goes wrong! The struggle comes when we’re at the end of our tether, when we feel exhausted and empty, when that niggling thought keeps returning, ‘There is no god; it’s all a delusion!’.
Pastors and emergency service workers – and maybe you yourself will nod – that Christmas can be quite a painful and lonely time when we’re all supposed to be so jolly and festive – good will to all? – bah humbug! In fact the troubles can seem amplified, the darkness darker, the world more grim precisely at this time and I’m not talking about the depth of winter! Where are you, God?
And God replies. We hear the cry of a new born. We hear the gurgling of a baby at the breast. We hear laughter and love of an infant. And so begins God’s message to us of understanding, of his real presence with us, of hope and security in this cruel, capricious, and corrupt world which we have made for ourselves. Our nature wants a ‘genie God’ to fix our mess but leave us in charge of everything. Christmas reveals a person linked to a manger and a cross who says, ‘Follow me in this world, in your life, one day at a time, and I will sustain you’. Babies grow on you! Our God never leaves us. That is why Christmas is actually controversial and subversive – God is with us! – but on his terms! And those terms don’t change when we find living so so hard!
GS