Christmas for believers
“Still the night, holy the night, sleeps the world hid from sight.”
Some hymns describe a season. For me, and for many others, that opening line of Joseph Mohr’s lovely hymn captures the moment.
But we must ask, is it possible for people, whether or not we believe the Bible story of Bethlehem, to recapture the true meaning and spirit of Christmas?
For everyone both believes and questions.
I have found that in every professed non-believer there is faith, and in every believer there are questions.
So, let us think of Christmas for all believers.
Before we complain that it is too commercialised, we should remember that Christmas has always been a noisy affair.
In her recent book‘Christmas; A Biography’, Judith Flanders outlines the merry antics of former days.
Eating and drinking to excess was common, while the religious side of Christmas was easily overlooked among the wild festivities.
In her pleasantly readable book, Judith points out that the emphasis on the family was instituted by George V in the first Christmas broadcast in 1932.
Since then, the Christmas family scene has been foremost.
I cherish Christmas. For me, the value and everlasting beauty of Christmas has lost none of its appeal.
I love Christmas Eve and the Watchnight service.
While I always loved Christmas, especially with my family, my most memorable Noel was in the Middle Church in Paisley.
We had opened the Christian Action Centre at the beginning of December. I cannot remember the exact year.
There was a real buzz in the whole community.
People provided sensible Christmas gifts — socks, scarves, gloves.
I was chaplain in Castlehead High School and the home economics department supplied goodies for the homeless men and women.
The local baker – was it called McMillan’s? – gave us Christmas food for our homeless friends.
We were still only providing breakfasts, we had not opened the overnight accommodation.
But that Christmas morning we were able to provide a breakfast followed by Christmas gifts and food.
As we tidied the kitchen, we heard the skippers begin to sing ‘Still the Night’.
They were not good singers, but they touched us all.
I felt the genuine sense of Bethlehem in that dilapidated church.
Christmas, for me, is real because it constantly tells me that Jesus Christ came into this world.
Our secular society has successfully removed virtually all visible signs of Christmas.
But no power on earth can remove Jesus from the world scene, nor diminish the power of Jesus in the affairs of men, nor eradicate the presence of Jesus from the human heart.
Jesus Christ came from God on that first Bethlehem. He is here to stay.
Jesus is independent as he stands on his own feet and is not knocked about.
He is within our human affairs, but is not curbed and inhibited by them.
He taught us about His real God, what He taught is often distorted, but Jesus’unerring message will never be silenced.
People can turn their back on His church, but they will always have to meet Him face-to-face.
On an individual level, our lived-in experiences can often be topsy-turvy affairs and we do not know if we are coming or going.
But, throughout everything, Jesus remains a constant and reliable factor.
But there is something far more. If you want a faith, a real faith, not some second-class hope-it-is-true religion, and why settle for anything less, then encounter Jesus because Jesus takes us to God.
Jesus puts people in touch with eternity.
The birth of Jesus convinces me of the worth and value of human nature.
Bethlehem tells me that the eternal and pure being of God reckoned people to be so important that the Eternal One came to be with us and to be one of us.
As John Calvin said:“Jesus became bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh.”
My life and your life have a significance greater than our mortal days.
That was what Christmas taught me in the Middle Church on that Christmas morning.
The angels sang:“Glory to God in the highest.”But we have found God’s glory in the lowest within our own humble life
“My soul magnifies the Lord” (Luke 1.46).