The Miracle of Christmas

Rev Canon Jenny Chalmers, UCANZ co-chair and Canon Precentor at Waiapu Cathedral of St John, Napier.

On Christmas Day community halls throughout New Zealand are filled with people eating at community Christmas dinners. Whether you have a family or not, at Christmas time there is a place for you to go. In these celebrations we see the grace of the Christmas story, and the best of human nature.

The Christmas story is the greatest love story ever told. God loved the world so much he sent his son, the one whom we call Immanuel, God with us.

This is a story young children enjoy, the wonder of the nativity scene, and the romance of a child placed in a manger. It’s a story the marginalised and disadvantaged adore, for in that story they are intelligent, wise and accepted. It’s a story that the old, the discerning and the insightful ponder year after year, for it is one of those myths that gains more significance with each year’s retelling.

It is a story of great paradox; a story of the joy, wonder and hope of a new family. It’s also about the deep and mysterious love of God that he should send us a messiah. And it’s also a story of deep humiliation, extreme marginalisation and overbearing oppression.

It is in holding these extremes together that we have the mystery and the real story of Christmas.

The story of the birth of Jesus as told in Luke, tells us that Mary became pregnant, but not to her betrothed Joseph. In this one line we catch a glimpse of Joseph’s deep humiliation. But we have a greater glimpse of Joseph's deep compassion, for a pregnant young unbetrothed woman in that culture, is a scandal that ricochets on to the mother and her child.

Mary and her child are at huge risk from gossip and marginalisation and having to rely on the charity of others for existence.

Joseph, having accepted Mary as his own, was then summoned to a census in Bethlehem, the place where his family came from - and so they travelled, although Mary’s time was due, to the place where the census would be taken.

It turns out that the place was inhospitable. Where else would a labouring woman be offered an animals’ shelter, than in a place where people were treated like animals?

The birth of this baby is nothing short of scandalous. There are no clothes prepared, no family waiting and nothing that can be given to a baby. There were just the shepherds who came to adore the new-born. We can understand the deep humiliation of the parents, and yet as with all new parents, they have big dreams for their child.

The story of Mary and Joseph and of their baby Jesus is a story lived by millions around the world. It is daily lived by the homeless, those without family, the marginalised, the strangers in a strange place, the Pacific Island people struggling against the climate that has changed their environment irrevocably.

But it is in this story of Christmas, that we recognise the best that humans have to offer and the most that the grace of God has to give.

For no matter how dehumanising, how obscene the situation of the child born in the manager, the child born in the refugee camp, we have the innate dignity of a new human being with all the hope and promise that brings.

It is the miracle of Christmas, not just that in Jesus, God became human but that in becoming human, God became one of the weak, frail, defenceless, misunderstood, rejected and marginalised persons of the world. In being born in the obscenity of an animals’ shelter, God took on human form at its most defenceless and weakest.

Why? Because God’s love and grace is unlimited. 

Songs for Christmas in Luke’s Gospel

Rev Peter Taylor

What is your favourite Christmas carol? Silent night? Joy to the world? Mine is Love came down at Christmas. At Christmas even those with no church background know some Christmas carols; I spotted this in the Harry Potter books, not known for their spirituality: “It was quite something to hear ‘Oh [sic!] Come, All Ye Faithful’ sung by an empty helmet!” In Advent and Christmas we focus on Jesus’ coming and birth. Most people like to hear of a birth; it is not surprising that Jesus’ arrival caused others to sing.

As the Lectionary turns to Luke’s gospel from Advent Sunday I thought it might be useful to have a look at the four songs Luke records for us around the birth narratives. They could become a theme for the December Sunday services.

I begin with Zechariah’s song found in Luke 1:68-79; logically it comes first even though it is not the first song. Zechariah was struck dumb when he questioned an angel’s message to him about becoming a parent after many years of his and Elizabeth’s infertility. The song, coming after John the Baptiser’s birth and the end of Zechariah’s temporary dumbness, praises God’s provision for Israel and looks forward to a promised salvation to be fulfilled through John’s ministry as he prepares for the Messiah. Maybe here on the second Sunday of Advent is a time to reflect on God’s promises.

The second song, commonly called The Magnificat, is found in Luke 1:46-55, and proclaims a radical shake-up of society to be enacted by God. It is an echo of Hannah’s song found in 1 Samuel 2, after the birth of Samuel. It could form the basis of a sermon on the coming transformation through Jesus Christ and be just right for the third Sunday in Advent.

The third song is brief and sung by the angels to the shepherds, see Luke 2:14. Although the song is part of a reading in most carol services, I suspect very few preachers have tackled it. Now is the time to do so; it sums up the gospel in very few words – God is to be given glory, peace will come to earth, God is pleased. There is your three-point sermon for the Sunday before Christmas.

The last song, coming on the last Sunday of December, is the so-called Nunc Dimittis, found in Luke 2:29-32, spoken by Simeon in the Temple when Jesus’ parents bring him for God’s blessing. It proclaims that God has kept his promises and the salvation God seeks is unfolding, and will embrace Jews and Gentiles. In a world of division this message needs to be heard – here is an opportunity to preach it.

However you celebrate Advent and Christmas, whether you sing traditional carols, or more modern ones, may we as Methodists, who are known for our singing, do so wholeheartedly, even if those carols do not include your favourite. 

Life and Loss

Rev Dr Susan Thompson

Christmas is a tough time for anyone living with a sense of loss. Those who have lost loved ones during lockdown have been denied some of the usual rituals that help people to grieve. Their feelings of pain and sadness may be intensified.

Working in a retirement village and rest home brings me into the presence of death and grief on a daily basis. It brings home the reality that we are all on the same journey of life and inevitable loss. Thinking about grief is something I’m often called to do.

The writer and artist Jan Richardson suggests that days like Christmas are “thin places” in the year. They’re days when the world we live in and the world of the spirit seem closer than usual. As we reflect on those who have gone before us, we may become aware of their continuing presence in our lives.

When someone we love dies, their physical presence leaves us. Our hearts ache and we are bereft. Hopefully we will love again, yet no one can ever replace the unique person who has gone from our lives. We will never have quite the same relationship again. In itself that’s often a cause for huge sadness and pain.

And yet, the love we shared doesn’t end. We remain in relationship with those who have died, carrying them with us in our hearts. There is more than just emptiness.

I was in my early thirties when my first very close friend died. We were students at college together and we laughed at things no one else found funny. When Liz died, I felt like I would never laugh again. Joan Chittister says “the loss of a friend is a gouge in the heart forever” and I struggled with grief.

Months passed and then one day I unexpectedly laughed at something quirky. I knew it was the kind of thing that would have made Liz laugh too and suddenly I realised that she would always be with me. I could always go to her memory in laughter, in gratitude for the things we shared, in tears sometimes for her absence. I could rest in her memory, in the knowledge that love continued.

That was a profound moment. It didn’t heal my pain, I still miss my friend. But love found its way through the gap inviting me to trust that she was with me still.

This Christmas may you too know that those you have loved and lost are with you still. In the words of John O’Donohue, may you know that “absence is alive with hidden presence ... the song of an eternal echo”.