Pastoral Letter
Dear Friends,
The Christmas season is almost upon us, and many people are busily writing Christmas Cards once again. Many cards will have jolly, heart-warming Christmas images printed on them, with cheery Christmas greetings inside, and people will write cheery messages on them to family and friends.
A striking Christmas card was once published with the title "If Christ Had Not Come". It was founded upon Jesus Christ's words "If I had not come." The card represented a Vicar falling into a short sleep in his study on Christmas morning and dreaming of a world into which Jesus had never come.
In his dream he found himself looking through his home, but there were no little stockings in the chimney corner, no Christmas bells or wreaths of holly, and no Christ to comfort, gladden and save. He walked out to the street, but there was no church with its spire pointing to Heaven. He came back and sat down in his library, but every book about the Saviour had disappeared.
The doorbell rang and a young man stood on the doorstep asking the Vicar to visit his poor, dying mother. He hastened with the young man, and as he reached the home he sat down and said, "I have something here that will comfort you." He opened his Bible to look for a familiar promise, but it ended with Malachi. There was no Gospel and no promise of hope and salvation, and he could only bow his head and weep with her in bitter despair.
Two days later he stood beside her coffin and conducted the funeral service. There was no message of consolation, no hope of heaven.
The message of that Christmas Card reminds us of the crucial importance of the Incarnation - the Word made flesh. I think the Incarnation is such a difficult concept for us to grasp that so often we tend to shy away from it and instead seek refuge in the more comfortable and safe images of Christmas stockings, santas, holly and reindeers.
As the celebrated theologian Jim Packer puts it:
"God became man; the divine Son became a Jew; the Almighty appeared on earth as a helpless human baby, unable to do more than lie and stare and wriggle and make noises, needing to be fed and changed and taught to talk like any other child. And there was no illusion or deception in this: the babyhood of the Son of God was a reality. The more you think about it, the more staggering it gets. Nothing in fiction is so fantastic as is this truth of the Incarnation."
It is staggering, but it is also true, and the very name "Christmas" is about the celebrating the coming of the Christ-child, and that is what should lie at the very heart of this time of year.
Someone once said that...
"Christmas began in the heart of God. It is complete only when it reaches the heart of man."
...and that is so true. One of my favourite Christmas Carols is "In the Bleak Midwinter". Its haunting melody and those wonderful words of Christina Rossetti seem to speak so much of the longing that lies inside the heart of so many of us to discover the true meaning of Christmas:
What can I give him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd,
I would bring a lamb;
If I were a wise man, I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give him-Give my heart.
I hope that you will, indeed, give your heart to the Christ-child once again this Christmas-time, and I wish you all a very happy and blessed Christmas.
May God bless you all,