Looking forward to Christ

I guess it is inevitable that we all look forward to different things at this time of year. Even though the nights are dark and wet, December seems to bring an air of expectation. The adverts, our diaries and planners all focused around the idea that something good is happening. Of course expectations and reality can be very different things. High expectation can lead to great disappointment, and so a new year often begins with a sense of drudgery or disappointment. Even Christmas itself, now so commercialized, leaves many hungry for something; even though most bellies are amply filled. Please don’t misunderstand me; I have no desire (just yet) to don my LED illuminated, Bah Humbug hat! (available on a wet November evening in Yate!) I love Christmas, I love the celebration, the food, the festival, the family and all the trappings that goes with it. I just wonder if perhaps we sometimes miss the simple beauty of Christmas when we let expectations get out of hand.
One of the great things about Christmas is that it does give a rhythm to the year as a whole. I don’t know whose idea it was to put Christmas at the darkest, wettest time of year, but I love them! [For any biblical scholars out there, we really do have no evidence that Jesus was born on Dec 25th just that it has become his ‘official’ birthday.] To have a celebration at the bleakest time of year is pure genius, and it fits so well… into the darkness comes the light. Every year needs a rhythm a routine that helps us to understand and make sense of things. Without that, there is simply chaos and disorder, each day another day, come from nowhere and leading nowhere. However add in the rhythms of Sabbath weekends and festivals and each day or month may begin to find its place.
For me I look forward to meeting Christ at Christmas. That annual reminder that something utterly beyond us touched the world in such a down to earth way is simply stunning. A mucky stable and a tired mother in a dubious marital situation struggling through a busy neighbourhood simply explode any false ideas we may have of a separation between sacred and secular. It is so ordinary and messy, and so profound: the light has touched the darkness. Every tacky Christmas light or decoration can be redeemed because they point to something so fundamental. Meeting Christ means that nothing is ordinary anymore. Every tiny act of kindness becomes an epiphany, God is in there somewhere. Although I don’t always meet Christ where I expect to at Christmas, I am rarely disappointed. The season itself seems to generate the possibility of kindness, and it comes in so many forms.
I hope you also look forward to meeting someone special this Christmas. One of the richest ideas in Christianity is that whenever we greet or welcome a stranger, or indeed a friend we may somehow be greeting or meeting Christ. Christmas suggests that God touches this world in the most ordinary of people, perhaps he may touch the world through you this Christmas
Finally I know that all your churches in Frampton and Coalpit Heath would make you very welcome if you wished to join us to celebrate Christmas, whether you want the calm of a midnight communion or the explosion of joy and laughter on Christmas day, you would be very welcome.
Stephen