The cost of loving at Christmas
We all know the uncertainties! Despite our best efforts the country is experiencing its worst crisis in decades. Political turmoil, the aftershocks of the pandemic, the devastation of war and communities, families and individuals deeply concerned about being able to survive - not to mention the ongoing effects of the climate crisis.
It doesn’t feel like a recipe for a Happy Christmas does it?
Yet these realities of hardship, uncertainty and fear existed way back at the time of the first Christmas. God chose incarnation among the poorest of a turbulent country at a difficult and dangerous time. His birth set the tone for his life and ministry. Though fraught with risk, incredulity and profound uncertainty, Jesus reached to those living in poverty, to the sick, the hungry, the marginalised and dispossessed, bringing hope in what would have seemed like bleak and hopeless times. His birth wasn’t, of course, good news to everyone! To the ruling elite, he would bring judgment for their actions and he brought fear.
Confident of the hope Jesus blesses his people with, we are called to be hope-givers, light-bearers and life-blessers. We have a song of hope to sing this Christmas and people need to hear the song more than ever. This means look beyond our walls and our peripheral vision to the people Jesus wants us to reach. So many of us are doing this and we are seeing the bigger difference that it makes in people’s lives. One act of loving-kindness in the name of Jesus will transform somebody’s life. This Christmas, let’s commit to doing at least one act of loving kindness a day. However much we are struggling, please remember there are people starved of hope – they have have less than nothing.
Christmas is the time when the world connects most with the Christmas story. This season gives us a wonderful opportunity to invite people to the many and various events and acts of worship. Those of you familiar with LYCIG will be familiar with the mantra, ‘It’s going to be great – I’m going, why don’t you come, too!’ There are so many people of all ages, families and single people, the lonely, isolated and bereaved – people like you and me whose Christmas may be transformed by your invitation. Friends, the first worshippers around the crib were invited: the angels invited the shepherds; the star invited the magi. Who will you invite? The National Church’s Follow the Star: The Great Invitation gives us fabulous resources and support to enable us to reach out gently yet confidently to the world around us, so very much in need of its saviour.
If you fear the cost, ponder for a moment the cost of love which came to us at Christmas – the love of God in the face of the Christ-Child, the one who lived for us and died for us in order to redeem death itself, that we might live with him in the place that knows no ending. That same love that is poured into the hearts of all who dare to invite Him in.
My hope for us all is that we will rise to the act of kindness challenge; that we shall dare to be invitation givers and hope bringers and that by blessing others, we will deepen our own understanding of what it means to be blessed by God.
I pray that you have a happy, blessed and warm Christmas.