HE HAS VISITED
HIS PEOPLE
Christmas
is like struggling through a thick forest and coming to a clearing and being
able to look up to the sky and knowing where you are. It is a space we create
each year where we pause in the midst of the bustle of life and take an eternal
view of our surroundings. If we call ourselves disciples of Jesus it means we,
at least, stop for a moment and reflect on the event that we remember these
days of Christmas. And I believe we, in some way, represent the many people who
do not think deeply about this event. We do it for them and somehow bring them
along with us to Bethlehem.
It
is a long story. A man called Bill Bryson wrote a book some years ago called A Short History of Nearly Everything and
in it he spells out for us in simple language the astronomical dimensions of
time and space which make up the preparation for the arrival of humans. We now
know that the bible story took billions of years to reach that point where God
“visited his people” in “Bethlehem of Judea.” He acted “when the times had run
their course” (Eph 1:9) and came to “bless us whom he had chosen before the
world was made.” (ibid). And Jesus himself told his disciples , “Blessed are
the eyes that see what you see, for I tell you that many prophets and kings
wanted to see what you see, and never saw it; to hear what you hear and never
heard it” (Luke 10:23). And the people had a sense of this as when they reacted
to the raising of the son of the widow of Nain: “A great prophet has risen
among us; God has visited his people” (Luke 7:17).
This
“visit” of God, this “living among us” (John 1:14) changed everything- not in a
dramatic way like the French Revolution or the world wars of the twentieth
century or the end of colonialism in Africa. It changed things as leaven
changes flour or as a seed growing. Jesus rejected all forms of force and
compulsion. He wanted then, and he wants now, people to grow. But they must
grow organically, naturally – each according to his or her gifts and abilities.
God is completely respectful of human rhythm. He is prepared to wait.
So
there was a long time of preparation, a short time of his presence among us and
now we live in “our time, the final days.” (Heb. 1:2). This is the time of
growth, and just as the dry season and the wet season come round every year, so
does Christmas. We cannot celebrate it once and for all. We have to keep coming
back to it and pray, with Cardinal Newman, that “each Christmas, as it comes,
may find us more and more like him, who at this time became a little Child for
our sake: more simple-minded, more humble, more affectionate, more resigned,
more happy, more full of God.”
“More
full of God!” This “third” age, these “final days” is the time for us to become
“full of God.” Our Baptism is the beginning: it is when the seed is sown or the
leaven enters the flour. But a lot has to happen later and this is our life.
The Christian, the disciple of Jesus, describes his or her life as a time when
they become “full of God” through their spontaneous or deliberate responses.
It
is amazing how the story shifts suddenly. We have Mary and Joseph and the birth
of Jesus. But as soon as this is described we move to the shepherds who were
close by and to whom an angel appears and tells them the news. We are told they
were terrified – everyone in the New Testament, even Mary, is “disturbed” or
afraid of the Good News. I do not know how many times the words, “do not be
afraid,” appear.
So,
as soon as the Good News happens it is announced – and people respond. The
shepherds were the first and all of us come later. This Christmas, as with
every Christmas but always in a new way, we are invited to respond. This may
disturb us, even frighten us, but the gospel is clear that the message is one
of joy. We come to the manger with our own particular reasons for being joyful
and grateful as well as our own particular concerns and anxieties and we place
them there with the gifts of the wise men from the east.
On
this Christmas Day we can leave the manger with a new dose of hope for the days
ahead into 2014. “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light”
(Is 9:2). We leave the manger with great hope that that light will shine on us.
I leave you with a word from the poet Seamus Heaney written in the dark days of
“the troubles” in Northern Ireland (1969-98):
“Human beings suffer,
They torture one another,
They get hurt and get hard.
No poem or play or song
Can fully right a wrong
Inflicted and endured.
The innocent in gaols
Beat on their bars together.
A hunger-striker's father
Stands in the graveyard dumb.
The police widow in veils
Faints at the funeral home.
History says, don't hope
On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.
“Hope and history
rhyme.” There comes a moment – a tidal wave - when the hopes of people actually
become real history: hope is fulfilled.
Christmas 2013.
