A five-year-old girl was watching as the nativity scene was set up for the carol service. She was mesmerized by all the figurines – especially the baby Jesus. When she asked what the manger was, her teacher explained that they didn’t have a crib for Jesus, so they had to lay a blanket on the hay and put him there. She thought about that for a minute, and then asked, “Did they have to use a manger for his car seat, too?”

Whilst many of the wonder-filled children of this generation will find it difficult to comprehend Christmas without cars, a number of today’s stress-fuelled adults would struggle just as much to come up with the connection between this annual Winter festival and the name “Jesus”. Christmas is simply a holiday, a time to party, an opportunity to exchange gifts with loved ones. “Jesus” is a swear word.

Those of this generation who do take the time to acquaint themselves with the story of Jesus’ birth often struggle to see how this ancient event might impact their 21st Century lives. After all, what difference should it make to us that a peasant girl called Mary gave birth to this particular child two-thousand years ago? 

The answer is: All the difference in the world! 

Before the birth of Jesus, we had only a vague idea of what God was like. In Jesus, God became one of us, and revealed himself to us. Before the birth of Jesus, we had a set of religious laws but no access to the Spirit who had inspired them. In Jesus, we hear the words, see the actions, and are introduced personally to the Spirit of God’s law of love. Before the birth of Jesus, this world so full of pain, injustice and death gave us every reason to think that, if there was a God, he must be angry with us. In Jesus, the almighty God stooped down to our level and opened the way for us to receive his hurt-removing, life-enhancing, all-transforming love. 

Those of us who know all of this could spend this Christmastime bemoaning the fact that others are missing the whole point. We could get irritated about all the debt, the greed, the commercialism. We could be tempted to lock ourselves away and wait for it all to pass. But just as surely as Jesus was born to make all the difference in the world, so the Christian Church exists to communicate that awesome fact. If we spend this time of year getting all huffy and superior then we too will be missing the whole point of Christmas! Jesus was born for everyone, and not just for those who already know him. So for those within our community who do not yet know the world-saving, soul-changing, darkness-banishing good-news of the true Christmas story, let’s use all the means at our disposal to get the message out. 

                                  Every blessing