Dear Friends
As we enter Advent, we look forward to the celebration of “God with us”, when God came onto earth in human form. He wasn’t born in the way we would have expected - as the son of a ruling monarch would have been - but instead in the worst possible of ways. He was born to an unmarried woman, who was engaged to an older man, in a time when single parents were not accepted. He came into a society that would reject the mother and leave her as a pariah within society. The child would be ignored at the Synagogue school with no male to guide him into manhood, when he would, for the first time, read the scrolls at his Bar Mitzvah. We can go on with the rejection scenario ad infinitum; except - it didn’t happen! We know what happened, we have heard the story many times so it doesn’t need a retelling here, because it all worked out ok in the end, but it beggars one question for us to consider and it’s this.
If a single woman came into our church, visibly pregnant and with the father of the child absent, what would we do?
Would we reject her for the apparent immoral life she leads? (Joseph didn’t!)
Could we find someone to give her room in their house? (The Innkeeper didn’t!)
Would people make provision for the child? (Three Wise Men did!)
Could someone prophesy over the child? (Anna and Simeon did!)
Would the eldership and minister bless the child before God? (The Temple priest did!)
Advent is a time of reflection and questioning. If we cannot answer these questions as others did, then our faith has nothing to commend itself to anyone. It also means that our church should shut its doors and give up!
These are some hard questions that normally would never see the light of day in print. Perhaps they would be dealt with in a sermon one Sunday, but not in a more major sense. These are questions that could damage a church merely by their asking and certainly if that church is weak in faith and spirit. I know that this church is not weak in faith or spirit; I know that this church would not act wrongly in this matter. I also know that this church will benefit from rethinking these questions and reaffirming that we stand by the weak and the dispossessed. We are a friend to all, no matter what their background and we stand by all who call on us for help. We use wisdom to help those in need and bless those who seek a blessing.
To all of this we say Amen, Amen and Amen!
Now a gentler concluding thought. Let us remember that the Wise Men are now plotting the progress of the star and making plans to travel towards the birth of the infant King. We too make plans to join the infant King on Christmas day. The giving of presents symbolises the gift from God, we have a feast day in celebration and we hug and kiss as a sign of the peace which the Christ Child brings. May this Christmas be all you want and need it to be, may the Christ child be born in your hearts and minds and may you know the joy of Christmas throughout the coming year.
God Bless and – ‘Where’s the mistletoe???’ .
God Bless,
Philip
|
