Christmas Eve - Holy night

LUKE 2: 8-20

It begins like any night. Out in the fields shepherds go about their monotonous work. Theirs is a humdrum world that offers few possibilities. Theirs is a world in which they have little status - the bottom of the pile is where they belong. It’s a world of darkness.

Nearby in Jerusalem Rome is all powerful. Caesar Augustus is at the peak of his powers. Hailed as son of God and the bringer of good news to the world, the painful reality is that his power is built on oppression, brute force and exploitation. His puppet King, Herod, is a man who undertakes great building projects including even the rebuilding of Jerusalem’s temple. Yet he is a man of capricious cruelty from which even his own family is not safe. It is a world of darkness.

And yet into such a world of darkness, a change is coming. But its beginnings are not with the followers of Caesar or Herod. They are not even with the bloated religious establishment. Instead the change is first felt on those hills where many labour for but a subsistence. To these men comes a revelation, a revelation of good news. A mighty liberator? No! But wait for it a baby lying in a manger where even animals would feed.

It sounds improbable. How can a baby in downtown Bethlehem be the bringer of hope? And yet the possibility can not be discounted for even the very heavens are full of the excitement of this night. And what a message!

“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours.”

Oh yes, this is a night in which the world is being changed in such a way that it can never be as it was before. This is a night that will divide the human story into a “Before” and an “After.”

What of those shepherds? Well they take a risk. They leave the fields and their work to go to Bethlehem to see for themselves what has happened. And there they see the Holy family - Mary Joseph and Jesus. But these are transformed men. They eagerly share the angelic message with all who will listen. And as they return to the fields, they go back in Luke’s words;

“glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.”

To borrow a phrase from C.S. Lewis, they were “surprised by joy.” Much they may have been unable to understand but before them lay a world pregnant with teeming possibilities. And yet but five miles away, Herod along with his Roman masters, the Temple establishment were untouched by the wonder of this night!

It is a foretaste of what is to come. The centres of power would never be reconciled to the gift of this night. Soon Herod would try to kill the child. Thirty or so years down the line a Roman governor would succeed where Herod had failed and the powerful men of the top religious body the Sanhedrin would be cheerleaders at that killing. For the babe of Bethlehem would as in his Nativity identify himself with the humble, the powerless and the outcasts. The babe of Bethlehem would grow to be the upside down King who would stand the unjust and oppressive structures of the world upon their head. His would be a Kingdom in which none would be written off for his coming is a non violent invasion of our world by Divine love and unlimited grace.

Our world today knows the reality of darkness. Across its continents leaders plot their violence and muffle out the cries of the poor, the outcasts and the voiceless. And yet the world can never be as it was before that night. God has engaged with our world and in Christ has brought light to the places of darkness, light never to be erased.

On this holy night, let us celebrate the embrace of God that reaches us through the babe of Bethlehem. May we like those shepherds journey towards the Christ child and then let him be born in our hearts. After all as that great mystic, Meister Eckhart put it;

“What good is it to me if Mary gave birth to the son of God and I do not also give birth to the son of God in my time and culture.”

Aye, a holy night that changed the world. A holy night in which is revealed the light to draw thee and me into the wonder of God’s gracious purposes.


Bideford Methodist Church Midnight Communion 24th December 2007