Archbishop Philip Freier
8 December 2024
The first Christmas always seems to me to be one of those liminal times when heaven and earth are closest to each other. This is true in both the biblical narrative, and also in our celebration, each year, of these events in salvation history.
In the popular reception of the festival the resonance of this liminality still comes through. This is something like a high tide moment that we experience when the gravitational force of the moon is at its greatest when the moon is at its nearest to us. Like any liminal space there is movement across a threshold that otherwise is thought of as unlikely, even impossible.
This is a time as the hymn says when, “the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.” Certainly our Christmas celebrations this year will carry a strong awareness of these hopes and fears as we hold a heightened sense of the horror of human conflict in our world.
The destructive potential of modern military technology is truly awful. This has been on display in Sudan, Myanmar, Ukraine, Gaza and Lebanon as it was earlier on in Syria. The changing power balance in our own region creates doubt about our own sustained enjoyment of peace. This makes it even more important that we hold together the world changing nature of the incarnation and the promise of the coming kingdom.
Read more: May you find the peace of Jesus at work this Christmas
It is perhaps one of the most repressive experiences of life when we lose hope. Whether this happens because of external circumstances or personal experience it presents us with a big obstacle to our capacity to flourish.
The birth of Jesus presents us with a profound disruption to the seeming “dead ends” of our human existence. Angelic messengers who gather the shepherds, cosmic signs that draw the travellers from the East and the transformation of the manger to be a bed of hope all challenge the finality of human disappointment.
As it was then so it is now. Our Christian life is variously described, but seeing it as a discipleship journey with Jesus does not let us down.
We know that the journey of Jesus goes forward from the manger to his gathering of the disciples and then to his trial, his crucifixion and resurrection.
In his earthly life and resurrected life he invited the same liminality present at his birth to be the transforming force amongst the apostolic community. Our discipleship journey in our time and place is transforming not just for us as individuals but for our wider community.
Look for the signs of when heaven and earth come closest in your life. We all have these at some time or other in our life. The times when we have a heightened awareness of God’s presence, knowing that Jesus is real in our life, when the Holy Spirit fills our minds with hope and peace.
These times are often the narrative hooks for telling our story of faith to others. It is our opportunity to join our story of faith, as little or insignificant as we might perceive it, with the big story of divine purpose in creation and for salvation.
May you have a holy and blessed Christmas.
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