Viewpoint

Unwrapping the Incarnation

Jeff Morton wonders whether the significance of Jesus’ birth has been lost in the commercialism of Christmas

NO sooner has Halloween tat been removed from supermarket shelves than music associated with Christmas starts to play and the money-making frenzy begins again. This commercialism can obscure the truth behind the celebration, that God the creator visited this world in order to save it: ‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us’ (John 1:14).

The message that God is with us has been buried and lost among the tinsel, gifts and music. If the message had been listened to, our world would not be in such a mess. The selfishness of humanity has caused the planet to become so polluted that it may never recover.

The problem for Christians is that the Christmas festivities indulged in by most of the wealthy parts of the world have nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus. For many it is just an excuse for making merry and exchanging gifts that commercialism has persuaded them to buy. The resulting social pressure drives people of limited means to go into debt.

Our difficulty is that the Advent of God has been obscured by time. The accounts of his birth in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke were written down 60 to 80 years after the events to confirm Jesus’ divinity to followers who were new to the faith. According to some scholars, this meant the accounts were subject to distortion. Regardless, I prefer the more perceptive statements of John.

The accounts of Matthew and Luke were written from differing perspectives. Matthew commences his Gospel with the genealogy of Joseph, showing him descended from King David to accord with prophecy that the Messiah would emerge from this lineage. The weakness of this is that Joseph is not Jesus’ father. He is born of God’s Spirit in the womb of Mary, who is stated to be a virgin.

Luke, who writes from a historical perspective, says the birth took place in Bethlehem because the Emperor Augustus ordered a census to be carried out. If Luke is correct, this took place in AD6 under the direction of Quirinius, the governor of Syria. It required citizens to return to their place of birth, which meant Joseph had to travel to Bethlehem. For Matthew, this fulfilled a prophecy that the Messiah would enter the world at this location (see Micah 5:2).

Luke 2:7 records that there was no room at the inn for Mary to give birth to Jesus, so she ‘placed him in a manger’. The inn was probably not a commercial operation. Houses in this period had a guest room where visitors would stay – usually on the first floor, as the ground floor was used as a stable for the owner’s animals. Luke implies that Joseph and Mary arrived in Bethlehem a day or two before the census but, because of the number of guests, the room was full. They were found a place on the ground floor – so Jesus was born in a stable.

The detailed circumstances of the birth are not recorded in either Gospel, but Mary must have had a midwife to assist with the birth. There is a tradition, based on the apocryphal Gospel of James, that a relative of Joseph named Salome was the midwife at the birth.

Many biblical scholars believe that the Nativity took place in the spring. This is based on the fact that the shepherds mentioned by Luke had flocks out on the hillside. At some time, according to Matthew, a group of astrologers – the Magi – arrived from the east and gave the child gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. This has perhaps caused modern commercial interests to embark on the idea that we should all give gifts to recognise the occasion, despite the fact that in our secular world many have more faith in Father Christmas than in the creator of the universe who entered our world.

We in the northern hemisphere only celebrate this event in winter because the Church, after becoming the official religion of the Roman empire under Emperor Constantine, incorporated pagan festivals surrounding the winter solstice in order that people would have an easy transition to the faith.

Have we allowed the significance of the Incarnation to be lost to the commercial exploitation of Christmas? We need to make sure the entry of God into the world is not just incidental to the events of the season.

The reason for the season

Major Nigel Bovey examines how we see and understand the light of Jesus

JOHN 1:1–9

IN contrast to the Synoptic Gospels, which focus on what Jesus said and did, John’s Gospel focuses on who Jesus is. In setting the context, John chooses not a historical event or a family tree but delves back before the creation of the universe and of time: ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God’ (v1).

John revisits the notion of Christ’s eternal, pre-existent nature in Revelation 13:8, where he describes Jesus as ‘the Lamb who was slain from the creation of the world’.

One memorable Christmas slogan runs: ‘Jesus is the reason for the season.’ Slick wordplay apart, it is packed with theological insight.

The Greek word for ‘word’ is logos, from which we get ‘logic’, ‘logical’ and ‘logistics’. In trying to make sense of the world, ancient Greek philosophers used logos to describe the underlying forces and principles that give the world relationship, regularity and rhythm.

In modern philosophy, logic is the study of valid reasoning, where validity is arrived at through a strict process of connection and deduction.

Jesus is ‘the reason’, because Jesus is the logical, deductive outcome of God’s reasoning. Even before he created a perfect world, God knew that it would be broken and, therefore, logically deduced that it would need someone to fix it. That someone is the output of God’s logic: Jesus, the Logos.

How often have we opened our mouth before engaging our brain or wished we had thought before we had spoken? The neurological fact is that, although we might not always speak what’s on our mind, without the engagement of our brain we cannot speak. Words are expressions of thought.

God’s remedy for a broken world goes beyond his thinking up a solution. God sees the pain that sin brings and tells a sin-sick world what he has in mind. God sees sin and speaks Jesus.

QUESTION

How much more is Jesus than an imaginary friend?

The beginning of John’s Gospel highlights another aspect of Jesus’ divinity – creator of the universe. ‘Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life …’ (vv3 and 4).

The theme recurs throughout the Gospel. In John 11 he recounts Jesus exercising life-giving power when he raises Lazarus from the dead. John records Jesus telling a grieving

Through the week with Salvationist

– a devotional thought for each day

by Lieut-Colonel Ray Oakley

SUNDAY

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. (John 1:1 and 2)

MONDAY

At the name of Jesus/ Every knee shall bow,/ Every tongue confess him/ King of Glory now;/ ’Tis the Father’s pleasure/ We should call him Lord,/ Who from the beginning/ Was the mighty Word. (SASB 74)

TUESDAY

Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

(John 1:3–5)