Saint Michael’s Church
Serving God and Bishop’s Stortford since 673
Clergy Letter For December 2007
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CLERGY LETTER FOR DECEMBER 2007 |
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The Vicar writes.... Don't Miss the Real Event!
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“I won’t be coming around again. Thanks for the tea. I’m sorry to have been a nuisance all these times.” That was Ian, a regular caller at the Vicarage where I used to live some years ago on his last visit before I left. He had been a miner but when the Pits closed he couldn’t get another job so he went on the road. He used to sleep out in all weathers. He begged for food and for clothes and for money. He had his regular ports of call and he used to travel widely. He called about two weeks before Christmas. Over the regulation cup of tea and large cheese sandwich I asked him what he made of Christmas. He replied quick as a flash: “It’s not for people like me.” His reply still haunts me today. The way we celebrate Christmas has done that for Ian and for thousands of others in much better circumstances. It’s obscured the Gospel. In fact the way we celebrate Christmas is one of the chief barriers to people hearing the good news of Jesus Christ. The Gospel is about the Lord of heaven and earth becoming man for our sake, living our life and then dying our death. But we surround it with so much else in the way of mid-winter commercialism, and so much that is trite and sugary and like a fairy tale that people like Ian think it is not for him. Of course the incarnation of Jesus Christ is for him: it is precisely for him, but how are we to make that clear for him? That is the real challenge of Christmas. When I went to buy some Christmas cards the other day from Carr and Bury’s I found it quite difficult to choose ones which told the Christmas story. The majority of them were either rather cute or featured something connected with mid winter secularism. One I saw had a picture of a family sitting on a sofa surrounded with presents and boxes of chocolates, with a huge Christmas tree in the background. They were glued to the television set. The caption read: Happy Christmas - Don’t miss it! How could anyone miss it, I thought, but of course they could. In fact thousands of our fellow citizens will miss it. They may eat and drink and give presents and visit relatives and have a good time, but they will miss it. Another card, however, did make me think. It simply said Christmas means we never have to ask how much God loves us. This for me is both the consolation and the challenge of Christmas and goes some way towards answering the Ians of this world. We know he loves us infinitely, but Christmas does mean that we have to ask what we can do to make that love real. We have the consolation of knowing that God is with us. We have the challenge of following the Lord Jesus from Bethlehem to Calvary and beyond. It’s no accident that the God of the universe became man by slipping in to the world in a busy and overcrowded town with everyone intent on something else. Only a few had any inkling of the importance of what was happening that night. They were simple people and poor, yet they knew something profound was afoot. Today, only a minority will have an inkling of the true meaning of Christmas: the rest will miss it. Don’t let yourself or your family miss it. Use Advent to prepare for it. Let it be real for you and try to do something that will help people like Ian discover that God loves them so much that he gave his only son for them. It’s not for people like me, he said. O yes it is, must be our convincing reply. May I wish you all every blessing for Christmas and the New Year?
Toby Marchand |
Office Address:
Saint Michael’s Church
Windhill
Bishops Stortford
Hertfordshire
CM23 2ND