Is it a serious but calm time, providing a renewed spiritual sense of the coming Feast of Christmas? Or is it a mad scramble to “get Christmas sorted”, preferably before 2.00am on Christmas morning!

Both of our great feasts are preceded by periods which are meant to provide a breathing space before the busyness takes over; and an opportunity to enjoy the anticipation. We all know that Advent is a preparation time; four weeks (give or take) to think about Christmas coming; but to understand Advent we need first to think about what Christmas really means to us. exactly what it is for which we are preparing?  

Two of the Gospel writers don’t mention Christmas at all and the other two have such differing stories we might wonder if they are talking about the same person.  The reason for this seems to be how each of the writers saw the meaning of Jesus and his ministry. Mark begins his Gospel with John the Baptist baptising Jesus in preparation for his ministry. The Gospel of John places Jesus back in time before Genesis as the Word with God; and then skips forward to the start of his ministry but both of these Disciples see Jesus’s relevance to the world as beginning with his ministry.

Matthew and Luke, however, want us to share in the time before Jesus’s ministry. It is unlikely that anyone was still alive at the time of writing the Gospels who could have known first or second hand the events surrounding the birth and childhood of Jesus (known as the Infancy Narratives). Much of what we read is drawn from the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament), as evidenced by references from Isaiah which foretell the coming of the Messiah and the likely events surrounding it.
 
No-one actually knew that it was going to be the person of Jesus by name; only that a messiah was prophesied as salvation for the Jews and expected to come in a particular way and from a particular place. So, each of the stories we have come to know and love concerning the birth of Jesus come bathed in the history and longing of the Jewish people.

Christmas is about salvation; less about a baby, but more importantly about the man Jesus would become, the teaching he would give us and the life he expected of his followers. Jesus came to change the world! To change our view of God. To turn accepted social norms on their heads, to reverse inequality; and by so doing to bring peace and wellbeing to all people and finally, by defeating death, to gather all people to himself when we pass from this life.
 
The charming stories we read and re-live each Christmas recognise the beginning of the Christian era, just as long as we don’t remain stuck there. Christmas is for grown-ups too. Perhaps this is something we could consider during Advent, when we have a couple of spare minutes. Christmas is for all of us because anyone can be born, but it takes a real grown-up God to die and rise again.
 
During Advent let’s offer up a prayer of gratitude for the long-term consequences of the star, stable, the shepherds, the Magi etc.. Supermarket checkouts are good places to offer up silent prayers, but I will write more about that in due course.
 
Wishing you a calm, happy, blessed and prayerful Advent.
 
JMC