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ALOVE
reviews one writer’s assertion that
Christmas is not quite so fluffy and safe
as your average Christmas card would have
you believe.
“An unwed mother, homeless, was forced
to look for shelter while travelling to meet
the heavy taxation demands of a colonial government.
She lived in a land recovering from violent
civil wars and still in turmoil – a
situation much like that in modern Bosnia,
Rwanda, or Somalia. Like half of all mothers
who deliver today, she gave birth in Asia,
in its far western corner, the part of the
world that would prove least receptive to
the son she bore. That son became a refugee
in Africa, the continent where most refugees
can still be found.” (Philip Yancey,
The Jesus I Never Knew)
Philip Yancey, in his book The Jesus I Never
Knew, tries to examine the Gospel stories
about Jesus with fresh eyes, stripped of the
interpretations and additions he received
from his Church upbringing. It is of course
impossible to be completely freed from the
worldview you have grown up with, but Yancey
shows that the attempt is worthwhile.
In particular, his chapter on the birth of
Jesus entitled Birth: The Visited Planet,
presents a powerful alternative to the sweetly
saccharine, airbrushed and commercialised
Christmas story that many of us have become
accustomed to and comfortable with.
Countless well-intentioned Christmas pageants,
cards, carols, television specials, and other
re-tellings of the story have dulled us to
the fact that “Christmas did not sentimentally
simplify life on planet earth.” For
one, it made things significantly more difficult
for a teenaged girl and her husband-to-be.
Mary is an exceptional character in the Christmas
story, one whose role we sometimes gloss over
in order to get to the main event. But perhaps
we forget that without this “most blessed
of all women” – well, young girl,
really – we would not even have the
main event. Yancey rightly focuses attention
on the incredible faith of this rural teen,
called by God to perform perhaps the most
significant endeavour short of the Resurrection.
She was, as Yancey says, “the first
person to accept Jesus on his own terms, regardless
of the personal cost.” And the cost
was heavy, given the shame, scandal, and lifetime
commitment the pregnancy brought along with
it. Malcolm Muggeridge argues that today Mary’s
pregnancy would be a prime candidate for termination,
on humane grounds.
Speaking of infanticide, Yancey also notes
just how perilous the arrival of the baby
Jesus was. He contrasts the apparent vulnerability
of the Kingdom of God as it slumbered in the
manger, with the apparent invincibility of
the Kingdom of the World, represented here
by Herod ordering the massacre of the male
infants. Herod, and Caesar above him, really
did in practical terms hold all the cards.
Think of Hitler, or Stalin, and their paranoid
use of power. If we did not know the rest
of the story, we might think the announcement
of this new King of all Kings to be a bit
of a joke.
Yet we learn from the Christmas story that
the King of Kings chose to make his entrance
in a way that would set the tone for the rest
of his life, and for the type of Kingdom power
he would exercise. Yancey says he was surprised
by the word associations he made when thinking
about the incarnation of God’s Son into
our world: “Humble, approachable, underdog,
courageous – these hardly seem appropriate
words to apply to deity.”
It is shocking that the very God who is shown
to be drowning whole armies in great rivers
he just finished parting should now be portrayed
as humble “as a baby who could not eat
solid food or control his bladder, who depended
on a teenager for shelter, food, and love.”
We naturally understand that God is great,
that he is powerful and huge. It took an incredible
revelation to show us that God is also small,
small enough to communicate with his creation
without causing us to keel over in terror.
This also speaks to the approachability of
Jesus. Fear is the currency of most religious
experience. And prior to Jesus, approaching
God was only attempted if you did not mind
glowing a little afterwards at the very least.
Here now is a God who would risk everything,
who would Empty himself of all but love, so
that we could approach not with fear, but
with love. So approachable was Jesus, in fact,
that his betrayer got close enough to receive
a kiss.
Yancey was also struck at how God seemed to
intentionally tip the scales out of his favour,
choosing to come into the world not as a privileged
ruler, but rather as an underdog. Not one
person who has had to flee persecution can
say that God does not understand their situation.
All throughout the life of Jesus he identified
most strongly with the oppressed, the poor,
the misunderstood, the ignored, the underdog.
It is this that caused G.K. Chesterton to
comment, “Alone of all the creeds, Christianity
has added courage to the virtues of the Creator.”
(p.42) The risk of the incarnation of Jesus,
even - or especially - in that first night
was enormous. It is entirely true, as it says
in the carol, that “the hopes and fears
of all the years” were met in the manger
that night.
Yancey ends his chapter with some epic Christmas
imagery from Revelation 12. Here we see a
glorified woman in labour, fleeing from the
wrath of a great red dragon whose tail sweeps
stars out of the sky and who is bent on devouring
the newborn child. Following the woman’s
flight a great war begins in the heavens.
These images do not usually show up in carols,
greeting cards, or nativity scenes, but they
reflect the reality of Christmas every bit
as much as the more familiar accounts in Matthew
and Luke. This is the glimpse we have into
what Christmas looked like from the perspective
of heaven, and there is nothing sentimental
or fluffy about it.
The birth of Jesus is a point at which human
history intersects powerfully with the usually
veiled cosmic clash of good and evil. And
the birth is a decisive victory for good,
as the eternal, omnipotent God took on the
fragile flesh of an infant boy to bring salvation
to his creation.
So as you celebrate Christmas this year, try
as Yancey did to look on the story with fresh
eyes. If you do, you will find that we are
not simply remembering a time of good will
and good cheer. We are also remembering a
time of disruption, invasion, great risk,
and greater victory.
Philip Yancey’s, The
Jesus I Never Knew is available to
buy - Click
here
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