Advent is the time in the Christian calendar when we ponder the mystery of Christ’s arrival in Bethlehem, when we meditate on the mystery of Almighty God taking on human skin and leaving the glory and majesty of heaven to come to a smelly stable as a screaming baby (those of you who know me know I struggle to identify with the little Lord Jesus who made no crying, as I had a son who screamed the place down for quite a few months when he was born and cannot believe in the myth of a perfectly silent baby!) It’s a time when Christians pause from the frenetic busyness of modern life to gaze at the stories we have concerning this arrival of life to a fairly obscure town at a frantically busy time of year (a gathering for the Roman census) and marvel at God’s planning, precision and provision. It’s a time when, as we shop as though there will never be another opportunity to do so and party as though there’s nothing else to do, we need to stop and take stock of God’s ways of doing things, which, as Isaiah reminds us, are vastly different to ours. (Is 55:8-9)
Over the next few days, therefore, I will be doing my Advent musings here, and, thanks to a prayer meeting Garry led at the beginning of last month when he challenged us to pray for our country and spoke about abortion in particular, I will be thinking particularly about the sanctity of life. Christmas is, after all, about the birth of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. We cannot celebrate His birth without thinking about birth in general, and this year, I shall be thinking very specifically about my granddaughter’s birth, on Christmas Eve 2016. There’s nothing quite like a birthday in December for connecting the dots about life in general and eternal life in particular! This birth was special, as all births are, partly because my granddaughter shares her birthday with my father, her great-grandfather, and so there is a sense in which life cycles have been very much on my mind lately. As I thought about my grandmother welcoming her son into life a month early on Christmas Eve 1940 and waited impatiently throughout the day for my granddaughter’s arrival at 7.38 p.m. last December, I have also been thinking about Mary, waiting for this treasure, conceived by the Holy Spirit (Matt 1:20, Luke 1:35). May we too unearth treasure this Christmas, not in the shops or parties we attend, but in the person of our Lord Jesus.