THE NEED FOR THE SUPERNATURAL
And the angel said to Mary, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you
have found favor with God. 31 And behold, you will conceive in
your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. 32
He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.
And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father
David, 33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and
of his kingdom there will be no end.”
Luke 1:30-33
And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field,
keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the
Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around
them, and they were filled with great fear. 10 And the angel said
to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great
joy that will be for all the people. 11 For unto you is born this
day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12 And
this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in
swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” 13 And suddenly there
was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising
God and saying,
14 “Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among those
with whom he is pleased!”
Luke 2:8-14
It is not easy to celebrate the festival of Christmas in a spirit of true Christian
worship and adoration, when so many worldly interests conspire to create an
entirely false view of it and succeed in reducing it to a season that is ‘good for
business', with booming sales in the shops and heavy spending by the public. And it
is more and more incumbent upon us to resist the pressure put upon us to become
embroiled and submerged in what can only be called a sordid commercial racket,
and instead, allow something of the quiet wonder and mystery of the message of the
angels to touch our spirits and remind us afresh what its real heart is.
Nor would this quench any generous impulse within us but rather quicken it and,
more important, give it a new direction, away from mere romantic sentiment and
into true Christian charity, as a worthy expression of the gratitude that wells up in
hearts that know the indwelling of the Saviour.
It was Charles Dickens who said that there was magic in the very name of
Christmas. We know, of course, what he meant, and few would be churlish enough
to want to deny or stifle ‘the Christmas spirit’ that is abroad during the festive
season. All the same, to speak in this way about Christmas is really to miss the
point. For it is not magic that we are concerned with in the coming of Christ into
the world, but mercy; and mercy means the supernatural.
This is precisely the note that has been lost and abstracted from the Christmas of
our time. The angels and the star have become symbols of the romance and
sentiment of the annual jollification, instead of signs of the Divine visitation to rescue
and redeem men from the tragedy and woe of sin. The sense of the supernatural in
the Christian faith has rarely been at such a discount; and having lost it, men have
lost their humanity too, and any hope of true life. For God made us for Himself, and
only when He ‘comes' to us (after our sin had driven us from Him) do we become
ourselves. It is the supernatural that makes us natural and real.
Let us take time, then, this Christmas, to allow the Spirit of Christ to interpret the
wonder and the mystery of the Incarnation to our deepest hearts, until they glow
and thrill with the very immensity of the everlasting Mercy, making all our rejoicing
and all our giving an expression of our gratitude and thanksgiving to God for His
unspeakable Gift.