Glory to God

Day Twenty Five                   

Glory to God                          

Luke 2:4-20

So soon it is over. The gifts are over and, probably, laid aside. The wrapping paper, so carefully folded and neatly secured with ribbons and bows, lies strewn across the floor. Only the dog pays any attention to it. The great, celebratory meal has been prepared and cooked at length; it has adorned the festive table, but now it is gone. The kitchen looks like a war zone. It will have to wait until we all have caught our breath. It’s time to sit down, to share good company, and to reflect.

Has it been a good year for you? Have there been changes that you eagerly anticipated and towards which you labored? Has another chapter begun at school or at work? Has your family expanded, or has it contracted? Has death or divorce or some other kind of separation cast a shadow over your year? Is there an empty place at the table? Has Christmas become, for you, a time to look back wistfully, not a time to look forward hopefully? What does our faith have to say after the dinner is done, as we sit back and reflect?

I hope that you will reflect upon the reason for the celebration. Christmas is about as far from a secular holiday as it is possible to be. No matter what people tell you, it’s not “all about the family.” Or, rather, it’s all about His family. We become members of God’s family by faith; not our faith, but His. It is Christ’s faithfulness that overcomes our faithlessness. His sacrifice enables us to be adopted into the family and household of God. And that, certainly, is reason for celebration.

There is rich glory in these days, and it is all His. “We have seen His glory” says John. Personally, we haven’t yet set eyes upon Him, unlike those who walked the hills of Galilee and the streets of Jerusalem, two thousand years ago. Of those who did, of course, some did not behold His glory. Herod ignored it. Caiaphas denied it. And, if he caught sight of it, Pontius Pilate quickly turned his face away. But John saw His glory, and what he knew, he wrote.

Christ’s was the glory of the only begotten Son of the Father. It was the glory of God, nothing less. There, surrounded by shepherds kneeling, a frightened Joseph and an exhausted Mary, watched over by a star and a hundred thousand angels, glory came down. In Christ that glory shone with an unparalleled blaze. Nothing could extinguish it, not even a Cross. There’s good reason for that – Christ’s glory is the Cross. His glory is that He gave Himself for us, in confirmation of the Father’s deep, deep love. His glory shines most brightly in whatever expresses divine love. There is glory in His birth, since it shows that He loved us enough to come and dwell among us; and there is glory in His death, because the Cross of shame is the throne of glory.

Celebrate the love that brought the Baby to Bethlehem. Don’t put it away with the decorations or leave it by the roadside like a discarded tree. In Christ the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Let that be your glory and your joy.

May the joy of the angels, the wonder of the shepherds, and the peace of the Christ Child, fill your hearts this Christmas; and may the blessing of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, be with you now and always. Amen.