This morning we worshipped with our family at Shoreline Covenant Church. Pastor Mike spoke of the significance of our use of lights during Christmas, and the need to remember the darkness those lights pierce. He reminded us that December is the darkest month of the year; the month which contains the darkest day of the year, a day when light is literally overcome by darkness. He spoke of how it is appropriate that it is in this month that we celebrate the Christ child’s birth: a savior who is the Light. He reminded us that the manger, from the beginning, promised the cross.
As he spoke, I remembered a quotation from Helmut Thielicke that I posted here last year, and share again now:
But the intent of Christmas is something totally different. The Child in the crib is not an ideal. It is only our love and often our sentimentality which have turned his story into an ideal…
Crib and cross—they are both of the same wood, they are of a piece.