Winter Fire--Colossians 1:25-27
Day 3
In keeping with my somewhat sudden interest in what G.K. Chesterton (an author, philosopher, and Christian apologist who died in 1936 and who I was scarcely familiar with)) had to say about Christmas in Winter Fire: Christmas With G.K. Chesterton, I ran across the Father Brown mysteries—which are based on Chesterton’s stories.
Karen and I watched an episode last night:
Veddy, veddy British!
(The villagers, including Father Brown, an erstwhile Columbo-type priest who shambles around England solving all-manner of heinous crimes, all seem to start their day in the pub with pints).
But what amazed me about the show was how much RELIGION is bandied about as part of ordinary life with these blokes.
There are Catholics telling Protestant jokes and vice versa. Their daily lives seem suffused with grappling with the mysteries of faith and sin.
There was an intolerant Presbyterian who was being cuckolded by the brother of the local Anglican vicar.
His wife seeks absolution through Father Brown and there is a whole scene where Father Brown quite frankly explains how confession, penitence, and salvation works.
When I look at popular culture today–where did the RELIGION go?
(Ironically, the vicar ends up killing his philandering brother by dropping a hammer on him from the steeple of his church–which then Father Brown figures out).
Hollywood has relentlessly driven faith far from the stuff we watch today.
Maybe that’s what has happened to Christmas too–Hollywood is relentlessly returning Christmas traditions BACK to its pagan beginnings and leeching out all of the Christian tradition.
Advent isn’t in Scripture.
Santa Claus, Christmas trees, and one billion Hallmark Christmas movies aren’t either.
Even if our Christmas traditions aren’t scriptural, that doesn’t mean the traditions aren’t worthwhile–and JUST PLAIN GOOD FUN.
Chesterton writes in The Man Who Was Orthodox about how Christmas tradition is wrapped up in paganism:
“It is the greatest glory of the Christian tradition that it has incorporated so many pagan traditions. But it is most glorious of all, to my mind, when they are popular traditions. And the best and most obvious example is the way in which Christianity did incorporate, in so far as it did incorporate, the old human and heathen conception of the Winter Feast. There are, indeed, two profound and mysterious truths to be balanced here. The first is that what was then heathen was still human; that is, it was both mystical and material; it expressed itself in sacred substances and sacramental acts; it understood the mystery of trees and waters and the holy flame. And the other, which will be a much more tactless and irritating assertion, is that while a thing is heathen it is not yet completely human. But the point here is that the pagan element in Christmas came quite natural to Christians, because it was not in fact very far from Christianity.”
He’s right.
The old pagan Winter Feast really isn’t that far from the Lord’s Supper.
Nowadays, wherever we look, we are getting a face full of the pagan traditions with a smattering of Christian faith underpinning all the Santa, Grinch, and Rudolph stuff.
Ryan Whitaker Smith writes in Winter Fire: Christmas With G.K. Chesterton:
“For Chesterton, the fact that Christmas might indeed have borrowed something from the dark ages of paganism was not a cause for concern, in and of itself. In fact, he was unequivocal in his preference for the pagan superstition of the ancient world over the rational skepticism of the modern one. Paganism, for its many faults, could not, after all, be accused (like modernity) of treating the world as a disenchanted place.”
For me, that’s why Christmas tradition matters.
Enchantment.
Like the pagans, I am enchanted with the mysteries of life and particularly the mysteries of my faith.
My enchantment allows me, I think, to display Christ fully in His glory.
Whitaker Smith references Paul’s words to the Colossians about God’s secret plan:
Colossians 1:25-27 25 I was made a minister of this church according to the commission from God granted to me for your benefit, so that I might fully carry out the preaching of the word of God, 26 that is, the mystery which had been hidden from the past ages and generations, but now has been revealed to His saints, 27 to whom God willed to make known what the wealth of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles is, the mystery that is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Of course, Paul is talking about God’s secret plan–the secret plan to have Jesus live in our hearts of all who believe in Him–not some secret plan that was only available to very special people in the know.
And this is why Christmas and Christmas traditions are so special.
The Christmas fudge, jingle bells, and Santa and his reindeer?
All of it ushers in the mystery of mysteries, the mystery that the pagans wondered about, a greater mystery than Elf on the Shelf–the grand secret of Christ’s gospel, as revealed by the Holy Spirit.
I bet that’s what Father Brown would say, anyway, then he would wink and ask for another pint. 🙂
Lord, we thank You for the privilege to be part of Your divine plan. We are in awe that You dwell within us by the Holy Spirit.
Lord, help us to serve faithfully, and like Paul, share this message of hope with boldness and joy, and Christmas traditions with those who have yet to know You.
Amen.