Be Still And Know

Luke 2:8-9 That night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep. Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord’s glory surrounded them. Of all the many surprises in the Christmas story, this is one of the greatest. We have long since got used to the fact that the birth of Jesus was announced to shepherds, but they were surely the last people you would have expected to hear about it. Their work forced them to live away from their communities and so they were always last to hear the news. But more than that, shepherds were smelly and ritually unclean because of their work. Yet God gave them the front seats in the Christmas story! If we had been given the responsibility of compiling an appropriate guest list to welcome the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, I would guess that shepherds might not have made an appearance. We might have thought about the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem. If Jesus was their Messiah, surely it would be crucia

Luke 2:5-7 Mary gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no lodging available for them. In a few brief verses, Luke summarises the birth of Jesus. Brief as they are, Luke offers us more details than any other Gospel writer. After placing the birth of Jesus within Roman and Jewish history, we are given some very specific details. With the town crammed full for the census there was, not surprisingly, nowhere for the family to stay. After his birth, Jesus was placed in a manger, or cattle feeding trough. On many Christmas cards, this manger looks like an idyllic place to put a baby straight after it is born. But it wasn’t. It was just the only place available. It would have been smelly, unhygienic and the last place that anyone would want to use for a newborn. The idea of God coming to earth in human form is amazing enough. But for him to have made his entrance in the least suitable place, at a time of profound political upheaval

Luke 2:1-3 At that time the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. (This was the first census taken when Quirinius was governor of Syria.) All returned to their own ancestral towns to register for this census. I am delighted that, in our highly secular society, Christmas still has a very special place. No one could possibly miss the fact that it is Christmas! All attempts to replace it with a festival such as Winterval have failed miserably. But even so, we have a problem. The birth of Jesus has become inextricably linked with Father Christmas and Rudolf the red nosed reindeer, and a whole host of other imaginary characters. It’s really important that we recognise Jesus’ birth was a historic event, and here Dr Luke gives us the facts. Jesus was born during the long reign of Augustus Caesar, who ruled the Roman Empire from 27BC to 14AD. During his reign, he established the Pax Romana which led to a period of relative peace for more than two centuries.

Luke 1:76-77 And you, my little son, will be called the prophet of the Most High, because you will prepare the way for the Lord. You will tell his people how to find salvation through forgiveness of their sins. Have you ever lost your voice? I’ve had many sore throats and, at times, have had difficulty speaking. But only once have I lost my voice completely. It lasted for around two weeks and it was the most bizarre experience. I felt horribly disconnected from everything that was happening around me. So, I have great sympathy for Zechariah, who was rendered unable to speak for nine months. Only after the birth of his son, John the Baptist, was his speech suddenly restored - and here are some of his words. John and Jesus were relatives, but they were brought up in very different parts of Israel and so probably didn’t know one another very well. But Zechariah recognised that John would play a crucial role in God’s plans. John’s message of repentance was crucial in paving the way for Jesus’ ministry - and h

Luke 1:51-53 His mighty arm has done tremendous things! He has scattered the proud and haughty ones. He has brought down princes from their thrones and exalted the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away with empty hands. As Mary praises God that she is going to give birth to his Son, she takes us right to the heart of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus didn’t come merely to rearrange things. He came to turn the world upside down. If we are to take Jesus seriously, we have to look at our society with new eyes. God is not merely disappointed with arrogance, abuse of power and injustice. God wants them to be toppled. Sadly, it is all too easy for us to fit in with our society and, in the interests of a quiet life, not to challenge injustice. The story of the German Church in the 1930s is a terrifying illustration of this. Hitler sought to bring the Church under his exclusive control, and the overwhelming majority accepted this. They were, understandably, fearful of resisting him and

Luke 1:46-49 Mary responded, “Oh, how my soul praises the Lord. How my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour! For he took notice of his lowly servant girl, and from now on all generations will call me blessed. For the Mighty One is holy, and he has done great things for me.” What an incredible moment this was for Mary! How could anyone put into words the overwhelming joy and privilege of being called to be the mother of the Saviour of the World? It is hardly surprising that she, as a young Jewish girl, turned to familiar words from the scriptures. She would have been brought up with the wonderful story of Hannah, Samuel’s mother, and would have been familiar with her prayer when she learnt that she was going to give birth. The words of Mary’s song, which is often known as the Magnificat, are extremely close to the words which Hannah had used centuries before. There are many moments in our lives as Christians when we simply don’t have the words to describe how grateful we are to God. Like Mary, we often tu

Luke 1:38 Mary responded, “I am the Lord’s servant. May everything you have said about me come true.” We know the story of Jesus’ miraculous birth so well that we often have to work really hard to imagine how completely incredible this moment was for Mary. She was probably a teenager, and may well never have travelled outside of the rural Galilee region where she was born. The news that she was going to have a baby was shockingly at every level. She was a virgin, and having a baby was therefore a complete impossibility. But she listened attentively to the angel’s words and is assured that, crazy as this all sounded, nothing is impossible with God. Her response was extraordinarily impressive. She describes herself as the Lord’s servant and accepted the future that God had chosen for her. To be a servant would normally be seen as demeaning. We probably instinctively think of Downton Abbey, and the way that servants, living below stairs, were given all the heavy, dirty and difficult work to do so that a fe

Luke 1:14 An angel of the Lord prophesied to Zechariah concerning the birth of his son, John the Baptist. “You will have great joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the eyes of the Lord.” This was the greatest day in Zechariah’s life. Being a male descendant of Aaron, he was a priest, which was a great privilege. However, it is suggested that there might have been up to 20,000 priests at this time, and so there were divided up into 24 groups which served in in rotation. The greatest privilege of all was for a priest to be chosen to go into the temple and burn incense at the time of the morning or evening sacrifice. Having burnt the incense, the priest would then emerge from the temple and pronounce a blessing on the people. This was such a great honour that a priest could only do this once in his lifetime - and many never got the opportunity at all. The priest was chosen for this responsibility by lot. Just imagine the sense of anticipation as the choice was ma

Matthew 1:22-23 All of this occurred to fulfil the Lord’s message through his prophet: “Look! The virgin will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, which means ‘God is with us.’” Loneliness is one of the greatest problems of our society today - and it is on the increase. This matters because loneliness is incredibly dangerous. It increases the risk of death by 26 per cent, is more damaging to health than obesity, and increases the risk of high blood pressure. Loneliness, living alone and poor social connections are as bad for your health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, according to research. But the person who knows Jesus personally need never experience loneliness, because he is Immanuel, God with us, and when we live with him day by day, we are instantly connected to a worldwide family of his people. The difference between our relationship with God and with other people is that God never leaves us. He is always by our side. We may have warm relationships

Matthew 1:21 “And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Naming a child is a huge moment for parents. If you have ever had that privilege, I am sure you will remember the conversations about the various possibilities. You might have considered names that were particularly important in your family, or names that you simply liked. But, knowing that the child will carry that name for life, you will have given it careful consideration. We have three children, and I remember the long discussions about various names well! Our third child is called Bethany, the name of the place where my wife and I first met. I was leading a student group on a trip around Israel, where we stayed in a cheap hotel on the West Bank near Bethany. My future wife was one of the students! Many have since asked us what we’d have called her if we had met in Bognor Regis or Market Harborough…and I guess the answer is probably Bethany! Jesus was given his name because tha

Matthew 1:20 As Joseph considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. “Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit.” This account is so familiar to us that we need to take a moment to try to imagine what the experience must have been like for Joseph. In all probability, he was a man in his 20s. Mary may well have been a teenager. He was clearly of good character and took his Jewish faith seriously. His decision to end the relationship quietly was understandable - but he must have been experiencing a riot of emotions, thinking about Mary, himself, his family’s reputation and his desire to do what God wanted. As he turned these things over in his mind, he had a dream in which he was addressed with his family title. He was Joseph, belonging to the line of the great King David. In the dream, an angel told him not to be fearful but to take Mary as his wife, because the baby was a gif

Matthew 1:19 Joseph, to whom she was engaged, was a righteous man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement quietly. At the centre of the account of Jesus’ birth is a man about whom we know very little. Joseph was the legal father of Jesus, but after Jesus’ birth, we meet Joseph on only one occasion, when the family visit to Jerusalem for Passover when Jesus was 12 years old. Although it is not detailed anywhere, we get the distinct impression that Mary was a widow by the time Jesus’ public ministry began. One verse in the New Testament tells us that Joseph was an artisan (Matthew 13:55) and it is generally assumed that he was a carpenter - but we can’t even be sure of that. The Greek word used for artisan also refers to those who work with iron or stone. Although we know very little about this extremely important man, we do know about his character. In today’s verse, he is described as a “righteous man”, which means that he was concerned to be obedient t

Matthew 1:16-17 Mary gave birth to Jesus, who is called the Messiah. All those listed above include fourteen generations from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the Babylonian exile, and fourteen from the Babylonian exile to the Messiah. Matthew shows here how the Old Testament has prepared the way for the coming of Jesus. He points out that there were 14 generations from the time of Abraham, the father of the nation, up to the reign of King David. This was undoubtedly the high-water mark in the Old Testament. David established Jerusalem as the city of God and prepared the way for the building of the magnificent temple. After that, everything went catastrophically downhill, with the next 14 generations ending with the Jewish people being taken into exile in Babylon. The following 14 generations were ones in which the prophetic voice was almost entirely silent. There is a 400-year gap between the final book of the Old Testament and the coming of Christ. However, throughout those dark years, ther

Matthew 1:1-16 This is a record of the ancestors of Jesus the Messiah, a descendant of David and of Abraham…Joseph was the husband of Mary. Mary gave birth to Jesus, who is called the Messiah. If you were writing a biography of a famous person, I strongly suspect you wouldn’t start like this. But Matthew was writing his Gospel for people from a Jewish background and so it was important that he started with an account of Jesus’ ancestors. They needed to understand where Jesus fitted in the history of the people of Israel. In his genealogy, Matthew details three groups of 14 generations. The first ran from Abraham to David; the second went up to the exile in Babylon, and the third concluded with the arrival of Jesus, whose legal father was Joseph. This placed Jesus firmly in the family line of David, and so he could be properly called the Son of David. The list names in this chapter doesn’t make great reading, but if you look at the individuals mentioned, it is absolutely gripping. The most startling

Romans 11:33-36 Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways! For who can know the Lord’s thoughts? Who knows enough to give him advice? And who has given him so much that he needs to pay it back? For everything comes from him and exists by his power and is intended for his glory. All glory to him forever! Amen. Paul has spent the last three chapters agonising over the issue of his people, the Jews. He is desperately keen that they should follow Christ and receive the gift of salvation, but he also acknowledges that most of them have rejected the offer of new life in Jesus. I love the way that Paul ends this part of the letter. He does so in worship, celebrating the greatness of God’s riches, wisdom and knowledge. In the previous chapters he has given the best of his mind to setting out the dilemmas and his thinking about the situation. But, at the end of the day, he knows the limits of his understanding are very real,

Romans 9:2-3 My heart is filled with bitter sorrow and unending grief for my people, my Jewish brothers and sisters. I would be willing to be forever cursed—cut off from Christ!—if that would save them. The apostle Paul was proud of his Jewish heritage and was passionate that his Jewish brothers and sisters should share in the wonder of knowing Christ as their personal Lord and saviour. But look at the language he used! He was willing to be cursed forever if it meant that the Jews would find salvation. This is incredibly strong language and shows very clearly that it meant everything to him. Paul knew that the Jewish people were in a very privileged position. They had been chosen to be God’s adopted children. God had revealed his glory to them, made covenants with them and given them the law. They had Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as their ancestors and Christ himself was a Jew. They had every advantage - and Paul couldn’t cope with the pain of seeing them reject Jesus. I want to turn Paul’s words into a qu

Romans 8.38-39 I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord. When I lived in India, I got to know an elderly missionary who had lived in the area for a very long time. She had asthma and found that the tropical climate was very helpful for her condition so, when she retired, she stayed in India and continued to have a powerful ministry there. Whenever I said goodbye to her, she would always come out onto her veranda, wave and say the same words: “No separation.” It was an unusual farewell, but she was celebrating that, when we become Christians, nothing can separate us from God’s love. Even if we travel away from our Christian brothers and si

Romans 7:24-25 Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. It isn’t easy to talk about the battles that go on in our lives but here, Paul lets it all pour out! Here is a mature Christian leader and brilliant teacher admitting that, although he wants to do what’s right, he often found himself doing the exact opposite. Paul recognised that there was a power inside him that encouraged him to be a slave to sin. It was an agonising dilemma that left him feeling miserable. But Paul also celebrated the fact that sin didn’t have to have the last word. The answer was – and is! - Jesus. By looking to Jesus and placing his trust in him, Paul found the liberty he craved. And so can we. The problem with sin is that it keeps knocking at the door of our lives. However mature we are in our Christian faith, it keeps trying to find a foothold in our thoughts, words and actions. Paul’s astonishingly blunt words

Romans 5:1 Therefore, since we have been made right in God’s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us. Everyone agrees that it is desirable to find inner peace. Go into any book shop and you will find dozens of books that offer you quick routes to inner tranquillity. These will give you a wide range of suggestions - from those that encourage you to change your diet, minimise your exposure to conflict or start meditating. None of those things are necessarily wrong, but they won’t get to the heart of the problem which is that, as human beings, we fundamentally lack peace because our lives are not right with God. It is only when that relationship is sorted out that we can begin to experience God’s gift of peace. In today’s verse, Paul celebrates the fact that Jesus’ death on the cross gave us that gift. When we are at peace with God, Paul declares that the door is flung open to all of God’s other blessings. The person who finds peace is introduced to a ne

Romans 4:20 Abraham never wavered in believing God’s promise. In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God. Paul is clear that faith is all important for those who want to be put right with God. Here, he uses Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, as the supreme example of this. He trusted God completely even when life was tough and there was little encouragement. It all began when God called Abraham to leave his home, together with his family, and set off on a journey into the unknown. When God later promised him, as an old man, that he and his aged wife would have a son, he trusted God once more - even though all the evidence pointed in the opposite direction. I love verse 18 of this same chapter, which reads: “Even when there was no reason for hope, Abraham kept hoping—believing that he would become the father of many nations.” That’s faith! Abraham showed total confidence in God. Now let’s bring this up to date. Today, God is calling you and me to be people of faith amid