As the whole world waits with bated breath for the arrival of the Christmas holidays and kick-start a week of celebrations with family & friends, gifting each other with gifts and a week of relaxation before starting a new year, the Church looks forward to the birth of the infant Jesus, as a pregnant woman drawing close to her due date looks forward for the child that is about to come into the world. In the Church Calendar, the Sunday before Christmas has a special name: the Sunday before the Nativity of Christ. What importance does the Church see in this day, which prepares the whole church for the encounter with the bright feast of the Nativity according to the flesh of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ?
When we listen closely to the Bible readings on the Sunday, we realize that there are a lot of names being read out in both the Old Testament and in the Gospel reading. In the Old Testament, we listen to the names of the children on Israel, Jacob who went into Egypt seeking protection under the Pharaoh from the drought and famine that was ravaging the lands then. We listen to the names of the children of Abraham, Issac and Jacob, the fathers of the children of Israel, the promised nation, who went into slavery. We can read the names of the children who went into slavery in the book of Genesis 46:8-27.
During the Gospel reading, which was written by St. Matthew, at the beginning of the Gospel itself, we have a list of names, who are the ancestors of Jesus Christ. Many a times we listen to it with a sense of impatience: what do all these names mean? Even the scholars who have studied the Bible cannot always know who each person is. Let us try and understand the reason why the Fathers of the Church recommended these readings for the day.
When we look at the list of names in the New Testament, we realize that the list goes back till the time of Abraham, to whom the promise was given the his children would be as numerous as the stars of the sky and the sands on the seashore. We also recollect that Jesus was the promise that was given to Abraham in Genesis 12-17, ‘the One who would have the title deed to the land of Israel, the One who would be a great progeny and the One who would be a spiritual blessing to the entire world’. When we look at the generations that went before the promise could be fulfilled, we realize that many human generations heard about the coming Messiah and waited for His coming. Through their many difficult times of trouble, the faith in the coming of the Messiah was not diminished in the people. While they waited, what did they do? Did they despair? Did they murmur? Did they grow angry? They did, but even then they continued to wait in hope and trust. Faith was not extinguished among the people, whatever might be their circumstances of life – rising & falling, abundance & hunger, joy & sorrow, freedom & slavery – through all this, their faith was not shaken.
The birth of our Lord Jesus Christ into this world fulfills this faith. The listing forces us to think about the fact that the Lord’s Nativity was possible only because these generations of people kept faith in God and fidelity to the Lord.
But let us look back on our own lives. We, too, are awaiting the fulfillment of our hopes and requests that we address to the Lord. We come to church to ask for our neighbors and for ourselves in our deeds, we light candles, give alms, ask others for prayers, and pray for ourselves. Every Sunday is a repetition of the previous one – and nothing changes. And what happens to us? The following happens: our faith weakens and our soul is visited by doubt, with which we do not fight. One begins not to seek trust and support in God, but in something completely different. At best, this can mean turning to good and decent people. But at worst it can mean turning to dark powers, psychics, witches, and sorcerers. And sometimes, having lost all hope, it means falling into despair, turning away from life, and turning to abusive use of drugs and alcohol. One can only imagine that if it had not been for the faith of the people of Israel, it would have ceased to exist as a nation and Jesus would not have come the way He did.
But the many people who waited for the promised Messiah were not able to see Christ, they were not able to hear or known about Him. In the same manner, should we despair and lose heart at not receiving what we have asked for? Or ponder for long on why we have not received what we asked for? We do not realize that the gift that we seek from God, which is given to those who ask for it, must be valued by the seeker. Everything that is given without labor dissipates and dies, if man is incapable of preserving and multiplying it. So it is with God’s gift that we seek from Him: man must value it. And it is valued only when man is prepared to accept and preserve this gift. Therefore the Church says: do not leave off your prayers; God will grant you everything you have asked for in a time that befits your salvation. God’s gift should be not only worthily received and valued but, like every gift, it should not overshadow one’s eyes by means of one’s own success. Therefore God gives us things when our passions and feelings weaken. He gives at times when the gift will be valued, sought, increased in every person.
Another thought that moved me while reading the long ancestry of Jesus was that He, being Son of God, chose to be born and possessed of a human heredity. Every generation after the other brought a new feature that became woven into the history of a human family, the crowning of which was the incarnate Son of God.
When we read the names of the ancestors of Jesus, some which we know, strike us because these are the names of the saints, the great men and women of the spirit. But there are also names of sinners and also of people who were forced into the ancestry. In this ancestry, holiness and human frailty and sin are interwoven in a way that should strike us. How can the Son of God take upon Himself a human nature which is woven by so many hands, ones both pure and the other ones soiled? Hands, souls, bodies, minds and hearts.
All of the persons mentioned here, frail and so different from the heroes of the spirit also mentioned in the same list, were part of a nation that loved the promise of the coming Messiah and lived in expectation of His coming, each according to his strength or frailty. And one of the wonderful things about God is that He is called “the Devouring Fire” in the Old Testament, but this devouring fire is not a destructive fire, it is a fire that is capable of taking unto itself all things, and transforming them into fire, pure, unsoiled, beyond any corruption or pollution. Just as fire can be fed with sandalwood or with refuse; once a material is thrown into this fire, it is taken by it and transformed.
And as we walk towards the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus Christ, this consumption and devouring fire is our hope and our wonder, that we can be used by God for His purposes. Just as Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, David, Solomon, Manasseh are remembered not only for their frailty but also for their repentance and their faithfulness, for the fact that they believed that God does not break His promise and that therefore one can live for the sake of that promise,waiting for it to be fulfilled in their lifetime or perhaps generations later.
And one day the promise was fulfilled. God came and resided among men and He is Emmanuel, God in our midst. His name is Jesus, which means God saves. The long awaited promise has been fulfilled. But should we not think for one moment of these thousands of years when people lived by hope, and never saw the fulfillment of this promise – so faithfully, so dangerously, ready to die if necessary but not to betray their faith, their certainty that God was true.
We live in a world when the promise has been fulfilled, the promise is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Eternal life which has come to us is a like a seed that carries us. And what about us, about our faith in the promises given to us, and our faithfulness to the living God who gave them?
As this Advent fast comes to a close with the fulfillment of the promise of the Messiah and as we look forward for a new year with anticipation for the fulfillment of the promises made to us, let us try an emulate the frailest in the Old Testament, and try to grow to the measure of the greatest. Just as they lived in expectation, let us also live within the certainty of the things that have already happened and expect the fulfillment of the glorious coming of the Lor, the victory of God which is our eternal life and our salvation.
Special hymns sung on the Sunday before the Feast of Nativity – in English & Malayalam.
Christ is born! Glorify Him!
Your brother in Christ Jesus
Jobin George
