Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, 26th December, 2021

Gospel : Luke 2:2:41-52 

Every year parents of Jesus used to go to Jerusalem for the feast of the Passover. When he was twelve years old, they went up for the feast as usual. When they were on their way home after the feast, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem without his parents knowing it. They assumed he was with the caravan, and it was only after a day’s journey that they went to look for him among their relations and acquaintances. When they failed to find him they went back to Jerusalem looking for him everywhere.

Three days later, they found him in the Temple, sitting among the doctors, listening to them, and asking them questions; and all those who heard him were astounded at his intelligence and his replies. They were overcome when they saw him, and his mother said to him,

‘My child, why have, you done this to us? See how worried your father and I have been, looking for you.’ ‘
Why were you looking for me?’
Jesus replied ‘Did you not know that I must be busy with my Father’s affairs?’
But they did not understand what he meant.

He then went down with them and came to Nazareth and lived under their authority. His mother stored up all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom, in stature, and in favour with God and men.

John Littleton,
Journeying through the Year of Luke.
www.columba.ie

Gospel Reflection

Christmas has finally Come. We rejoice that the Worn has become flesh, that God the Son has become human while remaining divine. There is no more waiting because the Messiah has arrived and now is the time liberation from our enslavement to sin. But this is n surprising since, in the Hebrew Scriptures ( Christians call the Old Testament), this arrival had been prophesied for many centuries before the birth of Christ.

The prophets taught that God would intervene dramatically in human history, redeeming his people by defeating the power of sin, thereby bringing an end to oppression and injustice (which are some of the consequences of sin), and by establishing freedom, peace and happiness. God would send the Saviour to rescue his people from their long-lasting trials and tribulations. As a result, the world and human life would never again be the same.

In Isaiah’s words the prophecy was definite: ‘For there is a child born for us, a son given to us and dominion is laid on his shoulders; and this is the name they give him: Wonder-Counsellor, Mighty-God, Eternal-Father, Prince-of-Peace. Wide is his dominion in a peace that has no end’ (Isaiah 9:5-7). This particular prophecy is one of the most important messianic prophecies in the Hebrew Scriptures.

The prophecy was fulfilled at the Incarnation and the birth of Jesus. He is the ‘Son of the Most High’ (Luke 1:32) who was destined to be the Saviour of the world. He is the light that came into the world casting away the darkness of sin and cancelling human estrangement from God (see John 1:9).

We are the descendants, both historically and spiritually of the many generations of people who ‘walked in darkness’ (Isaiah 9:1) for centuries as they waited and prepared for the Messiah’s arrival. Sadly, we become lost in spiritual darkness whenever our lives are sinful. Our challenge at Christmas is to abandon sin and invite the light of Christ to shine in our lives.

When, with the light of God’s grace, we overcome the darkness of sin, we are able to contribute to the ending of oppression and injustice in our world. That is what Jesus meant when, during his public ministry
thirty years after his birth, he advised his disciples: ‘Set your hearts on his kingdom first, and on his righteousness, and all these other things will be given you as well’ (Matthew 6:33). Yet there is much disharmony and violence in our world. This is because countless numbers of people have not accepted Jesus as the Messiah and have not responded to his life- giving and redemptive message.

Christmas is a time for both giving and receiving gifts. The greatest gift that God gives us is sending his only Son among us to redeem us from the effects of sin. Christmas celebrates the reality that God is with us uniquely in and through Jesus Christ.

We are encouraged at Christmas to renew our hope in God because he has intervened spectacularly in history, particularly by becoming human, to save us from sin and death. Christmas is about life and light — the life offered us in Christ and his light which destroys the spiritual darkness of sin. We rejoice and are glad that he lives among us.

Meditation

Today in the town of David a saviour has been born to you;

he is Christ the Lord. (Luke 2:11)