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| Vintage Norwegian Christmas Card |
When I was a child, we would get Christmas cards from relatives in Norway with the puzzling, to me, God Jul. Of course, it is Nordic for Good Yule or Merry Christmas.
It is a sad Xmas for me this year. My mother passed away this year. My father has been gone for years. It has left me with an emptiness, I'm not sure how to replace.
Christmas is a conundrum: an explosion of materialism and excess around an profoundly Christian holiday. The latter seems to be often forgotten.
Before Christmas, there were pagan celebrations for the Winter Solstice. For our distant ancestors, winter was a time of suffering and want. It was a time when survival was not guaranteed, but the solstice, though the longest night of the year, brought hope. Every day after the solstice is longer. Eventually, the sun will overwhelm winter and return life.
I read an enlightening interview with Nicholas Tom “N.T.” Wright in Time Magazine that made me think of Christmas. He is recognized as one of the preeminent New Testament scholars of this era.
In the interview he says:
In the interview he says:
Most modern Western Christians think that the point of Christianity is for my soul to go to heaven when I die. That's not what the Bible teaches. The point of Christianity is for the kingdom of God to come, as Jesus taught “on earth as in heaven,” and many churches have hardly begun to tune in to that and to work out what that might mean. What matters is God doing new creation, and the church being the people through whose life and prayer and work new creation is already happening around us.
This is a profound thought that as Christians we should be working to bring the kingdom of god and heaven to earth for all people. We are failing at this.
It made me think at Christmas, now is the time for us to work to make the world a better place for all people.
God Jul
PS: Here is a link to the complete Time Magazine Interview with Nicholas Wright:
PPS: I'm not a religious person. I have some jealously of people who are. I am a doubting Thomas. I grew up Catholic. I became disillusioned with the Catholic church over the years for many reasons like the sexual abuse of children. I haven't been a regular church goer in many years. I do occasionally pray. I came close to joining a United Methodist church once. Curiously, many of the people I met there were former Catholics. I've been to a Baptist church a couple time. I could see joining one. People were friendly and welcoming like I have never seen at any other churches.