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‘Santa Claus never died for anybody.’ So quoted someone about this season of the year, and rightly so.
In a cartoon, the Wise Men were gazing intently at a huge star in the night sky. One of them remarked, ‘Good heavens, don’t tell me it’s Christmas already!’ Another anxiously asked, ‘But where are we going to find gold, frankincense and myrrh at this time of the year?’
Supposedly they were magi, Persian priests who were soothsayers, lawyers and philosophers. Today, they’d be lecturers or professors at universities, or else magicians, conjurors and fortune tellers.
Nowadays, astronomers tell us that there was unusual activity in the heavens during the years immediately before the coming of Jesus. Halley’s Comet flashed across the sky in 11BC. Four years later, Saturn and Jupiter merged together and gave the Patrick Moores of the time a right old field day! And between 5BC and 2BC, the Dog Star behaved very oddly, rising at sunset on the first day of the Egyptian month ‘Mesori’, and ‘Mesori’ means ‘birth of a prince’, which is informative for us Christians.
But whatever astronomers may tell or not tell us, the Nativity is important for Christians. What better way than to leave us with a few reminders about the Incarnation:
‘The Word, and unable to speak a word!’ (Lancelot Andrewes, a 16th century bishop).
‘Christmas Day: the good old heathen’s feasting day, the profane man’s ranting day, the superstitious man’s idol day and Satan’s working day.’ (A Puritan divine of the 17th century).
‘The Christmas story is no pretty seasonal confection: for all its great joy, its implications are in deadly earnest’. (Daily Telegraph Editorial, 20th century).
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