Let me begin this blog with an apology for what I am about to do. I’m about to introduce a Christmas song into your head, Mariah Carey’s classic 90’s song – All I want for Christmas is You. As I say, sorry – although you have probably heard it before.
Why do this? To take some time to reflect on the song, and what it says about Christmas. It begins with Mariah saying what she doesn’t need for Christmas. She doesn’t need presents: I don't care about the presents underneath the Christmas tree.
What does she want? Just one thing:
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is you
So actually, it’s not so much that she doesn’t want presents; she wants a particular present. And that’s no great surprise, because over time our desires and Christmas wishes change. We start off quite content with shiny wrapping paper, but then we come to what’s inside, and then to the people we share Christmas with, and the joy of giving.
And maybe as we look forward to Christmas, we can understand Mariah’s desire for a particular present. We may change what we want from Christmas, but we still often want a lot; it is a time when we hope that ‘everything will be all right’. When we hope for peace on earth, and goodwill to all. Mariah wants someone who can be that guy. The one. The location of her hopes. Mariah is not asking for much, but she is also asking a lot. And it is not just Mariah. For all of us - who can bear the weight of our desires? Who or what can meet our needs?
Christmas offers most of the good things we might try through life to make us happy. There is usually plenty of food and drink. We have time with friends and family. Romance if often in the air, perhaps related to the food and drink. There are gifts, given and received. We might even get snow. Our churches are normally fuller than usual. And who doesn’t like singing about unabhorred wombs?
And yet still, do we ever get all we want for Christmas? The good things I have mentioned are good, but they are not good enough to fully satisfy. But we can very easily start to think that these good things are what life is about, and miss out on what we really need for Christmas.
So, lets remind ourselves of a familiar story:
Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. (Mt 1:18-19 ESV)
Don’t allow familiarity with the text to cause you to miss the wrinkle here. Jesus’ birth was humble, and in complicated circumstances. Joseph knew the child wasn’t his, and suspects what anybody would suspect.
Jesus enters into the realities of human existence with all its challenges. He was not born into a vacuum, but into an ordinary family in ancient Israel. Then we read:
But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” (Mt 1:20-21) Joseph receives a revelation of the surprising truth of who Jesus is. Mary’s child, by the Holy Spirit.
Jesus the saviour. He will save his people form their sins. We know there are many ways of thinking about sin. We can talk about wrongdoing, about the things we know we should do that we don’t do, about the things we know we should do that we don’t.
Another way of thinking about sin is this: sin is trusting in those things that cannot bear the weight of our desires; sin as idolatry. Good things, like family, friends, food, good health, and wealth. But things we do not ultimately satisfy. Jesus comes to save us from our sins, and part of that salvation is shifting our affections from the things that do not satisfy to the one who does. Finally from Matthew 1.
All this took place to fulfil what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). (Mt 1:22-23)
Here Matthew starts to indicate how it is that Jesus can save. He is fully man, born into a human family. He knows what it is to be us. But he is also God with us. He can bear the weight of our sin, and of our desires.
So we might sing all I want for Christmas is you if we focus it rightly. But perhaps better:
Glorious now behold him arise;
King and God and sacrifice:
Heaven sings, Alleluia,
Alleluia, the earth replies.
Happy Christmas.
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James Hughes is Vice-chairman of the Latimer Trust and Vicar of the United Benefice of Duffield and Little Eaton
Views expressed in blogs published by the Latimer Trust are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Latimer Trust.