Restless Wonderer

Few gifts really change your life.  Advertisers aim to convince you that the thing they want to sell is something you want.  The best adverts go further, persuading you that what you want is actually something you need.  Ignorance becomes desire, which becomes longing.  The Old Testament prophets who foretold the future day of God’s deliverance generated longing among Israel’s faithful.  Yet centuries of dashed hopes and false starts that followed the return of a remnant from Babylonian exile made their prophecies sound like a breach of the Trades Description Act.  You said we’d have God’s universal peace – instead we’ve got the so-called ‘Roman peace’.  We want our money back! There were those in Israel who held stubbornly to hope and Simeon was one.  Indeed God had given him a special revelation that he would not die without seeing the Messianic Age.  As Mary and Joseph brought the baby into the Temple, the Spirit brought Simeon.  Seeing through eyes of faith who Jesus was, Sime

You’ve probably experienced the scenario of the unwanted Christmas present.  The sinking feeling and feigned gratitude as the paper falls away to reveal another pair of socks, bottle of smelly stuff or saggy hand-knitted jumper.  Or the hollowness in someone’s eyes as they mumble that your gift really will be useful.  Unwanted gifts often reflect on the giver – a lack of understanding (‘I’m sure he’ll like this – I would’) or simply desperation (‘I’ve got to give her something!’).  Occasionally, though, they reflect something wrong in the recipient – lack of self-awareness (‘If only they knew it, this is just what they really need’) or ingratitude born from resentment (‘I don’t want anything from him!’)  So it was with King Herod. Herod’s image as the pantomime villain of the nativity play is largely supported by the historical sources.  This king of Judea, a client of the Romans, was ruthless, opportunistic and megalomaniacal, his one redeeming feature being his grandiose bui

There is an art to wrapping Christmas presents and I don’t have it!  My wife does.  What she can do with a sheet of paper, a ribbon and a pair of scissors never ceases to amaze me.  I remember ‘earning’ a badge for wrapping books in the uniformed youth organisation I attended, but I suspect now that either there was some corruption in the system or that my leaders were men of great pity. Mary is one of the most outstanding figures in Scripture.  She is a model of prayer, praise, meditation and adoration.  She is not to be venerated, but her example can certainly be emulated.  The part of Mary in the incarnation is both passive and active.  In one sense she simply had to accept what God had planned – her simple response was the heart of all true prayer, the words of God's servant: "let it be to me according to your word".  She didn’t make the baby grow – what mother does? She was, in one sense, the wrapping of the present, the protective shell around the precious gift o