Day Six — 30 December

The Word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us. O come, let us worship. Alleluia

Readings (Click the links to see the readings)

1 John 2.12-17 | Psalm 96.7-9 | Luke 2.36-40

Birth

Greg Weatherby (Walbanga people, NSW) Dreamtime Birth with "the Great Ancestor's omnipresent hands … presenting the divine gift to Aboriginal Spirit parents near legendary Uluru."

J.S. Bach. Motet BWV 229 Komm, Jesu, komm (BWV 229). La Chapelle Royale Collegium Vocale, dir. Philippe Herreweghe 1985

Reflection

Beholding His Glory is only half our job. In our souls too the mysteries must be brought forth; we are not really Christians till that has been done. "The Eternal Birth," says Eckhart, "must take place in you." And another mystic says human nature is like a stable inhabited by the ox of passion and the ass of prejudice; animals which take up a lot of room and which I suppose most of us are feeding on the quiet. And it is there between them, pushing them out, that Christ must be born and in their very manger He must be laid—and they will be the first to fall on their knees before Him. Sometimes Christians seem far nearer to those animals than to Christ in His simple poverty, self-abandoned to God.

The birth of Christ in our souls is for a purpose beyond ourselves: it is because His manifestation in the world must be through us. Every Christian is, as it were, part of the dust-laden air which shall radiate the glowing Epiphany of God, catch and reflect His golden Light. Ye are the light of the world—but only because you are enkindled, made radiant by the One Light of the World. And being kindled, we have got to get on with it, be useful. As Christ said in one of His ironical flashes, "Do not light a candle in order to stick it under the bed!" Some people make a virtue of religious skulking.
Light of Christ by Evelyn Underhill.

Prayer

We pray you, Lord, to purify our hearts that they may be worthy to become your dwelling place. Let us never fail to find room for you, but come and abide in us that we also may abide in you, who as at this time was born into the world for us, and lives and reigns, King of kings and Lord of lords, now and for evermore.
—William Temple.

May the Lord, who has called out of darkness into his marvellous light, bless us and fill us with peace. Amen.

St Philip's Anglican Church,
cnr Moorhouse and Macpherson Streets, O'Connor, ACT 2602.