Pathways Press.com

Written by Lyn Lloyd-Smith, from the Village Church.

If you ever find yourself in the UK or Ireland in December, consider going to a crazy, slapstick musical show, the traditional Christmas pantomime. The story will be based on a children’s tale, Cinderella or Dick Whittington perhaps, but it will bear no relation to any Disney version. The principal boy will be a girl, the pantomime dame will be a man, you will boo the villains and cheer the heroes. The audience will participate with cries of “Oh no there isn’t!” and “He’s behind you!” The performance is aimed at children, but there will be adult jokes and current political references that will go right over their heads. You may be wondering how on earth do these, and all other winter festivities, relate to the meaning of Christmas, to the holy moment of the birth of our Savior?

It seems to me that as with the raucous, secular pantomime, how each of us responds to the Nativity changes over our lifetime. For a child the scene in Bethlehem is all about the baby in the manger, the animals, and singing carols in the gloaming light. But as we get older, we gain more understanding of the transcendent nature of the Savior’s birth, the mystery of the moment when God entered history as a man.

This Christmas we will be spending the holiday season in England and are planning (with some trepidation!) to take our four small grandchildren, to see the pantomime Sleeping Beauty. May we all, as we enjoy the celebrations with child-like enthusiasm and appreciate the grown- up delights of wine and dark chocolate and Christmas parties, also take time to ponder, as Mary did, how Jesus’s birth changed everything. In Christmas are the seeds of Easter. While Christmas is a time to make merry, it is also a time of deep appreciation for our salvation. One is not possible without the other.