DAY 285
Faith in the Midst of a Pandemic
A series of daily reflections for people of faith
by Rev. Robert Bayley, Interim Pastor
Patuxent Presbyterian Church, California, Maryland
pastorrobert@paxpres.org
Week Forty-one Thursday 24 December 2020
Christmas Eve
This Holy Night
O God, you have caused this holy night to shine with the brightness of the true Light: Grant that we, who have known the mystery of that Light on earth, may also enjoy him perfectly in heaven: where with you and the Holy Spirit he lives and reigns, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen. - The Book of Common Prayer: Christmas Eve
It was midnight Christmas Eve in the church in which we had grown up when my younger sister and I, both teenagers, emerged from the sanctuary following a traditional service that concluded with a darkened sanctuary, people holding lit candles aloft, and the congregation singing “Silent night, holy night” a cappella. “Oh Robert,” she said, “Don’t you just feel so holy?”
An honest response to a moving service held long after we were normally allowed to stay up, to this day I reflect on that experience and believe my sister was on to something, not the ‘feeling’ holy thing, but rather the reality that we can, because of Christmas, actually be holy in God’s sight, His possessions through belonging to Jesus Christ confessed as Lord and Savior, for whom all His property is holy by virtue of His possession of it, that which is set apart as His.
In the midst of all the commercialism of the season, all the elevator music in the stores proclaiming, “Joy to the world, the Lord is come,” “Hark! The herald angels sing, glory to the new born King,” and “Silent night, holy night … Christ the Savior is born,” there is, I believe, another ‘silent’ pulsing through it all, another ‘holy’ hovering over everyone, God the silent Holy Spirit using it all to open hearts to the Content behind the commercialism, the Reality behind the rituals, the Truth behind the tinsel and the trees.
May ‘this holy night,’ however you mark it, impress you with a sense of the holy that you are, through your faith and trust in Jesus as Lord and Savior whose birth it celebrates.
Reflective question: In what part of the Christmas season do you most sense the presence of the Holy One and in the sensing feel holy, belonging, in His sight?
Reflective Scripture: Leviticus 20:26 – “You shall be holy to me, for I the Lord am holy…”
Reflective hymn:
“Silent Night” – Franz Gruber
Silent night, holy night, Son of God, love’s pure light;
Radiant beams from Thy holy face with the dawn of redeeming grace,
Jesus, Lord at Thy birth, Jesus, Lord at Thy birth.
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