Is your manger empty?

Help for not forgetting Christ this Christmas

I was recently speaking with a Christian friend about their plans for Christmas.

‘I’m going to do things a bit differently this year’, they told me.

‘Oh, how so?’, I asked.

My buddy explained that last year he did all the things he would normally do in preparation for the festive season. Buying presents. Attending church services. Spending time with friends and family. But, in the midst of it all, there was one thing that he now realised he forgot. He had forgotten to prepare his heart.

It might be that you are in danger of doing the same this year. Christmas tends to bring with it a lot of extra busyness. And this can be particularly the case for those involved with a local church. But the irony is that, even with the extra services and outreach events, we can forget to worship Jesus ourselves.

Incarnation contemplation

To guard against this, I have found it helpful to follow in the footsteps of many others in taking special time to meditate on the incarnation in the run up to Christmas. After Scripture, I have found Stephen Charnock helpful with this. Like so much of his writing, Charnock’s reflections on Jesus’ birth combine deep theological reflection with great pastoral warmth. And reading a page or two during Advent has done my soul a whole load of good over the last few years.

Indeed, Charnock thought that meditation on the incarnation was so important that it should not only be reserved for the days leading up to Christmas. Rather, it was something that we should do every day. He wrote,

Are these things worthy of a careless regard or a blockish amazement? What understanding can pierce into the depths of the divine doctrine of the incarnation and birth of Christ, the indissoluble union of the two natures? What capacity is able to measure the miracles of that wisdom, found in the whole draft and scheme of the gospel? Does it not merit then to be the object of our daily meditation?

Christ’s incarnation is something that should never be far from our minds. But, if you are anything like me, contemplating the incarnation does not come naturally. And certainly not as naturally as the many other things vying for our attention at Christmastime. As Charnock went on,

Why is it that we are so little curious to concern our thoughts in those wonders, that we scarce taste or sip of these delicacies? That we busy ourselves in trifles, and consider what we shall eat, and in what fashion we shall be dressed? That we please ourselves with the ingeniousness of a lace or feather, admire a moth-eaten manuscript or some half-worn piece of antiquity, and think our time ill-spent in the contemplating and celebrating that wherein God has busied himself, and eternity is designed for the perpetual expressions of?

Compared to the things that normally fill our minds, the birth of Christ is more than worthy of our time.

Christmas with Charnock revisited

If we are to listen to Charnock’s exhortation and take the time to mediate on the incarnation this Christmas, we need all the help we can get. Longer standing readers of this newsletters may remember that I shared some of Charnock’s reflection in the run up to Christmas last year. Because I have received many appreciative comments about these during the course of 2024, I thought I would share them again in case newer subscribers want to dive into them this year (or older ones want to read or listen them to again).

Each reflection takes about 5 minutes to work though and will take you from now up to Christmas Eve.

Why not bookmark this email and dip into one each day? You can find the links to each reflection below.

It only leaves me to thank you for your ongoing interest in my work on Stephen Charnock and to wish you a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

Yours,

James

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

Day 5

Day 6