Looking Beyond Christmas

Christmas is a good time for us to look beyond ourselves… what we really want for those closest to us and those who most need help.

Christmas is more than simply the celebration of the birth of a baby. The story of Jesus Christ takes us beyond the glitter and the tinsel and the lights to something much deeper.

As we witness countless re-enactments of the nativity this season, try to look beyond the scene…realize that the Saviour who was born is God’s gift of hope; the hope of peace and goodwill, of beauty and love. Look beyond what you see, however bleak it might seem, and discover signs of goodness and beauty, of hope, of joy despite whatever is happening in our world today.

Christmas is a time for looking beyond what our eyes can see; to look at the present crisis and see the stories of kindness and compassion that carry with them the hope of life beyond the darkness; to look at the violence and see the efforts made to change these patterns and see in them signals of hope for a safer world; to look at our environment and see the beauty that is there and to hear the call for green alternatives as signals of hope for our planet.

"When we accept the invitation to look beyond the surface, we become open to signals of hope for ourselves, our families and our world. This is part of God’s gift that is celebrated at Christmas but which does not stop there. God invites us to look beyond.

"May we all share God’s gift of love and hope this Christmas and in the year that lies ahead."

A Paraphrase of the Christmas message from the Most Rev Dr Idris Jones, Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church.

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