the Revolutionary Spirit of Christmas
Christmas Eve | Luke 2:1-20
Our story starts out in a time and place. Specific. Logged for historical purposes, right, like the kind of thing we want to hold onto, lock in place. Connect. But the evangelist isn’t just interested in historicity. People who write history books aren’t even the ones only interested in these things. Historians want a motive — the why. They want to explore why the story happens that way, what people were up to.
This is why we notice these opening sentences and mark them:
“In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.”
The emperor wants to do a first-ever census. The emperor of what? Rome. The Empire. Conquerors and rulers of the known world. What’s a census? A counting of all the people. What is a census for? Taxation. Now, we normally don’t think about taxes on Christmas, and don’t worry, that isn’t the point of this homily, either. (Go ahead — let out that sigh of relief.) The evangelist centers the birth of Jesus, the Savior, Messiah, Lord under the supremacy of empire. Within the known, conquered world. As the light of freedom shining in the darkness — and we are in the darkest nights of the year.
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