Christmas films can be decoded from the opening scene: the man will get the woman after a great misunderstanding, and the bitter old man only needs a fresh perspective. Scripture has its patterns too, and one of them is the opposition to the birth of a faithful son, from Cain and Abel through to Joseph. At the start of the exodus story (Exodus 1-2) Pharaoh fears a growing people and reaches first for the midwives, then for the Nile, while God hands the enemy kings, armies and chariots, and chooses women in their ninth month and their babies. Listen if you want to see a deliverer grow out of a basket in the reeds, and ask which scene of your life you write off as lost too quickly.
Born into Slavery
The Promised One
When we live in the present, it’s sometimes easy to forget about eternity and live as if what is here and now were all we can expect. However, the Apostle Paul, in his First Letter to the Thessalonians, though writing about very everyday matters, constantly reminds his readers of eternity, and every chapter of this letter ends with a reference to the second coming of Jesus. He does this because, even though we live in the present and struggle with the here and now, we can learn to view our lives, our daily struggles, and our everyday choices from the perspective of eternity-and that changes everything.
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