On Second Thought
Christmas draws us into holy anticipation, teaching the Church how to wait, how to remember, and how to hope with intention. Even on December 25, when waiting gives way to celebration, Christmas’ deeper purpose remains—to help us grasp what it truly means that “His name shall be called Emmanuel” (Matt. 1:23), “God with us.” The familiar titles we cherish at Christmas—“The Prince of Peace” (Isa. 9:6)—are not poetic embellishments. They are declarations that the eternal God has stepped into human history, not as a distant observer, but as a present Redeemer. Advent insists we slow down long enough to feel the weight of that truth, to let it press against the darker possibilities of a world untouched by Christ.
The old Christmas reflection about a clergyman dreaming of a world where Christ had never come captures this weight with unsettling clarity. In the dream, the absence of Jesus is not announced with catastrophe or fire from heaven. Instead, it is revealed through quiet, devastating omissions. No stockings. No hymns. No church spires lifting the eyes toward heaven. No books that speak of redemption. The dream’s power lies in its restraint. Evil does not need to shout when hope is absent; despair speaks softly and steadily on its own. When the clergyman opens his Bible and finds it ending at Malachi, the silence of the missing Gospels becomes deafening. There is law, but no grace. Prophecy, but no fulfillment. Longing, but no arrival.
This imagined world exposes something essential about the incarnation. Christ did not come merely to improve human morality or inspire religious sentiment. He came to reveal God’s nearness in suffering, death, and loss. Without Him, the clergyman has nothing to offer the dying mother but shared despair. No promise of resurrection. No assurance that death is not the final word. Scripture itself testifies that “if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile” (1 Cor. 15:17). But even before resurrection, incarnation matters. If Christ had not come, God would remain conceptually distant—spoken of, theorized about, but never touched, never heard crying in a manger, never seen weeping at a grave.
Christmas reminds us that the world into which Jesus was born was not ideal or peaceful. Rome ruled by force. Israel waited in silence. The poor and powerless lived on the margins. Into that world came a child whose presence quietly overturned despair. The angel’s announcement still rings with astonishing scope: “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people” (Luke 2:10). The Greek word chara (χαρά), joy, here signifies more than emotion; it signals divine intervention that reshapes reality. This joy is not rooted in circumstances, but in the arrival of a Savior who steps into the curse itself, fulfilling the promise that “He comes to make His blessing flow, far as the curse is found.”
The dream ends, as all true Christmas reflections must, with awakening. The clergyman rises to the sound of worship—“O come, all ye faithful.” The transition from despair to praise mirrors the movement of the Christian story itself. We do not deny the darkness; we wake from it. We do not minimize suffering; we answer it with incarnation. Christmas joy is not escapism. It is defiance—holy, hope-filled defiance against the lie that the world is beyond redemption. Because He has come, graves are no longer final, prayers are no longer unanswered, and suffering is no longer meaningless.
Christmas also presses us outward. The closing exhortation from Nehemiah 8:10—“send portions to them for whom nothing is prepared”—reminds us that Emmanuel is not only comfort for the Church but commission for the Church. God with us becomes God through us. Those who truly grasp the miracle of Christ’s coming cannot hoard its joy. They share it, especially with those who live in places where Christmas arrives without hope, without Scripture, without the name of Jesus spoken aloud. The incarnation obligates generosity, not guilt, but grace in motion.
On Second Thought
On second thought, the most unsettling question raised by this reflection is not “What if Christ had not come?” but “What if He has come, and we live as though He has not?” Christmas exposes this paradox with uncomfortable precision. We sing the hymns, quote the promises, and decorate our sanctuaries, yet it is possible to live functionally as if Emmanuel were absent—handling grief without hope, conflict without grace, and injustice without courage. The clergyman’s dream world may feel distant, but its shadows appear whenever believers rely more on sentiment than on the living presence of Christ. The incarnation is not only a doctrine to affirm; it is a reality to inhabit.
God with us means God present in hospital rooms, courtrooms, lonely kitchens, and quiet gravesides. It means Scripture that does not end at Malachi but opens into flesh and blood, cross and resurrection. On second thought, Christmas is not merely proof that God once came, but assurance that He still comes—again and again—into the ordinary, the broken, and the overlooked. Advent trains us to notice Him there. The paradox is this: the more familiar the story becomes, the easier it is to forget how empty the world would be without it. Yet when we pause long enough to imagine that absence, gratitude sharpens, worship deepens, and faith awakens anew. Emmanuel is not simply a name announced long ago. It is a presence we are invited to live within today.
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