The Reach of Christmas

When we think about how localized Jesus's birth was--in a little backwater town in a tiny country in the Middle East--it's natural to wonder about how his birth made a difference to people living thousands of kilometres away back then, and how his birth can make a difference to anyone today. It is helpful to consider how the birth of Jesus fit into the development of the ancient Israelites' understanding of God and the corresponding importance of their wisdom tradition. Seeing how he came to fulfill, to embody, and to incarnate these ideas helps us apply the same kind of approach to the various ways people conceive of the divine outside of the Jewish milieu. This is what the first chapter of the Gospel according to John does with the Greek philosophical concept of the "logos". When we grasp what is being said in this Gospel, we can more easily invite others to consider how Jesus fills out what they have already come to understand about God.