When my daughter was a preschooler, a neighbor had set out a traditional nativity display on their lawn. She loved that nativity scene. She loved going to see “Baby Jesus.” Every time we came home from church, the store, the school, or from running errands, she’d beg, “Let’s go see Baby Jesus!” Every time. And because the nativity scene was set up in a yard in a circular road off our street, it was an easy diversion to make and a simple request to fulfill. Maybe, just maybe, her best day was the afternoon we trudged through the snow to the nativity scene to visit “Baby Jesus” in person.
Nativity scenes capture the serene and holy hope of the Christmas season. Saintly Mary and her betrothed, Joseph, sit over a feeding trough gazing at the newborn who warmly coos. Gathered around are the barn animals, the shepherds, and the “Wise Men” in solemn worship. With the star shining bright, the child in me cries, “I want to see Baby Jesus.”
But the nativity scene is an enigma as the traditional story of Jesus’ birth fails to accurately line up with the biblical story, especially in one significant detail. The Christmas story is nothing shy of a bloodbath, filled with the screams and cries of mothers across Judea. Mothers who cannot be comforted.
According to Matthew, the “Wise Men,” better described as “Magi,” came from the east, probably from modern day Iran or Iraq. Being astrologers, they followed a star that led them to Judea. Connecting the star to a newborn baby, they went to King Herod to get more information. Specifically, they wanted to know where they were to find this child. Once they dropped the title, “King,” Herod’s paranoia was triggered. He sent them on their way with his blessings under the ruse that he wanted to worship the child. He didn’t. He wanted to kill the infant before the child became a man. King Herod was a ruthless ruler who was easily threatened by anyone he deemed stood in his way. So much so, he had his own son killed believing his son prematurely eyed the throne.
The Magi made their appearance before the child. Leaving their gifts, they returned to the east. However, being warned in a dream, they discarded King Herod’s request to tell him where the child king lay. Such defiance angered King Herod, deciding he cannot have anyone compete for his title or throne. In a moment which foreshadows the cross, and eerily linking Jesus to Moses, Herod cast a dragnet, ordering his men to kill all the baby boys under the age of two within the vicinity of Bethlehem. By employing genocide, King Herod will stop this threat before his throne is compromised. Instead of joy and laughter on Christmas, Matthew says we hear Rachel weeping for her children, and refusing to be comforted (Mt. 2:18).
It’s not the Christmas story we want or tell, certainly not the one we tell our innocent children. It is the Christmas story de-sanitized. For all the quiet, holy, and reverent moments, something dark and sinister is at play. Something dark is always at play. In the midst of the bloodshed and weeping comes a glimmer of hope. And hope never disappoints.
One of my favorite Christmas songs draws the listener to the manger scene in “Do You Hear What I Hear?” The song opens with the night wind speaking to the lamb about the star in the sky. The lamb goes to the shepherd boy and in the midnight sky, he hears singing. Presumably, he hears the angelic host in chorus. By now we realize that the song is drawing from myth since the wind communicates to a lamb who then speaks to the shepherd. The sheep speaks. The shepherd boy, doubling as the role of the Wise Men, goes to the Mighty King to tell him about the child shivering in the cold, pleading with the King to bring silver and gold. The Mighty King, instead of using the Magi as a ruse to kill the child, makes a proclamation, declaring to all people hope and peace as this baby child will bring goodness and light.
As much as I loved this song, I struggled with its lack of biblical accuracy. Never mind the mythology part, the Mighty King, who is clearly Herod, does not support the child but does everything to kill the child. That part of the song rested uneasily with me as one who holds the Biblical story in high regard.
All that softened once I discovered the context for the song. In 1962 Russia supplied nuclear war grade missiles to Cuba and parked them off the coast of Florida. For two weeks America was on a head-on collision with a third world war. Only this time, it was nuclear. And for thirteen days it looked like no other option was on the table.
Out of that crisis, on the cusps of the Christmas Holiday Season, and seeing two mothers with babies in strollers who were looking at each other, smiling, Gloria Shayne and Noel Regney composed, “Do You Hear What I Hear?” The song calls people to find another alternative to their fears, where Rachel weeps for his children and refuses to be comforted. The song embraces a prayerful peace. Ultimately, the only venue for peace comes, not from a nuclear holocaust, from the baby born in Bethlehem. Like the Mighty King, instead of feeding our fears, we turn to faith, we humble ourselves, and we use our power and position to help speak a calming peace to people, where Rachel, weeping for her children, may be comforted. When we do that, we fuel hope. And hope never disappoints.
Arguably, the bloodiest and deadliest war lasted five long years, fought between 1914-1919. We know it as World War I. That war was the first to use modern inventions and technology of tanks and artillery which stripped the land barren while dehumanizing the soldiers. The new trench warfare tactic dug people in, and it prolonged the war instead of bringing it to a quick and decisive end. It also became a cesspool for disease and sickness. The war killed more people than any war up to its time, and left the majority of soldiers wounded, not only physically, but mentally, emotionally, and spiritually as well. The war was rapidly devolving into one of the most horrifying moments in our world’s history. Over a million casualties with three hundred thousand fatalities occurred just during the six-month Battle of Somme. The scars from this war took a generation to begin healing, only to be ripped opened by a second World War.
In the early days of the war, Pope Benedict XV was negotiating a ceasefire when talks stalled, then failed. Instead of the heads of states coming to a consensus, a grassroots truce emerged from within the troops.
On Christmas Eve some German soldiers began singing “Stille Nacht” (i.e., Silent Night). As they were singing, the Allied soldiers began to join them. The Germans sang a verse in their language followed by the Allies singing a verse in English until both had formed a unified chorus of praise. Eventually, one of the German soldiers braved the enemy and emerged from the trenches unarmed. At first the Allies believed it was a ruse. But time unfolded and, daring to seek a holy peace, they acted in faith and stepped out into no-man’s land. Each side laid down their arms and shook hands. They exchanged gifts of cigarettes and chocolates. They topped the night with a rousing game of European football. When the day ended the soldiers shook hands and returned to the trenches where fighting resumed the next day.*
Many of the soldiers were changed by the new-born friendships. They refused to fire on each other and yelled out warnings when mortar was launched. Most of the soldiers were transferred to new outfits in order to reengage the fighting. But the 1914 Christmas cease-fire, the only recorded cease-fire in history initiated within the ranks, occurred because on Christmas Eve soldiers decided to sing Silent Night.
In the midst of a hell-hole called, War, a sliver of hope overran despair. No, it did not last, but it happened because understanding the true nature of the Christmas story, a story born in bloodshed, always brings hope. And hope never disappoints, so that Rachel, weeping for her children, can be comforted.
So if you find yourself in a not-so-silent Christmas night, because you’re Rachel weeping for your children, just remember that you are the reason for Christmas. For in the midst of weeping, we celebrate Christmas. We celebrated the child born in Bethlehem. For God did not send his Son into the world as a great, invincible, and powerful King who will put people and nations in their place. No. God sent his Son into the world as a vulnerable and precious baby, swaddled in clothes, lying in a manger. And that baby is the hope, a hope that comforts you, like you are Rachel weeping for her children. And that hope will not disappoint.
Soli Deo Gloria!
(i.e., only God is glorified!)
* Joseph Loconte, A Hobbit, A Wardrobe, and a Great War: How JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis Rediscovered Fatih, Friendship, and Heroism in the Cataclysm of 1914-19 (2015), ix-x.