January 3, 2016

John 1:1-18

“Light Wins”

In her Christmas Message a few weeks ago, Queen Elizabeth spoke about Christmas trees. She showed a picture of her great, great-grandparents’ tree – all decorated and covered with lit candles. She reflected on the fun family tradition of decorating the tree together, and the deeper meaning of the lights shining in the darkness.

The queen used her Christmas broadcast to emphasize that light can triumph over darkness after a difficult year. She noted that there have been “moments of darkness” in the last year, which has been marked by extremist attacks and a migrant crisis that has overwhelmed Europe. That’s in addition to continuing conflicts and wars, deepening poverty and hunger in many places, the chaos of weather-related disasters, and a growing awareness of the ecological crisis in our world. Unless we have ignored the news completely, most of us are aware that for many, if not most, of the people of the world 2015 was a very dark and difficult year.

The other day when I went to look up the Queen’s Christmas Message online, I came across a strange news story about the taping of this year’s message. When I investigated the website I was looking at, … Read more »