ADVENT: LOVE

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us”

1 John 4: 7-12

They loved him, even as a promise;

Alarm and risk of shame

Soon giving way to wonder

That they should be chosen

To create a family,

To care for such as he.

They dared to imagine

A new way of being.

They loved him at his birth,

Such treasure

Amongst the ordinary,

The crude and plain surroundings

At his arrival.

Yet they fashioned a place of love

Even in the unexpected.

They loved him as shepherds

Excitedly spilled their story

Of angels, glorious words

Of peace and favour.

They held the mystery deep within:

How could they know

What was to come?

And when celestial signs brought

Eastern travellers, lavish gifts,

Murderous threats

They held him as tightly

As any refugee parents would,

As they searched for shelter.

Oh, how they loved

And protected him,

This child of divine presence.

Love

That’s how

The light

Got in.

Chris Matthews