We reminded ourselves yesterday of the warfare version of the Nativity story from Revelation 12.
Eugene Peterson’s meditation on Revelation, Reversed Thunder, describes the scene in his usual eloquence beginning on page 119. Here are some excerpts:
The immediate consequence of the birth is not Christmas carols but a great war spread across the heavens.
He is referring to Revelation 12.7 – 12:
Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death. Therefore, rejoice, O heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to you, O earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, because he knows that his time is short!”
Peterson goes on:
This is not the nativity story we grew up with, but it is the nativity story all the same. Jesus’ birth excites more than wonder, it excites evil: Herod, Judas, Pilate. Ferocious wickedness is goaded into violence by this life. Can a swaddled infant survive the machines of terror?
…
It is St. John’s Spirit-appointed task to supplement the work of St. Matthew and St. Luke so that the nativity cannot be sentimentalized into coziness, nor domesticated into drabness, nor commercialized into worldliness…It is St. John’s genius to take Jesus in a manger, attended by shepherds and wise men and put him in the cosmos attacked by a dragon. The consequence to our faith is that we are fortified against intimidation. Our response to the nativity cannot be reduced to shutting the door against a wintry world, drinking hot chocolate and singing Christmas carols. Rather, we are ready to walk out the door with, as one Psalmist put it, high praises of God in our throats and two-edged swords in our hands. (Psalm 149.6)
If that doesn’t get your juices flowing, stay tuned. I want to share a song that says the same thing.