Matthew 6:6 — But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

A few days ago I wrote “The King of kings entered into history with no fanfare, no desire to make a great statement …” Today, one of my favorite Christmas carols has been in my mind:

Silent night, holy night all is calm, all is bright
Round your Virgin Mother and Child, Holy Infant so tender and mild
Sleep in heavenly peace, Sleep in heavenly peace

I never thought enough about that word “round” before — and maybe the way I’m looking at it today is peculiar to me. But I’m thinking that the night was silent around Jesus, Mary and Joseph because that wondrous child created a pool of peace surrounded by a sea of turbulent bustling life.
Jesus often had that effect I think — remember the storm on the Sea of Galilee that He calmed with a word?
I have the feeling that the silent step from infinity to mortality and the quieting of the waves were not just “how things happened”. I think they were teaching moments too. “Look,” The Lord says, “do it like this … Calm the storms, make peace, create your effects without fuss.”
One way of looking at Matthew 5 and 6 — the Sermon on The Mount — is that it lays out some new “rules” for living. I’ve seen it suggested that one reason the Jews did not, in the end, embrace Jesus is because He was offering an alternative to the established body of the Law. I’m not sure I see it like that. To me it’s more about defining the style of the Kingdom, the tone of voice if you like.
When you do charitable things … when you pray … when you fast … keep it to yourself, do it in secret. But why?
William Barclay has a wonderful description of how Christian generosity must be — “it must be the instinctive outflow of the loving heart; we must give to others as Jesus Christ gave himself to us.” It is that idea of the outward flow of love that I think The Lord is trying to get across to us. We are to throw pebbles of love into seas of pain to create love, joy, peace …
Christmas provides so many opportunities for silent generosity. Whether it’s a dollar or so in a Salvation Army kettle, or a toy for a tot, or a gift for a senior under a giving tree … Opportunities to impact people we will never see and create a little peace. When we create peace — Shalom — in a way we step out of mortality and into infinity as we associate ourselves with the great — the perfect — peacemaker.