St Paul’s letter to the Galatians enunciates that Christmas time is holy. “But when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons”

(Gal 4, 4-5).

Thanks to the Incarnation of God’s Son, time is doubly sanctified. First, time and eternity are interdependent and complementary. Second, the meaning of time is discovered in relationship, in personal communion and in an opening loving response to others.

The Incarnation of Jesus Christ implies specifically, in T.S. Eliot’s phrase, an “intersection of the timelessness with time”. In The Rock, Eliot portrays Christ’s birth as an event that occurred within time to transform it. “Then came, at a predetermined moment, a moment in time but not like a moment of time. A moment not out of time, but in time, in what we call history: transecting, bisecting the world of time, a moment in time but not like a moment in time. A moment in time but time was made through that moment: for without the meaning there is no time, and that moment of time gave meaning”.

The Christmas story powerfully illustrates that eternity is not extraneous to time but is inherently present in it. Thus, the two realities become one! In fact, according to the Romanian Orthodox theologian, Dumitru Staniloe, “eternity is as much in time as it is above time”. Pope Benedict XVI complements Staniloe’s understanding. “With the Incarnation of the Son of God, eternity entered time and human history was opened to absolute fulfilment in God. Time was, so to speak, ‘touched’ by Christ, the Son of God and of Mary, and received from him new and surprising significance: it became a time of salvation and grace”. Can we afford letting our human time be touched by Christ’s salvation and grace by repenting from our sinful ways and turn back to the Lord? The book of Sirach highly encourages us to do so: “Do not delay to turn to the Lord, nor postpone it from day to day; for suddenly the wrath of the Lord will go forth, and at the time of punishment you will perish” (Sir 5, 7).

In Jesus Christ, God became man to help us comprehend and live out our divine vocation to love freely. In St Gregory of Nyssa’s view: “The fact that the omnipotent nature should have been capable of descending to the humiliated condition of humanity provides a clearer proof of power than great and supernatural miracles … His descent to our lowliness is the supreme expression of His power”. Since, according to another influential Eastern Orthodox theologian, Vladimir Lossky, “he who takes no risks does not love”, God, through his Eternal Word, risked so much that “He came to his own home, and his own people received him not” (John 1, 11). Nevertheless, He kept informing, redeeming and strengthening our freedom by constantly inviting us to share his saving presence with us ever since! “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any one hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me” (Rev 3, 20).

Jesus is knocking at your heart’s door and waiting for you to open and receive Him. Those who opened were transformed. What about you? Turn your time from a simply predetermined swing of the pendulum (chronos) to a decisive moment of meeting God face to face (kairos) by taking seriously this biblical wake-up call: “Today, when you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.” (Heb 4, 7).

O Holy Time!