By Benjamin Scott Campbell
You remember, don’t you, the moment in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe when Mr. Tumnus explained that, in Narnia, it was always winter but never Christmas? How could you forget?
Take Christmas out of winter, and what have you got but a cold, dark time of year? Once the axe is laid at the root of the Christmas tree, people might rather take a cue from the wild animals and hibernate through January, February, and maybe March too. After all, the world outside turns a hostile face once the lights and carols go into storage, and those who venture out quickly come back in.
I recall one morning in Black Forest, Colo., before sunrise: the night prior had lain the forest under a deathly chill and quiet. It was altogether inhospitable and desolate—10 above zero, not to mention a biting windchill. Thick clouds barred the heavens, turning stars into fictions, moon into myth. A frigid sheet covered the Earth, the ponderosa boughs, everything. Nothing like the billowing white painted in cozy pictures. Snow is an icy killer, a shroud of gloom that—for an hour of omnipotence—imprisons life beneath it: trillions upon trillions of jagged joints interlinked, crystalline chains refracting darkness.
It was so quiet. No bugs—buried alive with their natural predators, the frogs. Hundreds, thousands of miles divided me from the nearest birdsong. Shivering, alone, here I stood. Winter is no place for living things, is it?
Even the word winter remains, for the majority of the English-speaking world, a kind of byword suggesting death, darkness, waiting.
But unlike its English counterpart, the French word for winter, hiver, bears a more hopeful connotation. You might recognize it from its etymological ancestor, hibernus, from which we get hibernate, in just the same way you recognize a cousin you’ve never met before at Christmas. He’s got Grandpa’s eyes, Grandma’s laugh. You’re cut from the same stock, the same genus.
Hiver’s ancestry suggests a place to pass the winter, a suitable place even. It might not always be the most patently enjoyable sort of habitation, but in the end, like that strange holiday dish we eventually learn to cherish, we find winter is actually quite serviceable. We hang up our hats, loosen our scarves, and gather round the fireplace with a cup of hot tea while our noses turn red and our fingers thaw. It’s not just serviceable, it’s suitable; in fact, it’s exactly what we needed. It’s good and right and true and beautiful even.
Back in Black Forest. It’s dawn, a herd of deer crest a nearby hill—seven, eight dressed dark in their winter coats! (They’re only visible because the forest burned so many years ago, denuding that little mound of its trees.) Ever noticed how easy it is to spot a deer, or a hawk, or a rabbit in the snow? In summertime, you might pass a hundred and never know. But now their broad, perky ears stand stark against the pink eastern sky. Their hooves leave deep tracks in the virgin snow. And you’ll notice how they watch you—you, a stranger in their wild domain. They’re just as perplexed as you are. Oh—and just as expectant as you are! Why do you stand there, staring at them as they stare at you? Or don’t they see a certain genus in you?
“Is that Him?” they perhaps are wondering. “Is that Him?”
They remember in their ancient blood what it was like to walk with gods in the garden. They remember (how could they forget?) that sad, lonely feeling of a winter without Christmas. And in that moment, they’re waiting, waiting to see if you will at this time restore the kingdoms, kingdoms of man and beast alike. But you clear your throat; they start, then bound away, thinking, “It’s not Him.”
Of course, you must disappoint them, as Christmas must disappoint us. What, Christmas: disappoint us? But yes, it must. Why? But I think you already know. As for Christmas, the luster of our earthly holidays soon pales. Presents gilded in silver and gold transfigure into cardboard and gaudy trash. We tire of tinsel. We know real gifts can’t be repaid in eggnog. Don’t you long for it too, the Christmas that never leaves?
He's coming.
Every year, we taste this “precious and very great promise,” this Deus dixit [1] surer than the dirt under our feet: the promise of his Second Advent in the celebration of the first. And every year we’re left waiting in the winter season of eternity.
Really, we live Christmas Eve lives all year. Christmas Eve is winter epitomized. Like the beloved in the Song, our heart leaps to hear the God-Man’s hand lifting the latch at the door—one night in late December. We rush to open it only to find Him gone as quickly as he came, like Christmas. We’re left with hearts yearning, ready to faint because we know, in our ancient blood, we were made to be with Him—He to find us “in our blood,”[2'] as the Scripture says: “God with us.”[3]
“Live!” He cries. Live in this dark and bitter world, for “I AM with you.”[4] Or why are we still standing here, “gazing into heaven?”[5] Don’t we see a certain genus in Him?
Christmas Eve, I confess, is my favorite holiday for the same reason I love hiver, the same reason I love winter. It is our season, we Christians, our hibernus at this brief moment of eternity. Winter has a way of burying all that’s frivolous and fleeting, but it reveals what really matters, life which, even when it hurts, remains until something better appears. At last, a revelation! The front door bursts open, crimson light exploding cold, dark, and night into warmth, wonder, and welcome. Welcome! This is that suitable hibernus where we so long to stay, that place to ride out the dead of winter—every year to remind us of the bitter cup that makes the Advent meaningful.
Let me forage the frigid chaff of this ephemeral world. Cold creation is enough; it is enough for the beasts; it was enough for His flesh; it is blessedness indeed. Winter’s bitterness does but sweeten the drops of the Holy Spring, when the Almighty Equinox—the “sunrise from on high” shall again visit us,[6] never to leave again . . .!
All earthly Christmases must disappoint us. But hiver, the Eve of Everything, never fails to sweeten the bitterness of winter with fresh hope.
Not yet, but soon.
Hear the angels as they’re singing
on the morning of his birth,
but how much greater will our song be
when he comes again to Earth—
when he comes to rule the Earth? [7]
_________
Benjamin Scott Campbell (MDiv, Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary) teaches Latin in Colorado Springs, Colo., and is preparing for ministry in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. He and his family worship at Black Forest Reformed Church. His first book, Esau, will be published in Fall 2024.
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[1] Latin for “God has spoken.”
[2] Cf., Ezekiel 16:6.
[3] Isaiah 7:14; Matthew 1:23.
[4] Matthew 28:20; cf., Pss. 16:8; 23:4; 27:1; 46:11.
[5] Acts 1:10.
[6] Luke 1:78.
[7] In the First Light, GLAD, An Acapella Christmas (Benson, 1991).