Season of Goodwill

'Glory to God in highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours’ Luke 2:14

Christmas is often called the Season of Goodwill, as though for a few weeks people can be expected to behave in a kindly and generous way. The title comes from the King James’ version of these words from Luke’s Gospel – ‘on earth peace, good will towards men’. It’s a nice idea, a kind of cosy season of the year when everyone is nice to everyone else, but it’s not what the message of the angel actually said, and in any case it flies in the face of all we know about ourselves and our fellow human beings. A plentiful supply of presents and alcohol may well spread a benign glow over proceedings, but generally it only lasts for a few hours.

The ‘good will’ in this verse is in fact, as the NRSV renders it, ‘favour’ – God’s favour, his loving-kindness or grace. The generosity, in other words, is his, not ours – though we are the beneficiaries of it. The birth of Jesus is God’s greatest gift - his ‘indescribable gift’, as St Paul calls it (2 Corinthians 9:15). The gift was costly (‘his only Son’) and undeserved – ‘the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost’ (Luke 19:10). And the gift was for ‘all the people’ (Luke 2:10). God’s ‘favour’ was now to
be revealed to the whole human race.

The Oxford Dictionary defines ‘goodwill’ as ‘kindly feeling’ or ‘heartiness’. Neither seems quite appropriate as a description of God’s motive in sending his Son into the world as our Saviour. But to know that in this act God was showing ‘favour’ – generosity – to his often rebellious and constantly disobedient creatures is deeply reassuring. At Bethlehem we became God’s favoured people, the recipients of the most generous gift the world has ever seen.

Canon David Winter is a former Diocesan Director of Evangelism, a broadcaster and author of many books including Message for the Millennium (BRF)