Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the Christmas story has taken on new meanings for me this year. I first became familiar with Chapter 2 of Luke's gospel when I had to read it at my school's carol service, or perhaps our church nativity service, in Nairobi. Which was a long time ago. And it was fitting that as a child I suppose I related most to the childish sections of the story: the hard-to-pronounce-words; shepherds "washing their socks" and "tuning to BBC"; sheep and cows.
And growing older, my focus hasn't shifted further than digging into the more esoteric details of the story: how shepherds were ranked in the first century Jewish society; how Luke nailed this story into the timeline of history with mention of Caesar and the census; how angels maintain their 100% record in Scripture of being absolutely terrifying to behold; how the shepherds got 'in' on the kingdom by being a bit cheeky.
But then the time came for me to become a parent - a father to a son - and changed this story forever.
