Christmas Truce

This is one of my favorite Christmas stories!

On the first Christmas day of World War I, British and German troops put down their guns and peacefully celebrated the Advent in the no-man’s land between the trenches. The war briefly came to a halt. All along the lines that Christmas Day, soldiers found their enemies were much like them.

In some places, festivities began when German soldiers lit candles on trees. Elsewhere, the British acted first, starting bonfires and letting off rockets. Pvt. Oswald Tilley of the London Rifle Brigade wrote to his parents; “Just you think that while you were eating your turkey, etc., I was out talking and shaking hands with the very men I had been trying to kill a few hours before! It was astounding.” The soldiers in gray and khaki sang carols to each other, exchanged gifts of tobacco, jam, sausage, chocolate, and traded names and addresses. They even played soccer between the shell holes and barbed wire.

This day is called “the most famous truce in military history.” It did not originate in the hearts of the national leaders, or even in the minds of the generals, in fact they were highly concerned as to whether the troops would have a will to fight afterwards. It started in the trenches, among the troops! In the midst of the fierce fighting, peace came as they remembered the birthday of the Prince of Peace!

Jesus said it this way, “My peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. I do not give unto you as the world gives. Do not let your heart be troubled, and do not be afraid.” (John 14:27) On the occasion of Christmas 2007, He is still our Peace!

History Shaped in Cradles

The year was 1809. The international scene was tumultuous. Napoleon was sweeping through Austria; blood was flowing freely. Nobody then cared about babies. But the world was overlooking some terribly significant births.

For example, William Gladstone was born that year. He was destined to become one of England’s finest statesmen. That same year, Alfred Tennyson was born to an obscure minister and his wife. The child would one day greatly affect the literary world in a marked manner. On the American continent, Oliver Wendell Holmes was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. And not far away in Boston, Edgar Allan Poe began his eventful, albeit tragic, life. It was also in that same year that a physician named Darwin and his wife named their child Charles Robert. And that same year produced the cries of a newborn infant in a rugged log cabin in Hardin County, Kentucky. The baby’s name? Abraham Lincoln.

If there had been news broadcasts at that time, I’m certain these words would have been heard: “The destiny of the world is being shaped on an Austrian battlefield today.” But history was actually being shaped in the cradles of England and America.

Similarly, everyone thought taxation was the big news on that first Christmas when Jesus was born. But a young Jewish woman cradled the biggest news of all: the birth of the Savior, who changed the world. And we celebrate His wonderful birth at Christmas… He truly is the reason for the season.. and the greatest news of all!