He swept into the hotel lobby seemingly out of nowhere. He was tall, dark-haired with a neatly trimmed beard. He was expensively dressed; a grey sport coat, silk shirt; delicate gold chain around his neck and a large watch on his wrist. His physical presence was imposing, his manner-in a hurry, impatient and unhappy. He strode towards a small group of men gathered to meet him; two were Chinese and two others, middle-eastern. They all greeted him with the Arabic ‘Salaam Alaykuma'. He returned the greeting without enthusiasm as he walked through the little knot of men, as though they didn't exist. He was a head-taller than all of them.

He then turned to one of those gathered, took him aside and gave what seemed to be an order which was accompanied by a nod of his head towards the Chinese who looked anxious and clearly wanting to please. The man to whom he was talking then joined the little group; followed by a worried discussion and then, with what seemed like a resolution, they all left the lobby towards the big glass doors and a waiting limousine; the big man in front, the others following like so many hurried and harried ducklings.

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: "The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel" (which means "God with us")

But exactly how is God with us? As Matthew continues to draw out the Jesus story he tells us how: this ‘Immanuel' is a son, ‘the child'. ‘God with us' is a kid.' Note how many times Matthew speaks of the child:

‘On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him...When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up," he said, "take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod...After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead." So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel...and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth.'

The image is of the Christmas tree at 1881 Canton Road, Tsim Sha Tsui. The original site was the headquarters of the Hong Kong Marine Police from the 1880's to 1996. The buildings' unique Victorian architecture symbolizes its colonial background. But in the middle of the small square that’s been created is this shiny ornate metal cone that you see in the image on the right above. When I saw it I was honestly astonished. I couldn’t really believe what they had done. So I took out my cell phone and took a quick photo and I hadn’t been able to get this image out of mind, since.

First, let me describe to you what you’re seeing. There appears to be a real tree behind that bright aluminum cone which looks like an upside down Hagen Daz ice cream cone. If the tree is real its’ probably a pine or spruce tree, a conifer, and they grow about 1 foot a year under ideal conditions. They are some of the oldest trees in the world and can be found as high as the Arctic Circle. This tree is probably about 30 feet high. And if it’s grown from a seed it’s probably taken 50 years to grow to this height, and was probably cut down in less than a minute by someone with a chain saw. But before it made its way to HK, its endured 50 seasons of snow and sun, rain and wind. It’s grown straight and tall and green despite the threat of forest fires and infestation of insects. It’s been the house of countless birds and squirrels and bugs providing food for as many with its seeds and bark. Its roots have held the soil together and provided habitat for literally millions of organisms. This tree is a remarkable achievement.

Like the ‘cord of three strands’ described in Ecclesiastes; the cord that is ‘not quickly broken’ I’d like to suggest that our Christian life and ministry is comprised of three threads: the first thread is story or narrative, the second is imagination and the third is faith; and I believe these threads are found in the birth narrative of Jesus in which Mary is confronted by the angel announcing the birth of our Lord through her.

The first is story or narrative: the story of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob found in the Jewish Scriptures and completed and fulfilled in the story of Jesus of Nazareth in the New Testament the story we call the gospel. But the story of this God is expressed through the stories of men and women who found themselves caught up in this divine and historical drama and who, like Mary, have their lives forever altered.

I've been thinking about my right hand a lot. I broke it last summer. Five months later it's still healing. ‘Old men should ride bikes with caution'. I'm guessing Confucius said that. It sounds sort of Confucian, but whether he said it or not, I believe it. I broke the 3rd and 4th metacarpals bones of my right hand when I went over the handlebars of my bike. The metacarpals are the finger bones.

But what is interesting is that the bones healed easily and quickly. I was casted and pinned and 6-weeks later my finger bones were 80% of what they were before they were broken. Give them another 2-3 weeks and they were good as new. However, what they don't tell you in the fine print is that your muscles and the soft tissue surrounding the bones don't heal quite so easily. You think everything is OK and then you realize your hand is getting stiff and hard and it no longer does what you tell it to do.