Christmas: Small Acts of Resistance in a World of Empire and Hope

Such a trivial-seeming detail in the Lukan Christmas story: “all the world should be registered.” It gives context to why Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the city of his ancestor David. It’s an inconvenience that this poor family would have to travel during the final days of a pregnancy, the kind of inconvenience the poor are used to having imposed on them by the powerful.

But it’s not merely an inconvenience. It’s a flex of imperial muscle. In a world of merchants and trade, it was a show of power to force people back to their hometown to be registered. In a world where cultures would blend and people would intermingle, sorting people into their regions and ethnicities was a way of maintaining order. In a time when the reach of the mighty Roman empire seemed incalculable, putting an actual figure to the number of subjects and territories was a tangible demonstration of the empire’s reach and influence. Whether such a census ever took place has been debated by historians, but the point of the matter is that such power was not out of the question for the Emperor of Rome. 

It is with this backdrop, in the shadow of this mighty regime, that a small child of questionable paternity was about to arrive in the outskirts of an occupied territory.

While the empire consolidates its power, unto us a child is born. 

Mary has already had a glimpse of what the birth of this child will mean: the scattering of the proud, the lifting of the lowly, bringing down the powerful from their thrones. (Luke 1:51-52). Mary knew that this first Christmas was a small act of resistance. 

At its core, Christmas is a celebration of the new world invading the old one. We celebrate the new born king, knowing his reign is not yet fully realized. We celebrate peace on Earth while wars still wage. We celebrate good will towards all while many still harbor malice. We shine a light on the world as it should be, while navigating the world that is. 

Christmas is for small acts of resistance. ​

Howard Thurman told us that the work of Christmas is “to find the lost, to heal the broken, to feed the hungry, to release the prisoner, to rebuild the nations”. He understood that Christmas was about righting wrongs. Perhaps then we can also see cleaning our waterways, replanting the forests, protecting endangered species, and reducing consumption as the work of Christmas.

And perhaps, if we see the first one as a model, the work of Christmas is
accomplishing those things in the small,
easily overlooked actions we take on a daily basis despite the enormous odds against us. ​

In churches around the globe, people will light candles in darkened sanctuaries. We do this, reminded that a light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it. (John 1:5) One candle is a small act of resistance against the dark, but joined together, our small acts of resistance can be a revolution. 

May this Christmas be filled with small acts of resistance for God’s people and God’s Creation. ​

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Derrick Weston

Derrick Weston is Program Director at Creation Justice Ministries.