Celebrating Christmas in Jeypore every year is somewhat a unique experience. The festival in the undivided Koraput district is a sign of unity and brotherhood.
With tremendous advancement in social life, one has the benefit to see various dimensions of Christian celebrations. To experience it in person in being the part of the Jeypore Evangelical lutheran Church is enthralling. This is to be a God given opportunity and also a blessing. The way of welcoming the Baby Jesus is different and diverse. Decorations, markets, money, wine, gifts, sports, cookies, dance-drink-dinner etc, constitute the core of celebrations.
Other side of the celebration is that Christmas calls for union and fellowship with families and friends. People come together with their family and share the joy and peace with everyone in the community. It is noteworthy to mention that many of the family members who are staying outside of Jeypore during this time normally get the scope for uniting with other family members to share love and joy of Christmas and it also gives them scope to meet old friends in the community who have also gone out for their living.
There are many Rachels who are weeping in our streets today, while the world is busy celebrating Christmas. What Christmas means to those mothers who have lost their children in the Pakistan or in India or in USA and other parts of the worldIJ Mothers, who have not even seen the dead bodies of their children! Those mothers may refuse to be comforted, but God will comfort them nonetheless. Rachel’s tears were not in vain and not forever.
Four hundred million children under 13 years of age are living in extreme poverty worldwide, according to a new study released by the World Bank at Washington on October 10, 2013. That total constitutes fully one-third of the 1.2 billion people still living on less than the equivalent of 1.25 dollars a day, according to the report.
The Bible is honest about the misery of the human condition, but it never gives in to it. Even those losses that seem inconsolable can be consoled. By quoting Jeremiah, Matthew wants us to know that Messiah came to bring comfort and joy, even to the Rachel of the world today. On this Christmas day, let us resolve that “Children should not be cruelly condemned to a life without hope, without good education, and without access to quality health care.”
May the Baby Jesus — the Messiah, who alone brings peace and joy to the world —usher in a new era where all children will be safe, secure and sustained with love, care and comfort! That is the true spirit of Christmas celebrations. let us dedicate ourselves to wiping out all tears from each eye.