Real Christmas trees have been selling fast this year – perhaps as many as ten million will be brought into homes and offices to celebrate the festive season. Whether it’s the scent of pines, the feeling of nostalgia, or just an excuse for some bright tinsel, their appeal this lockdown has been powerfully felt. Legend has it that it was Martin Luther who first brought a fir tree into his house and decorated it with candles. In the midst of the ferment of the Reformation, he had seen the stars sparkling through branches in the forest one night and had been filled with wonder at the glory of God’s creation. He knew no human craft could replicate that heavenly light, but he hoped his tree could reveal something of God’s presence all around us, that his family and friends would see in it and through it the God who made heaven and earth.

Luther and his fellow theologians were fascinated by the way the created world could serve as a set of ‘signs’, pointing beyond themselves to their maker and displaying the wisdom and majesty of God. Human beings had to learn to read them, to be open to the possibilities of awe and wonder and illumination that these created signs could disclose. When they did, they would find in the forests and the stars the inspiration for new ways of living, new relationships with each other and with the world. In this first week of Advent, our city’s streets are filling with illuminated trees and our meadows glitter with frost; in their radiance they invite us to turn our gaze and our imagination towards the Light that is coming into the world.