Christingle
What is Christingle?
1. Christingle actually means ‘Christ Light’ and celebrates the light of Jesus coming into the world.
In John’s Gospel chapter 1 Jesus is described as the “light of men”.
“The Light shines in darkness but the darkness has not overcome it” (Jn 1:5)
However no one is really sure how the Christingle came into being.
The earliest record of Christingle was in 1747 in a Moravian church in Marienborn, Germany.
The Moravian bishop, John de Watteville, gave each child a lighted candle tied round with a red ribbon as a way of illustrating the great love Jesus
has for us all.
2. The Orange stands for the world, with all its sin and suffering.
3. The Candle stands for Jesus coming into this world, as the light of the world.
We read in John Chapter 8 where Jesus says:
"I am the Light of the World. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12)
4. The red ribbon stands for the blood of Jesus.
Jesus, the little baby whose birthday we celebrate at Christmas - was killed on a cross by evil men when he was only 33 years old.
He died so that we could become part of God’s family. Jesus blood was spilled to take away the evil of the world – to wash us and makes us whiter than snow.
The red ribbon is placed around the orange to show that when Jesus died - it was for the whole world. And it seemed for three days that the Light of the world had been put out. But Easter reminds us that God relit the light.
4. The four cocktail sticks stand for the four seasons, spring, summer, autumn and winter.
On the sticks there are fruit, nuts and sweets to show the good fruits in the earth.
The fruit also reminds us if we are to follow Jesus, we too must bear good fruit. As St. Paul reminds us the fruit of God’s spirit in our lives is
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Gal 6:22)
Conclusion
I’d like to leave you with a final thought.
When evil men killed Jesus, they thought that they had put out the light of the world for good. However God relit it, when he raised Jesus from the dead.
And so I’d like to encourage you to think about this every time you see a candle on a Christingle or on an advent wreath.
Jesus’ birth is the like the lighting of the candle. And although it was blown out later by bad men, God re-lit the candle and every Christmas it continues to shine in the darkness.
And we should live our lives so that people see that we shine too, as the Candle - just like Jesus.
For we too need to bring love, help and support to others who need our love and God’s love.
