Friendly Beasts

Scripture: Luke 2.1-7

“Jesus, our brother, strong and good, was humbly born in a stable rude, and the friendly beasts around him stood, Jesus, our brother, strong and good.” The Friendly Beasts, a 12th century French carol

This carol may have been one of the earliest songs or meditations on Christmas that tell the nativity story from a bovine perspective. Of course, there have been many such meditations in countless children’s plays since the writing of this carol.

Here is another: we are, almost literally, the shaggy beasts who gather round the manger scene these days. We are friendly, no doubt, but there is also no denying we are beasts.

I hope I’m not spoiling the Christmas fun by reminding us of the reason our strong brother Jesus came – we need a Messiah to save us and the world from our sins.

How shall I describe our condition? Have you ever been on a long journey on an
interstate highway and you weren’t quite sure where you were? The speed limit is 65
mph - which is to say there really is no limit - so you go roaring down the highway, not
sure where you are or where you’re going, but you’re making good time. So that’s nice.

I think that describes the spiritual condition of many. We are a curious mixture of good
And evil. When a person falls into a life of exceptional wickedness we often refer to them as “beastly.”

The group, Jars of Clay, as a song called, “Good Monsters.” Let me recite as few lines:

All the good monsters open their eyes
To see the wasteland where the home fires rise
And the people shouting “Why, why, why”

Do you know what you are?
Do you know what you are?

All the good monsters rattle their chains
And dance around the open flames
They make a lot of empty noise

Do you know what you are?
Do you know what you are?

Not all monsters are bad
But the ones who are good
Never do what they could, never do what they could

We’re all good monsters, but we’re monsters nonetheless. Not only do we love ourselves too much and things that aren’t worthy of our love, but we fail to do the good we were created for.

The Apostle Paul relates this struggle in Romans chapter 7,
“I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.” Romans 7.15, 19

The latent image of God in us is trapped in the prison of a sinful nature. We can deny this truth all we want, and we can mock it as fundamentalist noise, but truth it remains. We’re afraid to look in the mirror, because of what we find looking back at us, something shaggy and sometimes ugly, our good monster.

Dan Haseltine wrote his song as a way of being honest about himself, not to strangers but to his family and friends, to people who knew him best but didn’t really know him. They didn’t know because he had been hiding from him, even, maybe especially, as a Christian. “The song was born out of many experiences and conversations between addicts, failures, lovers, loners, believers, and beggars.”

Sometimes when I look in the mirror and see the evil I’m capable of, yet, and the good I’ve missed doing, I can only cry out, “Oh my God!”

“Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Romans 7.24-25

The first step to becoming more than a monster is a cry for help to the One who can help us.

I do know this, we can’t change ourselves. As the song says, “Nothing ever changes by itself.”

When my dog chews on a Christmas ornament or drinks from the toilet, I can correct it and I can get upset, but I understand that my dog is just being a dog. A beast can only be a beast. Do you what you are? Do you know what you are?

C.S. Lewis, in a famous passage from his book, The Weight of Glory, remarks:

It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such a you now meet, if at all, only in a nighmare. . .There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit –immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.


You are more than a friendly beast. You are meant for greatness. You are meant to someday look into your reflection and see not a beast, but something like an angelic being staring back at you. That hope of greatness has its humble beginnings in stable rude.

Christmas is the beginning of a new world. It is supposed be the beginning of a new you. Will you simply dance around this holiday and continue to rattle your chains, or will you aspire to something more?

“Thus all the beasts, by some good spell, in the stable dark were glad to tell of the gifts they gave Emmanuel, the gifts they gave Emmanuel.”