REFLECTION 28^TH DECEMBER 2025

By Rev Dr Fei Taule’ale’ausumai

The Flight into Egypt: A Story of Refuge, Resistance, and Hope

Our Gospel reading from Matthew this morning tells us, almost in passing, that Jesus, Mary, and Joseph fled to Egypt. It is one of those sentences that can slip by us if we are not careful—especially during Christmas, when we prefer angels, shepherds.  But if we linger with this story, as the Gospel of Matthew invites us to do, we find ourselves standing not in a sentimental nativity scene but on a dusty road, under threat, with fear close at hand.

This is not a cozy story. It is a story of political violence, state terror, forced migration, and survival. It is the story of a family who became refugees because the ruler of their land, Herod the Great, was so threatened by a rumour of a child that he unleashed violence against the most vulnerable. The Flight into Egypt reminds us that the story of Jesus does not begin in safety, but in danger; not in privilege, not in power, but in resistance.

Historically, Herod the Great ruled Judea under Roman authority. He was known both for grand building projects and for ruthless paranoia. He ordered the execution of perceived rivals, including members of his own family. Matthew’s account of Herod’s decree to kill the children of Bethlehem fits this historical portrait. Whether or not we debate the scale of the event, the theological truth remains: Jesus was born into a world where political power used violence to protect itself.

Mary and Joseph were not powerful people. They were poor, rural Jews living under occupation. When they fled, they did not have passports, travel insurance, or safe corridors. They had a child, some belongings, and a desperate need to survive. Egypt—Egypt—was not just a random destination. It was a place with established Jewish communities, a place beyond Herod’s immediate reach, and a land that carried deep symbolic meaning in Israel’s story.

The irony should not be lost on us. Egypt was once the place of slavery and oppression. Now it becomes a place of refuge. The land of bondage becomes the land of safety. Matthew is intentionally echoing the Exodus story, reshaping Israel’s collective memory around the life of Jesus. “Out of Egypt I have called my son,” the Gospel declares. Salvation history is being retold through the experience of displacement.

From a progressive theological perspective, it matters that Jesus begins life as a refugee. This is not an incidental detail. It is a revelation of who God sides with. God does not hover above human suffering in detached holiness. God enters it—fully, vulnerably, and without guarantees.

Mary, Joseph, and Jesus did not flee because they were adventurous or curious. They fled because staying meant death. That reality connects them immediately to millions of people today who are forced to leave their homes due to war, political persecution, religious violence, climate catastrophe, and economic exploitation. When families cross borders today, carrying children and trauma and hope, they walk a road the that Mary and Joseph and the infant Jesus knows intimately.

To read this story faithfully in our time is to resist any theology that romanticises borders, glorifies nationalism, or dehumanises migrants. The child we call “Prince of Peace” survived infancy only because another country opened its doors—whether formally or informally—to a vulnerable family.

Imagine the cost of this journey. The fear of travelling at night. The uncertainty of food and shelter. The language barriers. The vulnerability of being outsiders in a foreign land. Mary carrying not only a child but the weight of unanswered questions. Joseph trying to be protector and provider with limited means.

Faith is not abstract. Many of us know that it is lived in bodies that get tired, frightened, hungry, and cold. The incarnation means that God experiences all of this from the inside. God knows what it is to depend on the kindness—or indifference—of strangers.

This challenges any version of Christianity that aligns itself too comfortably with power. If Jesus begins life as a displaced person, then the Church cannot claim faithfulness while ignoring, detaining, or criminalising refugees today. The Flight into Egypt is not just a story to be remembered; it is a call to moral alignment.

In today’s context, Herod is not only a historical figure. Herod is a system. Herod is any political structure that sacrifices children for the sake of control. Herod is present wherever fear is weaponised, where leaders protect power rather than people, where violence is justified in the name of security.

We see Herod in wars that displace millions. We see Herod in policies that separate families at borders. We see Herod in economies that privilege wealth over wellbeing. We see Herod wherever the lives of the poor are treated as expendable.

One of the most radical truths of this story is that God is mobile. God does not remain fixed in one land, one temple, or one nation. God moves with the displaced. God crosses borders. God lives in exile.

This unsettles any attempt to claim God as the possession of a single people or place. The Flight into Egypt declares that God’s presence cannot be contained by geography or guarded by power. God goes where life is threatened. God pitches a tent among the vulnerable.

For communities of faith today, this raises urgent questions. Where is God moving now? With whom is God travelling? And are we willing to follow?

When we place this ancient story alongside today’s headlines, the parallels are unmistakable. Families fleeing war zones. Parents making impossible choices to protect their children. Journeys marked by danger and uncertainty. Host countries debating whether compassion is worth the cost.

To preach or reflect on the Flight into Egypt today without naming these realities would be a betrayal of the text. As a progressive theological church I believe we refuse such silence.  We insist that scripture speaks into our world as it is, not as we wish it to be.

This does not mean reducing the story to a political slogan. It means allowing it to shape our moral imagination. It means recognising Christ in the faces of those on the move. It means asking how our policies, our churches, and our communities either mirror Herod’s fear or embody God’s hospitality.

And yet, this is not only a story of fear. It is also a story of hope. The child survives. The family endures. Life continues, even in exile. The powers of death do not have the final word.

There is profound hope in this. Not a shallow optimism, but a resilient hope that emerges precisely because God is present in the hardest places. The Flight into Egypt tells us that survival itself can be holy and transformative. That getting through the night is sometimes an act of faith. That God’s purposes are not derailed by displacement.

In this story hope is not passive. It is active, embodied, and communal. It looks like communities that welcome strangers. It looks like policies shaped by compassion rather than fear. It looks like churches that stand with the displaced rather than merely praying for them.

So what does this story ask of us today?

It asks us to see refugees not as problems to be solved, but as people to be honoured.  We are being challenged to examine where we benefit from systems that harm others.  It asks us to resist narratives that dehumanise those who are different.   It asks us to remember that Jesus’ first identity was not king or teacher, but refugee child.  And perhaps most uncomfortably, it asks us whether we would have recognised the Holy Family if they arrived at our border today. Would we have opened the door? Or would fear have won?

The Flight into Egypt is not the end of the story. It is the beginning of a life that will consistently challenge power, cross boundaries, and stand with the marginalised. Jesus grows into a teacher who has nowhere to lay his head, who eats with outcasts, who confronts injustice, and who is ultimately executed by the same kinds of powers that once tried to kill him as a child.

From beginning to end, the trajectory is clear. God is found not at the centre of empire, but on the edges. Not with Herod, but with the fleeing family. Not in fear, but in love that risks everything for life.

To reflect on Mary, Joseph, and Jesus fleeing to Egypt is to be invited into a deeper, more demanding faith. A faith that does not look away from suffering. A faith that recognises God’s presence in displacement. A faith that calls us to action as well as compassion.

This story still walks among us in refugee camps, in border crossings, in overcrowded boats, in families searching for safety.

The road that began in Bethlehem and led to Egypt has never really ended. It continues wherever people are forced to flee, and wherever God goes with them—still on the move, still seeking shelter, still calling us to follow.  Amen.

Audio of selected readings and reflections

Audio of the complete service