I have always loved Christmas best of all the holidays. The decorations, the Christmas music, houses decorated with lights. The Christmas story, family gatherings, friends, food, Christmas movies...all the things that make for wonderful traditions and memories and warm feelings of nostalgia.
But the events of this past week, both globally and in our very own community, have stripped away the warm and fuzzies of Christmas. Coming face to face with the suffering of a fallen humanity has a way of doing that. But it started me thinking about the first Christmas. There was absolutely nothing warm and fuzzy about this event. Not in any way. There was no hearthside, only a cold, dark, unsanitary cave. There were no family gatherings. Just Mary and Joseph...delivering their first child. Alone. Away from home. There was no Christmas carols. Just a loud announcement by terrifying angels to shepherds in the field. There were no church services, no parties to welcome this newborn King. Well, there were the shepherds. But shepherds were the outcasts of society. They were the ones nobody trusted and nobody wanted at their party. They were the only guests at the birth of the King.
Jesus, Immanuel—God with us—left comfort to come into a world filled with suffering. He left perfect Shalom to come into a world filled with war and violence. The All-Sufficient One became dependent on others. The All-Powerful Creator became powerless. The Eternal God stepping into the limitations of time and space. The One who never sleeps or slumbers, now experiences exhaustion. The One who never experienced sickness, would now struggle like the rest of humanity with sickness...and eventual death. There is nothing glamorous...nothing nostalgic about the first Christmas.
And tragedy and suffering has reminded me of this. It is stripping from me the counterfeit to bring me to the heart of Christmas. Jesus. Our idol-making hearts have a way of taking good things and turning them into ultimate things. We are keenly aware that consumerism has dirtied the meaning of Christmas. But could it be that our good Christian traditions have also distracted us for the true meaning of Christmas. We can get so caught up in our Christmas carols, our Advent traditions, that they become Christmas and Jesus is once again on the sidelines. How do we know when these good things have taken too high a place in our hearts? Perhaps our reactions when our favorite tradition is missing will give us a clue. When we grumble and complain because our “favorite” Christmas carol wasn’t sung in church, or we aren’t singing enough Christmas carols, or you fill in the blanks here...perhaps we are running dangerously close to missing the point of Christmas.
This past week, a letter written by Saeed Abedini was circulated (You can read his letter here). Saeed is the American pastor who is anticipating spending his third Christmas in a dark prison in Iran. There is no music in his prison cell. There are no decorations. No Advent wreath. No carolers will come to his door. There is no hearth, or tree, or gifts. There is no family or friends. And yet, he is filled with joy. Because what he does have is what matters most...Immanuel...God with us. There in the darkness and cold of his cell, he is keenly aware that God is with him and that God is at work in him and in this world, reconciling all things to Himself. And this causes him to rejoice. This causes him to celebrate Christmas. And he exhorts us to remember...to remember what the heart of Christmas is really about. His life is a reminder to us that in spite of our circumstances, in spite of what we have or do not have in this Christmas season, that Immanuel...God with us...is all that we need.
So let us enjoy our Christmas traditions, but hold them loosely. Let us hold fast, instead, to the love of God, found so beautifully in Christ. And, in the words of Pastor Abedini: “This Christmas let the lava-like love of Christ enter into the depth of your heart and make you fiery, ready to pay any cost in order to bring the same love to the cold world around you, transforming them with the true message of Christmas.”
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