Advent Readings From Outside The Box: Part 4

December 22

Christmas is a time of year for generosity and giving to charity.  Recently I have seen suggestions that we not give to a certain large charity because of their political stance.  I certainly disagreed with the political stance but I wonder should such a thing prevent me from contributing to a charity that does an excellent job of feeding and clothing people?  I read another article about the ungrateful and rude behavior of some recipients of food stamps.  I am fairly certain that not all rude people are poor so why hold the poor to different standards?  It seems clear to me that there are strings attached to our giving.  I have found it in myself when I have helped someone out and then immediately started judging their actions.  It is difficult not to do so.  We like to see our giving put to good use.  We don’t want to be taken advantage of.  But this type of giving has nothing to do with Christmas.    God didn’t show God’s love for us by becoming human because we deserved it.  God doesn’t take that love away when we are rude or make bad decisions.  God’s love is freely and generously given.  

December 23

Brace yourself, another football analogy coming and it references...wait for it....Tebow!  I know everyone is excited because we haven’t heard enough about this guy!  (the previous sentence is so heavy with sarcasm I could barely push the keys to type it).  I understand the excitement about Tebow.  It is soooo refreshing to have a football player in the news because he is praying rather than getting arrested.  He is a well spoken man.  Here are my two cents though: 1) whether he prays on the field or not says a lot less about his faith than his actions off the field particularly in relation to the tons of money he is making  2) last I checked I could pray to God without kneeling so clearly this is done intentionally to call attention to his prayer.  Is this drawing attention to God or to a certain football player? (Although it is possible he is kneeling so he can pray without getting caught off guard by another player’s enthusiastic celebration.  “Dear Lord, thank you....Ahhhhh dog pile!” Crunch!)  This last point, (minus the dog pile) is where it connects with Christmas for me.  Many folks say, “Remember the reason for the season.”  Clearly this is not done to remind themselves.  If they were reminding themselves we wouldn’t be hearing it or reading it.  So, does this glorify God or does this say “you all better remember the reason for the season like I obviously am since I am saying these words, aren’t I good?”  Would it not be better to live the reason for the season by giving generously and loving abundantly? 

December 24

Christmas Eve!  Ohhhh, the anticipation!  I can hardly stand it.  I won’t be able to sleep tonight because I am so excited.  What am I excited about?  Presents!  But the mightily cool thing about Christmas is:  I am not excited about the presents I will be getting but rather about those I will be giving.  We fret and worry about the materialism of Christmas but somehow as we grow it does become about what we give rather than what we get.  In this self-centered world that is no small thing.  Sure we go overboard.  I confess I did.  Sometimes we give out of obligation rather than out of joy.  There is definite room for improvement.  Yet a day of getting excited about what you give is not a bad way to celebrate Christmas!  My children, like most children, are probably more excited about what they get but they did spend a lot of time making special, hand-drawn presents for others.  And with careful guidance (like me crabbing at one of them in the middle of the store to “think about somebody besides yourself!”) and time and watching good role models they will discover the joy of giving.  I have great hope, with the way God is moving in this world, that our children may even do a much better job than we have of carrying that spirit over into the rest of their lives.  A hope-filled and meaningful Christmas to you all!

December 25

The day is here and as I reflect upon that child in the manger,
                                             God become human to live and die for us, 
                                                                                    our hope for the future, 
                                                                                                              our heart, 
                                                                                                                       our life, 
                                                                                                                           I am struck speechless.  


Let us dwell in quiet awe in this moment of that birthing cry, the light of hope that breaks the darkness.

Advent Readings From Outside The Box: Part 3

December 15

I was doing my ab workout the other day and the girls’ cat (pictured above) kept crawling on me.  I set her gently aside and continued.  When I got done and lay on the floor catching my breath, the cat climbed onto my abs and commenced to knead as cats are wont to do.  Ahhh, how sweet... until the claws started finding their way through my shirt!  I think Christmas is kind of that way: I love it until the materialism or the busyness and such give me a little jab of annoyance.  But maybe the real problem is I am letting the wrong things jab me.  The message of Christmas is love and hope but within it is also a jab: God is going to turn things upside down, bring down the mighty, uplift the lowly.  That doesn’t sound like a jab until I remember that I am one of the mighty in terms of wealth and privilege compared to much of the rest of the world.  Ouch!  

December 16

Mary got her heart broken twice.  Well, actually, knowing the way life goes it was probably more than that.  But, usually we think of Mary’s heart being broken when Jesus was crucified.  It seems to me her heart was broken at least once before that: when she became a mother.  Having a child breaks the hardness of your heart.  At least that is the way it seems to me.  Before my children were born I never cried unless someone died or something.  Now, all I have to do is go to one of my children’s programs and I am fighting off tears.  They make me so proud!  And it is not even just when my kids are up there.  The other kids doing well makes me tear up too.  For me having children opened my heart to a new kind of wonder, marveling at every thing they learn, the successes they have.  There is also the flip side, wanting to cry when they hurt, agonizing over their growing pains.  I don’t mean to say this is something reserved for people who have children either.  I think others have their hearts broken open by other experiences that open their hearts to whole new levels of compassion.  Because I am a prideful person, I will undoubtedly still fight like mad to keep the tears from showing on the outside.  Yet I am grateful for the depth my children have added to my life.  At Christmas we celebrate the child who broke Mary’s heart and who breaks our hearts open as well: expanding our compassion to include all people as Children of God.  

December 17

“How many times have you heard someone say — I can’t draw, I can’t sing, I can’t dance — with the case-closed authority of Solomon? Probably dozens of times, more if you yourself happen to be an artist blessed with the painting, flamenco, or woodworking gene. But have you ever heard anyone sheepishly confess, as they backed away palms up from an evergreen tree, Oh, not me — I can’t decorate Christmas trees?”  This is the opening to the blog post Christmas is a Time for Artistic Expression on the On Being blog.  I hadn’t really thought about it before but there are tons of opportunities to get a bit artsy at Christmas: decorating, festive baking, wrapping the presents to look just so.  Even if it is as simple as layering ingredients in a jar for one of those sand art baking mixes, we can all explore our creative side this time of the year.   The simple act of lighting a candle can be a way to express ourselves and give glory to God.   Don’t shy away from creative expression this season.  Let every act of creativity be a way of praising God for the abundance of beauty that surrounds us.

December 18

I have a special place in my heart for the shepherds.  This may have something to do with spending a good portion of my days tending furry, four legged, or feathered creatures.  Even as I write this I am continually finding bits of fluff clinging tenaciously to my face, my hands, my clothing.  I just finished grooming the rabbits.  It lifts my heart so much to think that the first to receive the Good News of Jesus’ birth were those who hefted hay, fleece and manure rather than those who leveraged power and money.  The king only heard rumors.  The shepherds were serenaded by angels.  

December 19

I don’t relate entirely to the shepherds.  I realize that in the scope of the world I am a person of privilege.  Perhaps today the angels would appear to factory workers or discount store employees.  The angels appeared to those doing the hard and un-heralded work.  This is the message of Christmas: God turning the world upside down, the divine entering the world in an infant, the message communicated first to the lowly.  I don’t know about you, but when I watch the news I think the world is so mixed up that upside down would be the only way to set us right.  

December 20

For all the shouting about the secularization of Christmas, I think sometimes the secular communicates the message of Christmas better than the Christians do.  For example, Charles Dickens’, “A Christmas Carol.”  According to Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol,  Dickens first set out to write a political pamphlet about the plight of poor children in his time.  He changed his mind and wrote “A Christmas Carol,” thinking it would be a more powerful way of communicating.   Standing up for the rights of children and the poor certainly seems closer to the true message of Christmas to me than “how dare you kill the meaning of Christmas by saying, ‘Happy Holidays!’”

December 21

I am totally cheating on this one.  I am going to ask you to provide me with inspiration instead of the other way around.  I volunteered to provide some music for our Christmas Eve service and have been trying to think of a song that is deeply meaningful and perhaps slightly unusual.  So, I ask you: What song would you most like to hear on Christmas Eve?  “The Christmas Can-Can” and “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” are not options.  Funny thoughts for in the midst of a candle light service, but not options.  For me, a Good Friday service is not complete without singing “Were You There?”.  Is there a Christmas equivalent for you?  Think of that song, hum it to yourself to get in touch with that deeper meaning of Christmas and then let me know what the song is.  Thanks for your help.  I await your comments and emails. 

A Prayer for the Christmas Season

I’ve been champing at the bit to turn on Christmas music, though so far I have resisted in part because of guilt.  Since materialism and consumerism have come to be associated with the Christmas season, I feel guilty for even liking Christmas.  But....now that we have cleared Thanksgiving Day, I have a confession to make: I love Christmas and I don’t think I should have to feel guilty about it anymore!

I love the decorations and the music.  I love the opportunity to seek out personalized and meaningful gifts for those I care about.  I love Christmas and it saddens me that this season has come to symbolize materialism.  Yet it seems that in our struggle to protect Christmas we sometimes make things worse.  Remembering “the reason for the season” becomes just another way of throwing our religion at others as if it were a weapon.  In the process we neglect the deeper meanings of Christmas.  

This time of year we all need a little celebration.  I will not deny that to my atheist friends or those of different faiths.  This holiday need not be about us against them...yet again.  

None of this clamor and fighting speaks to those for whom Christmas is a difficult time due to grief, financial hardships, loneliness, and so on.  But there is a message in Christmas that does.  It is this message that calls to my soul not just with anticipation but with impatient anticipation.  Thus, my prayer for this holiday season:

I have heard it said that people of Christian faith should be more about Easter and less about Christmas.  Easter is a powerful hope but it deals with things beyond this life.  It is a sure and certain hope but one that eludes my imagination, confounds my concrete mind.  The crucifixion is something I can wrap my mind around.  We have only to open our eyes and our hearts to the realities of the world and we recognize the darkness of Good Friday.   When the season is upon us I will dwell with great gratitude at the foot of the cross.  

But, Lord God, I want to stay for a while in Christmas where hope is something I can cradle to my chest.  I want to dwell here where music sings the promise of love, reminding me of those Mary moments in my life when it seems truth and love are about to burst forth from within and change the world.  

Let me hearken to Mary’s song and hear it as a radical claim awakening me for the sake of revolution, to grab hold of the Kingdom of God already present amongst us.  

Let me look into the face of the clearest revelation of your love and let him transform me so that when the “Slaughter of the Innocents” comes again upon this world I will stand up and say, “NO MORE.”

Let me dwell here in the incarnation of your love and let it change me so that materialism and consumerism are a distant clamor that has no claim on me.

Lord God, let me dwell here in Christmas for a while.  I know I am impatient but you understand how this holiday touches us.  Some call it sentimentality but you cradled each of us as you breathed forth the breath of life.  You know the power of that tender love.  It is life changing, not mere sentiment.

 So, let me draw out this Christmas season for a time and savor the message of love herein.  Then let me live that love with generosity and courage.  This I ask in the name of your son who is your love in human flesh, Jesus the Christ.  Amen.