It seems we have been getting ready for Christmas since before Thanksgiving. The piped in Christmas music, the gaudy decorations, the endless advertising, all have crescendoed to this week.
The Advent countdown is almost finished. I’ve hung the Jesse Tree ornaments and the Chrismons, the tree is decorated, and the eighty-plus nativity sets in my collection have been out long enough to collect dust. I’ve dutifully stood in line to mail long-distance presence. I long ago did away with Christmas letters and cards. Most of the presents are wrapped, and the cats have played with bows and chewed tissue paper. I know when the children and grandchildren will descend, and most is now ready. I’ve checked to see that my friends have a place to spend Christmas. Widows, the sick ones, the lonely, the divorced, and those too overwhelmed with life to feel the joy of the season. Today I buy the perfect roast and plan the dinner for hoards, (don’t really know how many of the hurting ones will join us), and the choir rehearsal and performance schedules for two services have their rightful chunks of time set aside. Somehow, all will be ready for THE DAY.
Then, I reread the Christmas story in the Bible. Our little granddaughter put on a darling finger-puppet show last night, a precious five-year-old’s version. “An angel came and talked to Mary. She’s going to have a baby.” Next scene: “Mary told Joseph she was going to have a baby.” Next scene: “Mary and Joseph rode on a donkey.” Then, “There wasn’t any room for them.” And sweetly, “Mary had the baby anyway!”
Can we just imagine the waiting time for the first Christmas? The anticipation. The concern. The ultimate changes in routine. Entire lifestyle and lifetime. Ninety miles of travel over dusty roads, uphill and down. And we really don’t even know if there was a donkey to ride. Months of pregnancy. Now she is heavy with Child.
What preparations we now make for the anticipated, welcomed birth of babies. Perfectly appointed nursery, at least one baby shower’s hoard of gifts. Of course, we need a baby monitor. Arms cannot cradle the infant, oh no. There must be the latest technological device, carseat, nursing pillows, safe cribs, swings, ad infinitum. And childbirth classes. Hygienic birthing suite, of course, and well-trained attendants with fully paid medical insurance. And these children will be APGARDed and weighed and measured and ointmented and footprinted and their medical charts will be updated and typed into digitized records and documents.
The Baby we welcome this weekend had his birth in a barn, had no gorgeous baby clothes, did not get weighed and measured and documented, and slept in an animal’s trough with scratchy straw to cradle His tiny head. Rightful place for The Son of God? Not the way we would have planned a royal birth, or even one of ours, but God chose this, and He is indeed sovereign.
Our hearts bow before this perfect scene, just as the shepherds brought their honor to the King. We need to erase the wrappings we’ve placed on the whole picture, and get down to the basics.
All we have and are should be brought in humility to the manger. Welcome, God is with us. Emmanuel.
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