12/24/2023
For your consideration….
I tend to like things that are routine and consistent. Christmas was one of the things I found constant in my life. It is always on the same day. My family had consistent ways of celebrating, eating, and shopping. I knew from the time I was small until I graduated from college my Mama would get me one bag of socks and one bag of underwear. Speaking of consistency, I have always been the worst Christmas shopper ever. I begin with my consistent habit of waiting until the last minute to shop. Then, I can never figure out what to buy someone as a gift. The greatest evolution of Christmas gift buying is the Gift Card. It is the only way to ensure the person gets what they want. Gift cards have helped me build a wonderful library over the years, and that was more helpful to me than cheese baskets and fruitcakes. Another consistency for the past few years has been the interactions with folk who want me to believe that Christmas is a Pagan Holiday. It isn’t, but for some people, it is a means of discrediting my belief, or they just think it makes them seem smart. It doesn’t, but we live in a culture that is programmed to pull out some “ got you” card like we are living in a “Matlock world”. The day isn’t right, but the early Christians who celebrated didn’t know that. They just knew they wished to celebrate the coming of the Light into the Darkness. It certainly wasn’t the way we depicted it at Wesley Chapel Church, either. The shepherds didn’t wear cotton bathrobes and bath towels on their heads. By the way, I was never elevated to the role of Wise Man in those plays. I tell myself that was just bad casting and not foreshadowing. That makes me feel better about myself.
The most consistent thing about Christmas for me is that it is important. It is when Light came to the Darkness. The month when we celebrate is also the month of the most incidents of depression, su***de, and violence. I have realized that I remember the painful events around Christmas more than the other events that have occurred at other points of the year. I think everyone has this struggle to some degree. We get so caught up in the message of Christmas that is driven by the desire to have a utopia here on earth and not by the actual story and message of Jesus' birth and life. The family was forced to travel while Mary was “great with child” because the Powerful wanted greater taxation. The local ruler was paranoid and wanted the Child dead and was willing to kill others to make it happen. The family fled to a foreign land to escape it all. It was not utopia; it was faith and perseverance. Mary knew it was all-important, not only for her but for others as well. The child would fulfill His purpose, God’s purpose. He would become a man who led a revolution, not building a Utopia in the material world where all other kings attempted to build an empire. He pulled us from the hopeless darkness and saved us to walk in the Light. He would build a kingdom of believers by conquering the inner world, where moths and robbers had no access and where there is no taxation. He would rebuild us to walk with our Father, to discern the difference between the Darkness and the Light. He builds in us the virtues that give us the courage to persevere to navigate this material world on our journey to the next world. He builds a new tribe and family who are His, and they walk on His path. They will be known not as the perfect or the powerful. We will be known as the Redeemed. That has been consistent since the beginning of our history. It is why I celebrate Christmas.
