Still Christmas

We forget the journey; the darkness, the cold, the trust needed to set out, following - a star?  The faith and stick-to-it-iveness needed to keep on going they knew not where, we know not where. In the Christmas pageant, the little magi come clomping in and lay their gifts at the manger, and they’re all there together: Mary, who has just given birth, is there, and Jospeh who had never had to help with such a thing before, and alone, along with the angels and the shepherds and the donkey and the sheep all jostling to see Jesus finally asleep in the feeding trough, complete with - at St David’s anyway - a sheep dog. Whether that is historically correct or not, it’s not, after all, about the details, is it?

We see the tableau and we forget the long journey to Bethlehem too, Mary massively pregnant  and uncomfortable, Joseph determined but unsure.Then the shepherds arrive, dirty outcasts that they are; having seen the angels and heard them singing, they come to see. But then they have to get back to work. The magi, those mysterious seers from the East didn’t get there until after many weary days and cold nights. Who knew where or when the star would stop? 

We know all this in our heads. Nevertheless, we’re lulled into thinking it’s a lovely tableau, when, after all, it wasn’t; that life is a lovely tableau, easy and serene, when really, it isn’t. It’s just life, inherently messy and infinitely glorious. Or, in this case, LIFE enfleshed - Jesus, Emmanuel, God-with-us, lying in the manger.  

So we start there - with the fact that life is messy and God-made-flesh joins us in midst of it, not shunning the mess, not shaming us, not pretending it is other than it is, (or that we are other than we are!) but entering fully into it. It’s sure not what we expect from the Creator of all that is, to join us here, as one of us.

And what do we learn from this Christmas Babe who grows into a man as we watch throughout the year? That God doesn’t hedge his bets - he’s all in; he doesn’t keep a Little Bit Back, Just In Case. That it’s not about me in splendid isolation, it’s about us, all of us together, and we are a motley crew!  That power is not about lording it over others or demeaning  or diminishing them, but is shown in serving others, in inviting them to serve us. That the Kingdom consists not in walling the other out, but inviting them in. That judgement is not payback or punishment, but mercy and compassion. That strength is incredibly gentle. That no, we don’t have the power in ourselves, or know the way, or have the answers. Nor do we need to. It’s enough to hear the angels singing and follow the sound, follow the star, to find the God who loves us enough to be born as one of us, to befriend us, to travel with us, not to tell us the way, or point out  the way, but to BE the way, and finally to stand with open arms and not to reject even Judas or Pilate or the Roman soldiers who mocked and spat and killed. 

It takes a lot - a Lifetime!- of unlearning. But if - no - as we begin to listen and let this Love be born and grow in us, we learn to be at peace fulfilling the various roles we are given at any certain time, whether it be sheepdog or angel, and  then “in quiet confidence we may continue our course on earth, until, with your call, we are reunited with those who have gone before” (BCP Pg 493)  

Louise Buck

January 2019