#ChristmasEve
Christmas Eve
It’s Christmas Eve; we all travel to Bethlehem. On Christmas Eve, we join Mary and Joseph as they study the face of their new son. As the final candle on our Advent Wreath--the Christ candle--is lit, we relive this story together.
It is a story you know it by heart—how the whole town was clogged with travelers, none of whom was there by choice. The emperor wanted them all counted and taxed and he could have cared less where they slept. That was their problem, not his.
Joseph and Mary got a stall instead of a room, which was not as bad as we sometimes make it out to be, but still, not an ideal situation. With luck, they also got a pitchfork and a wheelbarrow. We know they got a feed trough, because that was where they laid their treasure, and that is when the picture was taken—right then, while the star was still overhead and the angels were still singing in the rafters.
But twenty minutes later, what? The hole in the heavens had closed up and the only music came from the bar at the inn. One of the cows stepped on a chicken and the resulting racket made the baby cry. As she leaned over to pick him up, Mary started crying too. When Joseph tried to comfort her she told him she wanted her mother.
They both hurt all over and there was nothing to eat and it was cold as the dickens, but you know what? God was still there, right in the middle of the picture. Peace was there, and joy, and love—not only in the best of times but also and especially in the worst of times—because during those times there could be no mistake about who was responsible.
It was God-With-Us. Not the God-Up-There somewhere who answers our prayers by lifting you out of our lives, but the God who comes to us in the midst of them—however far from home you are, however less than ideal your circumstances, however much or little your life reflects the Christmas cards you send. That is where God is born, just there, in any cradle you offer him, on any pile of straw you pat together with your hands.
Any of you who have prayed to be transported into God’s presence this Christmas will get your wish—only not, perhaps, in the way you had thought. None of heaven’s escalators are going up tonight. Everybody up there is coming down tonight, right here, right into your own Bethlehem, bringing you the God who decided to make his home in your arms.
You are cordially invited to a special Christmas Day blog post tomorrow!
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