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Christmas Day

Isaiah 9
2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness-- on them light has shined.
3 You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder.
4 For the yoke of their burden, and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian.
5 For all the boots of the tramping warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire.
6 For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 His authority shall grow continually, and there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom. He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onward and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.


There must be a lull in the scientific community in the autumn of each year. If so, the lull produces some dramatic theories to help us understand Christmas in greater depth. For example:

How do eight tiny reindeer accomplish so much on one night?
Experts in quantum physics suggest that Santa travels through "wormholes," tiny perforations in the space-time continuum.

Why is Ebenezer Scrooge so unhappy? Clearly he is depressed, likely the result of unresolved grief at the death of his partner, Marley.

Rudolph's red nose? Most likely the result of a parasitic infection found in reindeer.

The elves? A disease of the pituitary gland that hobbles their growth.

And finally, the Grinch: he’s a walking list of symptoms. Depression, insomnia, irritability, microcardia (a heart two sizes too small), hyperpigmenation (excess colour in the skin) and an alarming disposition toward whole-word monosyllabic repetition: “noise, noise, noise, feast, feast, feast, sing, sing, sing. Surprisingly, all of these symptoms point to an actual ailment named Addison’s disease, of which the most famous sufferer was John F. Kennedy (aside from the Grinch, that is).

Explain it, dissect it, theorize over it, commercialize it, dress it up, set it to catchy holiday tunes…it is still Christmas, it is still the day we gather to celebrate God’s coming in a new way. It is still the day we reserve for the people closest to us, the day we try to honour others with gifts in the same manner that God honoured us.

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness-- on them light has shined. You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest. For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders; and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

We know who he is…or at least we think we do…Son of God, Prince of Peace, Saviour…but the question remains: What is Christmas? What does it mean? How could we explain it to someone completely unfamiliar to our tradition and our system of belief.

It can be a helpful exercise, to stand back, and try create a thumbnail sketch of what we think we know, or what we take for granted as a commonly understood idea.

So what is it? Give me your working definition of Christmas.

***

Isaac would give me the obvious…Jesus’ birthday. And them he would launch into the apparent contradiction in celebrating Jesus’ birthday on December 25, when clearly we mark time from the birth of Jesus, which no doubt should be on January 1st, the first day of the year. Trying to trip up the old man, eh? Why did it take me three years of theological college to spot the problem, and the boy still resides in grade five.

John Donne’s “Nativity”

Immensity cloistered in thy dear womb,
Now leaves his well-beloved imprisonment,
There he hath made himself to his intent,
Weak enough, now into our world to come.

“Weak enough, now into our world to come.” In Donne’s theology, God’s immensity is transformed into the most vulnerable human form to enter our world, to take on our humanity, to wear the fragility we wear.

Why do this? Why become vulnerable when the way of the world seems to be strength and power and the ability to move beyond others. Why would God become weak enough to enter our world?

1 Corinthians 1:26ff: Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.

Jesus is “wisdom from God.” A new kind of wisdom, a new expression of God, never before presented to humankind.

There were other appearances. God came to us before Jesus is a myriad of ways…wrestling with Jacob, speaking from the burning bush on Sinai, and another noteworthy appearance that goes largely overlooked: (from Jack Miles)

Once when Joshua was by Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing before him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went to him and said to him, "Are you one of us, or one of our adversaries?" He replied, "Neither; but as commander of the army of the LORD I have now come." And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped, and he said to him, "What do you command your servant, my lord?" The commander of the army of the LORD said to Joshua, "Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you stand is holy."

The man claims to be the commander of the Lord’s army, but the command for Joshua to remove his sandals, and his reaction of falling on his face, make it clear that this is God. This is the God that so many hoped for…that so many anticipated…sword draw, laden with armor, ready to defend God’s people with a swift arm and great strength.

But the wisdom of God changed. God changed. A world ruled by the might of sword and armor didn’t need the commander of the Lord’s army, one more competitor on the field of battle. The wisdom of God was no longer that God would appear and fight on our behalf, but rather that the way of service and humility and vulnerability would carry the day. Hearts would be transformed, and the line between us and adversary would vanish when God appeared not as Jew or Greek, slave or free, Roman or no, but as baby…a baby without politics or preference or power but the kernel of God’s immensity.

This wisdom would grow, and learn of us and our ways, our needs and hurts, our pain and predicament, and choose to live and die in our midst, that we might learn and grow and begin to reflect God’s wisdom anew.

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 1:34 PM