So what can we say about Christmas? No, Not the colored lights and the laughter and the camaraderie of friends in cheery places. Those are merely reactions to Christmas.
What can we
say about the why of Christmas? The source of our joy?
Christmas is a light…A light which shone into the darkness...and the "people who walked in that darkness" saw a whole new world.
It’s an understanding of God…finally.
People have
always had an awareness of God. They look around. They see that “things don’t
make themselves” and they deduce a planner, a maker, an architect. They look
within. And they realize that people matter. There is that sentient spark that
is more than just the body we wear. There’s a feeling that I…that part of me
which is identity…is immortal…or should be. There’s a knowledge of “justice”
that’s higher than animal “might makes right”. There’s hope and love and all
kinds of feelings that seem more than what we are made of--chemically.
Throughout history…there’s a desire for purpose and a knowledge that there must
be a God…but knowing Him, well that’s another thing.
We read in
Hebrew history of a time when the Israelites camped in a wilderness. For years
they wandered around with their tents and their sheep. They had a tent for God
too, and they packed it up and carried it along with them. But entering the
presence of God was impossible for most of them. There was fear. There was awe.
There were commandments—laws they could not keep and a holiness so pure it was
frightening. Lambs, they sacrificed to atone for sins. They sometimes loved
their God, and sometimes gave up on serving him. When their failures
overwhelmed them, they turned to an easier way. “It’s better to ignore God,”
they thought “and be our own independent lords”. Anarchy followed. Then captivity. All kinds
of slavery. Darkness.
But as they
suffered…generation after generation…they whispered to each other the promise
that their prophets had kept alive through centuries of writing…a savior will
come. God will provide a lamb—a lamb so holy we will never need another
sacrifice. He will show us the Father. All things will become clear. Light will
shine.
And God?
Well He kept loving and He kept promising and He even kept talking to those who
wanted to listen. And then, one weary night, Jesus slipped quietly into the
middle of human history.
Some were
unimpressed. After all, they had heard many stories of gods taking human form…waltzing
down to earth to stir things up, instigate battles, seduce women, reward the
faithful and punish the unbelieving…or punish the faithful and reward the
beautiful—these gods were capricious. When they got bored, they left. They
never suffered. Felt cold. Thirst. Hunger. Weariness. They never really understood
men because they never became mortal.
At Christmas
we celebrate something very different. Christ. God became man. He became one of
us. Not a rich one of us and not an oligarch or an exalted warrior. A baby. A
child. He would show God to us.
He would pay
for sin…once and for all…make a way for us to follow, restore our friendship
with God…to the point we could call Him Father.
This
Christmas baby was Immanuel which means literally “God with Us” He was the
light and He is still the light…shining into all our dark places. That
is the joy of Christmas. That is the why.
Credits to John Bailey for the stunning picture of the Rosette Galaxy.
