Christmas

I'm soooo excited! Tomorrow night, Paul and I and our friends will meet at church at 10:30 p.m. We'll sing carols as more people gather, and we'll have the accompaniment of our choir, and the organ, and a brass section helping out. We'll get bulletins and candles from the ushers, and hug people and smile at newcomers, and wish them Merry Christmas. And at the end of the service, around midnight, we'll light our candles, the church will go dark, and we'll sing Silent Night as we kneel in the circles of light that glow from our candles.

I'll probably cry, as much from the feeling of being surrounded in God's love and the love of those we gather with as from knowing that this baby boy who was born, and is born in each person, came for me. I can barely remember most of the people I went to high school with, but God knew all of us before we were ever conceived. He came for me, and you, and all the people of the world. People who don't know Him and maybe have never heard of Him. People who have forgotten they once knew Him. People who know Him, but are in pain looking for Him, or worse, ignoring Him. He came for me even though I was a pain-in-the-ass kid who lied constantly and ruined a Christmas snooping for presents with my four year-old sister. He came even though I'd spend years thinking He was no more real than Greek gods were to the Greeks. He came even though I still sometimes act like a stupid kid, or don't do what's right out of some sense of spite. He's here with me now and always, even when I forget it. And it's that way for everyone.

I'll cry because this event is so run-of-the-mill and yet so special. Babies have been born for thousands of years, and His birth was no different. Mary probably cried and screamed and moaned and wondered what the heck she was thinking saying, "Yes," to an angel. She couldn't blame Joseph, but did she get a little mad at God for choosing her, giving her so much pain? Jesus was born in the same mess as all of us, cleaned up and wrapped in fabric. It's normal and ordinary, and yet every mother will tell you that birth is a miracle. He would later perform miracles, but isn't this the biggest one of all? God and man? Wow.

I'll cry because of the times I missed Christmas, when I was an angry teenager, when I was in college searching for something that was already there, when I was too drawn up in myself to care about what was going on with other people in the world. I'll cry because of the joy that those times are behind me and I can go ahead in life with my head up and aware and full of prayer. Most of the time.

I'll cry for the people who don't have all that I do, who aren't surrounded by love and friends and family, who don't have a house or apartment or a room, who don't have enough to eat. I'll go home to a warm house with barking dogs greeting me, and a bed and a shower and blueberry french toast after opening a few presents in the morning. There are people who give a finger for a good candle to light their way in whatever darkness they have to live with, and all I have to do is move my finger to be surrounded in light.

I pray that everyone gets a tear of joy and one of just a little sadness too, this Christmas. I know I'll be busy with friends and family inn the next few days, and I pray that you will be too. But remember there are people, like Jesus, who are huddled and alone, who face living in an uncertain world that is hostile to them, who were babies once, just like you, me and Him.