There is more than one way to miss the point of Christmas. Starting at its worst manifestation, Christmas is about us. It is about what we receive, and about the feeling we get when we give – it is a glorified Valentine’s Day, a holiday created to celebrate business’s ability to market wares to shallow people.
At some level, it steps up and becomes about family. It’s not so much about an individual “us” but a collective one, a community.
Saturnalia would accomplish those ends just as easily as Christmas. The next step is the big leap – Christmas becomes about Christ.
But I want to go one step further down that line of thinking. It is more than about Christ. It is about the birth of Christ.
This, this is Christ the King,
Whom shepherds guard and angels sing;
Haste, haste, to bring Him laud,
The Babe, the Son of Mary.
The King of the Universe, laid low in a manger. The Lord of all Creation, weak and feeble, frail and helpless. Christmas strips Christianity of any haughty theological constructs. It is a baby.
Mild He lays His glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
The Mighty King who is can’t keep his head up straight. The Prince of Peace spits up on himself. Lord of the Sabbath, but he soils himself.
He cries dramatically for attention. He learns to walk. He smiles, he giggles, he laughs, he calls his mother “Mama”, he stares at bugs, he causes mischief with his little brother, he runs after a butterfly, he bounces a ball against a wall, he watches his father leave for work, he learns from the Torah, he hammers his first nail – with the same hand that would one day receive them.
Why lies He in such mean estate,
Where ox and ass are feeding?
Good Christians, fear, for sinners here
The silent Word is pleading.
Nails, spear shall pierce Him through,
The cross be borne for me, for you.
Hail, hail the Word made flesh,
The Babe, the Son of Mary.
Jesus, before he was called The Christ, was Jesus, son of Mary, son of Joseph. A fragile baby boy grew up strong, a real live person, not much different than your son or your cousin or your fake nephew. A fragile baby boy who became a young man, a real one; blood ran through his veins, air flowed through his lungs.
Christmas time is a time to reflect not only upon the heralding of a king. You reflect upon the birth of a king, in humble estate, helpless and pure, Savior of mankind. It is a fragile dawn, a feeble sun glistening its first rays on the hilltop, chasing away the dark, melting the frost, thawing our hearts.
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.
Fall on your knees! Oh, hear the angel voices!
O night divine, the night when Christ was born;
O night, O Holy Night , O night divine!
O night, O Holy Night , O night divine!
Words 
Eric-
Once again, I am impressed by your words. Thanks for the reminder. Also, I think you would love the sermon we had at church yesterday. Check out http://www.centralpc.org in a couple of days for the post.
Have a blessed week of time with Christ, friends and family.
Erin
I’ll try to remember to check it out.
SPEP is a few weeks behind now, but the last two were two of the top 10 sermons I’ve heard in my life – this week’s was priceless. It’s hard to prioritize Glenn’s sermons because he’s so gifted at preaching, but the last couple really resonated. I’m going to be posting it once it shows up.
You do realize you have about three different Christmas carols all mixed up togther…yes?
I never knew those “nails, spear, shall pierce Him through” lyrics until I sang I sang it for a solo yesterday. It’s too bad most churches always go back to “this, this is Christ the King”.
I did realize that. What I didn’t realize is that I had the same one repeated twice in a row. I wonder what I had originally intended there…
Bing Crosby inspired it with his woody, hearty voice. They don’t make voices like that anymore and it’s a shame.
He was also an alcoholic who battered his wife and children.
Do you keep a dossier on the personal failings of stars past, present and future? Was Nat King Cole a wife-beater? Can I like him still? How about Sinatra? Justin Timberlake?
Furthermore, I take issue at grouping “alcoholic” in with those other characteristics. One is a personal failing, the others are character flaws. Being an alcoholic doesn’t make you a bad person. Oversimplifying only marginally, being abusive to defenseless people does make you a bad person.
I think there should be a new law (along the same lines as the non-religious only being allowed to be united via civil union) that all non-Christians can ONLY celebrate Saturnalia. All shopping and other non-religious practices would be rebranded accordingly.
Don’t chastise me for not getting all warm and fuzzy when I think of Bing.
My family is full of alcoholics, many of whom were responsible for their own deaths. Am I to say that people who give in to unrelenting addictions don’t have some level of culpability? Are we to constantly argue “my genes made me do it?” We all have some level of agency with our addictions, whatever they may be.
I’m not saying alcoholics and drug addicts are bad people, because I work with and for those people. I am just saying that substance abuse, domestic violence, and other forms of physical abuse often go hand in hand. I just look at celebrities who are praised with a critical eye, as I look at anyone. It is not because I try to be the Judge of Humanity, I just acknowledge that many who are put on pedestals have many reasons to not be there at all.
I’m so cold my train of thought is incoherent.
I made fun of you for having a laundry list of others personal failings readily at your disposal. I chastised you for your demonization of addictive behavior. I do tend to agree with you at least naurally, but my personal experience has jaded me. Maybe I just need more personal experience, and I’ll be jaded all the way back to where I started.
I really don’t know what to think of Bing. I just hear him sing. I know he has a funny name. I have a concept of what he looks like, but not much more.