CHRISTMAS EVE 2005

A Sunday School teacher was talking about Christmas and the coming of Christ with her class of young children and asked, “And what was the name of Jesus’ mother?”

Everyone said at once, “Mary”.

In response, the teacher said very good, “Now, what’s his father’s name?” Silence fell over the classroom. Time seemed to drag on as the silence continued.

Finally, one brave little fellow raised his hand. “Virg”

With a puzzled look on her face, the teacher said, “Virg?” Where did you get that idea?

“Well,” answered the boy, “in the Bible they always talk about THE Virg ‘n Mary!”

Children accept what they hear at face value, and make sense of it in the best way they can. Small children especially, interpret what they hear quite literally.

The account of Jesus’ birth, as it is told in Luke’s account of the gospel makes for a truly wonderful children’s story. First of all, it is set in a barn (probably filled with farm animals). Children love farm animals. Then, add in a night sky filled with singing angels, and you immediately have a child’s attention. Next, mix into the story a group of farmhands called shepherds drawn in from the fields by the singing angels to visit the baby Jesus in the manger. Taken together, you have all the elements of a great children’s story: an intriguing setting, the special effects of singing angels lighting up the night sky, and colorfully dressed characters who take care of animals. What child could resist?

Taken as a whole, Luke’s account of the nativity is wonderfully detailed. It is filled with action as characters come and go. Moreover, its primary images are easily grasped by the minds of even very young children. It is a simple story, with colorful characters and told in a straightforward manner.

The truth is that while we adults like to complicate matters with abstract questions of logistics, symbolism, and subliminal meaning, a child’s mind simply accepts the story as they receive it.

Given the manner and style in which the nativity of Jesus is presented in scripture, we need to ask ourselves if maybe the children aren’t onto something important. Maybe we adults need to learn from them in how we read and interpret the story? God has a reason for telling the story in this way.

Perhaps, there are some things in life we simply need to accept as true? If the mystery of how and why Jesus was born bothers us, if the mystery of why shepherds were told and no one else was bothers us, or if any of the other thousands of possible other details connected with Jesus’ birth seem too wild for us to account for, then, perhaps, we should simply accept the mystery and allow ourselves to enjoy it. Maybe, just maybe, that is exactly how God intends for us to read this story.

For indeed, the deep meaning and spiritual significance of Christmas is hard to take in at an intellectual level. When we approach the nativity story at the intellectual level a whole series of questions come to mind. For example, why did the creator and ruler of the universe feel compelled to join the human race? Why did God choose to enter the world as an infant through the humble environs of a barnyard? Is the nativity story intended to answer the question of why Jesus, who was without sin or blemish, came into the world in the same messy and chaotic fashion as every other human birth before or since has?

In truth, there is no logical, rational answer for why or how God chose to come to us in the way he did. There is no logical, rational explanation to explain why God loves us so much that we would be given the greatest gift of all; a Savior, a Redeemer!

The only possible answer for why God choose to come to us is that God loves us. And, as we all know, love and logic don’t mix. If we think about love on a human level can any one really explain why he or she loves another person? We can point to specific things, but no one thing offers an exhaustive reason for why we love another. We simply do.

In a similar way God simply loves us. As His creation we belong to him. God wanted us to be with him, and the best way to make that happen was to become one of us. This is explanation enough for why we have the story of the nativity.

When children hear the story of the nativity, they usually have a many questions about how many angels there were, or was it cold in the manager that night, or were there cows, goats, kittens, rosters, pigs, etc. But I’ve never once had a child ask me how it was possible for God to become one of us in the baby Jesus. They simply accept it.

This is our challenge on Christmas Eve; to accept God’s love, not explain it, not to rationalize about how, not to theorize about why it came to us in one way or the other, but to simply receive it as the good news that it is. Emmanuel: God with us!

The nativity event and the wonderful stories that surround it are a marvelous gift from God, let us receive it as the children of God that we are, and allow its awesome wonder to transform us more and more into the creatures God intends us to be. Tonight, let us live in love and hope, for that is the true meaning of Christmas.

Reverend Marc V. Mason

Christmas Eve 2005

Trinity Presbyterian

Travelers Rest, SC