In the Flesh
We waited with excitement, feeling a bit chilly from the suddenly colder weather. Would they be here soon? How long would they stay? What would they look like, anyway? Would we be able to recognise them?
 A man, a woman and a baby! There they were!, looking different from us, but, in a way, quite ordinary, -resting in a stable, with straw and hay, a manger and a donkey. It’s such a familiar recipe for a Christmas tableau, but such a surprise, -even a shock, - to see them there, in front of us in flesh and blood. Christmas cards come to life, wooden figures take on flesh. Look, -the baby-in-the-manger is an actual baby, in a manger! But it’s so ordinary that I have to search for the extraordinary that I know it to be.
The time of waiting and planning is finished and now it’s really happening: the Advent Labyrinth has taken form, giving us a place of prayerful reflection, and made our wooden nativity scenes come to life in front of our eyes.
And what an arrival it is! Each Advent we try to touch that feeling, -the feeling that there’s ‘something in the air’, and expectation is high. We try to imagine the events leading up to Joseph and Mary’s journey to Bethlehem and that moment of transformation when two become three, and the Christ Child is born. But it’s hard to think ourselves into it sometimes, what with all the preparation for the Christmas festivities. There’s no time for thinking too deeply, life has to be ‘got on with’! So much to do, so little time to do it, -(despite the fact that we all know Christmas is coming on December the 25th every year, and have plenty of warning!.) And we’re probably asking ourselves, “Is it all worth it?”
What is the worth, -the value, -of Christmas?
It’s not as if it isn’t a reasonably ordinary story. A young, pregnant woman is rather taken off-guard, with no proper hotel accommodation, after a long journey. A child is born in exceptional circumstances, which have the appearance of reasonable normality. A young couple with their first child, are away from home for the census, stuck in basic accommodation. Is that so special?
And their visitors: shepherds and intellectuals from Far Eastern places of learning, -what did they think it was all about, and was it worth their journey?  Twenty centuries later, I sit in the peace of an Advent Labyrinth in my church, touched and inspired by a living tableau of an ancient story, and I know what it was worth, and still is worth. It is worth my worship, my declaration of value, for my God and his entry into my world as a baby, just like the baby in my church’s manger. And that journey didn’t start just a day or so ago, -it has its origins in the mind of God and the history of Humanity.
If only I can come with the simplicity of the shepherds and the wisdom of those Eastern thinkers, (seemingly opposite values, but a perfect combination when it comes to grappling with the idea of God becoming one of us!). God has made a journey, too, and wants to stand up and be counted, -counted as on our side, in our corner.
He became like us, so we could become like him.
God has arrived, -he has taken on flesh.
Was it all worth it? I believe so.
Here is a simple Advent prayer which you may find helpful.
Almighty God, this Advent, help me to hold together your almightiness and your vulnerability as a baby. Though you are far greater than I, please may I experience your closeness to me in my life, my particular situation, and my vulnerability. Amen. |
