I still cry at Christmas
I still cry at Christmas when children sing “Away in a manger” at those school Nativity services. You know the ones:  all the children are dressed up, at least half with tea towels on their heads. The teachers have rehearsed them so they are as sweet as possible. It's one of the highlights of the parents’ and grandparents’ year.
Then at some point they all break into song around the manger; it could be any song, but the best for me is “Away in a manger”. I just can’t help it, I cry. I should know better but it catches me out every time.
The ice is often broken by spotting the child who the teachers have tried to hide at the back. You know, the one whose parents misread the "come dressed up" instructions and their boy has come as Spiderman, but he is still singing and I am still crying.
Perhaps I cry during “Away in a manger” because it’s a sign that Christmas is really here. So tangible you can even smell it, the lounge has even been scented with the sweetness of a Christmas tree. The memory of two luscious weeks at home, schools out, free at last, Christmas has begun.
Maybe the reason I cry is a connection to the past, a painful Christmas memory or event? This is true for many. Christmas can have painful memories attached, but that is not the reason for these tears.
I know what it is, it's stirs the thought that it will snow; hats on, toboggans out. But in thirty six years I can only remember two white Christmas’s and anyway they are not those kind of tears.
These tears are different. They are not of pain, or even just raw emotion, but something much deeper and much rarer. They are tears of hope of peace. I have a sense of being held tight in God's hands and the future being packed full of hope and potential, far fuller than the base of any Christmas tree.
The deep history for these precious tears of hope is one of my earliest memories:
 I am standing in my father’s study on Christmas Eve, just before bed time, all snuggling in my pyjamas. There is a certain comfort in curling little toes in a long brown carpet in front of a cranky gas fire. I remember all the family being quiet (although I’m sure we weren't) as Mum lit the candles on the mantle piece. Candles that would cast flickering shadows on the small wooden nativity set with its floor that had been fresh lined with moss.
Then standing round in complete safety and peace, Dad would pray. All of us together, family comes first at Christmas.
Then Mum would lead us in a Christmas song, always the same one, always “Away in a manger, no crib for a bed, the little Lord Jesus lay down his sweet head.”
God was close at hand, almost catchable if I dared to move, he was holding me close. The entire world was well, even the things the where not right would be put right because Jesus had come. There was hope and peace expressed in tears that night. I knew it to be true then and I know it to be true now.
Mum would pray, and then off to bed, with fresh anticipation of what Christmas would bring.
So I encourage you to pause awhile this Christmas in front of the nativity. Allow God to speak with you about the wonder of what he has done. Allow him hold you in the safety of his arms. Say thank you, and if you get a little emotional, don't forget that it's ok to cry at Christmas. I do every year.
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