WE NEED WONDER

The Christmas holidays are a very busy time, but a noisy time. We seem to be rushing too much! 

 

What we need this season is not more invitations or events to attend. We are tired of having to run so much.

 

What we need is to be recaptured by the sense of wonder and awe.

 

Now, wonder and awe are not something that is easy to put into words. You live, you experience and your breath wonder. You are in the presence of a reality that is much larger than yourself. Your mouth drops open. There are no words that can come out. You are awed struck, silent and every so appreciative.

 

In Saskatchewan, if you wait long enough with your cup of morning coffee, you can experience the beautiful sunrise. The winter sunrises can be so beautiful, so overpowering – but there are no words to express how awed you feel in the presence of such beauty. It comes so quietly, daily, that you wonder how come your miss this moment of beauty at the beginning of this winter’s day.

 

Your neighbor hits the ditch on a patch of black ice. Her vehicle is almost buried in the deep ditch snow. Along comes a farmer (you only catch his name as Keith) . He stops. Picks you up and drives you to the toe-truck operator.  He refused any compensation for his efforts . And then he drives off, unknown, except for his black pick-up truck. 

 

What generosity! What kindness!

 

Now, come before the Christmas crib in your local church or school. Stand before the difficult story of the birth of this child in Bethlehem. This is God chosing to come among us and bring us healing and forgiveness. This is the great outpouring of the very heart of God; a heart of mercy, compassion and healing.

 

And remember that God comes among us when we humans are bombing the working poor in the Ukraine; blocking food distribution in Gaza and displacing thousands of innocent families in the Sudan. Why would God care about such evil people, such heartless people? Be awed by the pain and struggles within the heart of God over these unbelieveable atrocities.

 

Stand before the Christmas crib and allow all that God is doing among human beings. Be attentive to how God is moving human hearts to greater compassion, and healing and love for the stranger.

 

The sense of wonder can only be lived, beathed and experienced. It is very difficult to put into words – but it is so real in your body and your soul.

 

Now, how does God want to move you when you stand before the Christmas crib?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MARY SETS THE STANDARD

All three readings for this fourth Sunday of Advent focus on the choice of God to bring about the birth of this special child. This Sunday we have the gospel writer, Matthew, tell the story that shows that Jesus belongs to the family of David through Joseph. This was the proper lineage in the Jewish way of counting your place of birth.

 

But focus on Mary. It is important that devout Christians always remember that whatever we say about Mary, we are talking about ourselves. She sets the standard, our place in the plan of salvation.

 

First, she is a lowly person, a young woman, without power and position in society. She is one of the many little ones of this world. She is ordinary. She is like any fifteen year old that you know. 

 

God has chosen her in the great plan of salvation for humanity. God also calls you in your lowliness, your ordinariness, to play your part in God’s plan to redeem humanity. Stand tall with Mary as one of God’s chosen ones!

 

We know that Mary struggled with the request made by the angel that she become mother. God was asking of her the impossible. To be pregnant without a live-in husband was a shameful crime. And the neighbors would not be silent about such a sin!

 

Put yourself in her shoes. But she believes and trusts in God. In all this impossibility, God would not fail to support her in this impossible task.

 

When in your life have you faced such an impossible situation? Where were you put to the test to trust in God? To walk in the pitch dark with only faith that God would get you through this terrific storm? 

 

The trip to Bethlehem was an act of violence against Mary and Joseph. The foreign rulers, the Romans, forced everyone to return to their family birthplace, to be registered. And this was done to tax the people; to make them pay for the domination of Rome. 

 

Always keep in mind that the trip to Bethlehem was an act of violence that Mary and Joseph had to endure. And how did they pay for this trip: ie.. food, lodging and feed for the animal?

 

But the great mystery of the birth of the very Son of God in Bethlehem is that Mary brought forth the very Son of God, human and divine, in her body and in her faith.

 

This is how Mary sets the standard for each believer. It will be in our faith ,our trust in the power of God to work in our lives and in our bodies (i.e., our service to others) that we are to birth the Son of God in our lives. Christ is to come alive in us.

 

It will be in our prayer, or worship, our service and care for the world, that the birth of Christ happens in the here and now. Great things are meant to happen in and through you: Christ is to be born in your faith and in your body: Your life of service and compassion).

 

 

 

YOU WILL BEAT YOUR SWORDS INTO PLOW SHARES

The season of Advent may seem vague to many people. We stress that we are in waiting for the coming, the full coming, of Christ. This is a season of longing for a more intense sharing in the life and work of Christ: past, present and future glory.

 

Walk to the beginning of this Advent season and be grasped by the words of the prophet Isaiah, “They will beat their swords into plow shares.” What a vibrant image that people will come to the point in their lives where they will take their weapons of war, (i.e., swords made of steel) and beat them (i.e., change them) into a plow share that will be used to grow crops. We will move from fighting and killing one another and move to caring for one another as human beings by growing food.

 

Spend some time during this Advent thinking  ‘what are the implications of such a prayer’?

What demands does this part of the Word of God make on me? On our Church? On our world?

 

Right now the entire world society is experiencing three significant wars: the Ukriane, Gaza and the Sudan in Africa.  Many Canadians will say that we do not have boots on the groud, that is, we do not soldiers actively fighting in this war. But we are paying for this war with our tax payer monies. The war in the Ukraine is affecting us by our contributions of missals and equipment. These wars are not somewhere far away from us.

 

Christians are a people of peace. We work and try to build a world, a society, that is built on and energized by peace-building.

 

First, our prayer, our spiritual reflections are toward peace. How wonderful it is to have Christians pray for world peace, national peace and peace in our family each and every Sunday. We do not skit around the controversial positions of war-making. Our prayers are always in the nitty-gritty of peace-building.

 

In our country we try to build in values and procedures that leave no one out. It is essential to peace-building that we bring all the poor and the marginalized to share in the benefits of our society. We are working to bridge the gap between the one percent (the people are the very tope of the economic ladder) with the working poor. Peace-building is not some polite words in our church services, but very concrete actions, laws and structures of taxation to create a fair world for everyone. 

 

Peace building means that we are bringing respect and value to everyone that makes up our society. At the moment there are many new comers into our contry. Peace buiding means to see each person as an equal, a person of inestimable value.

 

When the ancient blacksmith would hammer the iron swords into a new instrument it took a lot of hard work. Our season of Advent presents that challenge. Work toward changing what is war-making into what is peace building. Grow grapes and wheat for your fellow human being!

 

 

 

 

OUDR GOD COMES IN POVERTY

The season of Advent calls us to stand back and reflect on what is happening.

It forces us to confront what God is actually like. It challenges many mistaken ideas that people have of God.

 

Overall, the entire focus on the coming of God among us, that is, God in the flesh, is a God who comes so ordinary. God comes and works among the poor; not the powerful and well educated of our society.

 

The big danger with the Christmas story is that we are so familiar with it we so often ,we miss the point of the Christmas story.

 

The first meaning of the story is how much our God wants to be with us. The entire story of the conception and birth of Jesus is that God wants to literally ‘ come and make his home with us.’ Bethlehem must not be some sweet historical place where the birth occurred. Each one of us, each Christian family, must now become the Bethlehem. Each family must be  the  location where Christ is born and takes root among humanity. Your family, your life must be the location for the birth of Christ.

 

We must discard any sweet, sentimental notion we  have of Mary.  In reality, she stands as one of the little ones of this world. She was a woman (without power), she was young and illiterate. Now God came to this powerless one and asked her to do the impossible. She was asked to become mother. And from her faith and from her body, she brought forth the very Son of God.

 

God comes among the ordinary, the poor and the marginalized of this world. God does not use the powerful, the well-healed and the talented to accomplish his work. He uses the very ordinary people.

 

Now, this Advent, get in touch with the poverty of God. No blasting fanfare. No powerful overkill by the rich of this world. No, just ordinary people, chosen and called by God.

 

Apply the Christmas story to your own life. Not many of you are rich, dominant and powerful. You are ordinary.

 

But pay attention to how God is using you. As he brought Mary into the great plan of salvation, so now you are being called to bring forth the goodness, the love and the mercy of God through your care and nourishment of the poor and the forgotten.

 

The man and woman who make sandwiches every day to sustain the homeless are using their very ordinary skills to share the love and the compassion of God. It is in their hands that the love of is made real.

 

During these four weeks of Advent, examine  in your own life where God is using you to bring forth the very love and compassion of God.