My friend Rob Fairbanks recently posted this Christmas prayer on his blog that I thought would be good to share as Christmas eve approaches tomorrow.
Sometimes we find your love in the warmth of relationship. In the embrace of a friend or in the believing words of a parent or in the intimacy of a life companion. Sometimes that love even comes as mystifying forgiveness from someone we have injured.
We find your love in the traditions of the Incarnation…family gatherings, the trees, the gifting, and the warm drinks…the Jesus story.
Sometimes we find your love in the words and the accounts of your people. We hear of the heroes and the heroines both current and past who give without restraint, who provide for the stranger and the other…who even die for the Gospel story.
And finally we find your love in the sacrifice. We find you as the defeated and triumphant one who was marred for us to live. You gave that we might be whole. You sacrificed so we could be touched and healed of our self-life. You died in innocence so we might be seen as innocent.
We find your love in the warmth, the traditions and in the one holy sacrifice.
We will continue to be aware and full of Your love that cannot be measured or controlled. We continue as ones who hope to look and act like the grand lover, Jesus
I hope this week finds you well! The Anchor is not going to be meeting for the next few weeks, but I will try to get on here and post some thoughts and reflections in the meantime.
With Christmas Eve tomorrow night, I start to think of the story of Christ’s birth in the manger. And that inevitably brings Silent Night to mind as the standard Christmas song celebrating Christ’s birth.
This isn’t necessarily a good thing though. When I reflect on what that night must have been like, silent is far from what comes to mind. I imagine that being in a stable was stinky, and a little gritty. Not to mention the shepherds who show up are not exactly the cleanest or most socially normal people around. Spending all that time with sheep out in the middle of nowhere tended to make a person interesting.
Yet I have the feeling that God would have it no other way. Where if I was God, I would choose a silent night, for the incarnation, and definitely not a stable. Maybe some fireworks instead of a star, just to name a few.
But the dirty, gritty stable with the rough and tumble shepherds is exactly where God shows up, and I think there is much for us to learn. If God is willing to enter our story in such a setting, it speaks volumes of who He is. This same God, our Lord Jesus would use this same humility to humble himself to death, even death on a cross - the lowest death possible, the death suffered for rebellion.
This all reminds me of the words that the ancient church planter Paul wrote so long ago when he said:
In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a human being,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
What a contrast, that this God, who is everything, would enter our story in one of the lowliest ways possible. But praise God that that is who He is. The God who chooses to stoop to being nothing because of how much He loves us and wants us to be in relationship with Him. This is the God who would do anything to keep us from condemnation.
I hope that as you celebrate this Holy Day, that you would reflect on what this incarnation was really like, and how much it conveys of God’s love for you, for me, for us as humanity, for His whole creation.
“How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytise?”
Check out this video:
Hearing Penn talk about Evangelism, or as he refers to it proselytism gives a very needed challenge to our belief structures as Christians. How many times do we avoid speaking with others about the Gospel for the very reason that Penn mentioned: wanting to avoid social awkwardness?
It reminds me of a conversation from this Spring where I was talking with a friend about helping people see evangelism by word and not just deed as a function of love. Many folks from this friend’s church had decided they wanted to be loving and respectful, so they were just going to do evangelism by deed and never really say anything.
The conclusion this friend and I came to was that we have to help people see that never talking about the Gospel is not loving. It is the very opposite of loving, for to not tell someone of Jesus and to leave them where they are is the opposite of loving. It is like Penn says: ”How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytise?”
Naturally, when confronted with this idea, our inclination is to point towards people like Bull Horn Guy™, the guy on the street yelling at everyone about how they are going to hell. Very quickly you say I don’t want to become Bull Horn Guy™ because I certainly don’t think he is loving either.
And you are right to object so.
You’ll remember that in the video, Penn mentioned that the man who gave him the Bible was a good guy and seemed to genuinely care. He wasn’t being yelled at with a bull horn or just being given a track to check off his religious duty for the day. He remarked on how he actually admired the man, and how because of that admiration he wanted to share his faith.
This is not to say that we won’t continue to be ignored or ridiculed by some, because we will. But at the end of the day what God calls us to is a life of love that continues to seek the good of those who have rejected the message.
This is a challenging idea for me. It is much easier to just say “I’m going to be nice to that person, and that’s all I need to do to evangelize.” But at the end of the day, I have to be willing to state what I really believe, even though it could be socially awkward. Because to not do so would not be loving. To purposefully not tell people the truth is the opposite, it is a function of hate.
“How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytise?”
Jerry Sittser, one of my professors from my time at Whitworth, has written a great book on Christian spirituality: Water From a Deep Well. This book has been a very good read for me that has cause many moments of good reflection on spirituality.
I just finished reading the chapter on the Word, and am dwelling on an interesting tidbit brought up at the end of the chapter. That is, do we approach the Word to listen, or to read? Sittser states:
We must learn to listen to the Word, for “faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the Word of Christ” (Rom. 10:17). Listening is different from reading. Listening uses the ears, reading the eyes; listening is a communal exercise, reading a solitary one. …
We need to recover the art of listening to the Word of God, allowing that Word to address us as if God were the speaker, we the hearers. When we read, we maintain control; when we listen, the Word has control.
I believe that this is a crucial paradigm for us to process as Christians: to learn to listen to the Bible, rather than just read it. Too many times, I prefer to read the Word, to try to force it to fit into my categories, rather than to find myself listening: in one way finding myself immersed in the story. Listening allows us to enter into the story, to take place in it in a way strict reading will not. Critical reading can help us to dissect a passage, to grasp the intracacies of the construction, but it is listening that allows us to hear God. Listening reminds us that it is the one telling the story who has the floor, and that we are invited into the wonderment of that story.
It is this idea of listening to the Word that has made Lectio Divina such an important thing to me: to actively listen to how God is speaking. It is very crucial that we maintain the other approaches to Bible study, but when was the last time you just listened to God’s Word?
Not to dissect it, or try to draw out some promises, or a principle, or a magic formula, but just to listen.
Is it important to you to listen to the Story?
How have you accomplished this way of being able to listen?
My friend Amon recently wrote a story about growing up in Rwanda to introduce a ministry he has started. I am going to post his story, and ask you that if you are interested in pursuing this Advent Conspiracy paradigm of giving to others instead of just spending on ourselves, to consider giving through Africa Mission Alliance.
The meat was gone. Celestin was not willing to serve borrowers. We were doomed. Another painful Christmas. But, oh well, this was just another of those many Christmases. We we were getting used to them, or so we thought.
As soon as I arrived home from the butcher’s shop I started crying. Papa had talked to
Celestin the night before. He had explained to him how he (Papa) had not been paid by the tea factory for almost three months. He wanted to borrow some meat for his children for Christmas. It was well known in the village that every butcher had some meat left at the end of the day. But not this Christmas of 1987. I was 12. I arrived at Celestin’s butchery at around 6:00AM. I was the first customer to arrive. I waited. I watched Celestin and his friend Paul grab the bull by the horns, lay it on the ground, and skin its thick brown coat off. It was Christmas in the making. I couldn’t wait. Paul grabbed the thigh by its bone and ran a three-cord string through it. He mounted it on a tall eucalyptus tree and started chopping at it. By that time many children had arrived. Some with their parents, others with their big brothers or sisters. I started wondering how many of them had money and how many were here to borrow a kilo or two. Paul started chopping off pieces of the Christmas delight and laying them on a brown, and slightly rusted, weighing scale the size of an old record player. One kilo, two kilos, one after the other. He chopped the thigh to the bone and was ready for the next one. Mrs. Celestin was seated quietly on her three-legged stool pocketing old and new shilling notes from the shoppers. If the whole thing could be sold in one day, Mr. and Mrs. Celestin would walk away with more than fifty thousand shillings. That was a lot of money back in 1987’s uganda.
The third piece of Christmas was gone and customers were still arriving- with lots of cash, mostly old notes stacked away for 12 months in preparation for Christmas. Others were waving new notes from the bank. These were mostly teachers and other civil servants. I waited. The sun began to turn yellow. The clouds gathered. Paul chopped. Paul chopped away the last piece of Christmas. Mrs. Celestin pocketed the notes. The meat was gone. Nothing left for the borrower.
I looked around to make sure I was not missing anything. Tears started to form in my eyes. A big and dark lamp of sadness grabbed my throat. This was one of those Christmases where the poor had no chance to celebrate.
I slowly eased out of the happy crowd and headed home. My mother saw me first and knew something was wrong. “What’s up muneza?”, she inquired. “You don’t look happy”. And how could I. The greatest day in the year 1987 was slipping away. And the greatest gift was gone. Gone to those who had the money to spend.
Last year when I was buying some meat at QFC in Portland, Oregon I received a sad flashback of the events of 1987 and the years following that. There are so many children in Africa today still reliving my pain. And that’s why I created Christmas in Africa. Last year I raised $15,000 with the help of Africa Mission Alliance. We purchased hundreds of gifts for children who, like me, were planning to swallow their sorrow and let another merry Christmas slip by. But not this time. Will you join me this Christmas to put a smile on a child’s face? Go to Africa Mission Alliance and join me to make this Christmas memorable for a poor child in Africa.
This Sunday, Richard shared with us from Matthew 3:1-17. This passage centers on John the Baptist, who Matthew depicts as a herald, preparing the way and announcing the coming of a King. Central to John’s message was the message of repentance. Specifically, Matthew notes this message that John had been saying:
You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
In this statement, John was speaking to religious leaders who had come out to be baptized. John focused in on what repentance really is, which is a change in action. Richard shared with us that this message is further clarified in Luke 3:
What should we do then?” the crowd asked.
John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.”
Even tax collectors came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”
“Don’t collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.
Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”
He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”
Our primary discussion this week centered around thinking through what this kind of repentance looks like for us. How do you see this view of repentance bearing out in your life? What does it mean for you to see repentance as having an effect on how we interact with others, and even in how we do our jobs?
bryan on December 24th, 2008
