Maybe can be a powerful word.It's a word of opening... of possibility. It can lift us from a place of cynicism or calm our unrealistic expectations of what a day can do in our lives. Christmas isn't a day or even a season, it's a radical event that changes everything. From that change we are invited to make our own transformations: in how we act, in how we love, in how we hope. Ron Sexsmith puts it this way:
Maybe this Christmas will mean something more Maybe this year Love will appear Deeper than ever before And maybe forgiveness will ask us to call Someone we've loved
Someone we've lost
For reasons we can't quite recall
Maybe this Chistmas
Maybe there'll be an open door
Maybe the star that's shown before
Will shine once more
And maybe this Christmas will find us at last
In heavenly peace
Grateful, at least,
For the love we've been shown in the past
Maybe this Christmas
Maybe this Christmas
May you trust what may be this Christmas season, allowing Christmas to mean something more than just a day that's already come and gone -- to open yourself again to the opportunity for new birth our God, Emmanuel, offers in his own.
If there had been a nightly news circuit in the time of Jesus' birth - an online newsfeed for the Holy Land - I wonder if Mary and Joseph would have been reading and shaking their heads in as much dismay as we do now: 'Can you believe it? This is not a good time to raise a child! It's like our culture thrives on divisiveness, argument, and scapegoating. How can a child grow up anything other than weary and jaded in a time like ours?' And yet Jesus came, and was born into a world of divisiveness and social strife. He was born into an occupied land under an oppressive regime dealing with many radical discontents - a time and culture vastly different, and yet strangely similar to our own. One of the common ways U.S. society, at least, enjoys creating divisiveness and strife is around the "science versus faith debate." Yet most major faiths agree with the fundamental concept behind one of the most revolutionary science theories of the 20th Century: Einstein's Theory of Relativity. For the non-science savvy person like myself it boils down to understanding that all energy and matter are interrelated. Everything - everything - is intertwined. We are not only inseparable from each other and our surroundings, but from even the farthest star in the cosmos.
We're All in this Together perf. Ben Lee. Lyrics HERE.
The fact that we're all in this together is not a new concept, but it's a Eureka moment when we realize that it's more than just a nice idea. It's the bedrock of our survival and thriving, and frankly, it's just scientific fact according to quantum physics. Jesus tried to get the message of our fundamental unity across his whole life, saying, "whosoever does this to the least of these does it to me," and "do unto others as you would have them do unto you," and really tried to drive it home in John 16:
"This is my command, love each other." - John 16: 17
It can't get much clearer than this, but somehow we forget to not only love one another, but even to really notice one another.We are all in this together, not because we have the same troubles, but because we acknowledge that we share in a common struggle through our days. We are imperfect, broken, frequently cynical or downtrodden. We are also strong beyond measure when we come together. We Resist the Sleep when we refuse to believe the lie that we are isolated, freakish, or worthless. We Seed the Hope when we joyfully proclaim to one another that, "You're made of atoms, I've made of atoms... and we're all in this together!" Loneliness and a sense of isolation are a part of the human experience, and Jesus never promised that he would cure these feelings, or that being God-with-Us would resolve all suffering and loss in the here and now. What he did promise was, "Lo, I am with you until the end of the age." In other words, 'we're all in this together.'Together -- even with God-in-Christ, who does not separate from creation but draws closer, now and always.
Where do you need to feel "in this together" with others during this Advent season?
May your journey be marked by strangers and friends who come up alongside you in the twilight, listening to your need, being supported by your presence in turn, each and all sharing pilgrimage into the dawning day.
- Anna
**This week, we'll take YOUR suggestions for what songs help you Seed the Hope or Resist the Sleep. Post a YouTube link with your thoughts and we'll re-post them all on our Saturday post.**
One of the more popular of recent years' holiday films has been Love Actually, with its celebrations and reflections on the bitter and the sweet of earthly love in all its forms: family, romantic, friendship and more. The general message, neatly packaged, is this: earthly love is messy, beautiful, complicated, painful, risky, self-contradicting- deeply imperfect, but somehow, sometimes, worth it.
Today's song takes the same idea, but to a much darker place. As this song points out, the melody we're singing might be 'love, love, love,' but some terrible, brutal things are done in the twisted forms of love we foster in our lives, and the echoing of those actions can haunt us.
This could just be some morose anti-Christmas cheer reflection on human fallenness and depravity, but I hear something else: I hear God's pity and God's grace, too. I hear Jesus coming as an infant, acting and speaking as a man about 'love, love, love' (echoing Dave Matthews 'love is all around' refrain from our Christmas Eve post) and having all of us so woefully, tragically, and almost willfully misunderstand him for two thousand years -- and yet and still offering us a love which is so wildly boundless, so graciously vulnerable, so passionately freedom-seeking that we can barely turn toward and believe it.
I received an emailed image tonight that sums up pretty well where I think we as Christians have twisted and mangled the idea of love, and especially Christ's love, back in on itself in so many ways (HERE). How can we hear this song as not only as a call to own our own broken witness to Jesus' love, but as an invitation to remember the Source of that love and the ways in which, as the song reminds us, 'now we see this / as in a mirror dimly, / then we shall see each other / face to face' ?
Love, Love, Love by The Mountain Goats (lyrics HERE)
The line about seeing 'in a mirror dimly' is borrowed from 1 Corinthians 13, slightly after the famous passage on love popular at marriages, which, if we read carefully, is less about romantic love and more about the kind of love which Jesus modeled in his relations with us: the love of enemy and outcast, neighbor and friend, sinner and saint alike.
If I speak in the tongues of humans or angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never ends.
- 1 Corinthians 13: 1-8a
May we continue to hear God's 'Christmas' song of 'love, love, love' in ways that bring life and wholeness, but also remember God's pity and grace for where we have erred.
Hello Mr. Montgomery, good to see you out on the street.
Been so long since we touched the ground
of this restless little town.
Good people, gather round, on Christmas Day.
There must be smoke coming out of every chimney,
the kindest words rolling off of every tongue,
And of all the gifts that you could give me, your love is still the greatest one.
- Pete Droge, On Christmas Day
The weather has been unseasonably warm in Southeast Michigan this month. The prediction is that it will not snow before the end of the week here, and while I am mourning my white Christmas a bit, I have appreciated the increased number of people who seem to be out and about enjoying this weather. There is something I just love about leaving my office and greeting the neighbors as they sit on their porch in the late afternoon, or going to a holiday street festival downtown and running into friends, or even being able to take a walk on a Saturday morning and stop to pet the Johnsons’ dog as I pass their house. This proximity and connection to others is usually more difficult in the cold weather months here and I am grateful for the reprieve, however long it lasts.
These chance meetings and times of visiting, are what I pop into my head when I listen to today's song. Though the song embodies a kind of nostalgic, small town culture that isn't really part of my Christmas past, I do connect with the themes of gathering together, prioritizing relationships and recognizing the blessedness of knowing and being known to those around you. I hear Pete Drodge singing into his time and culture, the tidings of comfort and joy from our carols and hymns of old.
On Christmas Day
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This past Sunday, my pastor preached about God’s love for people throughout time. He referenced the many stories of our ancestors in faith that tell of God being with the people: Abraham, Moses and the Israelites leaving Egypt, wandering in the desert, the judges, kings and prophets. For all time people of faith have believed that God is with us, but the Christmas story brings us a new idea about God. This time God isn’t just with the people, God becomes one of the people, inhabiting a body; the Eternal Creator wrapped up in flesh, in struggle, in joy, in the experience that is human life. There was a shift, pastor said, from God from being with us to God being within us.
The last statment has occupied much of my own reflection these past days. I am compelled by this belief, the incarnation, not just God’s coming to earth as a baby human, but the added wonder that God is embodied in us, in our living and loving and connection to one another. This season offers a sacred call to us, to celebrate the coming of God to dwell with us, walking among us so many years ago; but it also calls us to celebrate a God that comes to dwell with in us each day. There is a way in which even our modern culture around Christmas keeps traces of this wisdom for us, as we sing good tidings, give charitably, send greeting cards and reconnect with family and friends.But beyond that, a wonderful part of our Advent preparation is dwelling in our relationships and our connection to others; looking into the kind words, wishes for peace, and time spent together, and seeing the invitation, love and presence of our God Incarnate.
Holy One, dwell within us, as we dwell with each other, looking toward the celebration, peace and joy that you are bringing to the world.
We've been reckless, we've been good, doin' most of the things we should -- but the picture is much bigger than we knew... - Over the Rhine
Here's what I like about Advent: it puts things in perspective. At all times of the year people get sick, have surgeries, fight with family or spouses, break up with girl or boyfriends, lose jobs, get great news, give birth, feel lonely or frustrated or lost... but it all seems to matter more with the backdrop of Advent and Christmas. Things take on a weight and a poignancy that rarely gets equaled elsewhere in the year.
In this final week of Advent, the Advent Music Project is considering, How do we dwell into this Christmas-tide? My first instinctive response: We dwell into Christmas by dwelling into everything else - especially the difficult stuff -, too.
In our church communities we often have this urge to leave the unruly, disquieting issues of world affairs, broken relationships, and scattered hopes back at the beginning of Advent when in fact, that is exactly what we should bring right into the center of the quiet manger scene. As somebody was observing the other day, that "peaceful" manger-scene we carry in our collective imagination is really a moment of quiet in what's truly been a chaotic, stressful story involving an unexpected pregnancy, discernment in a marriage, travel, overbooked lodgings, and then... labor.
We usually politely ignore this last part of the story, maybe because it's disconcerting to think of Mary not looking perpetually calm and beatific, but I'm pretty sure that was not the expression she wore when Jesus was, you know... "about to emerge." I actually find this rather helpful, since I can get panic and confusion, dismay and even a little fear (let's remember Mary was likely between 13 and 15 years old, after all) ... it's the peacefulness that I sometimes have a hard time embodying.
Last December I worked every single day between Thanksgiving and Christmas managing a book store. There was no "Advent," there was CHRISTMAS... yelled in my ear for almost a month. So I can tell you, my physical and emotional fatigue walking into a late-night Christmas Eve service (the first time I'd been to church that season) was extreme. I had literally been forcing myself to not think about how miserable this month was making me, and suddenly I was in a dark room with people who wanted to sing and think about Jesus... and proceeded to surprise myself by crying during the whole service.
Maybe this sounds crazy to you. Maybe you've yet to experience a really terrible Christmas season, and God bless you if so. Or maybe you know exactly what I'm talking about, only much worse. I've talked to people who were sitting in inpatient behavioral health units during Christmas, people who were undergoing surprise chemotherapy at Christmas. It happens. All. The. Time.
What I love about We're Gonna' Pull Through is that because the issue they need to "pull through" never gets identified, it can become all of our issues. I love that there's some humor in here, there's some solidarity, there's some small admission of hope:
maybe, sorta', kinda'
if I really had to say,
something good is on its way...
We're Gonna Pull Through - Over the Rhine (lyrics HERE)
This is the permission we need: to dwell into the difficult places we can't just leave behind in Advent, we can't just stop feeling and we can't just fix. Life isn't that simple, and the picture is always 'bigger than we knew.'Instead, what we can do is give ourselves some space to deal with what we're ignoring without trying to solve it, and then... lay it in the stable door.
In the end, this is where the fabled peace of that manger-scene comes from: from a mother who lays aside her pain and her fear for the future to look into the eyes of new and marvelous life. From a father who lets down his guard and dwells into the moment with them. From a child who carries all the hopes of a thousand generations as if it were weightless because it is carried in love. This is where we lay down our hearts and realize that it is this releasing, even for a moment, that allows us to make it through. This simple act gives us the grace of perspective - a reminder that these things do matter, and that there's hope for it all.
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.
- John 14: 27
May we remember that the manger scene isn't a place to keep out our real lives, but a place to fearlessly invite the mess of the world that we may receive healing, peace, and grace from the God of Love.
Names are important to me. I am named after two of my great-grandmothers, one from Syria, one from Mexico. One a proud Orthodox Catholic, the other a proud Presbyterian. One who braved emigration and raised her family in New York, the other who raised a family on a farm in northern Mexico. Both strong. Both women of faith.
These two names from my great-grandmothers make up what is traditionally called my "Christian" name, but there's another part to what I consider my true Christian name. At my home church, when a baby, child, or adult gets baptized, they say, for instance, "Anna Marina, child of the covenant, I baptize you..."
This is my second name. I am a Child of the Covenant which stretches from a man asked to count the stars in Genesis, has a twist in the middle, and picks up in my tradition with Jesus of Nazareth. I am a Child of the Covenant since before I knew what it was, before I claimed it back, before I did anything to deserve it.
Why is this important? Because generally I don't do anything to deserve it. Because mostly I spend my days screwing things up, getting things wrong, and making a mess. This is no self-loathing; I'm just a human, and that's what we do: we make a spectacular mess of things. Life is hard on us, we're hard on ourselves, and at the end of the day sometimes all we can say is: wow, that's not what I wanted to do at all.
Born into a Light - Ryan Adams and the Cardinals ( approx. lyrics HERE)
What I try to remember during Advent is that I've been caught up in a story that began before I was born, and which will carry on after me. That my mistakes matter, but they're not the end of the world. That my "worthiness" has nothing to do with my belovedness. That I was born into a Light, and am therefore both known for all my shortcomings and also surrounded by the glow of grace. That my name is 'Anna Marina, Child of the Covenant,' and that is a name and a bond that will not let me go, no matter what.
It's a rich, amazing inheritance, but it's also one that I sometimes hide from because it's a little embarrassing. Jesus? Well, yes, but...
So I also challenge myself: if I've been given this gift of a name and an inheritance of grace, how can I take courage and claim that tradition back? To be bold and say again, "Yes, I believe in all the slightly strange but wonder-inspiring stories in this ancient book. Yes, I believe that God's Spirit is at work here, in this Bible, in this broken Church, in my patched-together, imperfect life. Yes, I believe that this little baby who grew into a flinty, challenging, grace-filled man was God. Yes, I claim this wonderful, foolish, backward truth, because it claimed me, and because it names me."
May we remember our claiming, our naming, in our Advent walk and gather our spirits and voices to claim the story and the name of Christ in return.
"Christmas Blues, don't know what to do, I'm all alone, no one t'tell my troubles to It's just another lonely Christmas, without you. Christmas... I'm feelin' down, Looking through my window, for you to come around-- but the only thing I see is the snow that's fallin' down..."
- G. Love "Christmas Blues"
For those of us who are deeply committed to social justice, we sometimes run the risk of ignoring the holy everydayness of ours and others' lives. Let's not get so lofty in our talk of religious and existential longings for justice and God's peace during Advent that we forget all the "ordinary" stuff for which we also long and wait. Health, jobs, centeredness, patience, relationships, wholeness... relationships. I say it twice because after all, for most people in the U.S. who were raised secular or casually Christian, Christmas is primarily about enjoying holiday cheer via parties, feasting, special events and present-giving. In other words: fellowship.
Even when our family, friends and loved ones drive us crazy, they leave their mark on our holidays. Even when we have had to walk away from family brokenness, create our home-places elsewhere, or reclaim our solitude as a sign of strength, we still operate on the power of our human connections. We are social creatures, and festival and holidays are things that, hopefully... sometimes... on a good day when the wind is fair... bring us together.
And while I may roll my eyes a lot of romanticized holiday pop songs for being silly or just plain creepy (can anyone say 'date rape'? I'm looking at you, "Baby, It's Cold Outside"...) it makes a lot of sense that we should name the desire for companionship, love and closeness with family and friends during a season where it's mostly just cold and dark.I'll Be Home for Christmas, isn't just saccharine sentiment. Most of us would rather not be nursing broken relationships, or be alone or lonely during the holidays, and I like songs that take that a little seriously, and a little tongue-in-cheek:
"Christmas Blues" by G. Love and Special Sauce
"yes there are times in life when we all need a second chance yes there are times in life when we just can't stand to stand alone, -- in a empty home -- So Happy Christmas, wherever you might be... and on this Christmas time, I hope that you're thinkin' 'bout me -- Happy Christmas, Baby..."
So let's not be afraid to name the common, mundane, everyday things we hope and long for during these days of Advent as well. Certainly, we keep them in perspective with the most dire and pervasive issues in our world, but they are needs as real as anything else, and have their place in the order of things.
May we be gentle with ourselves in our daily brokenness and everyday dreams, and yet and still dare to draw close to friends and family this Advent: for companionship and love, for fellowship and grace, to share in the festive birth of Christ together.
