X-MAS

My friend and I were musing over the variety of Christmas advent devotionals available as we struggled to find one that would meet us where we are at. He challenged me to pen one for next year. I jokingly replied with a draft first entry as follows:

“Day 1: all my faithful friends have their nativity up and lament at how Christ has been removed from Christmas and X marks the spot where this travesty took place. As I challenge them on this idea that everything hinges on the presence or absence of one word, they look at me like the evangelical liability they believe me to be. But still I am reminded in my heart that many will proclaim his name but Jesus might not recognise us all. Contrary to my community of faith, Xmas doesn’t bother me so much. When I read the gospels, I see Jesus was actually not that phased by the notoriety that followed him; in fact he constantly tried to outrun or outwit the attention. He wasn't looking for followers of Jesus so much as followers of Jesus WAY. So let us not lament the Xtraction of Jesus from popular Christmas culture, let us lament the extraction of lavish love, reckless inclusion and steadfast reclamation of every created beings humanity from modern Christian cultures celebration of the WAY before we sanctimoniously celebrate the birth of The Way-Reminder. Because people celebrating Xmas are often saying to all in need around them "shit yeh mate, of course I can help you" or "bloody hell, you are getting away from that man. You and the kids can come stay with me. Here have a fag to calm your nerves, I'm driving you to ED". They loan each other cash at Xmas and have no nativity on their mantle....but Jesus is on the mantle of their hearts. How do I know? Because they will be known by their love.”

I don’t know for sure, none of us can, and I have found it a counterproductive exercise to waste time dividing the world up into believers and nonbelievers, saved and unsaved. What I have found to be more fruitful is, just that, going through life stopping to delight in and appreciate the beauty of good fruit wherever I might find it - peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, temperance; as I attempt to authentically bear the fruit of faith. In recent years I have found this leaves enough room for God to challenge me on the constraints I have placed on divinity. 

Is not this the Christmas nativity story one of God constantly challenging our preconceived ideas through Jesus? They were waiting on a Messiah, a King to reclaim kingdom - and instead they found a child of peasants born amongst an animal kingdom not a royal kingdom! And whether you believe in the miracle of virgin birth or the historical socio-cultural linguistic construct of a virgin birth, convincing anyone, now or then, of this miracle was surely a hard sell with minimal buyers.

As far as the community of ancient near eastern times was concerned Jesus was born out of wedlock, out of dignity and out of any respect. And “king” Jesus didn’t become a doctor or a lawyer, not even a man of the cloth. He was a carpenter; his friends were fishermen. He often disparaged and undermined his temple contemporaries. He spent quality time with the least salubrious people of his day; the most controversial - those that were outcast from the religious community; those that were foreign to the ethnic community; those that were powerless to the political community (women and people with disabilities). Were it not for the fact that I think God did want this updated reminder message of lavish love documented, I am convinced this challenging of expectations would have gone so far as the baby king being born a queen! But nobody would have followed the life of a women let alone written the memoir - just look at who’s books were canonised in the New Testament and who did the canonising!

My point is, Jesus didn’t meet the brief of conquering kingship and in the final blow of smashing the Jewish community’s preconceived ideas and expectations to oblivion, this so-called king goes and gets himself killed; the long-awaited conqueror gets conquered. 

Sometimes, we categorise people out of Gods kingdom because they don’t meet the brief, they don’t fit our preconceived ideas and expectations. So, this Christmas, when I put my nativity in pride of place to celebrate “the King has Come”, I am reminded that a King didn’t come, at least not in the eyes of all those waiting on one. The nativity was the ultimate Kris Kringle (maybe the first!), where we quite simply don’t know what to expect and should always be prepared for a surprise, but it will be a gift.

When I place Jesus in the manger on the mantle, with Xmas songs playing in the background, my heart sings- “God with Us”.