Sensing Christmas


For the first time in I can't remember how long I'm not running at break-neck speed towards Christmas. Monday was my only day in the office at the church this week. The bulletins for Christmas Eve and the Sunday after Christmas were mostly done before the 4th Sunday in Advent and needed only some final touches. No department nor grocery store will see me this week. All the packages are wrapped and tagged and waiting to take their place under the tree.

I will be making some more cookies however. We've managed to nibble our way through the cookies we made the week after Thanksgiving. There are no cookies left to give away...and I always give away some of our favorites that are only baked at this time of the year.

I'm aware of being able to 'sense' Christmas in a way that's impossible when holiday obligations have me in a strangle hold. There have been ordinary moments, doing just ordinary things that have seemed like a gift. This morning even the late arriving sunrise of daylight savings time is a gift as I sit at my computer looking out the french doors which face east. The sky is ocre, on its way to sherbert, after which I expect a Florida blue sky.

My sensing moves beyond that which I can see to the mysteries of what we celebrate. I accept with gratitude the stray thought that the God of the Universe chose to become human for a while; that He didn't drop in as a successful entrepeneur but as a helpless infant born to poor parents; that God chose to use a weak, obscure form to inhabit and from weakness and not strength to change the world.

For years (from my busy-ness) I pleaded with folks in my congregations to slow down and let themselves be apprehended by Christmas. I invited them to let Christmas speak to them without words which, I knew at least on an intellectual level, was possible. I suppose it was difficult for them to hear my call to stillness when I was moving so fast! LOL

And so this year, in God's goodness and generosity Christmas is coming to me as the gift that I have an inner memory of it being. My heart is receiving the lights and sounds and smells and quiet as divine acts breaking into my life inviting me to consider the Gift Giver.

So maybe this year, from the silence, I can invite you to sense the gifts God has placed all around in your life to draw your attention to Him. And together we'll be partakers of the mystery of God coming to lowly folks like us, in the form of a lowly child like Jesus. And together we'll be filled with good news of great joy.

Merry Christmas from THE CELTIC MONK

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