Third Day of Christmas

“On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me three French hens…”

Scriptures

Psalm 103; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13

For reflection

Two days past Christmas Day, the realization of this journey to Epiphany begins to set in.  It’s such a different rhythm than the usual post-holiday let down.  At the same time we are usually beginning to put away Christmas decorations, this way of living Christmastime keeps the gifts coming and the celebration building.  If you put everything into the Big Day, you may find yourself letting down emotionally or spiritually this week as you get back to routine matters or delve headlong into New Year revelry.  May this simple spiritual journey and the gifts you are receiving sustain and steady you.

Open today’s gifts: faith, hope, and love.  The Apostle Paul distills these three graces as the most essential of all Spirit-given gifts.  Strip away everything else that seems so necessary, all those “must-have” gifts, the ones so desirable to possess, the ones that make us feel good about ourselves and others feel good about us, the ones that make us feel needed or rewarded.  What’s at the heart of this Christian journey?  What is irreducible for life to the full?  Faith.  Hope.  Love.

If you observe Advent, you know that faith, hope, and love, together with joy, are at the center of the Christmas story: HOPE for a Messiah sustained longingly over many generations; the FAITH of Zechariah, of Mary and Joseph; the LOVE of God for the world expressed in Jesus; the response of JOY by all who drew near to see this thing that has come to pass.

In Advent, we learned about these gifts.  But now receive the faith of Zechariah, Mary, and Joseph.  Now receive hope for the in-between times--which is most of the time!  Now receive love enough to eclipse all hurts, forgive all sins, and forge the deepest commitments.

What would it mean for us to move from teaching our children or loved ones about faith to offering them the gift of faith?  How do we move from talking about hope to living and modeling hope?  Why not quit trying to teach love; let yourself be loved and express unequivocal and unqualified regard for others?

The reality of these core gifts is that we will never realize them unless we exercise them.  Faith is not faith until you’ve trusted.  Hope is not hope until I’ve lived from here to there in unflagging anticipation that what was promised shall be.  Love is not love until we’ve opened our heart to risk forgiving or extending ourselves when reciprocity is far from guaranteed.

And it isn’t until we dare to move these gifts from being nouns to verbs that we realize that faith itself is more grace than effort, that hope is more grace than will, that love is more grace than feeling.  In the decision to act in faith, we receive it afresh.  In the decision to hope instead of live down to lowered expectations, hope is born anew in us.  In the decision to love, the love of God is unleashed in us all over again.  No wonder these “French hens” are so valuable, so prized as gifts.

Journaling/prayer possibilities

Journal (write reflectively about) an occasion in which you chose to act in faith or hope or love rather than in predictability, calculated risk, or typical rationality.  Why did you choose faith, hope and/or love?  What did you learn in the process?  How can you relay this experience to your children, loved ones, or friends?  Give thanks for the gifts of faith, hope, and love, and for the experiences in which they are exercised.  Reflect on your present life choices and consider what it might mean to choose to exercise faith, hope, or love in them.

Song

Above What We Can Ask or Hope by Charles Wesley

Above what we can ask or hope,

   The God of grace delights to give,

To fill the empty vessels up;

   And when we grace for grace receive,

Enough in Christ remains behind

   To fill the souls of all mankind.

Long as our faith’s capacity

   Is stretched to admit the blessing given,

We drink the streaming Deity,

   And gasp for larger tastes of heaven!

But when we lose our emptiness,

   The oil, the joy, the Spirit stays!

Empty us then, most gracious Lord,

   And keep us always empty here,

Till Thee, according to Thy Word,

   We see upon the clouds appear,

Thy glorious fullness to reveal,

   And all Thy saints forever fill.

Benediction

“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.  Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever!  Amen.” (Ephesians 3:17b-21, NIV)

Graphic by Sara Tyson (www.saratyson.com)

Second Day of Christmas

“On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me two turtle doves.”

Scriptures

Psalm 119:33-40; Deuteronomy 6:4-9; Galatians 3:1-25; 4:4-7

For reflection

Today’s Christmas gifts -- the Old and New Testaments -- are foundational gifts.  Together, they weave the connected and continuing story of salvation history.  It begins with the people of Israel and continues in the Church of Jesus Christ.  The books of the Old and New Testament are authoritative in that Christians hold that no other documents or sources are needed to lead us to faith in God and life in fellowship with God and one another.

Christmas is the transition point from Old Testament to New Testament.  Ancient anticipations, expectations, and interpretations of the Law and prophecies of a Messiah (Christ) are fulfilled in the life of Jesus of Nazareth.  Many good people were so deeply entrenched in their traditions that they simply could not make Jesus fit into their worldview.  Many others -- hungry for grace, liberation, and restoration – in faith opened their hearts to Jesus, in whom they found the embodiment of God’s promises.

The Old Testament was the primary source for early followers of Jesus.  It was the Old Testament to which the Apostle Paul was referring when he said “all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16).  So, don’t leave the Old Testament out of your study.  Read it for all its worth, for all you can possibly learn and glean from it.  At the same time know that much of what the OT points to has been or is being fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

The word “testament” is pretty heavy.  It’s similar to “covenant.”  Testaments have binding promises and obligations--many assumed and unspoken--for the parties who enter into their terms.  So, when Jesus says to the disciples, as they share the Passover meal together, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood” (2 Corinthians 11:25), it must have been rather mind-boggling.  We are still exploring and living the full implications of this new covenant.  Reading and seeking to understand the the Old and New Testaments, we live, learn and appropriate the terms of this new covenant.

One of the things I find most helpful as I read both Old and New Testaments is to try to grasp and apply the appropriate genre--the literary form--of writing that is being used.  We read legal documents differently than we do songs.  We understand letters differently than we do histories.  We appreciate the difference between a matter-of-fact statement and hyperbole (intended exaggeration).  Noting this helps us interpret and apply the Bible more effectively in our lives and world.  The fact that we believe the books of the Bible are inspired and useful for “teaching, etc.” doesn’t mean we read flatly.  To take the Bible literally does not mean we take it literalistically.  The difference is profound.

The dramatic diversity of the writings in the Bible makes it difficult to find a common thread running throughout.  But both Old and New Testaments point rather commonly to a Kingdom of God -- people living in harmonious and abundant community through the gracious reign of God as Lord.  God’s reign is depicted in the Old and New Testaments as a kingdom of peace.  So it is fitting that today’s gifts are depicted as “turtle doves,” the dove being the ancient and contemporary symbol of peace, or shalom.  I like to think of the Old and New Testaments being at peace with each other.  The dove is also a symbol of the Holy Spirit, who brings the Word of God alive in our lives.  Embrace God’s gift peace expressed in the new covenant mediated and sustained by Jesus Christ, the partridge in a pear tree.

Journaling & prayer possibilities

Try to imagine yourself a Catholic parent in 16^th Century England and your expression of faith has been banned because of international politics.  What essential gifts of the Christian faith would you want to instill in your children, even at the risk of your life?  Make a short list of essential gifts are vital for faith for children and adults in contemporary America, gifts worth living or dying for?  What simple daily steps can you take to increase awareness of and love for the Word of God in your life and the lives of your loved ones?  For what in the Old and New Testaments may you offer thanks today?

Song

Come, Holy Ghost, Our Hearts Inspire by Charles Wesley

Come Holy Ghost, our hearts inspire;

Let us Thine influence prove;

Source of the old prophetic fire,

Fountain of light and love.

Come, Holy Ghost, for moved by Thee

The prophets wrote and spoke.

Unlock the truth, Thyself the key;

Unseal the sacred Book.

Expand Thy wings, celestial Dove;

Brood o’er our nature’s night.

On our disordered spirits move,

And let there now be light.

God, through Himself, we then shall know

If Thou within us shine;

And sound, with all Thy saints below,

The depths of love divine.

Benediction

“May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever.  Amen.” (Hebrews 13:20-21)

FIRST DAY OF CHRISTMAS

Scriptures 

Luke 2:1-20; John 1:9-14
 

For reflection

This is the official day for gift giving and receiving.  After anticipation of Advent and “I can hardly wait” eagerness of children (and some of us adults, too), Christmas arrives.  What gift will you – or did you – open first?  What are your feelings after the last gift has been opened?

Of all the gifts our loved ones give us, there is a gift that is before and after them.  It is the occasion of every other gift.  It is a gift that is the more-than-gifts-can-express, heart-felt intent behind every gift.  Our “true love,” who is none other than God, gives us the Gift – Jesus Christ.
 

The Incarnation – the “Word made flesh” – is at once strange mystery and compelling attraction.  If we step back a bit from our cultural conditioning, foregone conclusions and all-but-imperceptible worldview, Incarnation is a strange mystery.  As the 4 Him song below muses: This is such a strange way to save the world.  Poets have tried to put the Word-made-flesh into words: What child is this who, laid to rest on Mary’s lap, is sleeping?  And: I wonder as I wander out under the sky how Jesus the Savior did come for to die for poor ornery sinners like you and like I?

Do you ever wonder about such things?  It is so beyond us that we can’t rationally fathom it.  We will be exploring it for a lifetime; we get to live these questions, to enter into the mystery.  But for now, for this day, at least, can we accept the Good News told by angels? Can we just revel in it, wonder, ponder?

If it is strange mystery, the Incarnation is also a compelling attraction.  Those who get the chance to hear the story – stark as angels appearing in the sky to shepherds – are drawn to the child in the manger.  Hearing, we, too, can decide to hasten near to the manger…to adore.  Adore.  Half giddy cooing like a grandparent over an infant; half prostrate-falling worship in the presence of sheer Power, sheer Love.

Today’s gift is a “partridge in a pear tree.”  The image is of a mother partridge feigning death in the presence of an intruder in order to draw attention away from her vulnerable chicks.  The Gift in the manger would one day lay down his life for poor ornery people like you and like I.  That, too, is part of the strange mystery and the compelling attraction.

This is a busy day.  I hope it's not too busy to take a few moments to step outside, away from the wonderful noises and traditions.  Break away briefly.  Wander out under the sky.  Quiet yourself.  Wonder about the Incarnation.  You don’t have to have answers for all the questions.  Asking about them is itself entering into the mystery.  And, before you head back in, find a way to offer simple thanks for it, for the Gift.

Song 

“A Strange Way to Save the World” by 4 Him
 

I’m sure he must have been surprised

At where this road had taken him,

But never in a million lives

Would he have dreamed of Bethlehem.

And standing at the manger

He saw with his own eyes

The message from the angel come alive.

 

Refrain

And Joseph said

“Why me? I’m just a simple man of trade.

Why him? Of all the rulers in the world.

Why here? Beside this stable filled with hay.

Why her? She’s just an ordinary girl.

Now, I’m not one to second-guess

What angels have to say,

But this is such a strange way

To save the world.”

To think of how it could have been

If Jesus had come as he deserved,

There would’ve been no Bethlehem

No lowly shepherds at his birth.

But Joseph knew the reason

Love had to reach so far

And as he held the Savior in his arms

 

Refrain

Journaling/prayer possibilities

What does it mean to me to “adore Him?”  What issues tend to hinder my freedom to “adore Him?”  Busyness?  Guilt?  Shame?  Feelings of distance or ambivalence?  Cynicism?  Name your hindrances.  Then prayerfully let go of this baggage for today.  Express adoration, or whatever is in your heart as you let your pen wander over the wonder of the Gift.

Carol 

“O Come, All Ye Faithful”

Benediction 

“O God, my Father, I thank You that when all other ways were inadequate You opened the way to us.  When we couldn’t come to You, You came to us, came to us in lowly form, human form.  And now we can come to You through the Way.  Amen.”  (E. Stanley Jones in The Word Became Flesh)