I’ve been thinking a lot about my family Christmas traditions in the past few months, especially since this is my first Christmas with no living grandparents. As we looked through pictures for my grandma’s funeral, we found so many pictures of all the Christmas memories. As we planned what we’re eating for Christmas Day tomorrow, I kept thinking about how my family grew up eating lefse that we had made together or gathered around a pot of Swedish meatballs that I still think we can’t quite find the family recipe for. One of the most memorable Christmases was the year we celebrated in the hospital because my grandpa fell off an icy ladder and broke his ankle after my grandma expressly told him that he better not dare try to go up on the roof that night. We made sure that no matter where we were or what we were doing, we were always surrounded with family on Christmas.
It has made the last few years more difficult as I’m no longer able to travel home for the holidays, and we have had to figure out our new traditions. We’re still in that transition period where we don’t quite have the traditions of old, but we are still figuring out what our traditions are for our family unit. That’s not to say that it’s a bad thing, but it has just been a different experience than I have ever had with Christmas before. Yet, I know it’s one that most people experience as we grow up and move away from home. I am grateful, though, that whatever else your holiday plans are, that you and your families are taking the time to come and spend an hour with us this evening. I know that people are big fans of saying, “keep the Christ in Christmas,” but I also feel like we cannot ignore the importance of those relationships with the people we care about. This time together with loved ones is an embodiment of Christ’s love in the world.
After all, our God is a relational God. If God wasn’t we wouldn’t have a need for God Incarnate to come and dwell among us. The promise of “God with us” would mean very little. It matters that Jesus comes into this world in the same way that every other human being has ever come into this world. The circumstances of his birth may be different, but God is able to relate to us differently because of the experience of Christ. Of being born as a baby, fully human and fully divine. Who needed to be tended to and taken care of by other humans who loved him. Who grew up in relationship with communities that surrounded him be they social, religious or cultural. In the incarnation, God is able to intimately understand the experience of humans in the world and meet us in our experience still.
God is inherently relational, and we are created for relationship with God, with our neighbors, and with all of creation that God so lovingly made. So, when we get to spend time with our friends and families, and cherish the memories that we are making. When we get to make those classic family recipes or try out new ones. When we get to keep the traditions of the past and add new ones as we grow, we are living into the embodiment of the season. I’m not going to stand up here and tell you that we can’t focus on presents too because I love presents as much as the next person, but I love them because so often they are chosen intentionally. You know the person and think about what they have said and done, what they might enjoy, and you give them something that shows that you see them for who they are. It can be so nice to receive those little things that remind us that we are loved. That is an embodiment of love.
I think about how much tenderness is shown in the care of baby Jesus in our story tonight. Here he is, born where animals sleep, as people made space for them to dwell, despite how many extra people would have been in town for this registration that Emperor Augustus declared. It wasn’t the fanciest of dwellings, but it made do. They still wrapped him in strips of cloth and laid him gently in the manger. They still probably whispered to him how loved he is and held him in their arms as Mary recalls the words that she said to Elizabeth, about all that this child will be for the world. It matters that we get this telling of Jesus’ birth because it changes the story if we just jump right to his ministry in his thirties. This is an embodiment of the love and care that God has for us.
Having a child changes family traditions too. Who knows if this is Mary’s first time being in Bethlehem, but either way she is surrounded by a family that isn’t hers by birth. And, now she has this new child to take care of, this new life to nurture. I can only imagine how Mary was feeling when all of this happened because this is probably not how she had expected her delivery to go. But, I think there is some hope for us in that too. That even when times of celebration, like tonight, are also a season of grief, anxiety, or fear, that God will be with us through all of it. That we can celebrate Christmas without having to cast aside everything else we are feeling too. That God is with us through the unexpected and sometimes rather unpleasant parts of life too. It’s a reminder that God doesn’t just dwell with us when things are going well, but in fact promises to be with us in the hardest, darkest moments. After all, Jesus was born to bring hope and peace to a people who were waiting for a promise that things would get better. This promise means less to us if we feel like everything is going amazingly all of the time. Christ’s birth is an embodiment of that promise.
Christmas continues to look different for me this year, and I’ll admit that I’ve shed many tears thinking back on all the past Christmases, grieving that the family traditions have changed because of both death and distance. Yet, I know that there is so much hope for the coming ones too because we will continue to surround ourselves with love and family, both chosen and biological, as we remember that this celebration tonight is an act of radical love and relationship. Of God drawing close to us and promising to stay close to us. The other traditions may change, in fact they will as time passes on, but this promise does not. So, no matter how you are feeling about Christmas this year, may you continue to hold onto that promise, and the promise that this tiny one, this baby Jesus, came into the world to remind us over and over again that we are Beloved. All of us and all of us. That this story and our own are embodiments of God’s radical love for the world.
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Sunday December 22nd, 2024 Worship