The Second Day of Christmas
26/12/15 05:28
I have little energy for arguments over the existence of God. I’m sure that they engender the passion of others, but they seem to me to be quite silly. When I have paid attention to such arguments, I have discovered that the “god” in which people do not believe bears little resemblance to the God I experience in my life. Those who argue that there is no god, seem to be obsessed with God as a supernatural being to which none of the observable laws of nature apply.
Our story, however, is all about incarnation - God coming to us in the midst of the world, in the ways of the world, in the realities of everyday human existence. We have no problems with believing in miracles, but it doesn’t take miracles for us to see God in the ordinary and every day.
The four Gospels are quite different in their narratives of Christmas. Mark doesn’t bother with a birth narrative of Jesus at all. In a headlong rush to tell the story of the crucifixion and the revelation of Jesus nature in the events of his human death, Mark doesn’t take time to tell the stories of Jesus’ birth, but rather begins with a very brief description of John the baptizer and the story of Jesus’ baptism. Matthew focuses on Jesus’ earthly father, Joseph and his rather limited role. He traces Joseph’s genealogy, speaks of Joseph’s hesitation about Mary’s pregnancy, and devotes half a sentence to the birth itself before telling about the visit of wise men from the East. Luke invests chapters in the description of Mary, her relatives, their songs and the build up to the birth of Jesus, which is told in a single paragraph. Then Luke goes on to discuss the visit of Shepherds. Luke is especially enamored with the visit of angels and how such visitations inform the various witnesses to the birth of what is going on. John does not rely on narration, but rather turns to philosophy, theology and poetry to speak of the symbolic meanings of Jesus birth.
I have not been gifted with facility in languages. I struggle with the language of my birth and childhood and have so far only learned a few words of other languages. I can barely decode Greek with the help of a lexicon and have relied on the translations of others to read and study the New Testament of our Bible. But even in translation, the prologue to the Gospel of John is a masterpiece of human poetry and symbolic language. I recite the first chapter of the Gospel each year at our Christmas Eve services, though I have noticed my memorization isn’t quite perfect in recent years. Still, the words of that part of the Bible are deeply ingrained in my thinking and my living.
So there is nothing “objective” about my approach to conversations about God and religion.
Like the Gospel, it seems to me that there is no need to prove or argue the existence of God. It seems as silly as arguing the existence of the air we breathe or the water we drink. God simply is. And God has always been. John’s way of putting this is: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word with with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.”
Laying aside the issue of gender, which is made more complex by the translation and the lack of a pronoun in English that doesn’t either assign gender or render the antecedent as an inanimate object, the Gospel writer simply beings with the reality of God. There is no argument for the existence of God, but rather a simple assumption that God is. In that way of thinking I completely align with the Gospel. And I go a step farther with the Gospel. God is in everything. There is nothing that can be observed in this universe that isn’t infused with God.
Those who think that God must be somehow supernatural - outside of the realities of the universe - might say that one can’t directly observe God. I answer that you can’t help observing God. There is nothing you can observe that doesn’t reveal a part of God.
Christmas is our season of reminding us of this reality. We don’t need to go elsewhere to seek God. We don’t need a special pilgrimage, or a specific destination. We don’t need institutions or churches or priests or guides. Experiencing the holy is as simple as inhaling and exhaling. It is as natural as holding a baby.
On this second day of Christmas, I awoke to fresh snow on the ground. The beauty of simply looking out the window is overwhelming. But I am aware that not every person has the same perspective. Over a hundred homes were destroyed in Christmas fires in Victoria, Australia. The war in Iraq continues to threaten the lives of innocents. Northern Afghanistan has been hit by a major earthquake. There are more than 150,000 people left homeless in the wake of South American floods. Many are missing in a huge landslide in Myanmar. At least fourteen have been killed in massive storms that have roared through the Midwest and South of our country.
There is no shortage of places where one has to look carefully to observe God’s presence. It isn’t that God is not present, it is that we fail to recognize that presence. The Gospel of John is well aware of that reality: “He was in he world, and the world was made through him, yet the world knew him not.”
For me the celebration of Christmas involves all four of the gospels - each unique perspective. I pay attention to the words of the prophets and to the stories of angel visits. I appreciate the genealogy and history of the holy family. I treasure the ancient tales of the baby born in a crowded place when his parents were on a trip. And I am moved by the philosophical tone of John’s poetry.
The story is simply too big for a single telling or a single day. Fortunately we are given a season each year to contemplate its glory.
Our story, however, is all about incarnation - God coming to us in the midst of the world, in the ways of the world, in the realities of everyday human existence. We have no problems with believing in miracles, but it doesn’t take miracles for us to see God in the ordinary and every day.
The four Gospels are quite different in their narratives of Christmas. Mark doesn’t bother with a birth narrative of Jesus at all. In a headlong rush to tell the story of the crucifixion and the revelation of Jesus nature in the events of his human death, Mark doesn’t take time to tell the stories of Jesus’ birth, but rather begins with a very brief description of John the baptizer and the story of Jesus’ baptism. Matthew focuses on Jesus’ earthly father, Joseph and his rather limited role. He traces Joseph’s genealogy, speaks of Joseph’s hesitation about Mary’s pregnancy, and devotes half a sentence to the birth itself before telling about the visit of wise men from the East. Luke invests chapters in the description of Mary, her relatives, their songs and the build up to the birth of Jesus, which is told in a single paragraph. Then Luke goes on to discuss the visit of Shepherds. Luke is especially enamored with the visit of angels and how such visitations inform the various witnesses to the birth of what is going on. John does not rely on narration, but rather turns to philosophy, theology and poetry to speak of the symbolic meanings of Jesus birth.
I have not been gifted with facility in languages. I struggle with the language of my birth and childhood and have so far only learned a few words of other languages. I can barely decode Greek with the help of a lexicon and have relied on the translations of others to read and study the New Testament of our Bible. But even in translation, the prologue to the Gospel of John is a masterpiece of human poetry and symbolic language. I recite the first chapter of the Gospel each year at our Christmas Eve services, though I have noticed my memorization isn’t quite perfect in recent years. Still, the words of that part of the Bible are deeply ingrained in my thinking and my living.
So there is nothing “objective” about my approach to conversations about God and religion.
Like the Gospel, it seems to me that there is no need to prove or argue the existence of God. It seems as silly as arguing the existence of the air we breathe or the water we drink. God simply is. And God has always been. John’s way of putting this is: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word with with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.”
Laying aside the issue of gender, which is made more complex by the translation and the lack of a pronoun in English that doesn’t either assign gender or render the antecedent as an inanimate object, the Gospel writer simply beings with the reality of God. There is no argument for the existence of God, but rather a simple assumption that God is. In that way of thinking I completely align with the Gospel. And I go a step farther with the Gospel. God is in everything. There is nothing that can be observed in this universe that isn’t infused with God.
Those who think that God must be somehow supernatural - outside of the realities of the universe - might say that one can’t directly observe God. I answer that you can’t help observing God. There is nothing you can observe that doesn’t reveal a part of God.
Christmas is our season of reminding us of this reality. We don’t need to go elsewhere to seek God. We don’t need a special pilgrimage, or a specific destination. We don’t need institutions or churches or priests or guides. Experiencing the holy is as simple as inhaling and exhaling. It is as natural as holding a baby.
On this second day of Christmas, I awoke to fresh snow on the ground. The beauty of simply looking out the window is overwhelming. But I am aware that not every person has the same perspective. Over a hundred homes were destroyed in Christmas fires in Victoria, Australia. The war in Iraq continues to threaten the lives of innocents. Northern Afghanistan has been hit by a major earthquake. There are more than 150,000 people left homeless in the wake of South American floods. Many are missing in a huge landslide in Myanmar. At least fourteen have been killed in massive storms that have roared through the Midwest and South of our country.
There is no shortage of places where one has to look carefully to observe God’s presence. It isn’t that God is not present, it is that we fail to recognize that presence. The Gospel of John is well aware of that reality: “He was in he world, and the world was made through him, yet the world knew him not.”
For me the celebration of Christmas involves all four of the gospels - each unique perspective. I pay attention to the words of the prophets and to the stories of angel visits. I appreciate the genealogy and history of the holy family. I treasure the ancient tales of the baby born in a crowded place when his parents were on a trip. And I am moved by the philosophical tone of John’s poetry.
The story is simply too big for a single telling or a single day. Fortunately we are given a season each year to contemplate its glory.