Across the Pastor's Desk - 22 December 2006

It is an interesting phenomenon that with Christmas soon at hand so many have already lost the Christmas spirit. Certainly much of that has to do with the culture in which we live. The Christmas shopping season now begins well before Halloween. Christmas carols have been on loudspeakers and in elevators for months. The last minute hurry to get at least something for everyone on the gift list has become overwhelming. Advertisements multiply to interrupt television programs and weigh down newspaper carriers. People are feeling the pressure of company and meals to fix to perfection. As a result it is not actually a surprise to hear people say that they will be so happy when Christmas is over even before it has in fact arrived.

Even churches get caught up in all of this. Many celebrate Christmas long ahead of the day and skip the season itself all together. Large productions are presented in some congregations even to the point of having a barbershop quartet of singing Santas. Clergy can be heard bemoaning the season and its obligations. Misguided church members complain that stores no longer include the word "Christmas" in their advertisements and yet do not keep the feast themselves either in their actions or in their hearts. If churches and their members can become so confused about the celebration and its season is it any wonder that the world at large loses it altogether?

There is no time better than the present to begin to reclaim the message of Christmas for the sake of the whole world. Christmas is not about the economy of the season, the buying and selling, the hurrying and the scurrying. Christmas is about the greatest gift ever received, a gift that is priceless and without duplication. This gift is not just remembered in the celebration of a birthday but rather is a celebration of the Incarnation, something that continues to take place yet in our midst. God becomes one of us. God takes on human form and identifies with us that we might more fully and completely know the power of God’s love and grace.

With Christmas and its twelve days just ahead take time to read and listen to the old, old story of how God’s love for the world is revealed in the most unexpected of ways. Share that story of love and grace with family and friends and others who are in need of its hearing. It promises the gift that is more lasting and life-changing than anything that this world has to offer does. Take time to celebrate Christmas for what it really is and what it really has to give. We will all be better for it.