Christmas: God… Is… Now… Here!

The Christmas story confirms one pattern of God—He shows up in unexpected places.

Maybe you have heard that popular story about an atheist who had a big poster hanging on the wall in his living room, which said: “God is nowhere.” One day, while he was reading the newspaper, his little daughter, who was busy doing her homework, suddenly looked at the poster and began reading it aloud as a new reader, separating the word “nowhere” into two words, saying: God… is… now… here! She was proud to have successfully read the sentence for the first time in her life. The father who wanted to correct her went silent. He had not seen that possibility. The next time he looked at that poster, he couldn’t help reading it as “God is now here.”

In a sense, the non-belief of the girl’s father is the reason for the Christmas story. We can look out at our own world and see sin, division, and non-belief. We can also look into our own hearts and see how that has influenced us.

We hear in our Gospel today: “For today in the city of David a savior has been born for you who is Christ and Lord” (Luke 2:11).

The people are trapped, and collectively oppressed; the future is blocked. And sin is both the cause and the reality of this oppression. Perhaps we have lost the staggering feeling of victory, rescue, liberation, because we have forgotten that to be bound by sin is to live captive, heavily laden, driven by the Evil One, yoked by a cruel taskmaster.

To defeat evil, a Power (who is the Savior of the World) had to be introduced from outside this world. We celebrate that today at Christmas. The Word of God existed before the creation of the universe yet was born among us in time. Christmas is the celebration of the Incarnation of God. We can greet each other—instead of with “Merry Christmas,” we could shout instead, “God chose flesh,” “God became one of us!”

Such gratitude enriches the Christmas season as a time for giving and receiving.

There was a story that appeared in AARP magazine a few years ago. It was about an unemployed salesman in 1971 who received an act of kindness that changed his life. He was scraping by, living in his car, when a local diner owner gave him $20 and a tank of gas.

Fast forward eight years. Our unemployed salesman is now hugely successful. He begins giving away money anonymously in order to repay the kindness of the diner owner. What started as a small gesture of gratitude has grown into a wonderful Christmas tradition. Over the past few decades, this anonymous businessman has given away tens of thousands of dollars every Christmas to people on the streets of Kansas City.

And just a few years ago, the businessman returned to the old diner to thank the man who changed his life. The diner owner was retired and caring for an ailing wife. Imagine his surprise when a man showed up on his doorstep and handed him $ 10,000.

The Christmas story also confirms that God shows up in unexpected places especially where he is born.

We hear that, “In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that the whole world should be enrolled…So, all went to be enrolled, each to his own town” (Luke 2.1-2). Such a decree was no joke. Government taxation depended on your enrollment, and you were required by law to go back to your hometown that maybe you have not been back to in three decades, and the roads and inns would be packed with many travelers.

When a pastor asked the class, "Why was Jesus born in Bethlehem?" a boy raised his hand and replied, "Because his mother was there."

Jesus dies in the great city of Jerusalem so that his crucifixion may be known to a great many of all, but the glory of his birth is hidden in the least of the cities. "O little town of Bethlehem...."

Picture Bethlehem at the first Christmas; a cluster of buildings nestled under a deep midnight sky, lit by a glittering star whose silver beams point the way for shepherds and wise men. O silent night, O holy night. O night divine.

We wish for our hearts to be still and deep like that; to offer our Savior a restful peace within our hearts, to mirror that idyllic scene in our own holy longings, to be receptive and welcoming. Our souls like a soft, deep velvety silence, a space of soul to reflect, pray, welcome the Word made Flesh.

Some people do not experience Christmas as good news as it can magnify the feeling of their aloneness, alienation, and grief.

But the real good news of Christmas is that Jesus was born in a barn which the angel said was to be “a joy to all the people” (Luke 2:10).