Glory to God in the highest heaven,and on earth peace among those whom he favors! In Nomine +
Let me start by stating the obvious. Something everyone knows. But sometimes, one has to state the obvious. There were no computers in the stable in Bethlehem. There were no computers in the stable in Bethlehem. There were no plugs, no cables, and no speakers or antennae. No screens, no broadband no Twitter, Facebook or Snapchat. . To make a long story short: in the stable in Bethlehem, there were none of the things we use to mark someone's existence. None of those things we need to show that we exist or to let people know that something has happened. In the stable in Bethlehem, there were no computers, none of the things we used to prove that we exist.
And still, over 2000 years later, with another language and culture, and many miles, kings, wars, popes, events and events that changed the world, we watch our crib. Year after year, Christmas after Christmas, we see the crib here, Joseph, Mary, the Christchild, angels, donkey, sheep, the Magi, the stars and the shepherds. All those characters from Luke's account of the First Christmas. And now that we see them all there just like last year, and the year before, and the year before, one starts to ponder what it would have been like to be there AT THE TIME, and how they found it.
What did they think? What did they feel? Would they have felt differently if they'd known that we, thousands of years later, would still look at them, and ponder this specific event? What was it like, one asks, and one feels the tide of history. And then I watch the kneeling shepherds. The shepherds. These men with a laborious and dangerous jobs. Those whose jobs meant that they were at the bottom rung of the social ladder. They belonged to those who lived their lives without appreciation or even attention.
They would probably never be noted in societal conversation and discourse. Shepherds were simply not noticed. And then, this night, as they lie by their fire to keep the darkness, the cold, and the danger away. Suddenly they meet a sight that they've never seen before, and, while their initial reaction is fear, they are eventually captured by what they see and hear. The sight, the song and the message they most likely never thought they'd find, all of a sudden steps right into their lives.
Just like the universe, just for a second, has opened the curtain and revealed its mystery. And they are very moved by what they see. The sight touches them and gives them a memory for the rest of their lives. And once the singing is over, the angels are gone, the glowing sky dark, and the night is silent again. Then they say, we must go to see this with our own eyes. They don't stay there, staring into space to relive the experience they just had, they don't try to savour the emotion, nor do they stay to talk, discuss and analyse what just happened. Nor do they try to find out if they hadn't lost their marbles, or if they had hallucinated.
No, they simply go to see with their own eyes! And finally, they come to the place of this Miracle, and they meet... A stable. An ass, an ox, a lonely young family, a wrinkly baby, a young mother who has just given birth, with all that mess of blood, sweat and tears. There they come, the men who had gone to see the Messiah, and THIS is what they meet. Personally, I think that I would have been disappointed and started to wonder if I'd heard angles on high just a moment ago. Or if I'd misheard or hallucinated. It wouldn't even remotely have met my expectations. Perhaps, I would simply have gone home!
But not the shepherds. They nod, hum, and say that everything was as they had been told. The shepherds don't hesitate. Immediately, they recognise the divine in the mundane. They don't struggle to see God, disguised in this lowly, dirty, forgotten appearance. For most of us, it can sometimes be difficult to see God. The divine doesn't always have tangible contact with my daily life. And my days still go by. Summer, autumn and spring come and go. I go to work and return home. I eat, sleep, some days it rains and other days the sun shines. Some days life is good, other days a struggle. Life goes on, following the laws of nature, but one doesn't always feel the divine intervention.
But sometimes, I start to wonder. Do I exist out of a pure coincidence? Where does everyone go when they leave this world? Is there a purpose to my life at all? We ask ourselves, time and time again if we've done the right or wrong things in the past. And sometimes it strikes me. How could something come from nothing? How could there come a homo sapiens from the big bang? Many people wonder about the purpose of life, if there is a God, some people have made up their minds that he doesn't exist, some don't care, and some spend their life looking.
He is an intangible entity, something that our minds can't grasp, and a longing that we can't put into words. And man stands there, almost as if he was made to be a question mark. With the question of the origin of man and his Creator just barely visible in the corner of your eye. Then, tonight happens. Jesus is born, God made flesh, he who is beyond our vocabulary comes and stands on the human stage. The intangible leaves His silence. As a stage and audience, he has chosen a carpenter named Joseph, a teenage girl to be a mother, a collection of shepherds, some animals, a star and a manger. His own body is an infant. God comes without computers and websites, without Twitter and Facebook. Without microphones or megaphones. Without shouting loudly, without trying to win fame and reputation. God comes slightly under the radar to mankind, the saviour of humankind sneaking in through the back door. And we can see a pattern starting to develop, a body in the shadows.
God doesn't force Himself on a human by absolute concrete facts and doesn't force anyone to worship him. Doesn't try to win anyone over with indisputable facts. God gives man a chance to approach Him freely. God shows us His existence by a sign. The angels said to them "This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth". God shows Himself by signs. We are given signs, traces and ideas. And perhaps, tonight the shepherds are role models for those of us looking for God. Maybe we, too, will dare to follow the signs without having all the facts. Maybe we dare to hold a faith that only occasionally flames up to be an absolute certainty, but just as frequently just shows itself as a quivering sense that yes, something might be there. Perhaps we, like the shepherds, can see the divine in the utterly mundane. Perhaps, this Christmas Night we, like the shepherds, will dare to open our hearts to that still small voice of calm that says that the God who lives beyond time and space has come to mankind for no other reason than that he wants to live with every one of us?
Merry Christmas!
Glory to God in the highest heaven,and on earth peace among those whom he favors! In Nomine +
