A Little Christmas

 

^" Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign: Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel."  Isaiah 7:14

   I  spent the morning having a tire checked for a leak with a local mechanic.  It wasn't going to take long so I sat down in the lobby to wait. My intent was to get any work done while waiting. However it became obvious this wasn't going to happen, given the cell phone conversations going on around me.  I am not, by nature, an eavesdropper, but  they made it difficult not to be drawn into their conversations.

  One lady, in particular, spent the entire time I was there talking to people about her flooded basement. It seems her sump pump chose this past weekend to go out. A heavy snow fall, followeed by unseasonably warm weather that melted all of the snow in a few hours, plus a long torrential down pour has caused a lot of flooding.  

  Apparently this woman owned a home with a beautiful finished basement.  Or at least she did.  Now that it was flooded the beauty was lost.  While I did my best not to listen to the details, it became obvious  just how much this had changed her plans. You try getting an insurance agent in to look at things two days before Christmas. She called family telling them she couldn't hold Christmas at her house, she called others trying to  make arrangements for people to stay elsewhere. She  called companies to come and clean up her basement. 

  Having lived in areas that received frequent flooding before,  was sympathetic to eh plight.  Floods are difficult to deal with the water goes everywhere. I damages flooring and walls, carpets it destroys memories as heirlooms and photographs are damaged.  If the oncoming water doesn't do enough damage, the left over moisture in the walls will cause rot, mold and mildew.  When a flood comes everything is affected by it.  

     It's not that water is a bad thing.  It's a very good thing. We need it to subversive. We like enough to drink water our lawns keeps our food growing. We like water, at least in small doses. We just don't want too much of it.

  I thought about that as I returned to my office and heard this Christmas song playing "For We Need A Little Christmas, Right this very Minute"  Do you know it?  It's a catchy tune. Nice little song. Not terribly religious or Christian. But certainly harmless.  It's also hard to get out of your head. For to those of you who will be humming the tune for the rest of the day, I apologize.

  But as I hummed the song in my office, it occurred to me just how right it is.  That's what we all want. A little Christmas.  Because a little Christmas is a good thing. We like a little break. We want enough Christmas so we can get a few days off work. We want just enough so we can have an excuse to get together with family and friends. Have a nice party.  Just enough Christmas  to get and give some presents.  Its a nice excuse to light up the home and feel a little festive. We even like a little Jesus. Cute baby, wrapped in swaddling cloths lying in a manger. Peace on Earth because well, babies are peaceful (Unless of course you have babies in your house. Babies bring a lot of things into one's life incl ding  joy. Peace is rarely one of them).

  We want  a little bit of Christmas, but t not to much. I dont' want so much  Christmas it might cause me to really think about what it means to have God born in flesh.  I don't want so much Jesus and Christmas that I'm reminded the whole incarnation was part of the process to destroy my sins on the Cross. I don't' want so much Christmas that the ramifications of a real personal God  actually changes the way I think and live. Changes my framework of how I understand the world.  Change... well... me.

  In short I want a little bit of Christmas, I just don't want a flood of Jesus affecting everything in  my life.  Of course the problem is this. God doesn't want to give you just a little bit of Himself. he doesn't want you to have just a little bit of Jesus. He wants to flood  your life with Him.   There  is a reason why Jesus is called Immanuel, God with us.  Not a little bit of God near us for  a few days, or just 24 hours. But God Al that God is with us.  Jesus came to flood our souls with His love, with His presence. 

  What might happen his year if instead of just having a "little Christmas" you actually allowed Jesus to flood your life? If you allowed Him to flood your lifer with His love so that love we carried with you all year?  Peace on Earth would become more than just a nice sentiment on a Christmas  card. It could become a reality for you. And who doesn't need more peace?  God will to others? Who wouldn''t want to be able to look at others and love them  and not be soured on life? Joy to The World" It becomes less a song and more the foundation which you operate in the world.

  The more I think about it, what we need is not a little Christmas. We need a flood of Christmas a deluge of the Christ child in our lives.  This year may your life be flooded with the presence of the one we call Immanuel. 

In Christ,

Rev. Dr. Brian Jones <><