Imagine Christmas without Carols

Imagine Christmas without carols. Imagine Christmas without packages wrapped with care (and torn open with glee). Imagine Christmas without commercialization. Imagine December was merely a count down from one calendar year to the next. No Advent. No holiday parties and no sugar cookies (I know…sugar cookies are yum). No “Wonderful Life” reruns and no ghosts of Christmas past for Scrooge or anyone else. No shepherds sporting bathrobes or angels cardboard wings. No hustle and bustle and running crazy to get the latest card sent off.

Instead, imagine a country occupied by a foreign power. Instead, imagine a local scandal involving a teenage girl who isn’t old enough to drive (a camel maybe, but not a car) and her respectable, righteous even, fiancée. Imagine, the shame. Imagine the surprise when she is not dismissed quietly, but aforementioned boyfriend stays the course, solid as the timber he plies for a trade. Imagine the panic as labor pains increase along with doors slammed shut, refusing welcome. Imagine the relief at entry, barn animals or not. Imagine the water breaking.

Imagine the mystery of all things, the creator of all that is, nurtured, nestled, in that young womb for nine months, submitting to the same story of every human come before. Imagine the emergence of beautiful new life: blood, fluid, and labored breaths; the young mother exercising a form of workmanship ancient and fresh, producing art which lives and loves. Imagine the impossibility made possible, of the creature caressing the creator to her breast. Imagine the cry of Life itself, Divinity itself, joining with baby’s breathe, hastening the redemption of all.

Imagine this tiny breath expanding from that straw stable to enveloping all that was and will be. A breath that we inhale by faith. A breath we inhale by virtue of having lungs and breathing air. A life we partake in by virtue of every cell in our body and every spiritual molecule in our soul. Imagine this and you will have come close to the Kingdom. Imagine this and you will tremble with the audacity of it all. You will slam your Christmas dinner table with fists of epiphany. You will have seen through the mirror dim, the true message of Christmas, given in a single name:

Emmanuel.

He is Risen!

Easter is unusually early this year. Lent started in the darkness of the winter and while in in the global north Easter has long been tied to spring, it’s still early enough that physical days of shadow and snow may linger. Yet, after 2000 years what more is there to say? Sermons galore, songs abounding, poems piling high, and liturgies around the world resounding with the cry, “Alleluia the Lord is Risen. The Lord is risen indeed, alleluia!”

There alone may be enough to be said. The proclamation of the Resurrection message has continued over twenty centuries through hell and high water, through towers falling, through economies booming, through endless paperwork, through endless controversial elections of the moment, and through the whispers of lovers and the laughter of children. In Saint John’s account of Easter morning Mary Magdalene is asked by Jesus (who she thinks is the gardener), “why are you weeping?” (John 20:15).  

It’s a good question. Not only for Mary, but for us. Mary weeps because she has lost her Lord, because the great movement of hope that was rising in her time had been nailed to a cross, robbed of all breath and taken lifeless to the tomb. All this calls for tears, but to add insult to injury, it seems the body has been stolen. Many of us too have lost our Lord, or had our hopes nailed to a cross of cruelty or terrible circumstance. Many of us have felt robbed of all breath, walked lifeless through life’s thousand little cuts and sat tomb-like contemplating our future.

Easter is easily mistaken as an occasion for smiles, cute bunnies, and new dresses. These have their place, but as happy little trinkets alongside the vast red canvas of the world’s history and our personal histories of blood and sorrow. Easter is a time to weep. To weep over the losses of life for ourselves, those we love, and the world. But it is also a time to tune our spiritual ear to the lyrical delight of hearing our names uttered by the risen Lord. When Jesus said, “Mary” she recognized him instantly and then -- I suggest -- she did not stop weeping but her tears of sorrow turned to tears of joy (John 16:20). This Easter, may yours and mine do the same.

Fifty Days of Forgiveness

Funny Friar Ministries is challenging you and everyone across the world to move toward forgiveness during the fifty days of the challenge, Easter Sunday (3/27) - Pentecost Sunday (5/15). To help Funny Friar Ministries will be sharing quotes, prayers, and links related to forgiveness on Facebook and making available the following sermons.

April 03: Forgiving Others
April 10: Forgiving Yourself
April 17: Forgiving God

It's time to forgive!