Advent Reflection, Friday, December 17
By: Harrison Higgins
I like Christmas and parts of it I love: the family gatherings, my wild and wonderful children and grandchildren, sweet memories of Christmases past, my wife’s calming, beautiful presence next to my chaotic all-over-the-placeness. But most of all I love the story that God decided to come to this earth and be with us, Emmanuel, actually to become one of us.
When I look out a plane window, I often wonder what it must be like to be God and know every person down there, to see their lives, their thoughts, their hearts; to see their acts of love and cruelty. Would it be more heart warming or heart breaking? I naturally tend to think the latter, but I don’t know. I hope I am wrong on this. What I am sure of is that I would not want to be one of these people; I would love them, try to help and teach them, forgive them when they repented but I would not want to become one of them. That would be asking too much, going too far. “They need to learn. They need to grow up.” I would be saying to myself.
But that is not the God we believe in. He did become one of us. I believe when He looks down at us, because of Jesus, He now also sees Himself. This gives me hope and sometimes even strength to not give up and to keep working for a better world. Christmas really is good news of great joy, if we can get past all the shopping.
One final thought – in today’s world, what is the equivalent of being born in a stable? A homeless shelter? A refugee camp? Under a bridge? And if God had chosen to become incarnate in 2021, who would He (or She) be? If God can see Himself in humanity, I think He also wants us to see Him in each other too.
This is something beyond my understanding that happened in that stable 2,000 years ago where a man and a woman, some shepherds and animals, and angels gazed in silent, reverent awe as the heart of God revealed itself and found voice in a cry of an infant son.