It is a wonderful scene in that stable so long ago. The animals quietly munching on their hay. Mary and Joseph lovingly peering down at their newborn baby. The star shining in the night, marking this place of miracle. The shepherds curiously looking in from the edge, their hats removed in respect. The angels singing their hearts out, hovering just behind the holy family, the light from their haloes illuminating the scene. The three wise men opposite the shepherds opening their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And in the middle of all this busy scene, there is the baby Jesus cozied down in the soft sweet smelling straw in the manger. Hark, is that the little drummer boy I hear coming? It is all such a beautiful tableaux. It makes for some very pretty Christmas cards.
Too bad it wasn’t anything like that. If anyone has ever been in a barn, they know that it is not sweet smelling and cozy. The stable would have stunk of sweat and manure. It was probably dark, with perhaps only a small oil lamp to light the space. The animals may have wondered why a baby was in their feed trough. Mary and Joseph would have been exhausted from their travels and from childbirth. If the shepherds were there, (they’re not mentioned in the Matthew account), they too would have stunk and been rude. If the three wise men were there (they’re not mentioned in the Luke account), their great gifts would have been used for food and the escape to Egypt from King Herod. The straw would have been scratchy. Even Jesus probably cried in discomfort. And I really don’t think there was a little drummer boy.
That was the reality in which God chose to insert himself into human existence. He chose to come in the form of the lowliest of human beings, dirt poor, rejected from the very first with no room at the inn. He chose to be born among us in the muck and stink of a barn. This is the Christ who came to tell us we had it all wrong, that our God was a God of peace, not violence, a God of abundance, not scarcity, a God of forgiveness, not revenge, a God of love, not division and hate. Ironically, not everyone thought this was good news, especially those in power. This is the Lord and King who comes to be with us, to understand us, to comfort us, not from some distant throne, but here in the muck and mire of our daily, and sometimes stinking, lives. This is the Christ who will die for us in order to call us into a new relationship with him. This is the God who loves us so much, who wants to show us how significant we are his eyes, that he comes to seek us, and calls to us, “Come closer.” We can hardly believe it, not as William Sloane Coffin says, “because he is so hard to believe in, but because he is too good for us to believe in, we being strangers to such goodness.”
Perhaps because it is hard to believe we have made it a myth, a good story. We have done our best to clean up Christmas. We have done our best to sentimentalize it and to make it about family, good times, and gift giving, sometimes extravagant gift giving encouraged by our retail mindset. Don’t get me wrong, I love the lights on the houses, the Christmas trees in the windows, the parties to go to. Those things are fun and heart warming. But let’s not confuse the sentimental Christmas scene, or the gifts under the tree with real Christmas.
William Sloane Coffin has said, “Christians are properly troubled by a commercialized Christmas. My own greater concern is with a sentimentalized one. A commercial Christmas at least never pretends to be anything else. Sentimentality, however, does not arise from the truth; rather it’s what’s poured on top, blurring and distorting the truth.”
The danger of making Christmas into just another Hallmark moment, is of course, that it trivializes what God had done for us. It calls for nothing from us, no response, except perhaps to raise the Kleenex to daub the tears from our eyes. The temptation of sentimentality lets us avoid the humility it takes to acknowledge something greater than we are, to accept God’s dominion over us and our own dependence on him.
By making Christmas a sentimental experience we risk confusing our emotional response as real spirituality. That little tug at our heartstrings may soften our hearts for a few days so that we are nicer to the people around us, but it does not fundamentally alter our lives. You see, that little babe in the manger is dangerous. If we listen to him, really listen to him, he will call us beyond ourselves into a transformative relationship. That little baby will not be satisfied until we have changed, until we have put aside our own egos, our own need for control, and listen to where he is calling us. When Christmas becomes a life-changing experience, then we can talk about how spiritual it is for us.
There are a lot of people today who call themselves spiritual but not religious. Perhaps you are one of them. Religion loses its credibility when it is focused first on our sentimental traditions rather than the deeply authentic meaning that Jesus Christ has for our lives. Religion loses its credibility when it focuses on its own hierarchy and polity, rather than the potential for the gospel to change the world. Religion loses credibility when its liturgy does not reflect our real concerns. Religion loses credibility when it makes no discernable difference in people’s lives. It is not that traditions and liturgy and hierarchy and polity are not good things, they are. They give structure to our spirituality and give ways to express our desires and our regrets, and call us into a community of fellow human beings with similar concerns. If the church is to appeal to people’s spirituality, we must first be authentic to the message of Christ’s saving love for all of us.
A non-sentimental Christmas can still be beautiful. Beauty has the capacity to touch us deeply, to express truth in ways we may have not noticed before, and to change us. When Christ touches us at the center of our spirits, we want to respond in gratitude by honoring him with our best gifts, our best efforts. Our hope is that the beauty of those gifts offered up to Christ, might inspire others to look more deeply into their own spirit, to their own relationship with Christ and be transformed. The beauty of our church, our music, and our liturgy, so lovingly assembled, can help us to reflect on the deeper meaning of the incarnation of God’s love for us.
So the question is, how has Christmas changed us? Has it brought us to our knees in sincere adoration of the one who has brought God down to be among us, cleverly disguised as a little baby? Has it given us the humility to acknowledge that even this babe is greater than we are, and that we need his forgiveness? Has it inspired us to deepen our relationship with God, with others, and ourselves through prayer and worship? Has is it convinced us that we need to go out and work for justice and peace, one person at a time? How have we been transformed?
Unto us a child is born. But this is not just a sweet baby in a romanticized scene far from the reality of our own lives. This is Emmanuel, God with us. He has changed the world, and he can change us. And that is a beautiful thing. O Come let us adore him, Christ our Lord.