It seems to me that Christmas in Michigan, 2009, is a little dark. Typically the residential streets are alight with decorations and color, and somehow, the neighborhood is a bit sober this year. Perhaps the fact that unemployment is higher here than anywhere else in the nation is taking a toll. And perhaps it's the empty houses where the residents have fled for jobs elsewhere.
I remember moving here three decades ago when bumper stickers said, "Last one to leave Michigan, turn out the lights."
Did someone already turn out the lights around here? Or maybe they just left and didn't pay the electric bill, like all the foreclosure homes around here where angry owners have trashed the house before they fled.
Seems like a general malaise is in place. Gloom and doom. Maybe it's just me, but I think Michigan is skipping Christmas this year.
That could be a good thing. In fact, it would be a retro celebration. The first Christmas was a pretty sober one too. Taxes, imposed by the Romans, had everyone scrambling. Oppression was daily reality in Judea. I'm sure Joseph and Mary weren't at all thrilled to be ordered by the Emperor to take a long trip when she was expecting a baby. We sing blithely of "the babe in Bethlehem" and forget that Bethlehem was the last place Jesus' parents wanted to be right then.
The accommodations were pretty grim. The first visitors probably smelled like sheep and the great out-of-doors, and no recent baths. Yes, there were angels and bright lights, but that faded after the shepherds went to town, and no one but the shepherds seems to have noticed it. No one cared that another baby was born for a long while -- not till the wise men came and asked Herod where they could find "The one born king of the Jews." Now that raised a rumpus.
In fact, it was such an uproar that Mary and Joseph made yet another journey, a long one to Egypt, and they stayed there in exile till Herod died.
They didn't face foreclosure, but they faced grinding poverty. They didn't lose their jobs; they left the job behind in Nazareth. They were lonely, young, and probably frightened. They didn't ask to raise the son of God and they didn't get a choice in the assignment.
Yet, I don't read of their complaints. Mary kept all these things in her heart and pondered them. Joseph got his marching orders, twice, from angelic visitors in dreams, but he did what he was told. They managed to get to the temple and present their child as they were supposed to do, and they got the blessings of Simeon and Anna. They just went on living, one step at a time. And God richly blessed them. In fact, because of their obedience, we celebrate Christmas.
I can do without the lights and bustle and shopping. Give me quiet, carols, friends and family. I'm warmed and fed and well. In the midst of a sober Michigan Christmas, life is actually very good -- because God is good.
No comments:
Post a Comment