Christmas, as we celebrate it today on December 25th, began sometime in the 4th century. And it wasn’t a day. It was celebrated over 12 days – yep, that’s where the song comes from.
It culminated in a day called Epiphany, which marked the revelation of Christ to the Wise Men. The way those 4th century believers kept these holy days (where we get our word holiday) helped them immerse themselves in the story like characters in a play.
The four weeks leading up to Christmas were called Advent. Advent is from a Latin word which means coming. In the old days, it was a unique time of the year – but not like it is today. It wasn’t a time of glowing lights and festive parties, instead it was shrouded in darkness. It was a time of getting ready, but a very different sort of preparation than we usually practice today.
It was a time of waiting in the dark, making space to sit in the needs and longings of the world and our hearts. It was a season that looked both backwards and forwards. Back to the first coming (“advent”) of the Messiah. And it looked forward to the second coming, the second advent, when, as one of the oldest creeds put it, Christ “will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.”
My family has been watching the television show SWAT together. People in danger who know the SWAT team is coming to rescue them, that their deliverance is certain, face their present circumstances differently. Advent does that too; it re-orients us each new year. It helps us find our place in this world.
We are thankful for and at rest because of the salvation brought by the first Advent. But we’re also vigilant and full of hope, no matter what darkness is around us, because we’re certain of Christ’s return to make everything right.
The writer and pastor Tish Harrison Warren says that historically (and in some churches today) the color purple is used for this time of year. Purple symbolizes both royalty and repentance, two themes we don’t often put together. Purple tells us that Advent means, “The King is coming. Get ready.”
Advent doesn’t just mark the weeks before Christmas. It captures the dynamic of the entire Christian life. It’s where we live. In-between. Free, but not yet home. Waiting in the dark for the Lord’s appearing. Looking back and looking ahead, so that we might live more fully with God in the present moment.
Our ancestors understood something we’ve lost today: Christmas will only be joyful to the extent we let ourselves feel the fear and trembling of our need for Jesus to come and deliver us today. “O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel!”
You can see why they needed 12 days to celebrate Christmas. That’s an intense emotional arc.
I made this little devotional series for us, for my kids, and for yours. Just one page a day for six days. I pray it will get us and keep us in the Spirit of Christmas. So kids, let’s use the muscles of our imaginations to keep Christmas weird.
Day 1: Keep Christmas Weird
Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Isaiah 7:14
Some of our friends live in Austin, Texas. One of the slogans for that city is “Keep Austin Weird.” As in, keep this city special, flavored like this one particular place and not like anywhere else. How do we keep Christmas weird? Or, at least, how do we make it weird again? How can we capture that God in diapers is just as strange as God on a cross?
The lyrics of the all the carols can get so familiar – yes, yes, we know, Christmas is the time we remember Christ’s birth – that it takes a considerable feat of the imagination to remember just how in-credible (as in, hard to believe) are the claims of Christmas.
Even if you’re aware of the danger, it’s easy to forget what Christmas is all about.
On the one hand, we have to do the hard work of pushing back against all the commercialism and consumerism that’s coming at us in waves from every direction. How our culture celebrates “the holidays” forms us in ways deeper than we realize. We want this to be a season of joyful celebration. But who can deny that what was once the garnish has become the main dish?
On the other hand, while it might be cherished for beloved traditions, even Christmas at church can get pretty stale. Sentimentalized. Over-familiar. Do we remember what we are celebrating?
It ought to give us pause that our best poets have struggled how to say it. “Immensity cloistered in thy dear womb,” one put it (John Donne). Our best hymn-writers have hunted for the right lines: “Veiled in flesh the Godhead see.” The one gospel writer we might call a poet, himself took to metaphors. “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us…No one has ever seen God…The only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known.”
If even the Biblical writers stop short of saying it directly, what does that mean for how we might talk about Christmas today?
We can start by admitting that the Christmas story is weird. It’s supposed to be crazy! It’s supposed to grab our attention, and let us know that this birth story was not the same as every other baby’s. He wasn’t made in the way all other babies are made. He wasn’t born in the kind of place anyone would expect a baby, let alone a baby King, to be born. His visitors were unlikely – dirty shepherds and wise rulers from far away. His parents were given the great gift and privilege of snuggling him and teaching him and raising him, but they also had to endure great difficulties – from funny looks and awkward questions (But you’re not married yet?), to a long and uncertain journey while very pregnant, to needing to escape to another country and live as refugees for a few years in order to keep Jesus safe.
Parents who follow Jesus will often say, “I want my kids to claim their faith as their own.” But can that happen without reckoning with Christmas being more than just “the most wonderful time of the year?” What parents are asking their children to believe, even base their life upon, depends on whether or not this actually happened. Without a wrestling, a reckoning, sooner or later a thoughtful child might agree with the skeptical voices they hear: “You know, you’re right. What my parents believe, what I grew up hearing in church, it is absurd. I agree with you.”
So how can we keep Christmas special, keep it weird?
That’s what we’ll be talking about these next few days. We’ll be using our imaginations to go deeper into the story, hopefully finding it stranger and scarier and more wonderful than we usually think it is.