Wally Hargrave
100 Mile House United Church
This hasn’t been a nice year for many of us. With the news filled with war and disease and desperate struggle for so many, including the planet and its creatures, we might think ‘Oh no, it’s Christmas!’
A part of us may want to keep our heads down and hope it is over soon. Sure, most of the children will giggle with anticipation and we get caught up in their enthusiasm.
But deep down, how do we really feel? Is Christmas really real?
Well, yet it is. It lives in all of us. It is Emmanuel, God is with us.
You see, in a dark time in human history, a darkness that seemed to overcome, a light appeared. God become flesh and dwelt among us. God came as an innocent infant, vulnerable, needing us, showing us the way.
And God still comes. God is still flesh and dwells among us. God appears as an unanticipated smile, an act of unconditional love, a slice of hope in our hopelessness.
Some years ago, I served the Heilsuk people of Bella Bella. Christmas was a time of real competitiveness when it came to Christmas lights. The whole village seemed to take part and the village was truly beautiful with the season.
A friend was travelling from Prince Rupert to Port Hardy on the ferry. For hours the ferry plowed the sea in almost absolute darkness. My friend shared how he was feeling quite depressed. Then the ferry came around the lighthouse and there was a village in all its Christmas splendor! My friend said his heart leapt with a sense of joy!
The darkness had given way to multi-coloured lights of the season and my friend felt a sense of unexplained peace. Suddenly he came out of himself and into the moment.
And maybe that is what Christmas is: to come out of ourselves and into the moment.
God became flesh and since Scripture says God is Love, I like to phrase it: Love becomes flesh every time we allow it. It is a personal choice. Let us be Love made flesh: toward ourselves, each other and to the world!
Merry Christmas! Joy to the world! Peace.