Christmas and New Year's are over.
Last night, coming home from a dinner out (after my fever broke) with some church friends, I looked out my window and did not see the twinkling Christmas lights, there was no blaring 80s music from the neighbor seven stories below, no Christmas playing on the radio, no kids blowing their New Year's horns. Every trace of the holidays is almost gone, except the weight we all put on over the holidays and in my case couple of boxes of tea cakes from Bizu and brownies!
One of the joggers I had bagels and coffee with this morning complained, "Jon, the Magic of Christmas is all gone." Just as she said that, a mother entered Mister Donut with a little seven-year-old boy singing "Repeat the sounding joy...Repeat the sounding joy...Repeat, repeat the sounding joy!" Hearing that sweet song, I said, "No, it hasn't. You just feel it has, but it really hasn't."
Do you remember when Christmas used to be magical? Perhaps for some of you it still is, but as adults we tend to lose the wonder and the magic of this season because other concerns have trumped what as children was of supreme importance. Maybe that’s not so bad given that much of the magic of this season is inextricably linked to characters and stories that have little, if anything, to do with the events of the first Christmas. (And don’t get hung up on the word magic. Remember that the Magi [magicians] are central in the Christmas story, but by magic I simply mean something transcendent and wondrously inexplicable). Thankfully, children remind us of something we regrettably gave up along the way – the belief that something new, something good, something beyond our control is happening in our world, and we are recipients of that goodness. In some ways that’s the gift children give to us at this time of year, and God knows many of us need that gift more than ever.1
Days after the Lord Jesus was born, after all the magic and excitement, when the star that shone over Bethlehem was no longer as bright, when the angelic songs have ceased, when shepherds have gone back to their normal routine, Mary and Joseph brought the infant to the Temple for a rite of purification, to offer a sacrifice and present their son to God in the Temple.
Luke tells us that an elderly man, Simeon, righteous and devout, took the child from Joseph and Mary and offered God praise. Simeon had waited many years for this moment, and when he realized who the babe was, he knew that his moment had arrived. He sang a song of thanksgiving, even though the song is, in part, about his own death. Confronting his advanced age and the certain prospect of death, Simeon sang – and he sang because he could see beyond the present moment to the new and the good God was revealing to him. "Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel." (Luke 2.29-32). 2
Then there's Anna. We know nothing about her other than that she prayed and fasted constantly, and almost never left the temple grounds. We also know that she must have been a woman of great faith from whom others learned for Luke refers to her as a prophetess (a word loaded with meaning in ancient Israel). She takes one look at Jesus and she sees more than just a helpless, fragile newborn from a humble family who find themselves in Jerusalem, far from home. She doesn’t know the circumstances of his birth, or the trials Joseph and Mary have endured leading up to this day. She does know something, however. She knows that in this babe God has drawn near, and so she begins to praise God and to tell everyone that this babe will one day have a central role in the redemption of God’s people. She must have sounded crazy. 3
Why would anyone take Anna seriously? But that is, perhaps, the wrong question for a prophet’s work isn’t to accurately predict the future as much as it is to accurately speak the ways of God. Anna’s words suggested something new and good beyond the present circumstances and reminded those who listened that God was very near, that salvation and redemption was getting closer by the minute. In other words, she spoke God’s word of hope when others simply could not see it. 4
Simeon and Anna believed in God’s nearness and the power of that presence to transform even the most challenging of circumstances. If we lived as if that were true, don’t you think that Christmas would regain its magic? As a matter of fact, Christmas would indeed happen everyday, to permanently enjoy the magic of Christmas and continuously sing of the wonders of His love and repeat the sounding joy.
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1 Javier A. Viera, The Magic of Christmas, CCNYC 122808 2 ibid 3 ibid 4 ibid 5 Baptist Hymnal, Baptist Press 1997
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