Bethlehem

December 24, 2019

Tonight we will sing, “Peace on earth, goodwill towards men,” but if there is one thing I’ve learned in life, it’s that peace isn’t a gift that can simply be bestowed on people like someone might give a fruitcake. Peace has to be claimed, owned, received, and chosen. Before he was crucified, Jesus told his disciples, “My peace I leave with you.” But our experience even as Christians is often one of wanting and searching in vain for peace. 

Christmas Eve is when we perhaps think about this peace more than at any other time of year. We read the Christmas story and imagine starry nights with shepherds in the field, of Mary and Joseph tucked into a warm and cozy stable, with baby Jesus lying in a manger. That night however, didn’t exactly go as Joseph and Mary might have envisioned it. It was tough enough traveling by foot for days from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and when they finally arrived with sore feet and aching back, as Mary felt those first pangs of birth, Joseph was frantically trying to find a place for them to stay. The streets were crowded, they were jostled and bumped, perhaps angry words were shouted to them. Nothing was going right. 

On Christmas Eve, I have often felt harried, frantic, on edge...anything but peaceful. Services need final touches, music rehearsals, all the gifts have to be dragged up from the basement and placed under the tree, the table set and...and...and... Nerves are frazzled as we put on our smiles and head to church. 

Jesus didn’t come into a Norman Rockwell world. He came into our world, a world that seems quite resistant to peace. “He came unto his own, but his own received him not,” John tells us. It’s not that we don’t want him in our lives; we do—desperately. But when he comes into our crowded Bethlehem of life, it is crowded and busy, and he settles for a stable in a dark corner. 

The shepherds were away from all that, out in the fields, keeping watch over their sheep. They had to be watchful and alert, but most of the time, it was pretty quiet and perhaps even boring as they waited through the night. They had one advantage over us, however. They weren’t so busy as to miss the birth...and the promised peace. And once they heard of it, they came. They simply came. I’ve heard of the birth so very many times, but I wonder how many times I’ve actually come to see. And worship. That coming, that worship can’t be hurried. It eludes those who are crowding their way through life. And it will elude me, if I fail to come. So I deliberately turn my mind from the busyness, from the irritations, from the stuff that has to get done, even from the people who surround me this busy night. Like a shepherd, I will stop what I’m doing and go see for myself this which the Lord has brought to pass.