The Grand Miracle

It is December 24 as I write this and I find myself unavoidably contemplating the Christmas holiday and what it means. Christmas falls on Tuesday this year, so yesterday was Sunday. The sermon was in regard to the virgin birth of Christ and how many folks in our world have difficulty with the very idea of miracles of any kind, let alone something like the virgin birth of Christ. Newsweek, in their usual anti-faith fashion, had as their cover story last week an article by a skeptic that was focused on how there are other non-Biblical stories about Jesus' childhood that are commonly rejected and so the virgin birth would also be rejected if it hadn't been repeated so many times. The article concludes that holidays and religion are fine for those who want them, but don't take them too seriously. To that I would say, to borrow from Scrooge: Humbug!

This is not to say that the virgin birth is not an issue. It is part of the Christian faith, and the faith most definitely involves miracles. As C. S. Lewis has said, it is indeed one Grand Miracle. Christmas,to me, gives us a glimpse of that thing that Lewis calls the Grand Miracle: the Incarnation of Christ. However, it is not the Virgin Birth that is the heart of that Grand Miracle. The Virgin Birth strikes me as primarily the pathway or mechanism. The miracle itself is much bigger than that, and those who gag at the idea of the Virgin Birth seem to me to have missed the point. For the God of the universe, who is outside of nature and beyond nature to take on flesh and enter into His own creation to make Himself known, and not just to make Himself known but to experience death in order to conquer death, that is a far greater miracle than for a virgin to conceive. Lewis calls this taking on of flesh, the Incarnation, the Grand Miracle because all the other miracles of the Bible either point to this, demonstrate it, or result from it. It is the heart of the issue. God became man to rescue man and to make God known. That is the specifically Christian miracle. Other religions have the occasional healing or other miracle here and there, but nothing like this. And the resurrection of Christ, which is rightly a matter of great focus in Christianity, depends on this Grand Miracle.

The virgin birth is, of course, consistent with this matter of the Incarnation of Christ. That God would come into this world through a pure vessel and would be different from all other men is required. But that is not the main issue. The issue is whether there is in fact someone much greater than nature, someone who is outside of the natural world and yet enormously concerned about this world and its people. And the issue then is whether that Someone did in history step into this world to save us from ourselves.

This is much greater than simply a virgin birth. Coming by means of a virgin birth is a small matter in this context. To reject Christianity based on a virgin birth seems to me rather like rejecting the idea of freedom and democracy because you don't like the foreign policy of America. It misses the point. If you are to reject something it should at least be on the basis of its central teaching.

That entire story of the Incarnation is what Christmas celebrates. It is indeed a Grand Miracle. In the midst of the tragedies of the world around us it reminds me that Christ also experienced tragedy and overcame it as a foretaste of putting tragedy behind us for good. And so I get a small glimpse of the Grand Miracle each year at Christmas. I hope you do as well. Merry Christmas!

Inflatable Christmas

They are all around us: Frosty the Snowman, Snoopy, Christmas trees, and a great many things that don't seem like they are about Christmas at all like rabbits and other animals. They spring up from the ground as darkness falls, as timers turn on fans that inflate them with air and turn on spotlights. Inflatable Christmas has arrived. The rabbi down the street now has an inflatable Hanukiah lamp in his yard, too, having been drawn in by it all.

I enjoy Christmas greatly. I enjoy Christmas trees and especially Christmas music. We generally attend at least 2 choir events for Christmas music and sometimes do more. I listen to the music in my car and with headphones in the gym. I enjoy many of the traditions of the season, including indoor decorations, but I do not like the 'inflatable Christmas'.

It was during my childhood that outdoor decorating with lights first became really popular. Businesses had done some of that prior to those years but private homes really did not get into that in a big way until the 1960's. Prior to then there would be doors with wreaths and  light poles wrapped with greenery or ribbon and some mailboxes that were decorated but not much beyond that. Then the electric lights took hold! I at first found them novel and sometimes nice, but it began to get overdone and gaudy over time. Nowadays I refuse to put up outdoor lights as I find most of it neither attractive nor in the true spirit of the season. The inflatable things strike me as even less desirable.

I don't write this to complain about the neighbors, though. I am not offended or angry about their decorations. Perhaps it adds some joy to the season for them. I find it more sad than offensive; it just seems to miss the point for the most part. Very little of it draws your thoughts to the way the entire world was changed by the birth of a baby in a remote corner of the ancient world, and that is the only reason we celebrate Christmas in the first place.

Perhaps the enchantment with the inflatable Christmas yard decorations will pass as a fad. I hope so. It is not a huge issue but it does make me think that we have our focus in the wrong place.