Finding Christ in Christmas, Part 1
Spirituality Column #212
November 30, 2010
Current in Carmel - Current in Westfield - Current in Noblesville
(Indianapolis north suburban home newspapers)
Finding Christ in Christmas, Part 1
By Bob Walters
There’s an old theology joke about God playing hide and seek with man.
Everywhere God hid – mountains, oceans, stars, streams, books, paintings, culture, music and magistrates – man found Him. God succeeded only when an angel suggested, “Hide in the human heart; man will never look for You there.”
Then there is Dorothy, who needed only to search her heart and click together the heels of the shoes she was already wearing to find her way home.
And there is the wandering drunk who stumbled upon a riverside revival. He was grabbed and dunked. The third time the unwitting sot was pulled up out of the baptismal waters, the thundering preacher once again demanded, “Have you found Jesus?” The soaked and stammering man gasped, coughed and sputtered, “I-I-I didn’t know I was supposed to be looking for him!”
So, three quick lessons. 1. God is always right here. 2. Home is where our heart is. And 3, the most underrated belief is to simply believe we’re supposed to look for Jesus.
Christmas is a great time to look for Jesus – the person of Christ, the Son of God, the unique and holy Word of God, the salvation of mankind ... the voice crying in the wilderness.
Jesus is especially easy to see this time of year. What does one think all the lights are for?
Notice loving people doing loving things for other people – buying gifts, preparing meals, decorating their homes, being hospitable. That’s the servant heart of the Lord Christ in action.
Yet we also notice the immense efforts of those trying to hide God, cloak Christ and make Christmas about worldly desires. That’s the wicked heart of Satan, the lord of the earth who exalts man over a God who Satan prefers people don’t seek.
At His earthly arrival, Christ wasn’t the powerful conquering warrior for whom the Jewish Nation awaited and prayed. Jesus was a helpless, humble baby born away in a manger to the frightened teenager Mary whose immaculate heart led her to obey God regardless of legitimate earthly peril.
And so Jesus came gently, I like to think, into that still, silent, good night.
Satan vigorously seeks to remove all that gentility, love, servant, humility, salvation stuff from the Christmas story, but commerce and greed are no match for the glory of God in Christ.
So be strong. Seek Jesus, search your heart, and find Christmas.
Walters (www.believerbob.blogspot.com, email rlwcom@aol.com) notes that a great place to start one’s search for Christ is by reading Isaiah 40. More next week.