...but that couldn't be farther from the truth, could it?
Our humanity is what makes our holiness accessible. Our humanity makes holiness not seem like an impossible ideal, but instead a glorious place of love, acceptance, mercy, and joy.
What has flagged that for me this Christmas? My mom.
My mom doesn't tend to get the "shout-out" she has earned in my life, probably because of the centrality she plays. You don't notice the importance of breathing - you just do it everyday, every moment...and that's sort of how my mom is. She is SO MUCH of who I am that I don't even know how to recognize and honor her importance.
At Thanksgiving, we had a "discussion" where she said, "Can we just stop making fun of me for my short-comings? It's always funny to bring up the things that I do wrong. Well, it's not funny to me!"
...and it's true. We often have a really good laugh at my mom's antics...like the bumper boats incident. Those moments are inscribed into our shared family experience. ...but, we don't laugh at the them because they highlight her imperfection - I love them because they highlight her accessibility. Her realness. Her willingness to put herself out there...and show her vulnerabilities - and to laugh at the outcome when it wasn't ideal.
My mom's willingness to be herself, to allow her "imperfections" to be displayed makes me love her more. My mom's immediate reaction to a problem with, "Shit. Shit! Shit! Shit!" makes me love her more. If she responded beatifically to every situation, well, I think we would be the most insufferable people. Completely inaccessible to others. Unrelatable. Untouchable. Separate. Removed.
Instead, she is the person to whom I can give a gift that combines two seemingly unrelated things:
because she is my personal reminder that humanity and holiness dwell together. She can laugh at the message of "Sofa King Bueno" while allowing the immutable truth of Jesus Christ present to us to be the anchor of her soul through the storms of life. ...I think people might say the same of me - and that is often why describing her importance in my life is so difficult. She is my first teacher and my best friend.
Humanity and holiness dwelling together. My friends, this is the Christmas Mystery. That the Creator of the Universe, God from God, Light from Light...could even put on our flesh and become human - that is mystery itself. ...but the fact that this God would choose to put on humanity...that is love itself.
Our image of holiness is one that is removed. separate. untouchable. ...because our sin doesn't allow us to encounter holiness. The effect of coming close to the fire of holiness would be to burn away to impurities and the imperfections - and that seems scary. To encounter the fire of holiness in our state would certainly be our undoing, our end.
The idea of God often seems far from us. God is removed from us. Separate. ...unreachable...untouchable...unrelatable.
...which is why the Incarnation, God becoming flesh, Light entering the world in the form of a person should bring us to our knees - out of sheer awe and relief and worship and joy.
Jesus, who did not believe equality with God was something which should be grasped,
humbled himself and taking the form of a man,
and finding himself in the form of a man, submitted to death - even death on the cross -
that at his name, every knee should bow on heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue proclaim that "Jesus is Lord!"
The miracle of Christmas is humanity and holiness reunited, knit together in the form of Jesus Christ. Jesus - the baby in the manger, born in the humblest of places into a working-class family...
Jesus - the teenager who senses his calling, who knows he is meant for more - submits to his parents' desire for him to stay home and near them...growing in grace and favor;
Jesus - the teacher, inspiring and confusing;
Jesus - the miracle worker, loving and noticing and touching and healing - the unlovable, the forgotten, the untouchable, the broken;
Jesus - the prophet, speaking words of truth that divide soul & spirit, right from might;
Jesus - the prince of peace and the stumbling block;
Jesus - in a manger, in his mother's arms.
Jesus - in a temple, sitting among his teachers.
Jesus - in a boat. on a beach. at a well, speaking to individuals, to friends, to the masses.
Jesus - at a dinner with his friends, reclining at table.
Jesus - praying for a miracle. desperate for a resolution. seeking consolation.
Jesus - taking up his cross, and shouldering the mantle of his calling.
Jesus - bearing all the brunt of hatred, power, man's inhumanity to man, our sin and all that has separated us from the holiness of his Father....he took it all upon him. ALL.
Everything that separated us from the presence of holiness himself: God the Father, Jesus destroyed through that cross. Everything. EVERY THING. including death.
For me, the images that evoke Jesus' humanness the most are his prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane and his crown of thorns. I see in those two images the very image of what it means to be human - to wrestle with the weight of suffering and death, the vulnerability to be scared and tell God about it, and to find the love and the strength to endure cruelty, pain, and the worst. excruciatingly painful and humiliation - and love and forgive - to do it all willingly and with overflowing love: that is what it means to be holy.
In his humanity and through his holiness, Jesus has been the restoration of our life. He has redeemed our lives through love. In him and through him: holiness and humanity can dwell together in harmony once again. They are not ying-and-yang. It is our true self, our true calling. Humanity and holiness dwelling in harmony.
Only possible through Jesus Christ, the God-Man. This Christmas, let us throw off all that hinders us and coming running into the arms of our Savior and Lord. This reconciliation - this is the greatest gift.
...and it enables us to look at the circumstances of life knowing that it's sofa king bueno because it really is well with our souls.
Merry Christmas!
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