Dear Trekker,
As Christmas is upon us, “visions of sugar plums dancing in my head” is, frankly, not where I am. But I do experience a host of Christmas hymns and carols ebbing and flowing from my mind to my lips. Singing in the “Messiah” recently aided and abetted that: “King of kings and Lord of Lords” and “He shall Reign forever and ever”. Wow, trekker, that is something to sing about!
Another Christmas ditty has danced in my head: “Oh, there’s no place like home for the holidays. Cause no matter how far away you roam, when you pine for the sunshine of a friendly face, for the holidays, you can’t beat home, sweet home.”
Friend wife and I have spent considerable time in the expatriate world of constant travel and transition, a global village shrunken by internet and intercontinental jet. Where is home for an expat? Expatriates have been around a long time; we’re just called them something else, like aliens, foreigners, global nomads, or “a babe in a manger.” Jesus Himself is the first and truly authentic expatriate. The apostle John calls it well: “The word became flesh and made his home among us.”
The verse of another Christmas song also nails it: “Thou didst leave Thy throne and Thy kingly crown, when thou camest to earth for me; but in Bethlehem’s home there was found no room for Thy holy nativity.” And the last verse of this hymn, which we often do not sing, really grabs me today: “When the heavens shall ring, and the angels sing, at Thy coming to victory, let Thy voice call me home, saying, “Yet there is room, there is room at My side for thee… God is forever calling us to His side! Can we not, too, utter the refrain: “Oh come to my heart, Lord Jesus, there is room in my heart for Thee”.
Now transition with me to the words we prayed aloud in my chapel a couple of weeks ago: “We must confess, however, that we are so intent on celebrating your advent so long ago and speculating on when you will return, that we forget you are ready to come to us now.”
Why is “home” for many of us so elusive? Could home be a relationship, not a place? Since the Garden of Eden we have been looking for “home” where paradise will be restored. And we look for “home in all the wrong places.” In actuality, the New Testament continues to chronicle our wanderings in search of home. Even the disciples and Jews hoped the Baby, now a man, would restore Israel and establish the Kingdom in Jerusalem. They were wrong, and so are we. They and the Jews began to wander and have been for 2,000 years, seeking a place where home, or the Kingdom, is forever restored. So do we roam! Yet, we remain clueless about where home really is.
The Christmas account by physician Luke can lead us back to our true home. The only real theme Luke stresses, three times no less, is that “Mary laid him in a manger because there was no place for them in the inn.” Amazing! I think Luke wanted to stress there was no place for Jesus… period!
Jesus was born in an animal hay manger, no place for a birth of a human baby. Born to his parents on the move, put into a manager, no place special. What does that tell us? Clearly, that God himself entered the world without a home, the first homeless person, to make a home with people who are wondering “where is home”? Home is where Jesus is!
As many in every age, the homeless shepherds were wandering and wondering where to place trust, allegiance, and worship. Why did the angels sing, why did the wise men “rejoice with exceeding great joy”? Simply… no place special had become the birthplace of the Sacred. Amazingly, what irony is present in Christmas! In our worship, in our desire to return “home”, to find peace and happiness, home has come to us! The Kingdom (read paradise) is within! One of my favorite writers and pastors, renowned Presbyterian clergymen Craig Barnes says it well: “Happiness (home) is not a goal to be obtained; it is a grace to be received.”
God became homeless that we might find our home in Him! Oh, that we all would not dwell too long on the first advent, except to realize it is the true beginning of life’s adventure! Oh, that we would not speculate so much about His return. He will come again when “the time is fully come.” He wants to come to us now! His abundant life is now. You and I don’t need to try to get the Christmas spirit; let’s just be honest and head for the manger!
A story circulated some years ago; the gist of it is as follows: A little boy had visited with his parents a manger scene, a crèche, somewhere in Eastern Europe. The parents walked away, the boy lingered. When they returned, they found their son in the manger bed cuddled up to the baby Jesus. When queried why he had done this, he plaintively replied, “I felt so sad because I had no gift to bring the baby. I thought he might be cold, so alone there, I wanted to cuddle up beside him and keep him warm.”
What a truth! Home is a relationship with Jesus. Jesus became homeless, separated from the Father for 33 years that we might find our home with Him. Oh trekker, head for the manger. Get in bed with Jesus and snuggle up to Him. He will warm your heart and give you the Christmas spirit. And you will warm His.
Rejoicing with exceeding great joy, your fellow trekker,
Jim Meredith
