A man leaves a party fearing danger.
A man enters a celebration knowing the danger.
A man in the wrong place at the wrong time.
A man in the only place in His time.
Bang Bang Bang - shots fired.
Bang Bang Bang - the yet unheard echo of nails pounded.
A gavel falls - a man goes free.
No gavel present - a man condemned.
Justice mocked.
A mother weeps.
A mother weeps.
Friends despair. No faith in the law.
Friends despair. No faith in forever.
Loved ones arise to carry on.
THE loved one arises to carry all.
While sounding much like Easter – it’s about Christmas. It’s a about a gift. Easter gives us our forever. The gift at Christmas gives us what we hold dear our entire lives; compassion, service, love of others, tolerance, caring, parables to help understanding, prayers to sustain, sacrifice. Pause - think - cherish.
A roof overhead. Clothes on our backs. Food on our table. All gifts.
We have so much in this world and yet there is an extreme focus on what isn’t there. What others have that we don’t.
Family is a gift. Friends are a gift. Children are a gift. Life is too quickly gone. Sometimes an illness - a blurred glimpse down a dark road foretells of the future. Sometimes it is unforeseen and in the blink of an eye and ring of a phone > everything changes. What couldn’t possibly happen has just happened and now NOTHING will ever be same.
Part of the scripture reference for this date on the devotional schedule is the birth narrative in Luke. The last Sunday of the Christian/Liturgical calendar (Christ the King Sunday) is the Sunday before Thanksgiving, leading into the First Sunday of Advent and the scripture reading is again from Luke > but is from chapter 23...part of the crucifixion story. It’s all ONE story - woven into the very fabric of our Christian lives - beginning with a gift.
Let us, this year, re-gift our Christmas present and spread the love that was given all those years ago.
Pause – think – cherish. Merry Christmas.
Steve Matthews
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