“All so very ordinary”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Wednesday, December 25, 2024
Luke 2:1-14 (Forward, p. 57) CEV p. 1056
Apart from its cosmic and life-changing consequences, the story of Jesus’ birth is hardly remarkable at all. In fact, it is all so very ordinary:
First of all, the taxes, and the taking of a census to assure the
orderly, efficient, and systematic collection of taxes. Doesn’t that
sound like governments everywhere? Don’t you think that they do
their level best to ensure that they don’t miss out on anyone? And, in
an age before computerized records isn’t this an ideal way of
accomplishing this?
Then there’s the fact of having to ‘return home’: in a world of such
mobility and transience its hardly surprising that many of the people
who had roots in Bethlehem had moved away. It is even truer today.
And the matter of travelling, at such a perilous time for Mary: this is
surely nothing new. Many people of a humble and ordinary lifestyle,
many poor people, many pregnant women, many people—like
Joseph, who probably had to stay home to the last minute to earn a
living, have had to put up with such an inconvenience at the behest
of some government. And, to find themselves ‘homeless’, without a
shelter for the night: again, this is pretty ordinary for much of the
world today!
And the shepherds out in the fields, minding their flocks by night.
Well, someone had to do it, and inevitably someone would have
drawn the longest straw and landed the night shift, landed this
onerous, boring, dangerous but oh so essential task. It reminds
me of all the health care, policing, and emergency workers who
end up working this shift. Necessary, but also part of life, then as
now.
And, so the birth of Jesus came amid the most ordinary of times and situations, with ordinary people just like you and me. And, why not, for it was to us, to ordinary people with nothing spectacular to claim as our merit or deserving, that Jesus came to save. Such was God’s incredible love, and gift, now and always. Thanks be to God.
Forward notes: “And she gave birth to her firstborn son” (verse 7a).
“That’s it! This short sentence is all Luke gives us as a description of Jesus’s birth. Before the angels and wandering shepherds, before the arrival of the Magi with three very impractical gifts, Luke gives us a simple picture of a family giving birth.
“We often make the birth into a Hallmark scene with cute fluffy sheep and sweetly singing angels. But I think that misses the point. God comes into our world in the midst of messiness, in the middle of too much to do and too little time. God comes into our world when we have miles to go before we sleep and no time to stop.
“God cares for the world through the small, easily overlooked gestures of love and fidelity, whether the helping hand of a neighbor, a meal offered with love, the sacrifice of a congregation’s traditions for public safety, or the meager words of the preacher. In all these ways, God is at work, still changing, loving, and blessing the world. Perhaps we might find both comfort and courage that God is at work in the many, many small gestures we offer.”
Moving Forward: “Merry Christmas!”