Hi everyone,

I’m going to be straight up with you all: I’m tired. Usually I take the Sunday between Christmas and New Year’s off, but circumstance this year got in the way of that happening. So while I’d usually be at home recovering from the business of the season, I’m actually here, in the office, pondering biblical texts like I was some sort of scholar.

And you know what? I’m not complaining.

I’m not even complaining about the tiredness, to be honest. The Christmas season is busy, yes of course, but it’s also life giving. It is joyful. It is (for me, at least) the embodiment of much of the faith we profess.

I don’t think Christmas is more important than Easter, but I do think that the themes of Christmas very much show us and remind us of the humility, the compassion, and the love that God has for us all. It’s like God, all powerful and mighty, comes to Earth as a weak little baby who is dependant on a young mother and sleepy father to raise him, to the point where he is thrown into the epitome of human suffering and dies for his beliefs. But then this culminates in Easter with the resurrection, showing us again that God’s love isn’t confined to human understanding or control.

It’s a wild story, and one that gives us meaning, purpose, and sense of who we are and how important we are God. It’s amazing to think, as unlovable as we are, that we are actually dearly and unconditionally loved.

Here are the readings for next week:
Jeremiah 31:7-14
Psalm 147:12-20
Ephesians 1:3-14
John 1:10-18
And a video of these texts being read:

Of course this gospel reading is familiar, as we just read it like twice over the past week. But the addition of verses 15-18 really “flesh” out the story (see what I did there?), in that all these things that God does in the revelation through Jesus is because of love. So entering into our world, the becoming human, the going through what we as people go through, all because of love.

Because to God, we are worth it. We are worth the feeling, the ups and downs, the love that is shown. We are worth saving.

Again, this is what I love about Christmas. That while the whole story of our faith starts like a couple millennia before this, we are shown and reminded of the love of God, culminated in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus that starts with the Christmas story. “God with us” has never been more clear and apparent. That through the presence of Jesus in our lives through the Spirit, we can see God, hear God, and know God intimately as we are lifted up in grace and love and saved by the hands that created the universe.

Thanks be to God! Have a great week, everyone!