Divine Simplicity

For my "Christmas" post I'm borrowing a quote from Bono that my brother posted last year. My personal theme for this year has been divine simplicity and it really was started by reading this quote last year:

I remember coming back from a very long tour. I hadn't been at home. Got home
for Christmas, very excited of being in Dublin. Dublin at Christmas is cold, but
it's lit up, it's like Carnival in the cold. On Christmas Eve, I went to St.
Patrick's Cathedral. I went to this place, sat. I was given a really bad seat,
behind one of the huge pillars. I couldn't see anything. I was sitting there,
having come back from Tokyo, or something like that. I went for the singing,
because I love choral singing. Community arts, a specialty! But I was falling
asleep, being up for a few days, traveling, because it was a bit boring, the
service, and I just started nodding off, I couldn't see a thing. Then I started
to try and keep myself awake studying what was on the page. It dawned on me for
the first time, really. It had dawned on me before, but it really sank in: the
Christmas story. The idea that God, if there is a force of Love and Logic in the
universe, that it would seek to explain itself is amazing enough. That it would
seek to explain itself and describe itself by becoming a child born in straw
poverty, in shit and straw ... a child ... I just thought "Wow!" Just the poetry
... Unknowable love, unknowable power, describes itself as the most vulnerable.
There it was. I was sitting there, and it's not that it hadn't struck me before,
but tears came down my face, and I saw the genius of this, utter genius of
picking a particular point in time and deciding to turn on this: love needs to
find form, intimacy needs to be whispered. To me, it makes sense. It's pure
logic. Essence has to manifest itself. It's inevitable. Love has to become an
action or something concrete. It would have to happen. There must be an
incarnation. Love must be made flesh.

Uh oh

Well, what I was afraid of happened tonight. Nice big fat allergy attack with all the trimmings. One person who didn't think perfume included..... perfume..... and I'm down for the count. Spent a chunk of tonight wheezing, crying and trying to remember what day it was. Oh, and trying to figure out if I could get a plane ticket for tomorrow morning and fly home pronto.

The problem is that now I'm much more sensitive for the next couple of days. So, no Christmas Eve church for me. I don't remember the last time I was able to make it through a whole Christmas Eve service without getting sick. Merry Christmas to me.

So, please pray. The next week and a half are jam packed with travel, conference, etc and another incident like tonight will be pretty serious.

Nothing says Christmas cheer like being able to hear your lungs rattle like the ghost of Christmas past!

Tree

Despite feeling horrible with a cold, I finally caved and put up my Christmas tree. I think that's all the decorations that will get up this year. Here's some pictures of the tree and some of the ornaments. Note the Mountie Snowman.

The Nativity Story

On Saturday night I went to see The Nativity Story. I came out glad I had gone, but not overwhelmed by the movie itself. The movie seemed tame. Nothing controversial. Nothing too radical. Just a straightforward telling of the story. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it did seem tame.

The questions that it raised were more interesting than the movie itself.

Issue 1

Seeing the story "come to life" I was struck by the way God chose to use Mary and Joseph. In using a virgin pledged to be married He made them outcasts in their society. People assumed Mary had sinned and when Joseph chose not to divorce her, they assumed he had sinned too. They were confident of their own standing, but it was a hard road for Mary and Joseph. In choosing to be used they put themselves out there for public ridicule, false assumptions and possible death. Their lives would never be the same, for both better and worse.

Issue 2

I had never really thought much about Joseph and this movie really fleshed out his character. Watching the story unfold I was struck by his sacrifice in doing this and the steadfastness of his character. A pregnant fiance followed up by a visit from an angel. Suddenly he's an outcast in his town. Yet he managed to show such leadership and sacrifice.

Issue 3

Journey and preparation. By preparation I mean wearing the right shoes. When they left for Bethlehem, they thought that was the full journey. Then Joseph hears from God that they need to go to Egypt and off they go. Clearly we always need to be prepared with the right shoes so that we're prepared to go when we get the call.

Issue 4

Simplicity. Everything about the way Jesus came into the world was humble and simple. How do we celebrate it? With stress and chaos. Seems wrong.


Just a few of the questions and thoughts going through my mind after the movie. Did anyone else see it?

All Is Well

I've liked Clay Aiken for a very long time. I've loved him live and supported his albums, even though I've never really thought they lived up to his live performances.

Finally this week he came out with an EP that captures his beautiful voice. On top of that, my favorite song of his (O Come O Come Emmanuel) is on there. It's all that I hoped it would be if he ever recorded it and it gives me shivers every time I listen to it. He has an amazing voice and this song (and recording) finally does it justice.

I'm not very into Christmas this year, but this is one way that Christmas 2006 will be outstanding.

Run to Walmart (did I just say that??) to get it. They have the exclusive on it.

Random Mumblings

Today my brain's full of random thoughts and not necessarily one thought strong or cohesive enough for a whole post.

1. What's with Christmas coming? I'm seriously not ready for it. It's not so much the presents (pretty close to done) or the cards (got them started). Mostly I'm just not emotionally ready for Christmas. Who do I talk to about getting another week in November?

2. Three weeks until I jet off to Canada. Whoo hoo! Hoping this year it will be less frantic before I go. I know. I'm naive.

3. I started a new book this week called Let Prayer Change Your Life by Becky Tirabassi. So far it's really interesting and inspiring. I do somewhat suspect (given her reliance on her own experience as a stay at home mom) that you need to be a stay at home mom to let prayer change your life. Anyhow, it's been good to be challenged by her writing about answers to prayer and how often we ignore them. Last night my small group had what could have been a really conflict-ridden night. Instead it was a really good discussion. I came home and thought "Wow - I guess I didn't need to be concerned and pray so much about it." BZZZZ WRONG. Maybe it went well BECAUSE we all prayed so much about it. I can be pretty dense. Maybe this book will beat some of that out of me.

4. This morning one of my non-bosses sends me something for review and comment. I read it, hate it, shred it, send it back to her. Oops. Evidently by "review and comment" she meant "skim and tell me I'm brilliant". You'd think people that work with me would know me well enough to know that when you ask for honest feedback you're going to get it.

5. McDonalds has applied for a patent on the making of sandwiches. That's a little freaky to me. In other news, I'm told Google wants to run my life. They can duke it out with God.

6. Conflict. What's with all the conflict in my life? And what's with these things coming in clumps? Everything seems fine and then one day everyone seems to be at everyone else's throats. Is it something in the water? Was there a memo I didn't see?

Operation Christmas Child

'Tis that time of year again. We did the shopping on Friday night and last night I loaded the box. It's always fun to try to find cool and useful things for the box. Also fun to think (and pray) about the child opening the box.