It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas everywhere I go.  Shops have had their festive decorations up for quite some time.  Every time you go into town you can see people carrying boxes, wrapping paper and all things to do with the Christmas season.  As far as I am concerned, the cards have been bought and written - well most of them anyway.  Some need to be posted early to go abroad, others to different parts of the UK and others I can deliver by hand locally.  Presents are either bought or ordered.  Some are already wrapped but still quite a lot to do.  Tomorrow (Sunday) is the first Sunday of Advent.  The last day of November is when I usually sort out the tree and decorations ready to be in place for the 1st of December.  So I guess you could say 'it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas'.  Or is it?  At least it's like what we in the west have made it become.

It's actually nothing like the very first Christmas.  How different!  There was no tinsel or decorations, no turkey dinner with family, no relaxing and being entertained.  The King of Kings was not surrounded by servants or lived in a palace with all the comforts of the hierarchical, rich lifestyle of those in authority.  Paul in his letter to the Philippians describes it as God emptying himself into the physical, human presence of his son.  This emptying was expressed by being born illegitimately to a young teenager in a place that was kept for the animals.  No family or friends to visit and celebrate.  Instead he was visited by lowly workers doing the night shift and foreigners who probably didn't even speak the same language as Mary and Joesph.  The subsequent years of his infancy were spent as a refugee, an asylum seeker, an immigrant in a foreign land.  He knew from experience what it was like to be hungry and a stranger and to be fed and accepted and taken in.  He had lived life in the lowly margins of society.  He emptied himself until there was no more to give.  

Having said all that, I do love Christmas and I love to celebrate as we do now with decorations, great food and exchanging of presents with loved ones.  And I don't suggest for one minute that we should stop doing that.  Be happy, enjoy time with family and friends, taste the good food, relax and enjoy the break but spare a thought for those who maybe have to work over the holidays.  Be thankful for what we have but remember that there are some who don't have a place to stay or family to share Christmas dinner with.  Some people now, instead of sending and posting Christmas cards, are giving the money they would have spent on that to a charity in order to help feed the hungry or give a bed to the homeless.  I must admit that I haven't done that, (I like the idea of greeting friends with a card) but I admire those who do. 

An activity that many engage in over the months leading up to Christmas is the filling of a shoebox with goodies to send to a child in some far away place.  This week I read of a young Filipino girl who 14 years ago received a shoebox at Christmas sent from a young boy in America through the very well known Operation Christmas Child scheme.  She was so grateful for that gift that she later tried to contact the boy to thank him.  She was unsuccessful but later in life, she was able through the social media to make contact with him .  Their friendship grew until recently they got married and for wedding presents they requested that people donate shoeboxes for the charity to continue the work that had brought them together.  You can read the full story here.

I guess that to make it really look like Christmas, we should enjoy the festivities but also give something of ourselves, empty out a little of the much that we have in order to help others, a kind of antidote to the madness of Black Friday.  That is the real message of Christmas and what God meant Christmas to look like.  'Insomuch as you have done it unto the least of these, you have done it unto me.'  Emmanuel - God emptying himself into every walk of life for all people everywhere.  That really is something to celebrate!


   

Transformers

Turbo snail

I was looking for a Christmas gift for the small son of a nephew of mine.  There is so much to choose from!  I eventually found a book about an ordinary garden snail who dreamed of being fast and having adventures.  One day he had an accident with a vehicle on a busy road and then discovered that he had been transformed into Turbo.  He could now race along as quickly as other creatures.  The book continues describing some of the things he got up to.  

One of the many transformers

There are lots of toys that actually can be transformed into something else - transformers.  We all know the films that are so popular among children (and dare I say grown-ups also?)  They look like ordinary vehicles, a car, lorry, pick-up truck, helicopter or some other vehicle and drive around with their human friends.  Then when there is trouble they suddenly transform themselves into some life-saving, human- defender and protector and of course always save the day.  The thing about each of these examples is that there is no need for any add-on bits.  You only need what is already there to transform the toy from  an ordinary object into some super being.

Maybe as grown-ups we could take a lesson from the children.  We are always searching for something else.  We think that 'if only I had that opportunity' or 'I wish I were more like so-and-so'.  Paul, writing to the Romans says that we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.  He didn't advocate that we go looking for add-ons.  The children sing a song, 'And I just thank you Father for making me me'.  Again the children teach us wisdom in their simplicity.

Ainsley Harriott with chefs and contestants

It reminded me of the programme that used to be so popular on TV - Ready, Steady Cook.  The competing chefs could use basic ingredients like eggs, milk, flour, herbs and spices but for the other ingredients, they were only allowed to use what the contestants had brought them.  They had to make some interesting, tasty and innovative meal with what they had been given.  They couldn't bring any hidden extras or their favourite special ingredients, just what had been handed to them.  Sometimes they apologized saying that with this or that extra ingredient they would have made such and such but they still managed to come up with a great dish that their contestant enjoyed.  I enjoyed watching the programme as it gave me some good ideas for something different but also, I think, helped people to realize that you could do something good just with what you already had.

The other day I watched Neil Diamond on TV and was struck by a song I hadn't heard before.  It is basically a love song but I couldn't help thinking of it as a worship song and singing it to God.  It's called The Art of Love: (Try thinking of God as 'she'.)

She said, it's time to teach you the art of love.
She said we're gonna reach to the heart of love.
A place you never knew,
A place that lives somewhere inside of you.

Neil Diamond

You made me see I'd have to be
A brand new man, he lives in me.
So here in me is where I began. 

You showed the kind of lesson I can't erase.
You showed a way to get from that lonely place
To where love comes alive
And you'd be waiting there when I arrived.

The truth was clear,
Love's not a place you go to find.
It lives in here, just leave it space, give it time.
I learned that I could stumble and maybe fall.
I learned in being humble I'd have it all.
A brand new way to live,

God makes each of us the unique person we are and transforms us not by adding bits on or taking bits off but by renewing what is deep inside.  God, who is true Love, lives inside of each of us.  We don't really need to go anywhere to look for Him.  He is already within  our innermost being.  We just need to look within and be transformed into the person He wants us to be.  We are the people we have been waiting for.  All we need is to look inside ourselves and go with what the spirit deep within us is saying.  Transformers, not by adding extras and becoming different people but to be the people He made us to be with what He already has given us.  Transformed and come alive by the power of His love that is inside. .  

Everywhere, All The Time

This week I can't seem to get away from the fact that God is everywhere, all the time - maybe because He IS everywhere, all the time.  I guess the thought process really began last week when an online friend blogged about breathing God.  He talked about the Hebrew word for God, Yahweh, and how that really referred to breathing so that even just breathing you were actually saying the word Yahweh.  If you have 2-3 minutes you can read his blog entry by clicking here.  It is the post dated 6th November entitled Breathing.  The point I'm making is that all life breathes all the time wherever it finds itself.  In the beginning God breathed life into the universe, His breath, His presence into everything.  No life exists without His living breath and presence within it.  


Then this week another friend shared on Facebook the picture opposites saying in the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson that wise people see miracles in ordinary things.   It seems to me that we tend to go looking here, there and everywhere for some expression of the power of God when He's all around us in the ordinary, everyday life.  I have often mentioned and will always be amazed at the cycle of nature and the seasons.  The very variety and detail of creation is astounding and documentaries seem to come up with new things all the time.  Some people have a tendency to imply that God can be found only in certain places or certain situations or certain times as though you need to go through some formula (usually involving special music, readings or prayers) of conjuring up His presence, even asking Him to come and be with us when God Himself clearly says that He is in all thing all the time.  Jesus also told us that the Holy Spirit is within us.


A couple of days ago the thoughts on God being everywhere continued when I read the daily meditation of Richard Rohr.  He is a Roman Catholic Franciscan priest whose daily meditations give much food for the soul.  You can subscribe to receive his daily thoughts on the website here and enter your details at the right hand side to subscribe.  He quotes Boniface when he says, 'By God's power, presence and essence, God is the one whose centre is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.  God exists uncircumscribed in everything.' meaning that God is everywhere.  Boniface goes on to say:

God is therefore all inclusive.  God is the essence of everything.  God is most perfect and immense within all things but not enclosed, outside all things but not excluded, above all things but not aloof, below all things but not debased.  Finally therefore, this God is all in all ... ... Consequently from Him, through Him and in Him, all things exist.



He is so powerful, He is everywhere at all times.  He is so spectacular, He makes so many miracles look like ordinary.  His presence is alive in every breath of every life form.  God is in everything and everything is in God.  It's time to stop searching here, there and everywhere.  Wherever I am, He is.  Or as St. Francis said 'The whole world is our cloister'.  As long as I breathe, He is within me.  Or as the song says, 'This is the air I breathe, your holy presence living in me.'   He is Yahweh, the I AM, the ever present breath of life, everywhere, all the time.

Remembering - Then and Now

During these days of remembering, I have been doing just that.  I was born during WW 2 and so have limited actual memories of my own but it's strange how some things stick in your mind.  I have a vague recollection of having to leave the house and take cover in the shelter outside whenever the siren sounded because planes were flying overhead at night.  As a toddler, I wasn't aware of the real danger.  It was more of an adventure.  I remember the blackout blinds at the windows and when we had to put the lights on as little as possible.  I remember the gas lights on the walls of the living room that seemed to cast strange shadows everywhere.  There are other memories of gas masks and sirens.  Even after the war had ended, I would run into the house afraid whenever an aeroplane flew overhead.  Over time things change and we do forget about disturbed nights when you had to run for shelter.  Nowadays we tend to use excessive energy on lighting our homes (and our paths, driveways and gardens)   Aeroplanes overhead now signify holidays abroad and good times, certainly nothing to be afraid of.


My Dad was a miner and so his work was deemed necessary to the war effort so he didn't join others as a soldier.  Instead as well as his regular job as a miner, producing the necessary coal, he had to do some work as a civilian so he was enlisted in the Fire Brigade while one of his brothers had to work as a porter in the hospital.  Two jobs but paid for one, all to help the nation.  Nowadays people might have two jobs for purely selfish gain to supplement their income in order to acquire more stuff and have more exotic holidays.  Money was always a bit tight so Dad used to make our toys (in the little spare time he had)  We had a beautiful, big dolls' house, a rocking horse and scooters each, all made out of wood while Mam would make things to put into the dolls' house.  How things have changed over the years.  How many children (or parents for that matter) would be quite content with homemade toys?


I remember one day my mother heard through the grapevine that there were some bananas for sale at the greengrocers in the town.  So off she went with all the family's ration books to use our food coupons to buy some fruit.  We stood in the queue for about half and hour and  were rewarded with the opportunity of buying a pound (weight) of bananas.  You could only buy what your coupon allowance permitted.  What a difference now!  I can go to the local supermarket and buy how much I want of whatever fruit or vegetable I like from just about anywhere in the world whenever I want.  I don't need to queue for half an hour.  I just go around and help myself to what I want.  I can even get it delivered to my house.

My Mam, Dad, elder brother and sister (my younger sister was born almost at the end of the decade) and me all lived with my grandma in a large 3 storey house along with my great grandma, four generations all together.  Next door to us another family of a woman and her 3 children also lived with relatives.  Her husband and my uncle (my mother's brother) were away doing their bit for the country but I can remember clearly the day my uncle arrived back and I saw him for the first time.  Sadly the gentleman whose family lived next door didn't make it.  So while we were happy there was a poor widow with 3 young children facing the future without the man of the house.  One of my Dad's brothers had been a prisoner of the Japanese on the infamous Siam railway.  He also came home safely and went on to live well into his 90s.  It is not just the soldiers who suffer.  For every one who doesn't make it, there is a family who has to face the future without him/her.


Lest we forget.  Let's remember the struggles, the danger, the make-do-and-mend attitude, limited resources in many areas of life, the challenges faced on a daily basis by those on the front line and those who remained at home to keep things ticking over.  Thank God for those who survived.  Cherish what we have now, taking nothing for granted.  Everything has a price.  We live the way we do today because others paid a high price.  But if we don't remember and learn, if we go on fighting wars and killing each other, if we take all our affluence and abundance for granted without a second thought, then they gave their all for nothing.  They did what they did so that it wouldn't happen again.  They aren't here to struggle for us again.  It's up to us to honour their memory by living and striving for peace and to learn to share the one planet we have with tolerance.  One world, one humanity, one life.  Let's make it work LEST WE FORGET.
. 

IMHO

It's that time of year when people voice their strong opinions on a couple of topics in particular.  We have just seen another Halloween when children enjoy the dressing up and it's ok for them to go knocking on doors expecting some sweet treat.  Opinions vary on religious grounds about elevating evil and witchcraft.  Some say it's all just innocent fun while others insist that there is nothing innocent about the occult.  Some don't have a problem with the spiritual aspect but are irritated by the interruption of their evening by the constant knocking on the door and the expectation of being given some sweets.  On the other hand, is all that sweet stuff really good for children or their teeth, apart from the expectation factor of 'I'm a child so you should give me a treat'?  Originally of course Halloween was about Hallowed Eve when the lives of saintly people no longer with us are remembered.  Strange how over time things get a bit twisted and changed - a bit like Christmas when some big bearded man in a red cloak now takes centre stage.

There was the same sort of reaction when Harry Potter first came to our consciousness.  There was a great deal of divided opinion among Christians in particular.  Some looked for some deep spiritual message in the stories while again others claimed that dabbling in the world of the occult is dangerous.  I have to admit that my own opinion was in the latter camp of opposition.  I think much of this was influenced by the particular group of Christians with whom I associated at that time.  Since leaving institutional church gatherings I have watched all of the Harry Potter films and have to admit that I have enjoyed them all and, yes, have found some worthwhile lessons in the stories.

The other, often divisive topic at the moment is about Remembrance Day and the wearing of poppies in particular.  Should we conform and wear the red poppy or should we make a statement by wearing a white poppy for peace.  It seems a shame that the whole original idea of the poppy of the British Legion has been hijacked by those who seem to have made it more about patriotism and Britishness than remembering the horrors of war and being determined to strive for peace.  Some very right wing elements have taken to selling cheap copies of the original British Legion poppy and instead of the money going to help soldiers and their families it is actually going to their own political coffers.  Some TV stations seem to oblige anyone appearing on their programmes to wear a poppy while ITV have accepted a difference of opinion of one their newscasters who made the decision not to wear a poppy on air (although she does support the whole idea and wears one herself on Remembrance Day)  You can see her valid reasoning here.  Meanwhile some British Muslim women have taken to wearing scarves designed with poppies to show their solidarity as British citizens and remember Muslims who died fighting for Britain in WW1.  You can read about it here.

I smile when I hear people say or see them write 'in my humble opinion' or just 'IMHO'.  It would be nice if that is what they really meant - humble and opinion.  But often that is code for 'I don't agree with you, you're wrong and I'm going to put you right!'  We have differences of opinion on most things in life not just the obvious ones I've mentioned but from Marmite to the value of space travel.  We differ in our views on politics, religion, the death penalty, the right for workers to strike, fox hunting, green issues, creation/Big Bang theory, gun laws, health services, immigration ... ... and so we could go on.  It would be a strange world indeed if we were all the same and agreed on everything - how boring!  Our opinions are always influenced by the culture we have grown up in and our experiences in life. Whatever my take on things happens to be, I have to accept that everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I cannot force my opinion on others.  They have had a different life journey so their opinion is bound to be a little different.  It is good for me to be tolerant and remember that it is only my humble opinion and not some great truth written in stone.  And as I have also discovered in my own life, my opinions can change.