A Christmas thought in May...
I'm doing some things a little out-of-order this year for my prep week - I'm going through my regular grid of laying out the Lectionary Scriptures and finding themes and things, but I'm also prepping Christmas and Easter (and their respective seasons) as the first priority. Everything else will fall into place on Thursday and Friday, I'm sure.
So, I just wanted to have a Christmas thought preserved here - a little early, but it's better than a simple bookmark. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German pastor during WWII who was part of the (illegal) Confessing Church and an indirect part of the plot to kill Hitler; he was arrested and imprisoned for his participation in the plot and was executed on April 9, 1945. I am determined to get to know who and what he was, and so I've tried to read a number of his works and try to grasp some of his thoughts. He wrote this about what Christmas actually means some years before his death...
Those Who Go to the Manger Will Be Transformed
If God chooses Mary as his instrument, if God himself wants to come into this world in the manger at Bethlehem, that is no idyllic family affair, but the beginning of a complete turnaround, a reordering of everything on the earth. If we wish to take part in this Advent and Christmas event, then we cannot simply be bystanders or onlookers, as if we were at the theater, enjoying all the cheerful images. No, we ourselves are swept up into the action there, into this conversion of all things.
We have to play our part too on this stage, for the spectator is already an actor. We cannot withdraw.
What part, then, do we play? Pious shepherds, on bended knee? Kings who come bearing gifts? What sort of play is this, where Mary becomes the mother of God? Where God enters the world in the lowliness of the manger?
The judgment of the world and its redemption - that is taking place here. And the Christ child in the manger is himself the one who pronounces the judgment and redemption of the world. He repels the great and the powerful. He puts down the might from their thrones, he humbles the arrogant, his arm overpowers all the proud and the strong, he raises what is lowly and makes it great and splendid in his compassion.
Therefore we cannot approach his manger as if it were the cradle of any other child. Those who wish to come to his manger find that something is happening within them.
So, I just wanted to have a Christmas thought preserved here - a little early, but it's better than a simple bookmark. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German pastor during WWII who was part of the (illegal) Confessing Church and an indirect part of the plot to kill Hitler; he was arrested and imprisoned for his participation in the plot and was executed on April 9, 1945. I am determined to get to know who and what he was, and so I've tried to read a number of his works and try to grasp some of his thoughts. He wrote this about what Christmas actually means some years before his death...
Those Who Go to the Manger Will Be Transformed
If God chooses Mary as his instrument, if God himself wants to come into this world in the manger at Bethlehem, that is no idyllic family affair, but the beginning of a complete turnaround, a reordering of everything on the earth. If we wish to take part in this Advent and Christmas event, then we cannot simply be bystanders or onlookers, as if we were at the theater, enjoying all the cheerful images. No, we ourselves are swept up into the action there, into this conversion of all things.
We have to play our part too on this stage, for the spectator is already an actor. We cannot withdraw.
What part, then, do we play? Pious shepherds, on bended knee? Kings who come bearing gifts? What sort of play is this, where Mary becomes the mother of God? Where God enters the world in the lowliness of the manger?
The judgment of the world and its redemption - that is taking place here. And the Christ child in the manger is himself the one who pronounces the judgment and redemption of the world. He repels the great and the powerful. He puts down the might from their thrones, he humbles the arrogant, his arm overpowers all the proud and the strong, he raises what is lowly and makes it great and splendid in his compassion.
Therefore we cannot approach his manger as if it were the cradle of any other child. Those who wish to come to his manger find that something is happening within them.