Jesus most definitely said “follow me” to his disciples. Paul said to the Corinthians, “Follow my example as I follow the example of Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1, NIV). There was that famous bracelet a few years ago with the acronym WWJD emblazoned on it: WWJD for What Would Jesus Do? There’s plenty of material in the bible that advises looking at Jesus to find inspiration for the life we should be leading:

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. (Heb. 12:2-3, NIV)

There’s a lot to consider when it comes to Jesus: his care for the poor and downtrodden, his focus on the Father, his prayer life, his compassion, and ultimately his sacrifice and resurrection. But if we all we do is look at Jesus and say, “OK, how can I get some of that behavior into my life” then we’ve missed the boat. Not that we’d be alone.

Peter was all about following Jesus. He hung around Jesus three years and saw incredible things. “We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty,” Peter says. (2 Peter 1:16, NIV). Jesus gave Peter an incredible example to follow. But it wasn’t enough.

The apostle John records the events of the last supper in chapter 13 of his gospel. He tells a story of Jesus getting up from the table, wrapping a towel around his waist and starting to wash his disciples’ feet. This was weird to say the least, but as usual, Jesus was teaching a profound lesson: “Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.” (v.14-15). More of that great “Jesus as role model” stuff.

But if that’s all we take away from the story we leap over a very important element. Before Jesus gives the instruction that goes with the example, he approaches Peter. Peter was less than enthusiastic about Jesus washing his feet. “No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.” OK, so he was emphatic about it. But look at Jesus’ retort: “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”

Check out this video which captures the idea: Jesus Washed Me in the Washing Machine

It’s not enough to look at Jesus, appreciate his teachings, show up at one of his churches, give money to his purposes. You’ve got to let him clean you up first. Think about the story Jesus tells about people really following his example in the grandest, most spectacular ways:

Many will say to me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?” Then I will tell them plainly, “I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!” (Matthew 7:22-23, NIV)

 If you want salvation, if you want forgiveness of sins, if you want eternity with God, then doing things will never be enough, even as close to the example of Jesus you may get. The most important and first thing you need to do, before trying to follow His example, is let him clean you up:

But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior (Titus 3:4-6, NIV)

So really, the biggest question when it comes to Jesus is not “Are you following him?” but “Are you washed up?” Ask Jesus to clean you up and make you presentable to the Father. Get washed up today.

I couldn’t remember the exact date of the baby dedication but I finally tracked down the day and time from a combination of my journals, photo albums and the computer hard drive.

As I was skimming my journals I read through a few entries. At this point in our church’s history we met in a coffee shop and bistro. I read in one day’s entry that a friend of ours, Benjy, had attended. It would be several years before Benjy accepted Christ, but it was good to remember how his journey with God first intersected with our church oh so many years ago.

There were names in those journal entries I’d forgotten but apparently Julia and I had some in-depth conversations with these folks. One of them was a young Japanese woman named Yunni. I wrote in that day’s entry that she and Julia had talked for quite a while. Julia didn’t really remember Yunni. I remember Yunni didn’t know Christ. We only saw her a couple times then, poof, like a cloud on a summer day, she blew out of our lives.

There were other names, some familiar, others just raising a glancing recollection of a church service or some social function they attended. There were names more enduring in their impact, but whose situations had changed since I wrote my journal entry eight years before. One young couple had just moved to our area back then. That couple is now, quite sadly, getting a divorce. Another couple had just adopted a little girl from China. Since then they adopted another little girl, who stayed with our family the other afternoon. The connections and intersections continue.

And today, as I was reading Facebook, my buddy Dean wrote on his status update that he had been thinking about this quote from Gandalf in Lord of the Rings: “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”

This reminded me of Ephesians 5:15-17:

Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.

I started reflecting on that journal of mine from 2002 and those observations about life back then: Julia and Bethany singing a silly version of Take Me Out to the Ballgame, building a Lego fort with the kids, having neighbors over for dinner and remembering those neighbors moved a couple years back (hopefully not because of that dinner , managing a conflict with people who no longer attend our church.

Just reading those journal entries reminded me of some of those situations and interactions from a summertime that seems so, so long past. If not for the journal I would likely have no recall of many of these things. I marvel at God’s ability to keep track of our ethereal existence. “What is your life?” James asks in chapter 4 of his book. “You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.”

I have a hard enough time keeping track of my own thought life and schedule, let alone the thought life and schedule of millions of other people. And then of course, assessing how that use of time matches up with passages like Ephesians 5: forget it! Literally! Have I redeemed today, this moment, this conversation, for God? I’m in total agreement with Paul:

I care very little if I am judged by you or by any human court; indeed, I do not even judge myself. Wait till the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of men’s hearts. At that time each will receive his praise from God.  (1 Cor. 4:3,5 NIV)

Only an infinite, all-knowing, personal God could keep track of my vapor trails in the lives of others and vice versa. To me, an important conversation or an act of kindness, or conversely, a terse response or mean thought, can skirt in and out of consciousness with barely a notice. But not with God.

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. (2 Cor. 5:10, NIV)

So my prayer is just this: Lord, help me be a faithful witness of your love and truth TODAY. Because TODAY is all I have. And I may not remember TODAY tomorrow. And that’s OK. Because I can trust all my “todays” to his gracious and fair judgment and keep moving with confidence toward the big DAY when I meet Jesus.

In other respects, he’s the same kid I’ve always known. He watches edgier movies these days and his humor can be a little borderline, but he can still sit down to watch a Disney movie or play a Pokemon board game with his little brother and enjoy it. That’s one of the things I really appreciate about David. He’s different at 18 from when he was 13 or 10 or 5, but he’s not unrecognizable.

I’ll probably get more wistful about my oldest on that day we drop him off at Ohio State in a couple months. Memories of family trips, school projects, sports, band concerts, etc. will probably flood my mind. I’m sure Julia and I will have a nice, long conversation on the way home. It will be strange.

But I don’t worry that David will become a stranger to us. His foundation is solid in his faith, family and friends. Instead of a complete makeover at college, I’m assuming higher education will just add to the framework that’s already there. I know that he will be challenged in his beliefs but I count that as good. Only if he’s challenged and thinks things through will his beliefs about God and Jesus and life become his own.

But I feel confident that in the midst of the transformation from teenager to adult, I’ll still be able to see David. I pray that at his core I’ll still be able to spot that fun-loving, dry-witted, thoughtful, problem-solving, smart goofball who plays soccer with his little brother and makes verbal pokes (and a few physical ones) at his little sister. 

I guess the feeling I have is maybe a little peek into the way God sees us, as King David relates in Psalm 139:

O LORD, you have searched me
       and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise;
       you perceive my thoughts from afar.

You discern my going out and my lying down;
       you are familiar with all my ways.  (v.1-3)

The Lord is familiar with all our ways. I don’t know David as well as Jesus knows David. So if David goes way off course, Christ can truly say (and know what He’s talking about), “So, David, why are you over here when you should be over there?” or “David my son, this is what I made you for, good job.”  God looks into our hearts and understands what’s happening, from our most noble thoughts to our darkest inclinations.

And He can call us back to who we really are. Kind of like that scene near the end of the Lion King, where Mufasa, the former king, surges forward from the clouds to speak with his son Simba and says, with authority, “You are more than what you have become. Remember who you are.” 

I pray for good brothers in the faith for David who will help him change in ways that God desires. I pray for a love of God’s word that will speak to his heart and motivate and challenge him. And lastly, I pray David always remembers who he is: the son of Clem and Julia, but more importantly, a child of the Most High God. If he remembers that then everything else will just be fine, no matter what changes come. Happy Birthday son.

There were farm animals to pet and some age-appropriate rides. They had this really cool car ride for little kids. There were six lanes of miniature race cars, each car straddling a single metal guide rail so the grade-schooler wouldn’t go careening into other cars. You could turn the steering wheel and the car would respond, but the wheels would hit that guide rail and the car would stay in its own lane. But you still controlled velocity – at least as much velocity as a suped-up lawnmower engine could muster. And you were in a race with all the other mini-cars on the track. Very, very cool. Great ride. Haven’t seen anything like it since.

When things maybe weren’t so great in life, if my folks told me we were going to Fantasy Farm I could daydream about it because I knew what it looked like. Just that vision of my not-so-distant future was enough to lift me, even if temporarily, beyond my present troubles.

Even with places I hadn’t been before, if I knew the place was pretty cool because other friends had been there, that could sustain me through all kind of tests, homework, boredom, anxieties, fears, etc.

When we know something about the place we’re going or an event we’re going to attend, even if it’s based on information from others, its easy to get excited about it, to anticipate it. Our mind turns in circles picturing how it will be. Those little imaginings can tide us over till the weekend comes, vacation starts or the holiday arrives. While we can’t really “see” the destination or the occasion, we can picture it, and we can bide our time and live in the current situation till the good times begin. We’re waiting for something we can’t see presently.

And that’s the funny thing about eternal life. We do know someone who’s been there – namely Jesus – and he’s described some features of what that next life will be like. The Apostle John says we’ll be like Jesus post-resurrection (see 1 John 3:2). I described that to my 7 year old one day: appearing and disappearing at will, walking through walls, flying through the air, no more being sick or injuries, but still able to hang out with buddies, eat as many gummy bears and ice cream as you want and never get sick. Mark was pretty psyched. Essentially, we get to be superheroes that never die and never have to drink bad-tasting cough medicine again. How good is that?

Now, I imagine this was super motivating for the early disciples. They got to share fish and chips with Jesus for several weeks after Easter and hear all about this many times over (look at Acts 1:3). I know that I’m blessed more than them because Jesus himself has moved in (see John 16:7). But even still, there’s a way in which I have to battle some ambivalence about what’s yet to come.

This must be one of the reasons that the author of Hebrews stresses that which isn’t known over that which was known. Over the over the author of Hebrews points his readers back to that which was not visible yet – the fully realized kingdom of God on earth, led by King Jesus himself. The temptation for the first century Jewish Christians, especially in the heat of persecution, was to return to Judaism and the Old Testament game plan, even though Jesus had clearly fulfilled what the Old Testament pointed toward. But when times are tough we tend to revert to what’s known. It’s comforting. What an act of faith to lean against our desire for the safe and secure and keep looking for the “city that is to come.” (Hebrews 13:14). And that’s what we’re called to do.

When it comes to the next life, I don’t have many personal recollections to draw on. I can’t reflect on the good times I had last time I went flying through the rings of Saturn without the aid of a spacesuit. Or how cool it was to eat five pieces of super rich chocolate cake and not gain an ounce. Instead of trusting in the good times I have to trust in the good-time giver. As Paul tells Timothy, “I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day” (2 Timothy 1:12).  As I’ve trusted Christ in the middle of very real difficulties and seen him come through, it gives me assurance I can trust what he said about a future it’s hard to wrap my imagination around. So go ahead and distrust the ambivalence of the hard-to-picture and put your confidence in the One who can be trusted more than anyone or anything, especially in the hard times. That’s no fantasy at all.

"Captain, I do believe the director is messin' with the back story of all our characters. Should I ready the photon torpedoes?"

I watched the latest Star Trek cinematic offering this week, which of course makes me a latecomer into this discussion. I’d been wanting to watch this film with the family. I’m a mid-level Trek fan, having seen all the films except for the last one with the Next Generation crew. I was a little concerned about possible sexual content but there’s one heavily implied scene, but no nudity, and we fast forwarded past that part anyway. Even still I was looking forward to a fun, thoughtful, engaging film. But the further the movie we went, the more I realized I was getting agitated. Was it the time travel plot device? No, not a problem. Star Trek has employed that little strategy more than once, especially to delightful results in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. No, the problem wasn’t the time travel ploy, but director JJ Abrams ultimate target: changing the back story of all the characters. Like a Klingon warbird cloaked to deceive the Enterprise into a trap, Abrams use of time travel is presumed to be about creating an interesting storyline. But no, fair fan, his final destination is the total annihilation of the previously known histories of the main characters. That Abrams be a crafty one capn’.  

I must warn you now that I’ll be revealing a few details that may spoil the movie for you. As we watched, I noticed things that didn’t seem right: James T. Kirk has always had a swagger, but according to this film, it’s because his father died on the day of his birth and he never had a strong role model. He’s kind of a space version of Maverick from Top Gun now. Spock comes off not as the logical, eyebrow-raising, cool, analytical type, but a half-blood outcast with passive aggressive tendencies. One scene has him beating the bejeebers out of another Vulcan kid. Huh? And then midway through the film, you notice Uhuru pulling up alongside Spock and putting both hands on his face and giving him a pretty sensuous smooch on the cheek. It gets worse, but not indecent. Just wierd. Oh yeah, another spoiler, if you ever watched the movie series or prior films, Spock’s mom shows up here and there. In this film, she’s killed off early. You think Abrams might use the time travel tactic to restore everything, but no, she remains dead in this new Star Trek reality Abrams has created.  

Now, I realize Star Trek is fictional entertainment. Why not mess with the stories of the characters? It’s just film fun. I’m sure many people will think, “This is no biggie, get over it.” I can get over it. Star Trek doesn’t hold that much sway over the way I look at life. But I have to admit, I’m troubled by Abram’s decision to muck with the back story on the characters. Presumably he did this to set up another edgier run at reviving the franchise. But what if we did that with other storylines that aren’t just hip enough for this cool, angst-ridden generation of Millenials. Captain Ahab – come on, there’s got to be some picked-on little brother psych things going on there? Or how about the great white whale. We’ll give him the mother issues. Oliver Twist – well, he’s got plenty of issues anyway, but let’s say we have him born not into poverty, but tremendous wealth instead. Yeah, yeah, that’s it. He’s really the heir to a wealthy oil baron’s estate. Now we’re talking.  

What am I getting at? Stories, fictional or true, become part of the larger story that we use to make sense of life. This is one reason people get upset when the sordid details of a hero’s life are revealed. It messes with our meta-narrative, the way we see life unfolding, or how it ought to unfold. At least with the hero who’s personal messes are revealed, it’s better to know the truth than pretend. Their particular story, as we knew it, wasn’t really adequate material for crafting our own big picture view of life. But why mess with fiction? There’s nothing to unveil. Totally re-orchestrating Forest Gump’s past messes with the things we love about his story. It changes the story.  

This is one of the reasons people get up in arms about folks trying to change the flow of Jesus’ story. And also one of the reasons I love how well-documented that story is. His story is not fiction, although some try to make it out as so. His back story is well documented and attested by multiple sources: virgin birth, born in a manger, raised in poverty. Mess with the back story and the whole thing unravels. Some will never believe the story about Jesus but, for my part, I know that its supported by reams and reams of solid, historically sound forensic evidence. His story has better support than any other figure in ancient history. So, JJ Abrams, go ahead and make James Kirk a space rebel with questionable cause and Mr. Spock a half breed with raging hormones. I’ll stick with Christ, who’s the same yesterday, today and forever.

U.S. skier Lindsey Vonn is a picture of exhilaration and exhaustion at the end of her gold-medal winning downhill run in Vancouver.

I’ve seen interesting responses so far by athletes depending on how things went for them in the last week and a half. First, you have Lindsey Vonn, who at the end of the downhill competition, knowing she’d scored a Gold Medal, wept and spoke from the heart about the difficulty and joy involved in winning. Her comments came in response to an NBC interviewer and I’m sure NBC is very happy to have that piece of footage in the archives.

On the other end you have Evgeni Plushenko, the disgruntled Russian figure skater, who so disliked the outcome in the men’s competition (he won silver, American Evan Lysacek won gold), that he fabricated a “platinum” medal which he said he really won for his performance in Vancouver. There was a picture of Plushenko on his web site holding the fantasy medal. It has since been removed.

Then you have Canadian women’s figure skater Joannie Rochette, who’s 55-year-old mother died suddenly in Vancouver, just two days before her daughter skated the short program. Her performance was characterized as courageous and stunning, especially because the grief-stricken skater posted her best scores of the year and put herself in contention for a medal.

The responses of humans to tragedy and success are unpredictable at times. It usually takes extreme situations, like putting it all on the line in a tense, high-stakes situation as with these athletes, to bring to the surface what’s really going on inside a person.

Biblical Job wasn’t an athlete, but he was a famous man of his day. Job 1:3 says “He was the greatest man among all the people of the East.”  When disaster hit, everyone knew. Stripped of wealth and children, he is “comforted” by friends who infer that Job probably had done something evil during his life to warrant God’s wrath. Reading Job gives you a very intimate look at the heart of an ancient man. But you truly see what he’s made of. And so it is with our Olympic heroes and villains, who’s stories are played out on television for a worldwide audience.

Why is it that God takes us to such extremes, as in the case of Job? What good comes of it? Perhaps we become more in touch with our humanness. We are usually humbled – nothing like everyone seeing the deep underbelly of our emotional life to bring you to the earth. And more than that, it shows what fragile vessels we are, vessels that God desires to fill up with treasure for all the world to see. As long as we’re unbroken vessels, no one can see the beauty and power of what we possess. See 2 Corinthians 4:7-12 for more.

I have no idea if Vonn, Plushenko or Rochette are Christians, but we have gotten a glimpse into the inner life of remarkable people. Part of the legend of such people is the way they’ve allowed all of us into their lives. In smaller ways, each of us has that same choice. But will we allow God to take us into places where others might see our frailty and his greatness? The way we answer that question will determine whether we live Gold Mettle lives.

The commercial sings the praises of the earth and all that is in it, on it and above it. One of the things I really like is that, in sync with the overall mission of the Discovery Channel, they not only praise the majestic and awesome, but the not-so-grand, which includes stuff that often gets missed or purposefully ignored: creepy crawlies that some people prefer did NOT exist; destructive forces like tornadoes, hot magma and man – note the guy shooting a bazooka; “dirty things” which encompasses just about everything else. There’s video of fireworks over some barren plain and a great whale arcing and crashing into the ocean, so there’s the ooh and ahh factor too.

(By the way, I didn’t put the little ad at the end of the song about an energy drink – not my thing and I’m not recommending)

This cable channel promo inspired me to look up Scripture that acknowledges the wonder of creation. There’s good old Psalm 19,

The heavens declare the glory of God;
       the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Day after day they pour forth speech;
       night after night they display knowledge.

There is no speech or language
       where their voice is not heard. (v.1-3)

Then there’s Psalm 8,

O LORD, our Lord,
       how majestic is your name in all the earth!
       You have set your glory
       above the heavens.

When I consider your heavens,
       the work of your fingers,
       the moon and the stars,
       which you have set in place,

what is man that you are mindful of him,
       the son of man that you care for him? (v.1, 3-4)

But like most things in life, I started zigging in the middle of my zag. I thought about the tendency of man to praise the creation and forget all about the creator. It’s our default setting: “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.” (Romans 1:25, NIV)

I think the creation is magnificent. My son Mark always (and I do mean always!)  thinks it cool whenever we see a grey squirrel on our porch although grey squirrels are as common as copper pennies. It’s the creation he appreciates and I have to admit, squirrels fascinate me too.

We see whitetail deer near our house. I know, some of you are thinking, “Deer – yummy!” and yes, venison burgers are part of God’s provision, but I’m thinking more about how they leap, run and glide, all with such effortless ease, like a leaf swept along by a breeze.

One year at the beach we found all kinds of sand dollars – whole sand dollars, not the ones you normally see crushed into shards by the waves. I felt like I’d discovered genuine treasure. There were hermit crabs congregating in tide pools left by the receding ocean. I had never seen hermit crabs outside of pet stores. My kids played with them, collected them, released them, recollected them, made mini-environments for them in sand buckets and thoroughly enjoyed them for a whole afternoon. It was amazing.

Even as someone who knows the creator, I can focus perhaps too much on what’s made versus the Maker. So I find this last Scripture ironic and beautiful in what it says: instead of receiving the praise, creation deflects it back where it belongs. And so, in closing, I offer one last psalm:

Praise the LORD from the earth,
       you great sea creatures and all ocean depths,

lightning and hail, snow and clouds,
       stormy winds that do his bidding,

you mountains and all hills,
       fruit trees and all cedars,

wild animals and all cattle,
       small creatures and flying birds,

kings of the earth and all nations,
       you princes and all rulers on earth,

young men and maidens,
       old men and children.

Let them praise the name of the LORD,
       for his name alone is exalted;
       his splendor is above the earth and the heavens. (Psalm 148:7-13, NIV)

Take some time to revel in the creation today, then revel in its creator. Blessings.

Tucked into this chapter, in three verses, is the truth that intersected with my other reading: “At that time Jesus said, ‘I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure. All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him’” (v.25-27, NIV).

People who study religious belief and faith in God have known for years that it’s much easier for a child to grasp and believe the truth about Jesus than it is for adults. According to Christian pollster George Barna (www.barna.org), about half of all Americans who ask Christ into their lives as savior do so before their teenage years (43%). Two-thirds of born-again Christians (64%) made that decision before they turned 18 and one of eight made a profession of faith between 18 and 21. These figures have stayed pretty constant in the twenty years Barna has studied Christian conversion.

But now enter the world of science. One of the books at my bedside the last couple months has been Fixing My Gaze: A Scientist’s Journey into Seeing in Three Dimensions. This is the autobiographical story of Susan Barry, a neurobiology professor at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass. It is not a spiritual book, but a personal book with a scientific context.

For the first 50 years of her life Barry could only see in two dimensions. She used other cues to figure out if something was near or far, say the height of an object compared to other objects in her view i.e. the bigger something was, the closer; smaller, than farther. But she had no sense of the space between things, near to far, up to down. Her other senses worked fine: she could feel three dimensions, smell, hear, taste, but as far as vision, everyone was a Flat Patrick . . . or Flat Annie or Flat Joey or flat microwave or flat map. Well, all maps are flat, but you get the point.

In her 40s Barry started experiencing new problems with her sight which led eventually to the office of Dr. Theresa Ruggiero, a developmental optometrist who specializes in vision therapy. Long story short: through the exercises she learned from Dr. Ruggiero, Barry’s eyesight transformed and suddenly she entered the strange and exciting world of sight that most of the rest of us take for granted. Barry’s eyes “opened” in a new way to grasp the wonder and beauty of creation, even in very simple things like snow falling, or the complexity of layers of tree branches. Barry’s joy in such sights is enough reason to read the book all by itself.

While Barry discovered that change is possible for adults, she did learn there is a difference in receptivity to change.  She notes, “An infant nervous system may change its connections in response to any stimulus as along as it is very strong or repeated sufficiently” (p. 158). She cites an experiment with barn owls whose vision is altered with prisms. Barn owls use both hearing and seeing to hunt. The study showed that young barn owls automatically made adjustments to the conflicting data between their ears and eyes, whether they were being fed or forced to hunt. Adult barn owls would only make the adjustment if they had to hunt. Based on this and other studies, and her own experience, Barry concludes that the adult brain can be rewired, but only if there’s a significant behavioral motivation. And that takes me back to the Gospel.

By the time we get to adulthood our thinking is pretty well fixed about what’s important in life and how to best function. It takes something significant to get us to think otherwise or to consider a different point of view. My friend Mark said that his mother’s death when he was in his late 20s opened his mind to search for answers about the meaning of life and whether there was an afterlife. Ecclesiastes 3:11 says that God has set “eternity in the hearts of men.” We have this vague notion that somehow we are eternal beings and that our deepest needs will only be satisfied by something eternal. But instead, we choose to fill the endless void with the temporary and ultimately unsatisfying. It takes something big to knock us loose of this way of functioning.  

The New Testament book of Romans, chapter 1, verse 20, indicates that evidence of the existence of God is plenty available to anyone willing to look closely at creation. But, instead of acknowledging God, we would rather bury this evidence in the back of our minds somewhere and not deal with it. Or we actively seek to cover up the evidence with “worship” of anything but God – money, things, other people, career – and orient ourselves around this other thing instead of the Lord who made us.

In John 16, Jesus says that the Holy Spirit is working on the hearts and minds of every person in the world to convince them that they have done wrong, that their standard of goodness is not the same as God’s, and that there is a judgment for the gap between our goodness and God’s. It does matter. However, it takes the Holy Spirit to help adults see that the coming judgment is “behaviorally important stimuli” to borrow Barry’s phrasing.

To turn from our sophisticated adult pursuits and look to God for answers appears to us as “childish.” The “wise and learned” don’t really get the Gospel. Its old-timey, simplistic, archaic. But children don’t perceive the Gospel through that lens. They have open hearts and minds to hear the story of Christ as it is – the story of God’s incredible act of love toward mankind – without all kinds of American cultural baggage attached to it. If we can suspend our pre-judgments for just 10 minutes or so and read Jesus’ story and hear what the writers were saying something marvelous may happen – God may reveal his secrets to us. We may discover something that is not only satisfying to our emotions and spirits but also to our minds. We might gain a new level of sight, a 4-dimensional vision really, that gives genuine depth and fullness to our 3D lives.

She and her husband-to-be travel to Bethlehem, the ancestral home of Joseph’s family, because the Romans are conducting a census. Mary goes into labor, but they can’t find a room, so they end up in a stable, more likely a grotto, where she gives birth to a son. Angels announce the birth to shepherds who visit baby Jesus. Three wise men from the east, known as magi, follow a star to the place where the little family is staying.

Herod pretends interest in the baby only to destroy him and tells the magi to report his location. An angel intervenes, telling the magi to go home by a different route. Another angel warns Joseph that Herod is sending men to find and kill Jesus and urging him to escape. Joseph heeds the warning and takes his family to Egypt till Herod is dead.

This is the Christmas story we know so well. Supernatural, hopeful, dangerous, wonderful. While Luke and Matthew do a splendid job of narrating the wonder and the peril of Jesus’ birth, two other versions of the Christmas story put in grander relief the cost and the risk.

The New Testament book of Philippians started as a letter written to a church in northern Greece. In chapter 2, Paul is addressing the behavioral code that ought to guide their thinking as they interact with each other. That code is simple to state and difficult to live: follow the example of Christ. As he explains what this looks like, Paul refers to the costly love of Christ, but in doing so he has to pulls the lens way back from the cross all the way to before the dawn of time:

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
      did not consider equality with God something to be grasped (i.e. held onto),
but made himself nothing,
      taking the very nature of a servant,
      being made in human likeness. (Philippians 2:5-7, NIV)

I asked a group of junior high kids if any of them would want to become babies again. One kid said, “Yes, because of the freedom” to which the other kids responded, “What freedom? When you’re a baby you go wherever your parents want you to go!” All the rest said, “No way.” Here they were, 12 and 13 years old, and none of them really wanted to return to infancy, even though they had all been infants at one time. At age 47, as much as I sometimes want to curl up in a fetal position, I really would not choose a return to babyhood.  

Imagine then that you’re God, endowed with infinite power, living in a perfect environment of love, good health and no danger, possessing a fullness of life and glory we can’t imagine. And He chooses to take on our form, which, as for all of us, started out dependent on his parents, unable to sit up or speak, naked. He chose to limit the use of his own powers as a man, so he didn’t turn himself invisible when Herod’s thugs appeared. He counted on Joseph and Mary to get him out of Bethlehem. How costly and risky was this move by God to come down here that first Christmas.

Then there’s one other telling of the story, in Revelation 12:

A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads. His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment it was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. (v.1-5a)

In general, scholars don’t really believe the woman in this passage is Mary, but that she represents the people of God, who in the Old Testament were the Jews, and in our day is the church, which is made up of people from all kinds of ethnic backgrounds. But the occasion is the same: from his people, God brings forth a son, an event we celebrate as Christmas. But immediately, the fate of this child is endangered by the dragon. It sheds new light on the action of Herod, who was plenty paranoid and hungry for power anyway, but who was also influenced by the enemy of God to attack Jesus. Later in Rev. 12, John identifies the dragon as the devil or Satan, the one who leads the whole world astray.

This is a frightful picture. Why would God, who created Satan in the first place, put himself in the line of fire like this? Satan hates God. Satan didn’t start out bad but he chose arrogance and pride over following the Lord. But God, because of his great love for us, made himself vulnerable to his greatest enemy. There’s nothing more vulnerable than a baby, and this is the way God chose. On Christmas day. There is a mystery to this, and I must be honest, I don’t fully comprehend that level of love. It’s hard for me to make myself vulnerable for the sake of those I know and love well, let alone my biggest adversary.

I pray these other perspectives on the Christmas story inspire you this season to reflect on the astonishing generosity and sacrifice of Jesus to join us in our humanity. One more reason to join with the angels, who broke out in uncontrolled praise, saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests” (Luke 2:14, NIV). Peace to you and Merry Christmas.