The End of Advent Wait (Day 27): It’s Christmas Day

What exactly happens on Christmas Day?

Does anything deep inside our DNA change from Christmas Eve night to Christmas morning?

Does a new Spirit overwhelm the earth on the dawn of the 25th of December?

Maybe more than this, Christmas becomes a reminder once again.

Christmas is an Ebenezer– every gift opened and hug exchanged, every quiet reflection is a memory rooted in the birth of Jesus all those years ago.

Eliot has been asking us a lot of questions about A Christmas Carol during this season,

wondering why someone is so greedy, why someone chooses selfishness,

and how it’s possible that their heart can become something different

through a few meetings with some ghosts.

Our coming of Christmas may not bring a fantastic transformation like the one Ebenezer Scrooge experienced.

But what little transformations show themselves to us on this day,

during this time of year?

What little holy things come out of hiding,

seep under our skin

and into the deep places of our hearts?

If you’ve been there when a baby is born,

you see with the birth of that baby

an enormous release of joy,

and a palpable exhaustion at the same time.

It is both at once, coming and going through the air.

And so mother and baby just rest in it,

and there is nothing else they need to do.

Maybe on Christmas morning,

what we need more than anything is just to rest in it.

Maybe we need to to feel the joy and feel the quiet and

be content to be here, in the Midst.

Maybe we just need to look up at that bright shining star that brought us to where we are, knelt by the King, and whisper a gracious thank you into the waiting air.

Merry Christmas, my dear friends.