A Christmas Message:
Gifts of a Hovering God.
At this time of year we sing. We wonder. We light candles. We share gifts. We eat good food. We gather together to celebrate Christmas and announce that Christ is born.
Each year we tell the story, often reading from the gospel of Luke. He begins his writing, stating that he is setting out to write an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among God’s people. Luke places these events of God’s fulfilled actions, of God’s mysterious love into a particular time, in a particular place, naming particular people, proclaiming that God comes to this world yet again, in a very particular way, led by the particular work of the Holy Spirit which hovers over creation like a parent filled with love and compassion and hope for children weary of pain.
Every year, as God’s people gathered, we read the words of the Holy Bible, which proclaim this orderly account. Beginning with the order of creation itself, God hovers over the chaos pulling light from the darkness. This light is so everlasting, that the dark of night can never defeat it. God hovers with everlasting compassion, creating and forming in loving-kindness a world that is good. It is particularly good.
God hovers and Mary is pregnant. God hovers and Joseph realizes that the child is of God. God hovers and the child is born during a time of a cruel foreign rule. God hovers and shepherds, simple shepherds watching in the night, are told by heavenly angels that a child of light is born. A simple baby will be a savior for this world weary of pain. God hovers and the shepherds tell all who will listen. Mary ponders upon the particulars and God is praised. This is the orderly account of Christ being born, a mystery that hovers and never leaves.
God hovers for the order and life of creation itself. Hovering in light of love breaking through the shadows of death. God hovers through particulars with mysteries beyond understanding as angels sing in the sky, virgins and old women become pregnant, a baby is born during a time of taxation, wrapped only in simple bands of cloth and placed in a manger. God hovers breaking into a world that has no room and the mysteries abound.
At Christmas we remember the mysteries hovering through particular realities. This mysterious God hovers so closely that God comes to earth to dwell among us as a child. God hovers so closely that God becomes one of us, human – incarnate. The Word incarnate in the world. The WORD made flesh in Jesus. And with the mysteries of the Holy Spirit, God hovers through us, in us, with us, around us, and does not let go. The Word made flesh in us.
God hovers and Christ is born this day, in this particular place, in this particular time, in us, a very particular people so that the world may know the love of a hovering God. We sing. We read the story yet again. We wonder. We light candles. For unto you, for into you, Christ is born. Thanks be to God. Amen.
Gently,
Pastor Elaine
