When Christmas Gets Radical: Whose Birthday Is It Really?
I had gifts to wrap. So, pull up the blankets. Prayers. And then, when I’m at the door, one hand on the doorframe, resting in the light of the hallway, I turn to close the door a bit on the dark.
He stops me with just one question:
“What does Jesus get for His birthday?”
The words hung… strung me up.
I say the words into the black. Um… A cake? Our love?
I can hear him turn again in the bed, roll over on the pillow. Restless…
“But Mom…. if we get wrapped presents for our birthdays, real sacrifices from people who love us — they gave up other things to give something to us — then why don’t we do that for Jesus’ birthday?”
I stand at the door looking into all that light cast down the hallway.
Why is the sky blue, why do we blink, how do clouds hold all that water, the children ask me a thousand questions and the world spins dizzy on a million questions I don’t know the answers to.
I stand in the dark, the light right there, and I grope for the answer that could change the world…
“Why don’t we give up things so we can give to Jesus for His birthday?”
Is it always this way, that a little child will lead them?
He was four or five that year, I can’t remember. I just know that now he’s fifteen and I stepped out into the light and we’ve done all the Christmases since his way, giving away. It’s not at all wrong to do it differently, but just for us… all the Christmas gifts — gifts for the Christ Child.
The Birthday Child tells us what He wants: Give to the least of these and you give to Me.
So this is how we do it: We pick out gifts from His gift catalogues — Compassion Catalog,Samaritan’s Purse Catalog, Partner’s International Catalog, World Vision Catalog, Gospel for Asia Catalog, Mennonite Central Committee Catalog.
They flip pages, deciding on what to give Him today:
“Anyone think we should get a pair of rabbits today?”
“Anyone think we should get a pair of rabbits today?”
“I was thinking mosquito nets. Two. I wouldn’t want to die of malaria.”
“If we buy a seed packet for a family, our gift is tripled.”
“Did you read the story on page 25 about what a difference it makes for an orphan family to have seeds? The little girl said, ‘Life is much better with food.'”
“Why are you crying, Mama?”
“Oh, just thinking—- how life really is much better with food…“
Just the first line of The Power of Your Name.. I was overwhelmed by the Lord's compassion and love and couldn't stop crying.
God really, really loves the children. the broken. the poor. the hurting. the lost.
God is a giver. The Father gave us His Son. The Son gave us His life.
And so much more.
What can we give today?
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