This, of course, is the time of year when thoughts turn to Christmas. Our emotional response to Christmas can be complex and varied. For some it raises warm memories of traditional church plays filled with children, family, delicious food, and a warm house filled with love. For others it registers disappointment and memories of not-so-good Christmases stained by alcohol or emotionally toxic family members. For others it raises the grieving memory of making funeral plans for a loved one on Christmas Day and for others sheer loneliness as they sit in an empty house with no one present to share the day that should be about giving and receiving, loving and comforting, laughing and belonging.
As I have been thinking about Christmas this year, the Lord simply reminded me of how much our redemption cost. We tend to compartmentalize Christ’s sacrifice and suffering to Easter – his arrest, his abuse, his crucifixion. Passover and Easter certainly highlight the incredible cost of our salvation but it not only ended that way but also actually began that way.
Christmas cards sanitize the Christmas story so that it is almost unrecognizable. Susan and I have already received a few with Mary and Joseph and Baby Jesus serenely surrounded by adoring animals in a pristine manger along with appropriately awed shepherds and joyous angels. There is some truth in all of that but it misses the point. The Christmas story begins with Gabriel appearing to Mary in the backwater town of Nazareth. Luke tells us that at his appearance, Mary was greatly troubled. The original Greek would amplify this word to mean confused and deeply troubled or distressed. The angel greeted her first but then added quickly, “Do not be afraid.” You don’t need to say that unless someone is visibly shaken and beginning to panic.
Gabriel then goes on to tell her that the Holy Spirit is about to fall on her, impregnate her, and she will have a son whom she is to name Jesus. He will be called the Son of the Most High and he will reign on David’s throne forever. That’s a lot to take in for a 13-year-old Jewish girl brought up simply, humbly, and traditionally. The true implications of what the angel had just said were probably not comprehensible…except the part where she would be pregnant without having gone through a wedding ceremony and without her marriage being consummated with her fiancé Joseph. Surely her first thoughts were about the impossibility of telling Joseph and her family and the almost certain unlikelihood that anyone would believe her.
The liability of being seen as an adulteress must also have loomed somewhere in the back of her mind. Adultery in those days was taken very seriously and was still punishable by death. In Jewish culture, her engagement was considered marriage although the sexual union could not occur until after the ceremony. To break the engagement required a divorce process. Apparently, her worst fears were realized when Joseph discovered she was pregnant and decided to divorce her quietly. Undoubtedly his heart was shattered by her perceived unfaithfulness and he carried as much shame in the tiny village of Nazareth as she did. Her story was unbelievable even to him until an angel confirmed what she had been telling everyone.
We are not told of the family’s reaction to Mary’s pregnancy and her unbelievable story, but Mary and Joseph’s trip to Bethlehem gives us some insight. According to Luke, Caesar issued a decree for taxation that required the head of each household to register in certain cities. Joseph was a descendent of David whose lineage came from Bethlehem, so off they went on a ninety-mile trek with Mary being very late in her pregnancy. She was not required to go to Bethlehem but went anyway on a trip that probably not only put her at risk but the child as well. To me the only explanation is that she was not particularly welcome in Nazareth even by her family and at the birth of her son there would no joyous occasion as she had always envisioned. She had also lost all of her dreams for a three-day wedding feast with her proud family and friends and the wedding night in which she and Joseph would consummate their holy union. So she went with her husband to a place in which they were apparently unknown to discover, on top of everything else, that no lodging was available.
A manger, a small barn or cave, was available where she would have to make do with some fresh hay while being surrounded by the smell of animal urine, feces, and barn rats. No family members travelled with them to help with the birth. Apparently, no midwife was available in Bethlehem. Joseph and Mary must have felt somewhat abandoned by God and family and must have felt very alone and even scared. They were probably wondering where the blessings were for their obedience because, day by day, things had not gotten better but worse.
Outside of Bethlehem, another disturbing scene was unfolding. In the middle of the night, shepherds, who were minding their own business, were suddenly confronted by angelic visitors. Luke simply says they were terrified. Of course, the angel said, “Do not be afraid” and eventually calmed their nerves with news that Messiah was being born to them and could be found in a stable in Bethlehem. Eventually that night, they found the stable and shared with Mary, who must have been exhausted, what had happened.
Another insight to the atmosphere of shame, gossip, and suspicion back in Nazareth was that Joseph, Mary, and Jesus did not return to Nazareth after the birth. As far as we know, two sets of Jewish grandparents had yet to see their grandson. Matthew tells us of the Magi, wise men or astrologers from the east, who had followed the Star of Bethlehem to find this newborn King of the Jews. This was apparently 18-24 months after the birth of Jesus. It looks as though Mary and Joseph had simply settled in there. These unexpected visitors from the east showed up unannounced and brought gifts of gold, myrrh, and frankincense to Jesus. Mary and Joseph must have been relieved to receive such a nest egg for the family and began to believe that peace and blessings were finally coming their way. Maybe he could expand his business or they could build a little home. But they immediately discovered that these were traveling expenses.
Herod, hearing from the Magi that a king was being born just seven miles from Bethlehem, determined to kill this threat to his own throne. Joseph and Mary were warned in a dream to flee the region and so suddenly became political refugees to Egypt. Herod, in order to secure his throne, simply had every male child in the vicinity killed that night – a night that became known in Jewish history as the Slaughter of the Innocents. So far the Christmas story is not just a story of angelic visitations and good news, but also a story of fear, shame, rejection, loneliness, the loss of dreams, and of a little refugee family fleeing their homeland for several years to live once again among strangers where Hebrews had once been slaves.
