Merry Christmas!
No, I’m not crazy. It is still Christmas. In fact, as I write this it is the 10th Day of Christmas. And while most of the world has moved-on from Christmas (Fred Meyer is already decorated for Valentine’s Day), we who claim the faith of Jesus do well to remember that the Twelve Days of Christmas BEGIN on December 25. So, please, don’t take down your tree yet.
This year, the most “Christmassy” thing I did was to ordain Erin Tulip, Hannah Moderow, and Ross McKay as Deacons. Ordaining Deacons around the Christmas Season provided me with a wonderful reflection: Christmas is God’s Diaconal Ministry.
Christmas is God’s ministry of presence in this world: God’s presence with the broken; the poor; the sinful; the hungry; the forgotten. Jesus, Emmanuel–“God with us,” God’s incarnate Word, was born so that God could be fully present to humankind, ALL humankind. He was born into a poor family, greeted by poor shepherds, but he was also greeted by Magi, acknowledged by Kings and those in positions of authority and power. Jesus was present to all.
Christmas, the birth of Jesus, is God’s ministry of presence in this world–the ministry of a Deacon: a ministry of love, service, compassion, mercy, generosity and justice. And Christmas reveals to us who we are called to be and what our ministry should be as Jesus’ people–His body, the Church. Christmas ministry–Diaconal ministry, is the Church’s ministry. It is not designated to only those ordained as Deacons. Deacons remind us, as outward and visible signs for us, that the ministry of Christmas is ours all through the year.
Howard Thurman, the extraordinary theologian and mentor to Martin Luther King, Jr, expressed this point in a poem:
The Work of Christmas
When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among others,
To make music in the heart.
Merry Christmas! May it be our ministry throughout this New Year.
