A Sneak Peek

I am really excited about the next series on the docket for our worship gatherings on Sunday morning! Why? Because it is an advent series where I'm going to try to take off some of that sentimental veneer that always surrounds Christmas.

Do you know what I mean? I know that in my own mind, I get so familiar with the Christmas story and the elements of that story that I miss how truly remarkable, messy, strange, and history-altering that whole story is. So as I was preparing this advent series, I wanted to take a really good whack at that sentimentality surrounding Christmas AND at the same time, return us back to some of the inspiring pieces of it.

So this series that will happen on December 16th, 23rd, and 24th centers on the courage within Christmas. The whole story is one of remarkable courage that hit me between the eyes as I thought about it.

Mary, a teenager (which gives a whole new connotation for youth ministry, wouldn't you say?!), is asked to give up her dreams for any sense of normalcy by bearing Jesus Christ in her womb. And when she's asked, she says, "Okay." How is that normal or sentimental? Her simple words of acceptance betray a ferocious courage.

Or there's Joseph, a righteous man, who says NOTHING (I never noticed that detail before). He's asked to go along with everything and give up his reputation to provide Jesus with the right lineage. In his silence, his actions shout volumes of courage.

And then there's God in the whole Christmas. He came to a poor couple who would live life on the outside of the mainstream. He came in the flesh and was laid in a manger of wood, only to be laid on a cross of wood. What remarkable courage to come so vulnerable and weak to live a life so fragile as to be hung on a criminal's cross! What courage to be "God with us" and change history as a result!

So let's peel off that sentimental veneer together and see the true courage that reverberates within the Christmas story. Because who knows... God may build that same courage within us as we follow Jesus.