When you are wondering if you really should eat that second piece of cake....

For all the O'Brien kin who dare to eat at my house on Christmas...and for nieces and nephews who bring me much joy...

 So if the crumbs mean anything, my cake was a success or maybe everyone was just being polite or the wine was that good and that it makes everything else seem that good.  The wine was gone too, but then wine always is.  Is there really bad wine?  I personally have never turned down a glass or thrown one out on the lawn. Most folks won’t turn down a plate of butter and brown sugar either.  My family is especially gracious in the fact that they allowed me to take over the blessing.  And they seem to love to participate in whatever I come up with.  One year, I had each child read the one of the O Antiphons.  (This would have made more sense to them had we not been a mixture of third generation Methodist and Moravian).  One year, we sang all the verses of O Come, O Come Emanuel.  My very musically gifted family members (of which I am not ONE), informed me that was an incredibly hard carol to sing and could we change.  I was slightly devastated because it just happens to be one of my faves. One year, we sang Joy to the World.  I seem to recall my nephew played his trumpet to accompany us, in my very small living room and to my ears it sounded glorious.  I could actually have an entire brass quintet and just might do that next year.  One year we read parts of Isaiah antiphonally.  This year I had them bring all of their used Love feast candles, I ended up with about 21 and some had purple wrapping instead of red- that means they were incredibly old-we O’Briens never throw anything and I mean anything away.  This would include flower vases from florist shops as well as liquor that as best we could tell was made in 1936.  I wouldn't open it. We could make a couple of episodes for hording reality shows.  Seriously.  This year I deciced we would light used Moravian candles and sing the third verse of “O Come All Ye Faithful,” which interestingly is different in every denominational hymnal.  Who knew?  (Not only do I collect prayer books, I collect hymnals and save odes from Love feast, apparently for the sole purpose of finding a random verse). My nephew had us sing the Methodist version of the third verse. We practiced and everything and were even given the pitch to sing in, which I am sure was perfect given the giftedness of my kinfolk. O’Briens love to perform, but sometimes I think they cooperate with my various blessing strategies, not because they love to sing and perform, but because beef tenderloin is in the oven. 

All of that to say, I love to host Christmas dinner, and though I am not entirely convinced my family loves cramming 17 people into my house, if you feed them they will come.   This of course can be traced back to a childhood trauma/drama. 

 I have two younger brothers who also happen to be bigger than me and for a while we entertained this very large hound name Princess who pretended to hunt and be our family dog.  I am sure I am embellishing slightly here, but to the best of my recollection Princess weighed 50 lbs. at least.  One would think the size would not have bothered me given the fact that my cat, Sami weighs in a just a tad under 25 lbs.  Which according to my students is not a cat at all, but rather a small mountain lion.  She is kind of large.

We owned a blue Oldsmobile.  One year, an artic front was passing through which was caused temperatures to hover around 8 degrees in the sunlight.  The trip to my grandparents was about 2 ½ hours across the mountains between here and southwestern Virginia.  For as long as I can remember we left every Christmas morning to go over the woods and dashing through the snow to grandmother’s house.  On this particular Christmas, the trek was especially painful, since we had to take Princess with us and she sat in the back seat.  The heater in our car was not functioning.  The backseat of an Oldsmobile is just not big enough for three kids and a large dog.  This was the age before mini vans and to be honest, a Suburban would not have been large enough that day.  And despite the 14 blankets, the toboggans, the mittens and a dog sitting on top of me, we were still cold.  My mother used to drug us with Benadryl for the trip so we would sleep and not fight.  This rarely worked though and this particular Christmas, I seem to recall the dog sitting on my lap, my middle brother getting the rest of the back seat and my youngest brother laying in the floorboard and I was not allowed to put my feet down.  I also remember my dad stopping every 15 minutes or so to scrape the ice off the windows.  I think I neglected to mention the snow and sleet that was falling, making the driving conditions a tad hazardous, especially without a working defroster.  The point of these trips of course is to increase family bonding, but it was more a scene out of The Christmas Story or Christmas Vacation.  I seem to recall, after the dog rearranging herself on top of me, and complaining to my mother, that Bobby was “hogging” the backseat and her giving me that look that says, “Don’t make me make your father stop this car….”, and blowing the icy snot out of my nose, that I made the vow.  It went something like this, “No matter what, I will never make my children leave their house on Christmas Day and I will never visit family that lives farther than 10 minutes away and I will be a dog owner.  And I will own very, very large cars.” 

As childhood vows usually go, we rarely keep them, especially those involving the things we will never to do to our unborn children.  The only part of that vow I have ever kept is the fact that I have always been a cat owner and for a large part of Davis’ childhood we have hosted Christmas dinner. Oh, I forgot to mention, Davis is an only child, hence not needing really big cars.

I was reflecting during dinner, (wine will do that you know), that maybe my family might dread my house like my car rides on Christmas day or maybe they really do enjoy all the chaos and mayhem and Joseph really is the star of the Christmas story.   Wine makes one very philosophical.  Beer makes you truthful.  Water just has bacteria.  Something to ponder the next time you drink a glass.  Any who, I was wondering if they thought it was too crowded, (which is was), was the beef overdone, (maybe a tad on the ends), did I have enough plates set, was my niece’s friend about to jump off my roof and/or go running out the back door never to return, (he’s a trooper and the kids loved him), should I make more tea, and even though they are not my blood, they are kin.  And isn’t funny, that when they are kinfolk, there just isn’t a whole lot you aren’t willing to do.  From having 17 people in your house, to attending your girlfriend’s family function, to bringing all your old ove feast candles at a moments notice, to singing random verses of carols, sitting really, really close, eating all the food and saying it is good and taking photos to post on Facebook and Instagram.  You also are willing to make a fool of yourself playing the latest game app called Heads Up.

Which brings me to Joseph.  Who, in my opinion doesn’t get enough press.  He’s really the hero in all this.  Mary’s role as the mother of God just doesn’t impress me as much as Joseph and those wisemen and then of course John the Baptist. (Now there’s a story.) I sort don’t imagine she had much of choice.  She was a pregnant, unwed teenager in first century Palestine and for some reason, not entirely clear to me, thought of as poor.  Not sure she was going to get out of the whole birth thing.  It also seems that by the time Gabriel let her in on the little surprise, she was already pregnant.  Also, given the fact that Jesus was male and I have son, I know raising him was no picnic and pretty much she did what she had to do.  I can just hear her saying, “Jesus-I really don’t care who your dad is, clean your room or I am going to pull your ears off.”  Or at that whole temple incident, “Jesus- do you have any clue how worried I have been.  Messiah thing or not, you will not leave my side until we get back to Nazareth. Is that clear?  Now march to the front of that line and don’t step out.”  Or at the Cana wedding, “Really- you think you are going to embarrass my girlfriend by not getting more wine?  Let me know how that works out for you.”  “You are so busted right now and the saving the world gig is going to have to wait because I told you to take those dirty, filthy sandals and put them out back days ago.  This is not a manger and you do not live in a barn, might have been born in one, but I will not allow filth and vermin in my house.”  “Look, son, I am really concerned about your choice of friends- James and John- not only is their mother a hot mess, they carry knives and I am thinking they are gangsters.  Perhaps we need to reconsider our choices.”  So, I am not sure she was so much obedient as doing what mommas do and that is raise children – theirs, ours and yours.  And for the incarnation to have any meaning to be me at all, it is realizing that Jesus grew up.  This includes hormone rages, adolescent crushes, acne, selective hearing, thrill seeking and boundary testing.  Remember the desert.  Talk about testing boundaries and thrill seeking.  And Mary was the mom in all of this.  I think most moms will tell you that we are genetically hardwired to raise children and there is not a lot of choice in the matter.  And pretty much we will step in and raise anybody’s child. 

Men on the other hand, seem to have choices about fatherhood.  And this is why I love Joseph.  He stuck it out.  Fathers have choice and back in first century Palestine, Joseph had a lot of choice.  He knew this kid was going to different.  This kid was not his own.  There would be no long talks in the wood shop, no skipping rocks across the river Jordan, no son to take over the family business, no son to look after the kids and Mary when Joseph died.  Not to mention, apparently Jesus could out talk anyone at the synagogue, and maybe Joseph’s friends lacked appreciation for Jesus’ intellect.  I suspect they too gossiped about Joseph not being able to control his kid.  He even moved to all places- Egypt, just to keep Jesus out of danger. 

Jesus wasn’t his kin.  He took him in anyhow.  He fed him, took care of him, raised him, and loved him.  He didn’t have to.  He adopted him as his own.  Which is kind of what God does when you think about it.  And honestly, I think this is the message of Christmas.  At the end of the day, human relationship is worth the risk and the trouble.  Having relationships with other humans is quite dangerous.  More often than not we refuse to take the risk.  We don’t like messy.  We don’t like noisy.  We don’t like endings we can’t control or see and we certainly don’t like people different from us, much less people who can’t love us back the way we would choose.  We are a fairly self-centered lot actually, and if someone doesn’t fit our mold or measure up or love us back the way we want to be loved, we pretty much quit them. 

It is pretty easy to say we believe in the Christmas story but much harder to live it out.  It is easy to love our neighbor and to take care of the invited guests- but love the guy who votes different than you or watches a different news channel or has a different haircut and maybe, maybe even looks at the Christmas story a little different – now that’s a challenge. God showed up and took a risk to become fully human.  Joseph embodies that somehow for me.  He lived out his convictions, he lived out his beliefs, he manifested his identity and integrity to the world by choosing to love another human who was radically different from him.

We are never told what happened to Joseph and this makes me kind of sad.   I like to think he sung lullabies over the sleeping Jesus.  And I suspect his fatherly advice may have went something like this:

Go on and go to sleep.  Rest.  You have a long road ahead.  I think he probably prayed for God to guard his heart so he could sleep.  I think Joseph probably told him to go and chase his dreams, saving the world could wait till another day.  But mostly Joseph just did what we all should do and cared for the ones standing right in front of him.  Joseph chose to be human and in doing so ended up touching the divine.  Joseph risked everything just so Jesus could sleep for a while.

‘God’s incarnation in Jesus… God’s word become flesh. If the incarnation – the mystery of being both human and divine – means anything, it means that the “mind of Christ” is a mind that mortals can take on. The scandal of the Christian profession is that God took on mortality in order that mortals could take on God’s life’ – Parker Palmer

All is grace,

On the first day of Christmas:

Grateful for:

Wine

Tabletalk

Nephews who love to sing and know random verses of carols

Moravian candles especially the old ones

Butter

Brown sugar

Small living rooms

Twice baked potatoes

Instagram

Apps for games

Charades with a twist

Loud laughter

Tissue paper

Guests

Skin

Cows

12 days instead of one
Realizing perfection is really over rated

Let me know how that works out for you

To be perfectly honest, I don’t believe there was another way to get our attention. The Incarnation.  We would have never paid attention otherwise. God had to put on skin. Humans are complicated and complex and I think that is what God loves about us. We are not simple and rarely do we make things easy.  I kind of like to think that is why God invests so much in us.  God loves a good challenge and humans are challenging at best, even on our absolute best days: like Christmas eve, eve, perhaps. And I am willing to bet that today God was putting on his best Dr. Phil voice and saying, "Let me know how that works out for you."

I am prone to making my life far more complicated than it need be.  Take this afternoon for instance.  About once a year, I become delusional and fancy myself an accomplished baker.  Usually this coincides with some major holiday that revolves around 17 or so people coming to eat at my house. I can cook and I can bake but it is probably not in my best interest or those of my guests to try out new recipes.  I should probably stick to things I know how to bake.  Like: chocolate chip cookies or pound cake or pumpkin pie. 

I love the seven caramel layer cake.  Decided I would make one for Christmas dinner. How hard could it be?  I would like to add, unless you have attended cooking school, don’t try this at home. While, the cake itself (if you don’t mind baking seven layers), is easy peasy to make, that frosting is wicked.  It is a boiled frosting and for those of you that don’t know, think Julia Childs on her worst manic day, with that psychotic cat running around her kitchen, jumping on everything and Julia drinking her second bottle of wine and speaking that fake French and she left out the part about: it must be buttermilk.  Not cream, not whole, not half and half, not evaporated, not 2%.  Only buttermilk.  This frosting officially has taken me 27 hours to make.  The recipe boasts that it can be made in less than 30 minutes and that would be a lie.  And if you think you can substitute any other milk product in this recipe, think again. 

And this of course, led me to the Food Lion incident and thinking about Joseph and the prophet Isaiah and Mary and how much I miss my friend Sarah at this time of year.  I am standing in the corner (did I mention corner?) of the aisle staring at the seven different kinds of buttermilk, trying to decide which one I need.  And to be honest, had I just gone ahead and texted my friend Sarah instead of feeling sorry for myself, none of this would have happened.  I had no intention of making a repeat trip and clearly from my previous attempts, perfection was required.  I guess it is remotely possible; that I was taking too long to make up my mind, and I guess it is possible I should have noticed the woman waiting (who waits for buttermilk anyway?) to get her buttermilk and offered to move. But then she screamed at me and told me I was in her way and to hurry up and then I sort of went postal, if the stares of others mean anything.  I shouted, (just like the prophet Isaiah, I might add), “Really, are you kidding me? I hope the love of Christmas finds your heart.”

Of course, everyone was staring at me, and then I felt the need to defend myself, “She started it.” 

Fuming, I stormed to the check out line with buttermilk in hand. The gentleman behind me says, “Are you ready for Christmas?”  At least I turned around at looked at him.  I may have smiled, I hope I did and I hope I sounded as least hopeful as I said, “I think so.”  And then I did manage to get out of my own narcissistic spiral and ask, “How about you?”  He said with tears running down his face, “This year I will be alone.”  He went on to tell me about his wife of 59 years, who had died four weeks earlier.  And how many good memories he had and how blessed he had been to love her and how much he missed her but he knew that in the end love trumps death.  He went on to say that many people never know a love like that and that his being sad just reinforced how much he loved her.  He also went on to say that life is brief and fragile and we should just all be grateful and love each other.

After, I choked back tears, paid for my buttermilk and gave him a big hug, suddenly I wasn’t so mad anymore and suddenly as if an angel of the Lord appeared before me:  "Peace, Goodwill."

I thought about the words of Isaiah and Joseph and Mary. 

“The people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who have lived in the land of deep darkness- on them a light a has shined…For a child has been born for us…his name is …Prince of Peace…” (Isaiah 9:2,6)

Those are perhaps the most gorgeous words for what we celebrate this time of the year.   That text was written 700 years before the birth of Christ and we can forget it can stand on its own without interpreting them through the eyes of Christmas.  These words don’t take on meaning solely by the message of Christmas.  Isaiah’s words offer powerful hope for those in darkness in any time, any place.  Even in the aisle of Food Lion.  And I suspect my new friend already knows about this kind of peace.  He would not have gotten out of bed today otherwise. He would not find hope in love and he would not see hope beyond death if he didn't know.

 

God took a chance that night long ago.  God decided the only way to get our attention was to take on skin.  It has often been called the great mystery.  The Incarnation.  I am not so sure it matters much how it happened as much as us deciding to do something with it.   Sometimes I think that in my less than holy moments, it is only then that God shows up.  More often than not, I suspect I don’t see him, but today I think I did.  In both encounters.  How frustrating it must be for God to wait on us to see what is sitting right in front of us like seven different kinds of buttermilk and yet when God shows up in chance encounters and love is spilling all over the aisle at Food Lion, we lie on a backs like shepherds watching the night sky in awestruck. 

And maybe the stars will shine brighter tonight, and maybe the skies won't be as dark as before and maybe tonight love is raining down on all the world tonight, it is what we all are praying for.

God is for us, God is with us, God is in us.  Emmanuel.

 

All is grace,

Kathleen