Bungee cord 12-28-15

Hello,

“Silent night.  Holy night.   All is calm.  All is bright.  Round yon virgin, mother and child.  Holy infant so tender and mild.  Sleep in heavenly peace.  Sleep in heavenly peace.”

When it comes to the birthing of babies, the process that happens today is really quite a recent phenomenon.  All the prenatal care, the birthing classes, the rushing to the hospital, spinal taps and pain medication, sterile rooms and incubators….only recently born babies, at least in the scope of the centuries of births, have had this level of care and precision.  I have had parishioners for whom it was vastly different, who were born in their homes under the care of the town doctor calling for hot water and towels; not because they opted for a more “natural” birth, but because that was the way every baby came into the world.  What we have come to expect with baby births is really quite a recent expectation.

I don’t think that Mary and Joseph expected what we expect.  I highly doubt that they had many prenatal visits to a doctor gauging the process of the pregnancy.  I highly doubt that they were disappointed to have given birth in a stable.  At least it was shelter.  I rather suspect that when the contractions began, anxieties rose to a fever pitched level wondering if mother or child would survive what was about to take place.  If Jesus was Mary’s firstborn, as the Bible says he was, the birth pangs were probably the most severe she would ever feel as a birthing mother.  And I can only imagine the delight (?) in Mary’s heart when a bunch of shepherds showed up merely hours after her delivery…I know that I have visited many a new mother who greet me with thanks, but I can tell are struggling to put a smile on their faces after the ordeal that they have just been through.

Maybe, because birthing things are so different for us, the sentimentality and ease that we apply to the birth story of Jesus is a recent phenomenon, too.  Maybe we are among the first to miss the degree of worry that Mary and Joseph felt.  Maybe we are among the first to miss the degree of pain and fear that was part of that event.  Maybe we are among the first to miss the inconvenience of that night.  But most importantly,  maybe we are among the first to miss the degree of thankfulness and  amazement that all went well that night.

I find that something to consider when worry, pain, fear, and inconvenience take hold of me – maybe I will find myself more appropriately thankful and amazed by God’s fulfillment of his promise to be born into my life.

Have a great week!

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger