As I mentioned before, I have often found Christmas morning to be split. It was half excitement and joy of getting what I asked for (basically Lego sets) and half dismay at sitting through another Christmas morning service, where they always tell the same message. That’s a ten year-old’s mind for you. It was only the same message because I never listened to it.
I went this year, with my brother, and enjoyed greeting happy people and listening to a volunteer choir. The message spoke was one of such simplicity and honesty, and perhaps that’s what made this morning different. Marla spoke the message of Christ through the parallel of an old wooden Nativity scene. She told how it was a tradition in her family, the importance of the set, and the eventual misplacement of parts due to kids. Well, in all honesty, the message could have been construed as corny. But I found it meaningful.
She said two things that stuck out. In her tradition, the shepherds were always stuck at the back, away from the action, from the manger. She spoke about how the shepherds were the poorest attendants to the Christ child, and often times are looked over. But to them, witnessing this baby, after a company of Angels announced it to them, why should they not get to feel important? Often times we overlook those who are common, to attend to those who are extraordinary. But what makes a person more extraordinary than another, after all?
The other things she spoke was about losing the manger. One of her kids, when young, would often misplace the manger and then the baby Jesus would be crib-less. In essence, forced to be held. There was no way for the figures to hold Jesus, but that thought of keeping Jesus in your arms, in your presence, it was simply profound. Without a place to neatly tuck away Jesus, where else would he go? Holding Jesus means being aware, mindful, caring. Isn’t that how we should conduct ourselves?
The end of the service in my church is always with a volunteer choir getting congregational volunteers to sing Der Friedensfurst, a robust and lively German hymn. I believe it’s translated as Prince of Peace, but I could be wrong. I spent almost a half hour trying to find it on the internet with no luck. But it’s a wonderful loud and exciting song to sing. The row I was sitting in had the Enns boys, three of them and their cousin. We all filed out and to the bass section (though I admit, I would likely fit better in tenor), and we picked up the sheets.
Now, I can’t read sheet music, sing in tune all the time or, most importantly, read German properly. But, regardless of all that, I wanted to sing. I wanted to raise my voice in choral unity to sing. It’s so easy in a choir to almost borrow neighbouring voices and almost hear them as yours. In that way, I enjoy the company of a choir. With the lines and notes before me, and my music being shared with Randy Enns, I sang my best, reading my best German. It was loud and joyful, and I felt good. I was the only members of my family in the choir, and I believe that my Opa used to join in for the song, when he was still alive. Part of me felt a small pride in representing the family in the choir loft. I’ve often been told I look like Opa, and I felt a little close to him, singing in his native tongue. I also felt closer to GOD, too. I haven’t sung my way close to Him in a while.
And that was my Christmas morning.
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