The nativity story as you have never seen or heard before! By Linda C. Stafford

My husband and I had been happily (most of the time) married for five years but hadn’t been blessed with a baby. I decided to do some serious praying and promised God that if He would give us a child, I would be a perfect mother, love it with all my heart and raise it with His Word as my guide.
God answered my prayers and blessed us with a son. The next year God blessed us with another son. The following year, He blessed us with yet another son. The year after that we were blessed with a daughter. My husband thought we’d been blessed right into poverty. We now had four children, and the oldest was only four years old. I learned never to ask God for anything unless I meant it. As a minister once told me, “If you pray for rain, make sure you carry an umbrella.”
I began reading a few verses of the Bible to the children each day as they lay in their cribs. I was off to a good start. God had entrusted me with four children and I didn’t want to disappoint him. I tried to be patient the day the children smashed two dozen eggs on the kitchen floor searching for baby chicks.

I tried to be understanding when they started a hotel for homeless frogs in the spare bedroom, although it took me nearly two hours to catch all twenty-three frogs.

When my daughter poured ketchup all over herself and rolled up in a blanket to see how it felt to be a hot dog, I tried to see the humor rather than the mess. In spite of changing over twenty-five thousand diapers, never eating a hot meal and never sleeping for more than thirty inutes at a time, I still thank God daily for my children.

While I couldn’t keep my promise to be a perfect mother – I didn’t even come close – I did keep my promise to raise them in the Word of God. I knew I was missing the mark just a little when I told my daughter we were going to church to worship God, and she wanted to bring a bar of soap along to “wash up” Jesus, too.
Something was lost in the translation when I explained that God gave us everlasting life, and my son thought it was generous of God to give us his “last wife.”
My proudest moment came during the children’s Christmas pageant. My daughter was playing Mary, two of my sons were shepherds and my youngest son was a wise man. This was their moment to shine.

My five-year-old shepherd had practiced his line, “We found the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes.” But he was nervous and said, “The baby was wrapped in waddling clothes.” My four-year-old “Mary” said, “That’s not ‘waddling clothes,’ silly. That’s waddling toes.”
A wrestling match broke out between Mary and the shepherd and was stopped by an angel, who bent her halo and lost her left wing. I slouched a little lower in my seat when Mary dropped the doll representing Baby Jesus, and it bounced down the aisle crying, “Mama-mama.” Mary grabbed the doll, wrapped it back up and held it tightly as the wise men arrived.
My other son stepped forward wearing a bathrobe and a paper crown, knelt at the manger and announced, “We are the three wise men, and we are bringing gifts of gold, common sense and fur.”
The congregation dissolved into laughter, and the pageant got a standing ovation. “I’ve never enjoyed a Christmas program as much as this one,” laughed the pastor, wiping tears from his eyes. “For the rest of my life, I’ll never hear the Christmas story without thinking of gold, common sense and fur.”
“My children are my pride and my joy and my greatest blessing,” I said as I dug through my purse for an aspirin.

Christ is Born! Glorify Him!

Christ is born; glorify Him.
Christ comes from heaven: go out to meet Him.
Christ descends to earth: let us be raised on high.
Let all the world sing to the Lord; let the heavens rejoice and let
the earth be glad, for His sake who was first in heaven and then on
earth.
Christ is here in the flesh: let us exult with fear and joy -
With fear, because of our sins;
With joy, because of the hope that He brings us.

Once more darkness is dispersed; once more the light is created.
Let the people that sat in the darkness of ignorance now look upon
the light of knowledge.
The things of old have passed away; behold, all things are made new.
He who has no mother in heaven is now born without father on earth.
The laws of nature are overthrown, for the upper world must be filled
with citizens.
He who is without flesh becomes incarnate;
the Word puts on a body;
the Invisible is seen;
He whom no hand can touch is handled;
the timeless has a beginning;
the Son of God becomes Son of Man – Jesus Christ, the same yesterday,
today and for ever.

Light from light, the Word of the Father comes to His own image, man.
For the sake of my flesh He takes flesh; for the sake of my soul
He is united to a rational soul, purifying like by like.
In every way He becomes man, except for sin.
0 strange conjunction!
The Self-existent comes into being;
the Uncreated is created.
He shares in the poverty of my flesh,
that I may share in the riches of His Godhead.

From the Orthodox Christmas Liturgy

Christ is Born! Glorify Him!

Christ is born; glorify Him.
Christ comes from heaven: go out to meet Him.
Christ descends to earth: let us be raised on high.
Let all the world sing to the Lord; let the heavens rejoice and let
the earth be glad, for His sake who was first in heaven and then on
earth.
Christ is here in the flesh: let us exult with fear and joy -
With fear, because of our sins;
With joy, because of the hope that He brings us.

Once more darkness is dispersed; once more the light is created.
Let the people that sat in the darkness of ignorance now look upon
the light of knowledge.
The things of old have passed away; behold, all things are made new.
He who has no mother in heaven is now born without father on earth.
The laws of nature are overthrown, for the upper world must be filled
with citizens.
He who is without flesh becomes incarnate;
the Word puts on a body;
the Invisible is seen;
He whom no hand can touch is handled;
the timeless has a beginning;
the Son of God becomes Son of Man – Jesus Christ, the same yesterday,
today and for ever.

Light from light, the Word of the Father comes to His own image, man.
For the sake of my flesh He takes flesh; for the sake of my soul
He is united to a rational soul, purifying like by like.
In every way He becomes man, except for sin.
0 strange conjunction!
The Self-existent comes into being;
the Uncreated is created.
He shares in the poverty of my flesh,
that I may share in the riches of His Godhead.

> From the Orthodox Christmas Liturgy

Recently, while going through an airport during one of his many trips,
President Bush encountered a man with long gray hair, wearing a white robe
and sandals, and holding a staff. President Bush went up to the man and
said, “Has anyone told you that you look like Moses?”
The man didn’t answer. He just kept staring straight ahead. The president
said, “Moses!” in a loud voice. The man just stared ahead, never
acknowledging the president.
The president pulled a Secret Service agent aside and, pointing to the robed
man, asked him, “Am I crazy or does that man not look like Moses to you?”
The Secret Service agent looked at the man and agreed.
“Well,” said the president, “every time I say his name, he ignores me and
stares straight ahead, refusing to speak. Watch!” Again the president
yelled, “Moses!” and again the man ignored him.
The Secret Service agent went up to the man in the white robe and whispered,
“You look just like Moses. Are you Moses?”
The man leaned over and whispered back, “Yes, I am Moses. However, the last
time I talked to a bush, I spent 40 years wandering in the desert and ended
up leading my people to the only spot in the entire Middle East where
there is no oil!”

We have a spiral staircase in our home that connects the basement with the two floors above it. It is a steel staircase (made by US Steel – it says so right on one of the railings). In it’s nearly 30 years of existence, these stairs had never been painted. We decided a nice coat of black Rustoleum would greatly improve it’s appearance. Six hours later, the stairs were looking pretty good. However, an unfortunate splatter on a new carpet, a few unintended spots on the otherwise white ceiling and inky black cuticles were vivid reminders of my amateur status.
Not knowing any better, I dabbed the carpet stain with Mineral Spirits. Did the same with the spot on the wall. To my horror, the black oil spread making the stains even worse. My on-line search yielded many solutions, including cutting the carpet out and gluing a new patch in it’s place. But I was determined not to go that route.
Application after application of Mineral Spirits and gentle dabbing, the carpet looks almost like new. Hours of soaking my hands in mineral spirits and then my fingers in nail polish remover eventually yielded minor improvement. It’s taken days of washing and a professional nail technician to restore my cuticles to some semblance of normalcy.
What does this have to do with the delusion of sin? Have you ever known a recent convert or a reformed addict? When newly “born again” we think we understand it all and that we will never be deluded again. But in reality we’re looking pretty much like that black stain in my carpet. Just a layer of delusion wiped away and we think we are in the clear. Yet the confusion remains – we are most in danger when we think we’ve finally “got it.” Instead, we’re just spreading the ink.
Each moment we spend in the presence of God, in prayer, in silence, in Scripture, in praise is like the mineral spirits dissolving the inky delusion just a little bit more. Time after time, day by day, the delusion gets a little less messy and the light of God that is there inside at all times shines through.

I have become enamored with the TV show “House.” The main character, Dr. House, is an obnoxious but brilliant diagnosticians. His bedside manner is almost hateful but not quite. One suspects that underneath it all is a man who cares deeply about life. Dr. House is in chronic severe pain and can only function when on high doses of Vicodan.
Dr. House has a younger assistant neurologist who was recently transformed by a near-death experience. As a result this doctor has become a peaceful, contented, rarely angered human being. Dr. House cruelly tries to break his new found equanimity. I don’t have this quote completely right but it went something like this: “I need you to be angry. People who are at peace are happy to live in mud huts and meditate all day. Only people who are out-raged make a difference and change things.”
I can relate to Dr. House. I, too, am in chronic pain and I have days when Vicodan is the only thing that keeps me from total panic. I also can relate to his assistant. Every day I spend several hours in prayerful meditation. I am at peace with myself and with this world. I’m not so angry these days. I don’t have such a need to change much of anything except those things I am able to change. Only chronic illness could teach this to me.
But I wonder sometimes. I believe that the depth of prayer and conscious-living that I have come to know make a difference, probably much more difference than all my frantic activity of the 30 previous years. But I wonder. I used to be a change-agent. In any given situation, I knew how to make it better and I usually busted my butt to do so. Now, I don’t really care so much. I’ll do what I can but I don’t feel that I need to do so. I have more of a sense that things happen all in God’s good time. My efforts might be helpful once in awhile but only in a fleeting way, like the vapor of a burning candle.
I used to say “I’d rather burn out than rust out.” Perhaps I’ve done that. Or perhaps I have found a way to flow with the Spirit. Life is much better and I certainly don’t miss being angry. Still, I think of the t-shirt my daughter once gave my husband: “If you aren’t totally outraged, you aren’t paying attention.”