Image by Sr. Regina Krushen, O.S.B.
I gazed into the faces of two of my brand-new granddaughters this past week as our family welcomed Violet Fisher and River Leith to planet Earth. I couldn’t help leaning down and putting my cheek on their cheek and whispering, “I love you…everything’s gonna be okay.” It was a special moment coming face to face with a new life, a life that was clearly only able to be created by the power of God to create from nothing.
To the best of my knowledge, Violet’s and River’s parents had no angel appear in their room, saying that important line angels say, “Do not be afraid!” You might recall the angel also proclaimed that Mary would give birth to a son who would rule Jacob’s house forever, that there would be no end to his kingdom, and that this baby would be called Holy, the Son of God. That’s enough to make a mom to be rather nervous, to say the least!
I’m pretty sure that if we could peek into the manger moments after Jesus was born, we would have seen Mary lean down and touch her cheek to the cheek of the Son of God. I bet Joseph did the same moments after. I’ve been wondering what Mary and Joseph felt when their faces touched the face of God. It must have been an electric moment loaded with meaning, hope, fear, wonder, insecurity, and praise. Maybe Mary wondered out loud to Joseph how they would go about raising the God-child Jesus. After all, this baby was destined to save the world, and centuries later, we are still following him and calling him Christ, the Lord.
I imagine that only Mary and Joseph, along with some friends and family in their neighborhood, got to hold baby Jesus. For you and me, we can only ponder what that might have been like. For us, living two thousand plus years later, we know that the baby Jesus grew up and died for us to give us life, living forever with Him in heaven. Along with the shepherds, the Magi, and billions of others over the last 2,000+ years, we must grapple with the life of Jesus. Was he just a good teacher? Does the baby born thousands of years ago matter today as we hustle to buy one last Christmas gift to put under the tree? C.S. Lewis wrote in 1970 in his book, God in the Dock, “Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important.”
Oh, one more thing. We will never get to be cheek-to-cheek with baby Jesus, but we will see God face-to-face someday. The Apostle Paul writes that God will trade our dim human ability to conjure up an image of God for a face-to-face encounter with Him someday. All blurry darkness, all foggy images, and ideas will be replaced with knowing Him fully while at the same time being fully known by God.
In the meantime, what will you do with Jesus this Christmas? Who will you tell about his life? There’s no better time than Christmas!
Greg Leith
CEO