Silliman University Church Reflections

Matt. 1: 18-25

How do you see Christmas? You will be surprised at so many variations of views there are about Christmas.

I’ve heard some people say that Christmas is boring!  What is Christmas but commercial songs (You better watch out…Santa Claus is coming to town) that invite us to shop at the mall as early as September. Christmas is when you hear a commercial jingle bells, it is no longer a surprise! Even Wowowee dancers are wearing Santa’s red bonnet as they make giling giling and alog alog.

But Christmas must first be a celebration of faith. It is a time to see with eyes of faith, much like a child discovers the wonders of life. It is a celebration of the unexpected; it is a festival of surprises.

This reminds me of the story of a man who was blind for 50 years. He couldn’t see a thing. His world was a black room of sounds and smells. He stumbled in darkness for 50 years. And then, one day a skilled surgeon performed a complicated eye operation on him and, for the first time, the man could see. He found it overwhelming. “I never would have dreamed that yellow is so…yellow,” he exclaimed. “I don’t have the words. I am amazed by yellow. But red is my favorite color. I just can’t believe red. I can see the shape of the moon–and I love seeing a an ant carry a load and greet other ants along the way. And of course, sunrise and sunsets are unbelievable! And at night I look at the stars in the sky and wonder how far they are. You cant imagine how wonderful everything is.” 

Sometimes we need to suffer terrible blindness before we can appreciate Christmas. Imagine yourself being blind and deaf for 50 years. And then suddenly you gain sight and someone takes you to
Bethlehem on Christmas eve, would you be surprised?

Christmas was the night when shepherds were surprised by the songs of angels; when a star – brighter than Jupiter – lightened the night sky and guided travelers. Christmas is when 3 wise men go on a surprising trip, bringing gifts to a Prince they had not seen, to a country they have not visited before.

This is the night when one small donkey bears the weight of the world’s future, and a cow is surprised to play host to the Lord of heaven.

This is the night when we are told to seek our King, not in a palace but in a stable.

Was there ever a house more topsy-turvy, dirty and smelly, than the House of Christmas, the cave house where Christ was born?

And as we push open the little door of the stable, and enter, we find in the arms of a Mother, who is a Virgin, a Baby, Who is God!

But the greatest surprise of all is this. When Jesus was born on earth, Earth became Heaven. Heaven was here. God ruled his vast kingdom of the universe from planet earth. The universe turned upside down. Down is up and up is down. The angels and the stars look down on God who made them and God looks up at the things He made.

This is why someone said: the only way to understand Christmas properly is to stand on one’s head.

There was no room in the inn for Him who made room for us in the Milky Way; and where God is homeless, all men and women have found a home and a family.

We were promised a Savior, but we never dreamed that God himself would come to save us.

We knew that He loved us, but we never dared to think that He loved us so much as to become like us.

But that is the way God gives. His gifts are never quite what we expect, but always something better than we hoped for.

We can only dream of things too good to be true; God has a habit of giving things too good to be false. That is why our faith is a faith in the unexpected, ours is a religion of surprise.

Now more than ever, living in times so troubled, facing a future so uncertain, we need such faith. We need it for ourselves, and we need it to give to others. We must remind the world that if Christmas comes in the cold of December, it is so that there may be an Easter of harvest in April.

Isn’t that the way we should see Christmas? But Christmas is surprising only if we see it with eyes of faith. Instead of seeing it as a time of happy happy, eating eating, giling giling.  

How do you see Christmas?

Sermon delivered on 21 Dec 2008 at Silliman Heights chapel. (Adapted from an essay on Christmas surprises)