"Why Christmas? Why Christ?"

Ps. 103:13, NIRV

     In an age in which a great many books and ideas regarding

spirituality are on the market, we might ask the questions in our

title: “Why Christmas?  Why Christ?”  Why is it uniquely these

aspects of spirituality that can settle so deeply into our hearts? 

Today we will offer a personal answer.  

    Christ is the intimate face of God!  Jesus (his name in his coming

among us) is the “visible expression of the invisible God.”[1]  He is

the portrait of the Father’s heart, the mirror of the Father’s heart

(Luther).[2]  He is the one “close to the Father’s heart, who has made

him known.”[3]  He portrays “the heart of tender mercy and loving-

kindness of our God."[4]  He is "Love came down at Christmas, love

all lovely, Love divine . . .”[5]  He is God entering our everyday

material existence and struggle and becoming bone of our bone

and flesh of our flesh.[6]  He comes to be our family, our “brother.”[7] 

He comes to be the “ghostly glue” that binds God and us together

(to use terms from a spiritual classic[8]).  (See scriptures referenced

above: Col 1: 15; Jn. 1:18; Lk. 1:78; Mt. 12:49-50; Heb. 2:11.[9])

    Jesus comes to show us that “God is in love with us!”[10]  He

comes to show us that God cannot let the “beloved” children of God

go.  And we are those “beloved” children.[11]  

    The poet Novalis tells us Jesus is God’s “mysterious embrace.”  He writes of "a face never seen before--in the poverty of a poetic shelter--a son ... the eternal fruit of mysterious embrace. . . .  In solitude the heavenly heart unfolded.”[12]  In other words, God’s very “heart unfolded” so that we might see it in Christ.  Novalis continues: “Ere long . . . [l]ike flowers sprang up a strange new life in his presence.  Words inexhaustible and the most joyful tidings fell like sparks of a divine spirit from his friendly lips."[13] 

    Jesus comes, indeed, to touch us in friendly manner--intimately

and mysteriously.  Jesus calls us into intimacy with God--into a most

unexpected and surprisingly close relationship with God. 

There is a wonderful classic way of meditating in which one enters

into biblical scenes where Jesus is revealed.  One of the most

touching suggestions is that in meditation we enter the scene of

Jesus’ birth.  In whatever way we chose, we are present within the

scene in imaginative meditation.  Perhaps you imagine yourself a

servant helping in some modest way.[14]

    We find a painting by Murillo especially helpful for such

meditation.  Click on this link to Murillo’s masterpiece “The

Adoration of the Shepherds”[15]:

https://www.wikiart.org/en/bartolome-esteban-murillo/the-adoration-of-the-shepherds

    A cow, a sheep, two chickens, and a donkey (in shadows) are depicted in this scene by the artist.  Why shouldn't I be here too?  A barefoot shepherd is here--the soles of his feet quite dirty.  Why shouldn’t I be here too--irrespective of the dirt on my feet (or wherever)?  An ordinary elderly woman carries a basket of eggs as a gift.  Why shouldn’t I offer a simple gift as well, even if it is only my service to this dear family?  Mary and Joseph are clothed as simple, ordinary people.  Why shouldn’t I be here with them?  Jesus is an adorable babe.  Mary pulls back the covers to share his entire earthly existence with the humble visitors--just as Jesus came to share his entire existence with us.  Since I am a servant [in this meditation], perhaps Mary or Joseph offer me a turn holding this earthly, adorable Christ-child.  Surely they need a rest sometimes. 

Why shouldn’t I hold him close to my heart?  Why shouldn’t

I entirely immerse myself in this scene--grasping the intimacy

of God’s coming among us in a vulnerable, defenseless babe:

one who comes to be close to--to be intimate with--us in every

way.

    He will also, eventually, give his all--everything!--for us

(Jn. 10:11).  And he will promise never to leave us--never to

leave us “orphans.”[16]  

    So he will always be present to us, and furthermore, he will promise as well that the “Companion” and “Comforter” or "Helper"[17] (Holy Spirit) will always be with us--if only we so choose.[18]  Jesus is the intimacy of God incarnated--he is the embodiment of a God who desires genuine close relationship and companionship with us.  (See our personal meditations--similar to the one described above--at the end of this post.)

    We need the intimate in any deep love relationship.  We need the intimate in our spirituality (see previous Christmas posts that stress this as well[19] ).  As Helmut Thielicke writes: “We need ‘contact with the Father's heart, the heart . . . [one] sees in his [her] brother Jesus Christ. . . .  'Nevertheless I am continually with thee’. . .” (Ps. 73:23).[20]

    We could give 101 other answers to the questions in our title.  However, we have chosen to stay with heart-based answers today.  Both Martin Luther and John Wesley offered a fulsome theology of the heart.[21]  However, as mentioned in previous posts[22], too often an argumentative culture gets caught up in answers that simply stress the “conceptual-doctrinal”[23] and the mindset of “rationalistic materialism.”[24]  Meanwhile, such answers tend to neglect or forget that in the end the spiritual is about relationship.  This means heart theology.  Thus, no sense of argument enters into our thoughts here.  It’s all about love on both sides of a relationship. 

    Arguments cannot touch real love.  Thomas Merton writes,

“It is hopeless to try to settle . . .  [any spiritual question] out-

side the context of friendship and of love.”[25]  We agree.  May

we meditate upon Love Came Down: to enter our world, to

love us completely, to relate to us in our deepest hearts, to

give everything for us (Jn. 15:13), and to share everything

with us in deep loving relationship for as long as we walk

this earth.

    Evelyn Underhill writes that one of the most consistent and

unique hallmarks of the old saints and "geniuses" of the Christian

faith is their  “joyous intimacy” and “tender feeling” in

relationship with God.[26] 

     We believe this is what we ordinary ones are invited to experience as well--in loving relationship with God.  Christ came in the “tender mercy” of God to touch us intimately--to be with us (Lk. 1:78; Mt. 1:23, 28:20).  We allow the mercy and Grace Christ brought to sweep away any impediment that could get in the way of this loving and experiential relationship, which can and should be filled with new-found “joyous intimacy” and “tender feeling.”  

    Great multitudes have experienced a touch of such feelings in

this holy season as the joy of Christ’s gentle entry into this

world beckons us in mesmerizing, inexplicable, and enlivening

ways.  We cultivate a life lived in this mysteriously beautiful

relationship (for which Love Came Down--to us!) all year long.  

At Christmas many experience mysterious intimations of the 

heart's "faithful guardian."  The poet Novalis writes:

“Our heart has a faithful guardian, / Heaven’s own true, 

blessed child.” [27]  

   The Apostle Peter assures us that this child grows to

become our faithful “guardian” forever.[28]

    It is as if in all ways Jesus, in his entry into our world, is

saying: “Hold me close to your heart . . . Keep me as close

to yourself as the bracelet on your arm.  My love for you is

so strong it won’t let you go.  Love is as powerful as death

[cf. Eph. 5:25]. . . .  Love burns like a mighty flame.  No

amount of water can put it out.  Rivers can’t sweep it away. 

Suppose someone offers all their wealth to buy love.  That

won’t even come close to being enough”; Song of

Solomon 8:6-7, NIRV .[29]

⭐⭐⭐

                           

We close with thoughts for meditation, prayer/poetry/proverbs for this Season:

                             

“Advent Meditation, Advent Waiting”

     (Note: “Christmas” literally means “Christ’s Mass”--i.e., worship to celebrate

Christ’s coming into our world and lives. In Advent we anticipate this coming.

Also see 2 Cor. 4:7.)

⭐⭐⭐

                             

An imaginative meditation based on Luke 2:6-19:

    (Also with reflection upon Isa. 53:5; 1 Pet. 3:18; Jn. 8:36; and

especially Ephesians 2:8-9.)

⭐⭐⭐

                           

A meditation at the manger bed:

                                                                                                                        

    (With reflection upon Lk. 2: 7, 16 and Hos. 11:4: “I was to them like those who

lift infants to their cheeks; NRSV, NSRVCE.) [30]

“Let us not flutter too high, but remain by the manger and the

swaddling clothes of Christ, ‘in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the

Godhead bodily.’” - Martin Luther, Table Talk

⭐⭐⭐

⭐ Perpetual Christmas (a prelude to prayer):

     (With reflection upon Lk. 2:7; Jn. 1:1-14; Mt. 18:3, 19:14; Phil. 2:5-7;

Rom. 12:16; and 1 Pet. 3:8.)

Walter Hilton: “For Truth and Humility are full true sisters . . . and there 

is no distance of counsel betwixt them . . .” [31]

⭐⭐⭐

“Meditation upon the Incarnation--God’s Great Love Story (quoting

Luther & St. Catherine)”

“[T]o keep company with us … [Y]ou made yourself lowly 

and small to make us great!” – St. Catherine of Siena [32]

The INCARNATION is . . . 

the “ghostly glue” of God’s Grace 

drawing nearer and nearer and nearer--until . . . 

it had to become enfleshed . . .

became one “clay” with us, 

mixed into the very “cake” of our lives,         

so our lives might be mixed into God.

Incarnate “ghostly glue” of Grace--

longing, LOVING, 

wooing, compelling.

Beyond all expression the prophets say,

drawing intimately nearer . . . to us.    

Then may I draw near to YOU, 

SUCH LOVE, 

as YOU draw near to me. 

I would draw near to YOU; 

     YOU have drawn . . . so NEAR . . . to me!  

                                       

    (With reflection upon James 4:8 and themes quoted in various spiritual 

classics: Martin Luther’s discussion of being kneaded into one cake 

[kuchen] with God, St. Catherine of Siena's discussion of Christ being 

“kneaded into the clay of your humanity like one bread,” and the 

anonymous classic The Epistle of Prayer speaking of the “ghostly 

[spiritual] glue” of Grace.[33] )

⭐⭐⭐

First Exquisite Breath (a Meditation):

(See: a. Mt. 18:3; b. Jn. 20:22; c. Mk. 7:37, 1 Jn. 1:9, 2 Cor. 5:17;

d. Luke 1:78, Heb. 4:15-16, Ps. 25:6, WEB; e. Ez. 36:26; f. Mt. 1:23;

g. Mt. 28:20; h. Mt. 6:9, Ps. 131, Lk. 15:12-24; Isa. 49:15, RSV;

i. Jer. 31:3, NIV.)

⭐⭐⭐

(SEE an Extra Christmas Meditation on the beautiful poetic words

of Luke's Nativity Story after the notes.[34] )

(See additional blog posts after the “Notes” in Newer/Older Posts,

including more Christmas posts.[35])

………………..

Notes:

1. Colossians 1:15, Phillips translation.

2. Martin Luther, Large Catechism (1529).

3. John 1:18, NRSV, NRSVCE.

4. Luke 1:78, AMPC.

5. See Christina Rossetti’s poem “Love Came Down at Christmas,” 1882.

6. See “Most-Amazing Love”; http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2017/03/.

7. Mt. 12:49-50; Heb. 2:11.

8. Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism (New York: Meridian Books, 1955), p. 427 (quoting the
“Epistle of Prayer”: some think this epistle was written by the anonymous author of The
Cloud of Unknowing). Also see Note 33.

9. See Notes 1, 3, 4, 7 above for translations (when used).

10. David Hazard, ed., “Forward,” A Day in Your Presence: A 40-Day Journey in the
Company of Francis of Assisi (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1992) p. 8.

11. See “The Tender ‘Love Song’ of God”;
http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2017/02/.

12. Novalis (Friedrich von Hardenberg), “Hymns to the Night,” 1897, trans. George
MacDonald (revised); https://logopoeia.com/novalis/hymns.html.

13. Ibid.

14. Especially see David L. Fleming, S.J., Draw Me Into Your Friendship: A Literal Translation
and a Contemporary Reading of the Spiritual Exercises (St. Louis: Institute of Jesuit
Sources, 1996), No. 110­-117.   Fleming translates St. Ignatius's Spiritual Exercises

from the 17th c. There has been much use of this prayer/meditation model

throughout the ages since.

15. Bartolomé Esteban Murillo was a Spanish Baroque painter, 1617-1682.

16. Jn. 14:18; Mt. 28:20, NIV.

17. Jn. 14:16-17, CEB, ASV, NKJV.

18. Regarding choices see: “Can We Hinder the ‘Shepherd of Love’; Can We
Hinder God?”; http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2018/08/.

19. See “The Descent of Tender Love: The Christmas Story”:
http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2015_12_01_archive.html; 

“The Tender Romance of God’s LOVE—The Christmas Story”:
http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2016/12/;
“God’s Greatest ‘Love Letter’ to Us: The Tender Romance of Christmas”: http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2017/.  

20. Helmut Thielicke, Life Can Begin Again: Sermons on the Sermon on the

Mount, trans. John W. Dobertein (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1963), p. 145.

21. See Bengt R. Hoffman, Theology of the Heart: The Role of Mysticism in the
Theology of Martin Luther, ed. Pearl Willemssen Hoffman (Minneapolis: Kirk
House, 2003); Randy L. Maddox, A Change of Affections: The Development,
Dynamics, and Dethronement of John Wesley’s “Heart Religion” in the
Methodist Tradition and Related Movements, ed. Richard Steele (Scarecrow
Press: Metuchen, NJ, 2001), pp. 3-31;

https://dukespace.lib.duke.edu/items/30e65538-1a19-492e-ace6-5e6af987c140

22. Especially see “Sacred Tenderness and the Western Mind”;
http://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2015/09/.

23. As Bengt Hoffman writes: “[T]here are barriers built into western intellectual
thought structures which render if difficult to grasp the intimate connection
between the conceptual-doctrinal and the experiential” knowledge of God’s love
and “God’s presence”; Bengt R. Hoffman, Luther and the Mystics (Minneapolis:
Augsburg, 1976), pp. 18-19 (this is the original form of the above [in Note 21]:
the 1976 version is cherished by us because of many personal notes in margins.)  
Also see discussion of the “conceptual and doctrinal” in Rudolf Otto, The Idea
of the Holy, trans. John W. Harvey (London: Oxford University Press, 1923),
p. 108.

24. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung, eds. Herbert Read, Michael Fordham,
Gerhard Adler, William McGuire, trans. R. F .C. Hull (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1953-79), Vol. 9(2), par. 282. Note that in one form or another

Jung's concern about the one-sidedness and “rationalistic materialism” of modern

Western culture pervades his writing.  (For further thoughts on the concept 

we stress here, see Notes 22-23 above.)

25. Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island (New York: Harvest, Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich, 1955), pp. 131-132.

26. Evelyn Underhill, The Mystics of the Church (New York: Schocken Books,
1964), p. 33;  Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism (New York: Meridian Books, 1955),
pp. 104, 63, 65, 73, 376, 279, 467.

27. Walter D. Toy, “The Mysticism of Novalis: An Interpretation of Die Hymnen
an die Nacht” (“The Hymns to the Night”), University of North Carolina Press,
Studies in Philology, Vol. 15, No. 1, p. 21.

28. 1 Pet. 2:25, RSV.

29. Note that the Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs) is often seen as both a
human love story and a metaphor for God’s love.

30. All prayer/meditations/poetry/proverbs by Lorraine B. Eshleman.

31. Walter Hilton, The Scale of Perfection, Book 2, Chap. 13.

32. Catherine of Siena: The Dialogue, A Treatise of Prayer.

33. See Martin Luther quoted in Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, trans.

John W. Harvey (London: Oxford University Press, 1923, 1950),

Appendix VI, p. 205.  See Catherine of Siena: The Dialogue, trans.

Suzanne Noffke, O.P. (New York: Paulist, 1980), p. 65.  For “ghostly

glue,” see the anonymous classic The Epistle of Prayer in The Cell of

Self Knowledge, printed by Henry Pepwell, 1521.  (Also see Catherine

of Siena: The Dialogue, p. 273.)

34. Luke 2:1-20; "&" and capitalization added.

35. For other Christmas posts, see https://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-descent-of-tender-love-christmas.html; https://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2016/12/the-tender-romance-of-gods-love.html;

https://sacred-tenderness-christian-tradition.blogspot.com/2017/12/gods-greatest-love-letter-to-us-tender.html

...

An extra--

Meditating upon the beautiful, poetic words of LUKE 2:1-20, KJV

(with Note 34 above):

✬✧✫✮✧✫

✬✧✫✮✧✫

✬✧✫✮✧✫