From the Bench
A BELATED CHRISTMAS STORY
January is not the time to be writing a Christmas story.
Right? It's as bad as having icicle lights still hanging from the porch,
or exchanging forty-dollar sweaters that are now marked down to ten. By
now, Christmas has become shop-worn, and it is time to get on with the
business of the new year.......fun things like figuring your income taxes
or paying your first big winter gas bill.
Now that I have you in a "Grinchy" mood, I may as well go ahead
and tell you my Christmas story. But it is not a story with trees, or
lights, or snow, or any of the other stuff we stuff Christmas with. It
is just a simple little story about my miracle on Christmas eve.
We all like stories about miracles, but we tend to be skeptical about
them. After all, miracles are big events that happen to other people,
not to us. We only read about them in the Bible, or "Guideposts",
or "The Reader’s Digest."
Don’t be too sure. Miracles can be sneaky, unobtrusive things that come
up unexpectedly. Sometimes they come as a message just for you, and if
your mind is somewhere else, or if you’re not in the right mood, they
may slip by unnoticed….gone forever, leaving you poorer without knowing
it.
My miracle was like that, bringing me a message in the blink of an eye.
The message continues to grow, and I’m still sorting it out.
It came on Christmas eve. My wife and I were spending it the way we have
for many of the past forty years, attending candlelight service at church.
The most meaningful part for me has always been The Lord’s Supper, watching
families go down front together. I was again enjoying warm memories of
times past.
Suddenly, the mood changed. A family I have known for many years started
down the aisle. But this time was different. He was not there. There had
been a car wreck in late summer.
I closed my eyes. The hurt on their faces was too much. I did not look
up for awhile.
Then I opened my eyes and looked across the aisle. In that instant, I
saw my miracle.
But I must go back, for it had its beginning more than a year earlier.
A young couple in our church had wanted a baby for some time, and with
the help of modern medical science, it was going to happen.
It became a churchwide nativity, as the mother-in-waiting shared pictures
of the miracle developing within her. Her excitement was infectious, continuing
until the baby came last January. They named her Iris, for her mother’s
favorite flower.
On Christmas eve, Iris came to church. When I opened my eyes, still filled
with tears, there she was, in her mother’s arms, the first thing I saw.
Words cannot do justice to the emotions that came over me. But, simply
put, the sadness was gone, and in its place there was peace.
As I left the church to the strains of "Silent Night," I was
pondering the message I had received, and I have distilled it down to
this: Life is eternal. In grief and sadness there is yet hope. And in
the miracle of birth there is promise of what can be.
What better time than Christmas eve, and what better messenger than a
baby, to remind us of that.
