Embrace the Disruption
I love the week before Christmas. The day itself is fun, but it’s a whirlwind of family, gifts, worship, and food. Then it’s over. Our adult children leave as quickly as they arrived. The house grows quiet, and I begin pondering what I might expect and where I may need to focus in the New Year. There always seem to be more questions than answers the week after Christmas.
But the week before Christmas is special. Every year, Jo and I intentionally shift gears the week before Christmas. We embrace the disruption to our routines for at least a full week. We take walks, seek opportunities to serve in unique ways, go to movies, visit friends, deliver gifts, hunt, play… We may even spend a day in our pajamas with good books and great coffee! And no matter how much we pack into this week, or how much we simply sit still and quiet, there’s always the anticipation of Christmas Day, something bigger ahead.
I always feel a bit sorry for friends and family who are pressured to keep their routines of work, sleep, and eat right up to Christmas Eve. Of course, they squeeze in shopping, and a party here or there, but for the most part, they work to minimize the disruption.
But isn’t disruption a fundamental part of Christmas? What was the birth of Jesus if not disruptive? Imagine the young bride-to-be, Mary. She had set the date. She had sent the save-the-dates, calling her family and friends to block the weekend on their calendars and carve it in stone. Have you met a bride-to-be with a wedding date? For most, it becomes an obsession. The last thing any bride-to-be wants to hear is that something, anything, is going to disrupt her day. Then Gabriel appears and drops a bomb. Mary is going to be pregnant on her wedding day! Morning sickness. A new dress. Will she show? The murmurs.
And Joseph surely had his own plans for their first year of marriage. Sleeping late on Saturday mornings, adult dates, adult food, hanging out with other couples, evening strolls… all gone. Is anything more disruptive to a couple’s routines than having a baby? That first Christmas completely disrupted Mary and Joseph’s lives forever. Life would never be the same.
We are so accustomed to the Christmas story that it’s become as routine as any other annual event. Yet, the arrival of Jesus was anything but ordinary or routine. Jesus disrupted every life he encountered, and he still does. A life disrupted by Jesus is a changed life. If you think you’ve encountered Jesus, and you’ve simply stuck to your routines as if he’s riding shotgun in your passenger seat, you should think again. I doubt you’ve encountered Jesus up close and personal. Emmanuel, God with us, doesn’t simply ride shotgun. He drives. He leads. He calls us to follow Him. But he does not simply follow us around like an abandoned puppy, or a genie waiting to be beckoned from his bottle.
To encounter Jesus is to be offered freedom. He frees us from the baggage of our past. He takes our identities bound by the worst things we’ve ever done, redeems us, and gives us new names. Jesus disrupts our patterns of fear and anxiety by giving us a lens of hope, love, peace, and joy through which to see the world. Light always disrupts darkness, and no one does that like the Light of the World. He is anything but routine.
Jesus also rewrites the stories of the disenchanted, misguided, and broken-hearted. He never leaves us where we found him. He gives courage to the fearful, strength to the weak, and hope to those in despair. He gives purpose and meaning to the lost and wandering. He comforts the challenged and challenges the comfortable. Jesus fills us with wisdom and the Holy Spirit, equips us with his word and spiritual gifts, and calls us to discover our destinies. He calls us out of the ordinary and into the extraordinary. He disrupts all the daily dysfunction and compromise that we have accepted as normal, shows us that God’s ways are within reach, and promises something bigger is waiting ahead.
Most of the modern world measures time in BC (Before Christ) and AD (After Death). When I AM entered the world measured in years, decades, and centuries, he disrupted the very way we measure time. And you think he’s entered your life without disruption? Jesus is so much greater than a god who would do that. He will not simply ride along.
Perhaps it’s time to revisit the manger.