|
|
The Mangy Scene At
Christmas Being an observer of the human condition, and a sometimes participant in it, I think it is fair to say that most women love little babies. This usually means that Christian women take a special interest in the baby Jesus and have a special understanding of the labors of his mother, Mary. I assume that many of them, like my wife, collect crèches from different cultures around the world. Like everything human these depictions run from the beautiful and exotic to the banal and terrible. In my first pastorate it was the custom every year for the minister to erect the manger scene on the church lawn. However, I had learned in seminary that the shepherds (Luke) and the wise men (Matthew) may not have been in the same place at the same time. Indeed, if Our Savior was born when the star first appeared to the wise men (rather than two years later when they got to Bethlehem) then Jesus probably walked up to them. Taking my young self with utmost seriousness, I decided the congregation needed to understand this critical, biblical point. Therefore, the manger scene would not appear until I had explained the Historical Quest for the Baby Jesus. Moreover, by the authority vested in me, as a minister of the Church of Jesus Christ, Reformed according to the Word of God and holding the Presbyterian order, I would leave the shepherds in the closet with their purple (!) donkey, a creature that mightily offended my aesthetic sensibilities. Fortunately for me, one afternoon a friendly elder drove over to the manse and insisted that I go for a ride with him. He drove me to the church, opened the door, unlocked the closet and without a word we put up that mangy scene -- purple donkey and all. As a long-term result I developed a passionate commitment to the office of ruling elder. I also learned that pastors need to love their people long enough to be loved in return before shaking their customs. In other words, congregations want to know for sure you care before they care what you know for sure. Not long ago a friend of mine traveling overseas bought his wife a crèche as a present. Not only was it unusual, it was on sale. A situation some Presbyterians cannot resist. The manger scene was quickly bought and packed away. When unwrapped on Christmas day, my friend discovered to his dismay that, while every other piece of the traditional manger scene was present, the baby Jesus was absent. This fact undoubtedly explains the low sale price. Unfortunately, I know Presbyterian churches that can offer the same big discount. In one of them some members sitting in the balcony counted the sermonic references to Jesus. They often went home with both fists clenched. In Christian congregations where Jesus Christ is absent, baptism is a jiffy lube and the Lord's Supper becomes a fast food take out. The real issue, of course, is not the number of homiletical references to Jesus, but their meaning. Put another way, nearly every Christian accepts much of the traditional view of the work of Christ, but the traditional view of the person of Christ is under direct and indirect attack today. According to John Calvin, "the blessed and happy state of the Church always had its foundation in the person of Christ" (Inst. II.6.2 Emphasis added). This situation demonstrates how a good and faithful idea can transmogrify into a bad and faithless one. For examle, the good idea of social democracy when carried to the extreme unbounded individual quality and leads to the dumbest common denomination. Likewise, the Reformed tradition's distinctive understanding of the humanity of Christ running naked across the field of theology may have contributed to the denial of his deity. Until recently Presbyterians mostly cozied up to the heretic, Nestorius, because he at least tried to preserve the integrity of Christ's two natures. We left the heretic, Arius, with his denial of Christ's deity, to the Unitarians and we left the heretic Eutyches, with his denial of the risen humanity of Christ, to the Lutherans. One would hope that Presbyterians will always buy Christmas with the Christ child at its center recognizing that Incarnation and Resurrection are core commitments. The shadow of the cross falls across the cradle. Charles
Partee |