Tod Bolsinger

Tuesday: A Wordless Christmas Week

Nativity, by He Qi, China

A Wordless Christmas Week

Christmas for preachers is a time of many words.  It's what we do. The advent of our God is upon us and all of creation is called to bear witness to the mystery.   So birds fly, fish swim, flowers preen, and the rocks would cry out if necessary.  Singers will sing, musicians play, and all of God's people will stop and pray, if only for a moment.

But to those of us who are called to speak on Christmas Eve, the burden of trying to capture the wonder of the incarnation in appropriate and meaningful phrases can weigh heavily. (Especially THIS Christmas Eve when the fourth Sunday of Advent is the same day as Christmas Eve. Three different messages at six different stories is just a lot of words.) How do we tell a story that everyone already knows? How do we speak of event that so many doubt really believe happened? How do we move beyond cliches and offer genuine "tidings of comfort and joy"? 

One of the Desert Fathers described the heart as being like a steam room and the mouth as its door.  It only offers warmth when its door has remained closed for a while. Then when the door is opened, the warmth rushes out to meet the one that seeks entrance.

This week I am going to allow pictures instead of words to fill my blog, and prayers instead of prose to fill my heart, so that a bit of wordlessness can lead me to speak well of the word-made-flesh who dwelt among us, and by whose Spirit remains with us as God-with-us indeed.

Word
I, who live by words, am wordless when
I try my words in prayer. All language turns
To silence. Prayer will take my words and then
Reveal their emptiness. The stilled voice learns
To hold its peace, to listen with the heart
To silence that is joy, is adoration.
The self is shattered, all words torn apart
In this strange patterened time of contemplation
That, in time, breaks time, breaks words breaks me,
And then, in silence leaves me healed and mended.
I leave, returned to language, for I see
Through words, even when all words are ended.
I, who live by words, am wordless when
I turn me to the Word to pray. Amen.

Madeleine L’Engle  - Reflections on a Writing Life

The Third Sunday of Advent

Somehow, not only for Christmas,
But all the long year through,
The joy that you give to others,
Is the joy that comes back to you.
And the more you spend in blessing,
The poor and lonely and sad,
The more of your heart's possessing,
Returns to you glad.
--John Greenleaf Whittier

What Labradors do...

Scout and one of her favorite fetch toys.

The Second Sunday of Advent

"Waiting patiently in expectation is the foundation of the spiritual life." 
Simon Weil

     "Most of us think of waiting as something very passive, a hopeless state determined by events totally out of our hands.  The bus is late? You cannot do anything about it, so you have to sit there and just wait.  It is not difficult to understand the irritation people fell when somebody says, 'Just wait.' Words like that seem to push us into passivity.     "But there is none of that passivity in scripture. Those who are waiting are waiting very actively...Active waiting means to be present fully to the moment in the conviction that something is happening where you are and that you want to be present to it.  A waiting person is someone who is present to the moment, who believes that this moment is the moment."
Henri Nouwen (from Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas, p. 31)

Herod Plays Santa

Frequent visitors to this site (and the sites of several other Christian blogs) will undoubtedly know Derek.  Derek is a committed Christian, an ex-marine, a retired lawyer, a music lover, avid cyclist and rough-and-tumble blog commenter and member of SCPC who loves to cross key strokes in theological jousting with any and all in the name of helping the church be more faithful to its mission and its Lord.

If you have ever met Derek, then you know that he is a big guy (like 6 feet 6 inches tall or something) whose not afraid to throw on a hearty hug to any one who comes his way.  He has a deep (dare I say, "booming"?) voice and he will argue about just about anything of substance.  (Did I say that he was a lawyer?)

So, you won't probably be surprised when I tell you that for a few years, Derek was the obvious choice to be King Herod in the Christmas Eve family pageant at our church.  While by faith, Derek certainly would have preferred being Joseph or a Magi, he is committed to "telling it like it is" and as we all know the Christmas Story includes King Herod and his dastardly deeds.  So, in the name of accuracy and (with some fear of "typecasting) Derek not only agreed to be Herod, but brought his whole, big soul to the part. 

Again, if you think about it long enough, you are probably not surprised.

But this just might.   

Guess who dressed up in an "extra-tall" Santa suit for the children of the USMC 1st Combat Engineers Battalion Christmas gathering?  Yup.  That big ol' softy, Derek.   I know, it seems logical that the guy who keeps showing up on the blogs hankering for a good theological squabble might be willing to play Herod, but Santa? 

No kidding. That's Derek putting a smile on this little guy's face (whose own Dad is probably in Iraq right now)...and that's something you may not have expected.

Of course, if you ask the family who had all their furniture moved into a new apartment the day their baby arrived by Derek and a group of his friends, or the Marines at Camp Pendleton who are all welcomed home from deployment with one of Derek's hugs, or the people who Derek has visited in the hospital, or ask anyone at church about the guy who organized all of his biking buddies to serve cookies one Sunday on the patio (wearing Bike jerseys and shorts no less) about him, they'd tell you that Santa is closer to the real Derek than Herod and that some things just don't come across too well in cyberspace.

First Sunday of Advent

The house lights go off and the footlights come on. Even the chattiest stop chattering as they wait in darkness for the curtain to rise. In the orchestra pit, the violin bows are poised. The conductor has raised his baton.  In the silence of a midwinter dusk, there is far off in the deeps of it somewhere a sound so faint that for all you can tell it may be only the sound of the silence itself. You hold your breath to listen.  You walk up the steps to the front door. The empty windows at either side of it tell you nothing, or almost nothing. For a second you catch a whiff of some fragrance that reminds you of a place you've never been and a time you have no words for. You are aware of the beating of your heart…The extraordinary thing that is about to happen is matched only by the extraordinary moment just before it happens. Advent is the name of that moment.

Frederick Buechner, Whistling in the Dark, pp. 2,3

One of My Favorite Christmas Traditions

SCPC 2006 CHRISTMAS PRODUCTION
San Clemente Presbyterian Church is proud to present their 22nd annual Christmas Musical and Concert, “Sacred Grounds—A Coffeehouse Christmas”-- a heartwarming Christmas story for all ages. The show includes performances by our Christmas choir, hand bells, drama troop and full orchestra.

This family event is open to the community, running Saturday, December 9th 4 and 7 PM as well as Sunday, December 10th at 3 and 6 PM. Admission is free and childcare is provided for nursery through 4 years old.

In addition to the concert there will be a simultaneous event aimed at kindergarten through 4th grade “La Posada”. An interactive story of Joseph and Mary’s journey into Bethlehem, as they search for an inn to rest and prepare for the birth of Jesus. Children interested are encouraged to come dressed in Biblical period costumes. Children are invited to attend either event.

Don’t miss the opportunity to experience this inspiring holiday tradition at SCPC.

Something Worth Considering...

Today is December 1, and so, ready-or-not, the Christmas Season is now upon us.  Even though "Advent" doesn't begin until Sunday, I wanted to post one of my favorite, thought-provoking quotes: 

There is no ideal Christmas; only the one Christmas you decide to make as a reflection of your values, desires, affections, traditions.
--Bill McKibben, Author, Hundred Dollar Holiday: The Case For a More Joyful Christmas

So what would your "Make-your-own-Christmas" look like?  What it would take, if for only this year, to have a Christmas that is an accurate reflection of YOUR values, desires, affections and traditions?

Advent

Advent is one of my favorite times of the year.  In some ways, I realize that that is kind of wierd.  Because Advent is not about doing anything.  In fact, it's about NOT doing anything.  It's about waiting and preparing.  As a kid, I hated the days right before Christmas.  They seem to creep by so slowly that I would go to bed early to make them pass. 

Today, Christmas is on us before we know (like around Halloween) and so over-done that we usually end up bidding it good riddance. 

But Advent puts things back into perspective.  It's about fasting, not feasting.  About anticipating, not celebrating.  It's about lingering in the moment and waiting for what is to come.  This year, at SCPC, we are really going to focus on Advent and try to keep from racing headlong into Christmas.  We'll have Advent colors in the sanctuary (Sorry, no red and green!), and we'll let the excitement of the coming of the light of the world become a growing glow all about us.

It may be hard to wait, to linger, to anticipate, to look forward to a future event, to be faithful in the momen, to prepare.  But Advent is the perfect "practice" for what the Christian life is all about.

My friend, Mark D. Roberts puts together the coolest Internet Advent Calendar every year.  Bookmark this link and visit every day.  What a gift, Mark.  Thanks and Blessed Advent to you.

(Mark also wrote a fine introduction to Advent two years ago that is so good, I'll never have to write one.)