From the Nativity to the New Year!

A few years ago for two consecutive Christmas' my parents got me the Willow Tree nativity set. While it's been set out every year, this is our first Christmas in a house, and I love how it's been able to be properly displayed. It's big and it's on our front table so I get to walk by it all the time and look at the remarkable scene. My daughter, however has a problem with it. Not just it, she has a problem with any nativity that doesn't have a manger. In our nativity Mary is holding baby Jesus. My daughter says things like, "Don't they know the Bible says Jesus was laid in a manger?" and "Well, where's the manger? They really need to get a manger." While I love her zeal for Biblical accuracy, I have to admit I like it.

I love seeing Mary hold baby Jesus. There's something about the Savior of world in his mommy's arms that personalizes the Christmas story for me. They were real. She was a real woman who really had a baby. After having three kids I can't imagine having one in a stable with a man I hardly knew. I have to think in the middle of night when Mary was exhausted she rolled over and looked at the peacefully sleeping Joseph and said, "Yo, Joe! You want to walk the kid for a few minutes for me?" They were real people living in an extraordinary time, witnessing first-hand the stories we hear today.

I've always loved Christmas, but after hearing the same story year after year after year, it's easy to become numb to its meaning. This year I've been struck with this truth: Christmas was not merely Jesus coming as a baby, but it was God coming to Man. In that moment God became present and available to people in way that He had never been before. No more sacrifices or burning bushes. All that's needed to meet with God is to open my mouth and talk, to open my Bible and read.

I've been pondering this thought. With Christmas over, and New Year's around the corner, I'm trying to be proactive with this truth. The God of the universe is available to me. I can talk to Him, confide in Him, cry with Him, and rejoice in Him. He loves me! How can this truth influence my everyday life? I'm not really big into New Year's resolutions, but I think I'm going to make a list of goals for the next year for our family that try to reflect the every-present God in our lives.

I'm so thankful for the picture of Christmas, but I'm so much more thankful for what it means for my life.