Pastor’s Page

      It was July and we were stacking hay, my uncle and I. I was running the pitchfork trying to move the hay around in a frame to make a nice stack. Between lack of technique and lack of size I was working hard but going backwards. I compensated by flailing, falling, sweating and breathing through my mouth. And it was July and it was baking. And it was baking and dusty. Really dusty in July in a haystack in a field with no shade and baking. There was a lake nearby but that was an hallucination. Soon enough I noticed my tongue was thick and I my mouth was dry and dusty; I could not muster up any spit. My favorite new word was caccckkh. I was very warm and needed some liquid. My head was throbbing, my cheeks were hot and the hay kept coming. I kept flailing. Caccckkh!

There is no such occupation as hay flailer – I’ve checked on Google. Even if there were such a thing I’m sure it is at minimum wage with nowhere to go but underneath.

At around ten my aunt came with lunch – summer sausage sandwiches, a jar of water, a thermos of coffee. The crowning glory was a freshly baked blueberry coffee cake – with streu-sel topping. I couldn’t taste anything. I couldn’t swallow. I had to gargle and rinse and spit and swallow, less than picturesque I know, but I had to re-hydrate my mouth so I could eat and taste and enjoy. Otherwise the tangy salami, rich homemade bread (with butter) and sweet juicy blueberries and the buttery streusel would not register with my taste buds. Eating (vs. merely inhaling) hay would’ve had about the same effect – tasteless and choking.

Finally I got hydrated and operational and the food was wonderful. It was rejuvenating, restoring, energizing and tasted wonderful. Some of my fondest food memories are of meals consumed in the shade of a truck or tractor resting against a tire. Maybe you’ve had similar experiences in a deer stand, over a hole in the ice, on a boat, across a tailgate (in Green Bay?), on boxes in a new dwelling, in a hunting shack or a stump next to the campfire. As opposed to wolfing down a burger and fries in the car. Fries under a car seat have a ½ life of up 30 years depending on where they come from.

OK, back to live action: Hay. Flailing. Baking. Dirty, dusty, dry, dehydrated, desiccated. Beautiful lunch. Can’t taste, swallow, eat. Water, gargle, rinse, rehydrate. Wonderful, won-derful food, taste, nourishment. Sentence. Fragments.

We have to prepare to be fed. The table, the food itself, any utensils, for kids a tarp under the chair, flatware, wash hands, get beverages ready. All have to be readied to some extent or another. Then we even set ourselves a bit – saying a grace to remind us where it all comes from – instead of attacking our meal like wolves on a moose carcass. Then, then we sit down in rela-tive civility, peace and fellowship to be nourished and fed. The meal becomes an event for the moment and for life instead of mere biological function.

We also have to prepare to be fed by God as he gives us his Son. Thus Advent. After 48 weeks of the year flailing, falling and sometimes even succeeding to arrange the events of our lives in a nice stack we need four weeks, four Sundays, to gargle, rinse and rehydrate our souls so we can taste, chew and absorb the birth of the Son.

The birth of Jesus and its impact on creation and on us – on you – demands more than just passing by on Christmas Eve or Christmas Morn for the hour or so. Take some time, sit down and contemplate. Find 20 or 30 minutes – by yourself – or as a family and think about Jesus coming. Was it historical? Was it personal? Did he know me then? Does he know me now? Why Bethlehem?

Please note that the word Bethlehem in Hebrew means place or house of (beth) food, bread (lehem). Also, the place where the baby Jesus was laid was a manger. Mangers hold the hay(!), grain, silage – the food – for the livestock. Our savior was born in a town called place of food and spent his first hours and days of life in a serving apparatus. So his words in his final hours. “…take and eat, this is my body…” seem to mesh with his situation is his first hours.

Consider also in your quiet times: how did such a seemingly inconsequential thing change history? Why was God so subtle about it – yes, the shepherds and angels and wise men but who else in the world knew? The news media outlets weren’t there to generate hysteria. As much as Mary rejoiced did she also anticipate sorrow? Did Joseph smoke while he waited? Did he assist? Was there a midwife helping?

Ask also, these are the cliché questions but they are absolutely the essence of claiming to be a Christian, is there a place in me – my heart, my life, my family, my vocation, my finances, my relationships – for Jesus? Can he be born and live in me? Can I be a manger? Can I be a beth-lehem? Am I ready to be fed, nourished and rejuvenated (transformed) by Jesus? Am I ready to or capable of offering this meal, this baby Jesus, to someone else? Read the Nativity stories in Luke 2 and Matthew 1:18 and on into chapter 2 and let your mind wander. Was it cold or hot? What did it smell like? Did they stop for coffee or tea? How tired were they at the end of a day? How come they weren’t texting or twittering? How comfortable is a donkey? Just wonder about every little thing, then realize that while it is certainly history it is also about—for— you.

You are a character in the story you are reading – in a teleological sense. Which is real.

The Advent has begun again. The one belonging to Jesus. The one belonging to you. The one belonging to all of Creation.
Forsake the flailing and heat and dust and choking of life.
Come to Advent so Jesus can come to you.
And be borne again.