Christmas Morning

Luke 2:1-20 December 24, 2016

Christmas Eve Candlelight Services

Mark S. Bollwinkel

Remember what it is like as a kid to be so excited about Christmas morning that you couldn’t sleep; you’d wake up at 4:00 a.m., counting the minutes until you could wake up your parents?

Remember how there was always one present under the tree that would take your breath away?

For many of us such memories are dim now.   We might dig up a moment of nostalgia watching an old movie rerun on TV or going over old photos.   Maybe we have the privilege of watching a child or grandchild intoxicated with the season.  Sure, we appreciate the story and the traditions.   But for many of us the disappointments of life have dimmed the possibilities.  

The ideals of the Christmas promise and the realities of our world are in open conflict.   Our hopes and fears seem more apart than ever.   The headlines don’t help.

I must confess, and it may seem odd coming from a preacher, but I struggle to get into the Christmas spirit. 

And then comes the music.  For me it’s the music that inspires the Christmas spirit; “Joy to the World”, “O Little Town of Bethlehem”, “Silent Night”, these songs move me.

I am sure a composer could tell us a lot about the key and tempo in which this music is sung, how singers blend their voices, the technicalities of the harmonies, but that won’t explain the impact music has on us.

I am sure a poet could explain the philosophy of the lyric and its history in the Christian tradition.  But the words on the page won’t begin to explain what happens when we listen to these songs.

The impact of music has a lot to do with the heart that receives it.  There is “something more than” at work in the power of music to evoke the deepest meaning.

Something more than.

One of the profound places where I re-connect with that "under-the-Christmas-tree-joy" is in my life as a potter.  Surprisingly it helps me connect with unexpected joy in the other places of my life as well.

I have been an active potter longer than I have been an ordained clergy.  I took "Pottery 101" in my fall semester of my freshman year at the University of the Pacific 46 years ago.  Along with all the football players, I was looking for 4 easy units.  Much to my surprise I found one of the loves of my life.  During my four years at UOP I ended up as one of the teaching assistants in the department.  

Dick Mackey was also one of the assistants.  Our on-going friendship has evolved into an artistic collaboration at the studio he has built on his family's cattle ranch in Northern California, where I go when my "day-job" allows me.  Along with a fully equipped ceramic studio we have a variety of kilns which we fire.

Cracking the door of a ceramic kiln is a moment of high expectation, anxiety and joy. 

A potter works for days, if not months, to form and glaze the works that will fill a kiln.  Learning how to do such a process can take a life time or the rookie frenzy of a "Pottery 101" class.  Novice or master, for the potter opening a kiln...gas, electric or wood, big or small...is a moment of transcendent surprise. 

Now one would expect such romantic projections from a 46 year pastor-potter.  I tend to find the "spiritual" in just about anything and unapologetically confess that I am looking for it.  With that kind of presupposition any conclusion of mine is biased.  Yet upon opening "The Flying Z" wood burning Tamba kiln at the Canyon Creek Pottery in Northern California I always sense "something more than..." 

A chemical engineer could deconstruct the chemical interaction of the clay and glaze properties as they interacted with heat and time that results in 'such-and-such' effect on a piece...or not.  But none of that information... knowledge..."truth".... really begins to express what one sees as they open the door of a kiln. 

There is "something more than" at work.  There is a transformation in the fire that goes beyond mere logic, although its science has directly contributed to the process from the start.  All of the varying inputs made to that moment, or to one single piece of pottery, can't explain the transcendent creativity of the fire.  Numbers and formulas don't describe beauty. 

The modern mind has reduced truth to what we can measure and weigh.   What we can reproduce in controlled conditions.  As important as the scientific method there is "something more than" at work in life.   That's true of an art process, a relationship, one's sense of self, music and even pottery.   Reducing life to the evolution of the chemical/biological interactions of self-conscious beings may be completely accurate but it doesn't begin to define the moments of our living.  There is "something more than" at work. 

One can dismiss such a conclusion as the self-justification of a theologian.  But the next time you stand in awe of a sunset, the helping hand of a friend or the Bethlehem manger scene take a breath and suspend that logic that seeks to limit such moments to what you and I can understand. 

And. Be. With. The moment.  

Our firing crew uses the affectionate term for the moment of cracking a kiln door as "Christmas Morning"; as like the joy and excitement as a child rushing to open Christmas presents under the tree in the warmth and affection of a family. 

Whether you understand the Christmas story of the Bible as history or metaphor or a combination of both, the Bethlehem manger describes the possibility of finding redemption in the most surprising of places.  It talks about a divine spirit that pursues us no matter what.  It talks about light born in the darkness.  Cultivating an appreciation for that makes life richer indeed. 

Whatever ideal you may hold for the surprise of transformation, for the unexpected discovery of "something more than" at work in your life, may your moments of "under-the-Christmas-tree-joy" be many and full.   For like the Magi and the Shepherds in our Christmas story, there is love and light to be found there. 

Amen.