Image 13

Reflection:

“Be Not Afraid” could be a legitimate substitution for “Merry Christmas.”

A message from the Divine must start with “Be not afraid” because it is shattering the security you’ve found in limited conclusions like:

Existence is a curse to endure.

Our bodies are just flawed meatsuits full of disappointment. 

Divine encounters only happen with worthy saints on mountaintops or in sacred places.

The Almighty can’t wait to be wrathful toward all the sinful malarkey taking place on this earth.

We deserve to be left out because of our glaring inability to be faithful.

And yet the messengers who “stand in the presence of God” are astonished by our limited conclusions, for their message is a proclamation of good news:

That existence, in all its seeming absurdity, is not a curse to endure but the very gift that the Giver of existence wants you to receive and participate in.

That it’s good to be in your body, for all kinds of miracles happen through it.

That divine encounters happen in the humblest of places, like at your job, in your kitchen, in the headspace of making hard decisions.

That the Almighty didn’t enter the world as a judgmental titan set on condemning it but as a loving participant whose ultimate work of healing came through His ultimate loving participation.

That Love is intentionally inclusive in Its restoration invitation of all things and isn’t worried about not accomplishing what It has set out to do.

Maybe the place we experience God-with-Us today is in the very fears we have about our own lives, our own world, our own future. The fears that keep us from believing that anything can be different. The fears that make the silence of the Divine feel like centuries have passed. The fears that we are here all on our own. The fears we will be holding at our upcoming angelic visit.

Today, let our fears be the starting place of divine connection, because if a messenger from heaven were to show up with an announcement of good tidings of great joy, a message that will change everything, historically that proclamation would begin with the greeting “Be Not Afraid” - or, the way we say it today, 

“Merry Christmas.”

…

* this meditation is an excerpt from the book Honest Advent.