I suppose gift giving became a part of our celebration because of the gifts of the Magi-or perhaps because of God’s gift to the world, his savior Son.

Giving to those we love at Christmas is not a bad thing at all, but one way we can adore our Lord is to bring material “gifts” to him. After all, it is a celebration of his birthday.

Just on thing we could do, for example, is provide Christmas for someone who wouldn’t have it otherwise, or be part of that endeavor, depending on what resources are available to us. In as much as you have done it to the least of these, Jesus said, you have done it unto me.

But there are other things to bring, that are not material and are just as significant.

“Shall I play for you” the wonderful old Christmas lyric goes, “on my drum?“ This ability is all the little drummer boy has to offer, and the image of him standing by the manger in his rags, wanting to give what he has touches me endlessly. Perhaps you don’t play a drum, but there is something you can do for him with the talents he has given you.

Madeline L’Engle says the artist (think of that in broad terms as whatever you can do) is “a servant who is willing to be a birthgiver. In a very real sense,“ she says, “the artist (male or female) should be like Mary who, when the angel told her that she was to bear the Messiah, was obedient to the command.“ L’Engle says that whether the work is of great genius or something small, the artist either agrees to give it birth and says, “My soul doth magnify the Lord,“ or refuses. “Not everyone,“ L’Engle writes, “has the humble, courageous obedience of Mary” (Walking on Water 18).

Praising, as I discussed last week, and giving are, in a sense, ways of bowing before him.

But I’m wondering how long it has been since in some private place we have literally fallen on our knees, like the beautiful Christmas song says, overwhelmed by the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Perhaps this could happen if we somehow slow down and listen for the angels’ voices and visualize the miracle of the “night divine,“ and contemplate all it means.

Short of that, or along with that, I try to find things to display in the house for Christmas that represent a bowing heart. One is an ornament that hangs in the middle of my tree at eye-level. It is a pure white Lennox china circle. Cradled in the bottom of the circle is the baby Jesus. At the top of the circle opposite the Christ child, written in script, is a simple word: “Behold.“

I’ve held the grandchilden up to see it. We exchange a smile. The children know its significance, understand its preeminence. Another testimony sits on my mantle. It is a gold colored bust of a wise man, head obviously bowed in reverence.

Such are good reminders when I’m racing through the house with wrapping paper and a stack of boxes or rushing out the door with a plate of cookies for another holiday get-together. The white lights twinkling on the wreath over the mantle and on the tree by the front windows reveal what matters most at Christmas: a baby-and a wise man bowed in reverence before him.

One way we can express our adoration for the gift God sent is to praise Him with joyful hearts. Even though I love words, I often feel unable to praise god adequately. I often let the psalmist help me bring him praise. He praised God so well that we have leaned on him for expression for thousands of years.

“I will praise you, O Lord, with all my heart,“ David writes.

Even generic ones seem appropriate for Christmas praise: thank God that when we “lie down and sleep” and wake again, it is because he sustains us (3:5), that he never “forsakes those who seek” him (9:10),  that he “has made our lot secure” (16:5b),  that he “reached down from on high and took hold of (us)“ (18:16), that “the Lord’s unfailing love surrounds the man who trusts in him (32:10), that “the Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit ((34:18), that “under his wings” we find refuge” (91:4a), that he forgives our sins, crowns us with love and compassion and satisfies our desires with good things (103:3-5), that his love is with those who fear him from everlasting to everlasting (103:17).

I, like David the psalmist king, want my heart to sing and not be silent. “O Lord my God, I will give you thanks forever” (30:12)
.
New Testament passages can help you praise God during this Christmas season as well.

Praise him and thank him that he has “called us out of darkness into his wonderful light” (I Peter 2:9). Praise him that He has become our intercessor, our great high priest, that we “can approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4).  Thank him that when the host of angels brought “good news of great joy” to the Bethlehem hillside that Holy night, it was for “all people” and we now have peace with God. Join the angels in saying, “Glory to God in the highest!“

Another source of praise is music. Find CD’s that proclaim the advent. Put on Steven Curtis Chapman’s The Music of Christmas CD and praise God with songs like, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.“ Every time I hear it, I’m carried away to another, better place. Often when I’m alone, I put up my hands and sing with him, “Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel / Shall come to Thee, O Israel!“ Jesus has come and he’s dispersed “the clouds of night / and death’s dark shadows put to flight!“  Christmas is rejoicing the end of exile from God.

Anna and the shepherds praised God and told people about what God had done. We can do this in our Christmas cards and Christmas letters, by making attending a Christmas Eve service a priority and taking others with you, by reading the Christmas story with our families as the focus or culmination of our Christmas festivities.

How will you praise God this Christmas season?

Heaven sent a host of angels to sing the night Mary settled into the cleanest hay Joseph could find in the stable and gave birth to this promised Son and savior.

On a nearby hillside, an angel appeared to lowly shepherds, “keeping watch over the flocks.“ “Do not be afraid,“ the angel said. “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.“

After the angel had told them how to find this baby, a company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rest.“ With this announcement, they rushed off to find the baby and worship him. Afterwards, they “spread the word concerning what had been told them about the child” and returned to their flocks, “glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen.“

Fast forward a few days to Jerusalem. The time had come for Joseph and Mary to present Jesus to the Lord and “to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord.“ As they entered the temple, two more people rushed to adore the incarnated Christ.

Simeon, righteous and devout, “lived in the prayerful expectancy of help for Israel” (Luke 2:25, The Message). The Holy Spirit was on him and revealed that he would not die before he had seen “the Lord Christ.“ Seeing the baby, Simeon took Jesus in his arms and praised God, saying: “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation . . . .“

Anna, the prophetess, was always in the temple. Married seven years and a widow for eighty-four, she remained in the temple day and night, fasting and praying. As Simeon finished speaking, she came up to them and “gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.“

By the time the Magi reached Bethlehem, by way of Herod and Jerusalem, the star they had followed for so long stood over a house where Mary and Joseph were staying. The Maji (also called wise men and “three kings”) were overjoyed to have finally arrived, and “when they saw the child with his mother Mary, they bowed down and worshipped him.“ Then they honored him further by opening their treasures and presenting him “with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh” (Matt. 2:10-11).
He deserved such homage.

Like Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, Simeon and Anna, and the Maji, Christians have some inkling of what God has done for us, and like them, adoration should well up within us. And like these first worshippers, we can express our adoration in three distinct ways.

I want to discuss those ways in the next two blogs. The first Christmas I’ve had this website, I wanted to tell the Christmas story and have it in the archives.

The way Jesus came into the world is an event only exceeded by the way he left it to return to his Father.

So, “hear ye, hear ye!“ :-)

Heaven sent a host of angels to sing the night Mary settled into the cleanest hay Joseph could find in the stable and gave birth to this promised Son and savior.

On a nearby hillside, an angel appeared to lowly shepherds, “keeping watch over the flocks.“ “Do not be afraid,“ the angel said. “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.“

After the angel had told them how to find this baby, a company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rest.“

With this announcement, they rushed off to find the baby and worship him. Afterwards, they “spread the word concerning what had been told them about the child” and returned to their flocks, “glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen.“

Fast forward a few days to Jerusalem. The time had come for Joseph and Mary to present Jesus to the Lord and “to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord.“ As they entered the temple, two more people rushed to adore the incarnated Christ.

Simeon, righteous and devout, “lived in the prayerful expectancy of help for Israel” (Luke 2:25, The Message). The Holy Spirit was on him and revealed that he would not die before he had seen “the Lord Christ.“ Seeing the baby, Simeon took Jesus in his arms and praised God, saying: “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation . . . .“

Anna, the prophetess, was always in the temple. Married seven years and a widow for eighty-four, she remained in the temple day and night, fasting and praying. As Simeon finished speaking, she came up to them and “gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.“

By the time the Magi reached Bethlehem, by way of Herod and Jerusalem, the star they had followed for so long stood over a house where Mary and Joseph were staying. The Maji (also called wise men and “three kings”) were overjoyed to have finally arrived, and “when they saw the child with his mother Mary, they bowed down and worshipped him.“ Then they honored him further by opening their treasures and presenting him “with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh” (Matt. 2:10-11).
He deserved such homage.

Like Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, Simeon and Anna, and the Maji, Christians have some inkling of what God has done for us, and like them, adoration should well up within us.

And like these first worshippers, we can express our adoration in three distinct ways. I want to discuss those ways in the next two blogs.

The birth of Christ, one of the two greatest events of all time, was not marked by the extraordinary, except Caesar Augustus did issue “a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world,“ which necessitated everyone to go “to his own town to register.“ And Magi from the east did “see a star” in the east and traveled far to worship the “one who has been born king of the Jews.“

But most did not notice when “the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.“

How was an inn keeper to know that the child about to be born “came from the Father, full of grace and truth”? If he had, would he have provided the one who was “with God in the beginning” a better birthplace than a stable, a better cradle than a manger? The chief priests and teachers of the law knew the prophecy, however, and exactly where the Christ would be born. I would guess indifference, not ignorance, kept them from following the Magi to Bethlehem to kneel before Immanuel.

But some experienced incarnation, and they worshipped.

No one worshipped more completely than the humble girl who “found favor with God” and became his servant, though she could not fathom how she would give birth to the “Son of the Most High.“

“How will this be,“ she asked, “since I am a virgin?“
I’m not sure the angel Gabriel cleared things up for her when he explained that the Holy Spirit would come upon her and the power of the Most High would overshadow her and that the child she conceived would become the “Son of God.“

But her response was one of sweet obedience and faith: “I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said.“

The man she was pledged to marry worshipped with the same humble obedience. When an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and told him that what was conceived of Mary was of the Holy Spirit and that this baby would be called, “Immanuel, which means God with us,“ Joseph woke up, left anxiety behind, and made Mary his wife as the angel commanded.

Their willingness and obedience was the truest expression of adoring worship.  Mary’s heart overflowed with song:  “His mercy flows in wave after wave on those who are in awe before him” (Luke 1:50, The Message).

Next week I’ll look at others who noticed.