Because Sarah lost her Mary, I keep a watchful eye for replacements.
“Would you mind,” Sarah asked, when I told her I’d look for a Mary: “Would you mind keeping an eye out for Jesus, too? The one I have is stuck to the manger, and I’d like one that can be added on Christmas Eve.” (I always love a challenge that requires me to search for charming old stuff rather that deal with what I already have.)
This morning a nativity set showed up on an online marketplace, so I clicked on it. It appears to be a perfectly sound set, well-appointed with colorful old Italian painted figures, a vintage creche and lots of animals. I pinched my fingers, touched them to my phone, and expanded the photo. Jesus was missing, and so was Mary.
I'll betcha I could buy this set, put it out on my front table, or set it up for a church lesson, and it might take a minute for anyone to notice the pivotal figures were missing. The rest is just so charming, and it looks so familiar we hardly look closely anymore.
Of course I won't do that. I am, after all, specifically on the lookout for Mary. And a Jesus who will be moved. We need a Jesus who does not stay in the manger.
Things are getting pretty serious around here. Between the unprovoked Russian attacks Ukraine, the pandemic, natural disasters and the grand canyon that politically divides otherwise civilized people, we sure could use the Jesus who does not rest passively in a manger . We need the one who grew and learned and taught and healed and listened and wept - not the infant "I'm hungry" cry, but the one who whispered "Oh, Jerusalem" through his tears. We need the one who understands us completely, the one who asked his father to take away the big hurt, and who mourned with Mary and Martha when Lazarus died, even though he knew he would raise him.
I suspect he still weeps.
Though I am looking for an infant Jesus with a separate manger, what I personally need is the wise Jesus, wiser than his years, who confounded the priests and the rabbi’s. I need him to inform my heart and my mouth for the sake of my struggling kids.
I need the passionate Jesus, who stood his holy ground and ousted the moneychangers in the temple. I need his gumption to first know what is holy, and to defend it without apology.
I need the loyal Jesus, who performed his first noted miracle because his Mom asked him to. Not that loyalty was the driving force behind changing the water to wine, but that it was the impetus for even considering it.
I want the tolerant Jesus. His whole human existence had to have been an exercise in tolerance and patience! Peter alone would have done me in! And Thomas, who doubted. And these were his friends. Those who would seek to destroy him…seriously, who would be able to so readily forgive in the moment itself? This Jesus allows me to be flawed and still be loved. I need this Jesus.
I need the Jesus who left the manger.
And I also need the Jesus who parted the waters of the Nile and the River Jordan- Who caused rain to cover the earth yet saved just enough to start the whole thing over – Who knew there were people across the ocean who needed him – Who saw darkness fall over the earth he had created, then restored the light. I need that Jesus too, the one before the manger.
We get the beautiful, peaceful, all-is-calm all-is-bright feeling at Christmas, which is hope. And we need hope. But hope is just a baby, laid in a manger, and my maturing heart and mind both need Jesus to grow up, like they need me to grow up.
It takes more than just a passing glance at proverbial Nativities. It takes a bit of serious trust coupled with courage to step out. For some it takes the willingness to throw tradition, like a boomerang, way, way far away, trusting if it was made correctly, it will find its way back home. For others, if their heart tells them so, it means walking the same path they have always walked, with a scythe in hand to clear weeds out of the way. I think I'm a path walker, and my hands are blistered with scythe overuse.
If my life were laid out simply on a table top, I believe you would be able to see the colorful people who enrich and enfold me. But I hope no one will ever be able to look at it and say; "Jesus is missing."
