Before you read this, read the blog immediately below this one. I wrote it a few days ago, before I knew anything that happened (in what I’m about to tell you) happened.

You back? Good. Keep reading.

Friday afternoon, I’m sitting at my desk at work when I get an email from my wife. She learned about an event happening at a local church called a “Manger Build”. And just as the name implies, it is an event designed for Dads to bring their kids and together build a manger.

I was immediately excited about the idea and almost as fast resolved in my mind that this manger build is what my Saturday morning (the very next day) would hold.

I came home and excitedly told my 3 oldest kids about it–Madison, Macy and Crews. Crews was almost immediately uninterested. But the girls were all about it. So, Saturday morning we headed out to Southside Baptist Church, found the room where the hammering was happening, and got started.

Let me say right here that another thing I learned Saturday is that my girls were born to swing a hammer! Neither of them had ever driven a nail before, I was totally expecting to have to teach them the finer points of grip and balance and all that stuff. They took to it like a fish to water! It did my heart good!

But more than that, I was deeply reminded that it’s the manger, not the tree that ought to be serve as the centerpiece to Christmas.

And as we built that manger together, took it home, and placed it next to our Christmas tree I was quickly reminded and thrust in my imagination to THE manger. The one that held the Messiah. I was reminded so strongly that God came into this rough cradle, this feed trough, for nothing more than love–love that would drive him to the cross–for the sole purpose of forgiving me.

And in perfect innocence, and a love for Jesus, as soon as we got home my girls wrapped up one of their dolls, “Sarah” who for now will be our Jesus.

Forgive me for not writing more. I know there are at least 2 people on the entire internet who have read this blog of mine.

Forgiveness, it seems to me is the most potent of all mental, emotional, social, and spiritual transactions that can take place. Nothing else has the power to do what true forgiveness can do. Forgiveness is something we are all in need of. No one who might ever read this (inluding the 2) can ever live very long at all without needing forgiveness for something.

It’s been said that to forgive is to set a prisoner free, only to realize that the prisoner was you.

Forgiveness was/is the chief purpose of the earthly life of Christ. And with Christmas a mere 5 days away, it seems fitting to sit a moment and soak in the reality of that fact. With all the attention on the manger, we ought to think about why the manger, why the advent, why the human birth of the Son of God, wherever it happened, was necessary? We give lots of attention to stars, and shepherds, and a virgin, and an inn, and angels, and wisemen, and gifts. But why would God stoop so low? Ironically enough, it’s quite easy for me (especially at this time) to focus so much on the birth of Christ that I literally miss the reason for the birth of Christ. And the reason was and is for the act of forgiveness. Nothing more, nothing less.

We’re told clearly in the Bible that Jesus came “to seek and to save that which was lost.” But that “lostness” is due to our need for forgiveness. It is we who are the offenders. It is humans who are the selfish ones. It is God who is selfless enough to give up His Son for the likes of me.

I’ve had recent situations in my life where forgiveness was necessary in both directions; both giving and receiving. And how anyone can withhold something given by God so freely is beyond my current ability to understand. When I grasp my need to be forgiven by God and find that He is more than willing time and time again to pour out that forgiveness, then I find that giving that forgiveness to those who need it from me is more than a pleasure; it is the very reflection of God.

This Christmas season, my prayer for myself and my family is that we will look beyond the manger to the reason that a child was placed in it at all.

The Sunday paper. Our next door neighbors get it delivered every week. It was just a newspaper. But yesterday, it became the centerpiece of a powerful reminder from God.

Yesterday was Sunday. My wife was looking out the window, watching a lady out for a walk as she approached our next door neighbor’s driveway, where their Sunday newspaper was. The paper was laying on the ground in the middle of their driveway. As the woman passed by, she kicked the paper out onto the edge of the road and kept walking. That was strange. My wife quickly surmised that this woman’s plan was to steal the paper on her way back. After the initial “kick” of the paper, the woman looked back over her shoulder at our neighbor’s house a number of times. Weird.

After she passed, my wife immediately began to think out loud, as to what she should do about this. Clearly, she is not one to sit idly by and watch a crime take place.

My wife is a superhero. I’m not kidding.

I was content to simply watch the drama unfold; to watch what exactly this walking woman’s plan was. My wife? Not so big on just watching. My wife sprung into action with an unmistakable “she must be stopped” look in her eyes.

So, the initial plan was to walk out, pick up the newspaper and walk it up to the neighbor’s front porch, out of the reach of paper-snatcher. But just as she walked outside, the woman had made her way back and was now only steps away from the newspaper, still lying right where she kicked it.

Just as she passed our house, on the way to the newspaper, my wife walked out the front door in a none-too-obvious “Somebody’s watching” noise-making fashion. Startled, the woman looked at my wife, looked back down at the ground, and kept on walking….newspaperless.

Ah, my wife the vigilante. It’s no wonder I’m head over heels for this woman.

Justice. It’s what people want to see. When we see injustice, we wince, we boil, and sometimes we even act; springing into action to make the unjust just.

What my wife did reminded me that as Christ-followers, we’re to look EVERYWHERE for injustice and not merely be spectators (like yours truly), but activists. We are to be those who are actively involved in setting the wrong right. We are not called to sit in the upstairs window (like I did), but rather engage the injustice and put a stop to it (like my wife did).

Amos 5:24 says it well:
“But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”

Maybe that cloak of righteousness that Christ puts on us is meant to double as a cape.

Up, up and away.

How does someone become a food critic? The only requirements seem to be 1) have a mouth, and 2) complain about what goes in it.

This morning, I had the honor of baptizing 6 adults; 2 woman from the diversion center across the street from our church, and two married couples. All with powerful stories that were shared publicly for all to hear.

And I stood next to each one, and listened to their story being read, I couldn’t help but notice the details that were quite clearly NOT left out. Details of drug abuse, addiction, and dealing. Details of alcoholism, depression, and deep pain. Details of rape, family dysfunctions, and even suicide attempts.

What, in heaven’s name would drive anyone to divulge their past in such certain, unmistakable terms? There they stood, truth told, unashamed. What was it? It was redemption.

When we are redeemed, we are set free. But not merely freedom from our past, but from the shame of our past. Freedom from caring any longer about what people think of where we came from, or what we’ve done. Freedom to, as the hymnist penned it, “the uttermost”.

I used to work in a boardwalk arcade in Cape May, New Jersey. It was one of several summer jobs I had as a teenager. One of the tasks I had was to stand behind the “redemption counter”. Kids would play the games; skee-ball, slot machines, and other things that would dispense tickets and tokens instead of money. Then, when they were done playing, they would bring their tickets and tokens to the redemption counter, turn them in to me, and I’d tell them how many points they had earned. They would then choose a prize that corresponded with that point amount.

My favorite moments were when a small child would come up to the redemption counter with their heart set on a particular prize in the glass case that separated us. Yet they’d be woefully short on points to “afford” the object of their desire. These moments were my favorite because I would take the points they had, give a quick look around to see if the manager were nearby, and give the child the thing they so wanted, yet were so far from being able to afford.

Redemption is a powerful thing. In fact, the only thing more powerful than redemption is unearned redemption. And that’s where we all stand. We are all woefully short on “points”, yet the Father takes all we have and all we are and dispenses to us grace, forgiveness, hope, and peace.

I was driving home the other day on Newby’s Bridge Road. I had come upon a curve in the road (one of millions). When I got about half way through the curve, I saw a cat standing directly in the middle of my lane–facing directly toward my car. Not crossing, not moving, just standing–stunned I suppose.

“What in the world is this cat doing?”, I thought within a nanosecond. And then I saw it. Scurrying across the other lane, moving quickly away from the cat…was a mouse.

And in that moment I was reminded of the Enemy’ s predictable, and yet all too productive plan: To lure us with whatever means necessary straight into the path of our oncoming demise.

It reminded me to be wise; to be careful what I’m willing to chase.