Parish Newsletter - January 2012

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Your Pastor's Ponderings

For me, the beginning of January is both a time of great anticipation and of slight melancholy.  It’s sad because I hate to see the season of Christmas and all the wonderful holiday times come to an end – I already miss that time with family and friends, that time spent eating delightful meals and noshing on all the wonderful buttery, chocolaty, cinnamon type of treats (cookies, cakes, and candy).  I already miss the slow rhythms of the week between Christmas and New Year’s – reading books near the tree, taking naps in the recliner, or walking in the woods. 

            But these times aren’t meant to last forever (else we wouldn’t treasure them so much) and so we turn to the New Year.  And the great thing about the New Year is that the slate is wiped clean, we get a fresh start, a chance to begin again.  And that’s wonderful news (especially for those for whom the previous year wasn’t so great, for those for whom the holidays were actually a little rough and not so wonderful).  The New Year is a time to look ahead with hopes for a brighter future, with renewed energy for trying something new.  That’s why we make all those new year’s resolutions isn’t – because we want to start fresh, begin anew, take another try at something that didn’t succeed previously.  The New Year is exactly that – a fresh start and something to look forward to. 

And I’m struck that this is exactly what the message of the recently born Christ child brings to the world.  Jesus brings something new to the world – a picture of God with us, God for us, a God who loves, wants to be with us, and fill our lives with blessing.  While the dates of December 24th and 25th may be past, the church is still celebrating this message, still in its celebration of Christmas (at least for a couple of more days).  In the church, the Christmas celebration is to last from December 25th to January 6th (Epiphany) twelve days – twelve being a holy number (the 12 apostles, the 12 tribes of Israel).  And those twelve days of celebration spanning the end of the old year and the beginning of the new one focus on the celebration of Christ – the hope, joy, peace, and love that he brings to the world.   His coming brings a new hope into a dark world.  The gifts that the Magi bring at Epiphany to the child reminds us not only of the gifts that we have received this Christmas but also of the gift that God has given us in Christ. 

The gifts of the magi (gold, frankincense, and myrrh) all point to the gift of the cross – the sacrifice that Christ will make on our behalf.  Gold is a gift fit for a king (as in the King of the Jews inscribed above Christ’s head).  Frankincense is an aromatic resin often used in religious ceremonies to represent life and new birth.  It is also used in anointing a body for burial.  Myrrh is an aromatic gum resin/oil that comes from a small thorny tree in the East.  (think crown of thorns).  Myrrh is often used as anointing oil for both the last rites as well as healing rituals.  In this oil as well as all of the Magi’s gifts, we have the duality of the cross – symbols of both death and new life. And thus the gift of life that comes at Christmas (the new born babe in the manager) is also the gift that leads to death and resurrection, the cross and new life.  All of which stems out of God’s love for the world, all of which offers hope for a new day, a new beginning, a New Year. 

To be sure, when it comes to our New Year and especially our resolutions, that fresh perspective, that clean slate doesn’t always last as long as we’d like.  Inevitably, our resolutions get broken, our good fortunes hit a bump in the road, our new perspective slips back into the same old, same old.  But this is why the gift of the Magi, the gift of the cross, the gift of the Christ, the gift of baptism (all of which we remember and celebrate at the start of the New Year) is so exciting.  Because in these gifts, we are reminded that there are always opportunities for a fresh start, for a new beginning – not only at end of a calendar year but every day.  Every day -- in which we remember that we are God’s beloved, in which we remember that we are baptized children of God, in which we remember that we are followers of the cross, in which we place our weaknesses before the cradle and the cross – we are reminded that we are forgiven, that we are loved, that we belong to something greater than ourselves, that we have been given the gift of new life, not just in the hereafter but here and now. 

And because of this, even though our New Year may eventually start to feel old and commonplace, we can take hope and comfort knowing that in the cross of Christ, in the forgiveness and love of God with us, every day is a new day, a New Year even.  Happy New Year! 

That’s what I believe.


Pastor Will

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