Sunday our Pastor was trying to humanize Joseph and Mary's plight by having us picture the initial fear they must have felt and how the stigma of her pregnancy occuring while she was betrothed but not married must have affected them. I followed along, trying my best to picture it but something kept pulling me away from the sermon, tugging at me inside to go to a different place. I tried to shake it off and willed myself to concentrate on the holy words spoken. I felt that gentle, unyielding tug again and remembered times it has occurred in the past. It reminded me almost exactly of the instances the Holy Spirit wanted my attention.
I looked to my left side and saw my oldest son Nicholas and felt his head leaning on my shoulder. Next to him was my Wonderful Wife. Behind us sat a dear friend, a young mother with her two children. Eight or nine rows ahead was another friend, pregnant, sitting with her older children. The youngest were in Church school and the nursery downstairs. To the left was another expectant mother and to the right across the aisle was another new couple, un married but probably heading forward in that marital direction. It was sensory overload and I had no idea where it was taking me. But when the Holy Spirit tugs, I have learned to go along for the ride...
I went back eleven and a half years to St. Peters Hospital, Maternity Ward. My Wonderful expectant Wife was in labor, practicing breathing exercises that seemed useless and growing extremely impatient with her Obstatrician who kept telling her" One more push.."
She finally had enough and pushed so hard Nicholas came sailing out. The intern assisting was so flabbergasted she got confused and told MaryAnne he was a girl. I do not know what she was looking at, but I do know from my vantage point he was most certainly male.
And then it happened. The memory of that particular moment that eleven and a half years in the future God would use to give me a personal perspective on what happened over two thousand years ago.
It happened somewhere between the contractions and pushing and that time a little later when Moms lifts the blanket and counts fingers and toes; a few moments before that crushing dose of terror and the reality when she realizes she really is completely responsible for this being 24/7 for the next millennium or so..
In between all those moments, MaryAnne first held Nick and looked at him and was wholly overwhelmed by his beauty and perfection. That is when it happened. You Moms all know what I'm talking about. The experience is practically universal.
That moment is what connected me to the Christmas story. It was not the fear or trepidation Mary had thousands of years ago, awaiting birth. It was those few seconds in time when she looked at her Child and realized he was utterly perfect.
Jesus was perfect and will remain so thru out time. There is no real comparison to Him and our children except in how a mother views her child in those first precious seconds.
It does connect us though. Even dads experience it sometimes. Two thousand years has changed little that really matters in life. As parents we have as little idea of our children's paths as Mary did on that evening. She had no idea what would happen to her son thirty three years later. She loved him, had faith and prayed for the best.
Not much different than my Wonderful Wife...or any of you, I suppose.
So my apologies to Pastor Matt. I know it was an excellent Sermon. They always are. Please know I did my best to stay on course. My Wonderful Wife smiles when she calls me " non - linear".
I am believing God does also..
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