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Why Christmas Is Just Getting Started
There’s a radio station in our area that starts playing Christmas songs 24-7 on Thanksgiving Day or the day after. The station’s been doing this for several years, providing a soundtrack for the busy holiday season. While I haven’t typically tuned in, this year I did. I remember I was driving southbound on Michigan Street in our city, heading to work. I was at a stoplight, flipping through the radio stations, impatient that most were on commercial. And then I landed on the 24-7 Christmas songs station. They were in the midst of White Christmas, which happens to be not only one of my favorite Christmas songs but also one…
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The Scandal of the Savior’s Birth
We’ve all probably seen a children’s nativity play. But even if you haven’t, you can perhaps imagine the gist. They’re usually a creative conflation of the two different stories we have about Jesus’s birth from the Gospels of Luke and Matthew. There’s the setting in a manger at night, of course, with shepherds and angelic choirs, from Luke’s version. There are the Magi — the three wise men from the East — from Matthew’s version, though Matthew reports that the wise men showed up sometime after Jesus was born, not the night of his birth. And there is, of course, Mary and Joseph and baby Jesus, the central characters of…
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When God’s Vengeance and Recompense Are Good News
I heard a lot about God’s wrath and judgment as a kid growing up in the church. God hated sin and I was a sinner deserving God’s wrath and judgment. That’s why Jesus came — to take the punishment I deserved. The implicit theology I learned was that Jesus, who was loving and merciful, saved me from God, who was mean and angry. This was something to be thankful for. Because of Jesus, I’d get to go to heaven instead of hell when I died. But there was also the end of the world to be concerned about. In the church and all the TV preacher programs that provided a…
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How Christian-Year Spirituality Shapes Us In The Way of Jesus
This past Sunday was the First Sunday of Advent. The Christian Year began again. The texts in the Revised Common Lectionary switched to Year A, starting with the texts for the First Sunday of Advent. At our church, the Advent candles were lit, Advent hymns were sung, and the message focused on living with active, hopeful expectation and anticipation at the coming of Christ when everything will be put right. This is the most counter-cultural of all the Christian seasons, our pastor suggested. Because while the rest of the world is busy shopping, decorating, preparing for Christmas, and making merry, Advent invites us to reflect on the end of the…
A Blog by Sam Ochstein.