Jim Hite

By the time you read this, Christmas Day 2006 will be past. Even some festive holiday decorations will have already been taken down and boxed for use in 2007. Some of you may even feel exhausted as the rush of pre-Christmas comes to an end and the hope of returning to a normal schedule becomes a reality.

I had plans to write a column for the Millen News prior to Christmas, but it was not to be. And I cannot plead lack of time. While as busy as many of you, I still could have put seat of pants to seat of chair in front of the keyboard and put ideas to screen. However, for some reason, no seasonal inspiration was in my heart or mind. It’s been years, maybe decades, since that last happened. I love reading of the event we celebrate, pondering its meaning, thanking this God who so loved us that He came to us as a baby. I love preparing, setting up the decorations, writing cards to friends and relatives in what often is the one time of the year we exchange greetings.

And while the two concerts in which we sang with the Augusta Choral Society, the Nine Lessons and Carols and the annual Christmas concert, both in the beautiful setting of the Sacred Heart Cultural Center, were moving and inspirational, they were not enough to help put ideas on paper.

Then a couple of news items, somewhat opposite in nature, broke the stalemate.

Every Friday night for over three years, in Portland, Oregon, car- and vanloads of Christian volunteers pour into downtown where the homeless struggle to exist under the Burnside Bridge. Bringing sleeping bags, blankets, hot meals, shavers and scissors, soap and water, they serve as part of an inter-denominational evangelical organization called Bridgetown Ministries.

Their motto: “Get out of the box.”

They feed, clothe, barber, wash without judgment. Whether the recipient of these ministrations is worthy or unworthy, drunk or sober, addicted or clean, does not matter. These volunteers are Matthew’s chapter 25 in action!

As part of that washing, they wash the feet of the homeless, dust with foot powder, then put on a clean pair of socks.

How this baby we celebrate this season must praise such faith!

As the ministry leader Marshall Snyder tells the volunteers, “When you go out there tonight, I want you to look for Jesus. You might see him in the eyes of a drunk person, a homeless person.”

They serve in quite a contrast with the different and less inspiring face of faith that is smug and secure in its narrowness, disparaging other Christian faiths as well as other religions, that sees those to whom disaster has brought suffering as somehow being at fault, as some so-called religious pundits did when they stated Katrina victims had it coming because of their sinful lives or that 9/11 was due to the sinfulness of our nation.

In juxtaposition with the above article, a companion piece discussed the new video game based on the Left Behind series. Set in post-Rapture New York, good guys (Tribulation Force) fight against the bad guys (Global Community Peacekeepers). From what I have read, not having seen the game and not being a video game aficionado, the object of the game is to save as many of the remaining souls as possible by converting them while getting rid of those who stand in the way.

Somehow, such a concept seems far removed from this baby we honor, who as a grown-up showed anger only at those who made a profit from religion (remember the cleansing of the Temple?) and those who were sure of their relationship with God (remember the many “woes” to the scribes, Pharisees, et al.?). And it’s definitely far removed from the Bridgetown Ministries.

I love Christmas and marvel how God came to live with us, not as a conqueror, not as a temporal ruler, not as a powerful political figure, but as a baby. As Harry Reasoner said many years ago, God acted well here, for we can relate far better to a baby than to a conqueror.

Christmas cannot be taken away, as long as we are true witnesses to this God of Love. Christmas is not just a day or season that ends when the decorations come down.

God is with us (Emanuel) each hour of each day throughout the year.

The question, then, for this upcoming new year: Is my life a witness to what I say I believe?