It occurs to me…

“In all things give thanks….”  Thessalonians 5:18

It occurs to me that gratefulness, being thankful, requires faith.  Faith does not, at first blush, seem to be required to allow me to be grateful for the positives in life.  A win, found money, a beautiful sunrise or sunset, a heartfelt “thank you,” all seemingly require no faith.  In some sense one could say that those things “just happen” and leave it at that, but the mere fact that I am being grateful seemingly expresses some level of faith, otherwise, to whom or to what is the gratefulness directed?

But of course, life is not always so kind, the object of gratefulness not always so agreeable.  Being grateful for “negatives” requires faith in something else, faith in a Master Plan, in something or someone else beyond me or my limited capacity to understand.  So, gratitude for an illness, for a run of bad luck, for lost money – those are more difficult as they all require faith to get there.

This is both freeing and scary.  The good news is that I am not in charge.  The bad news is that I need to make peace with the good news.  But for now I can just be grateful for faith, and how it lets me, if I let it, be grateful in all things.

Lyrics from a song by Johnny Gimble.  Photo taken at Blue Genie Holiday Show in Austin.

I had some last-minute things to check off my list yesterday, and so spent half the day here and there around town.  Before leaving I put on a Santa Hat, the traditional red hat, furry white trim, ball on top, and kept it on during my errands.  What became apparent to me throughout the morning was that the hat influenced how I acted during the day.  I mean, who wants someone thinking about them —  “That guy in the Santa hat is a real asshole?”  As I wound my way through the crowded grocery store with my cart, I was less hurried, more inclined to let people by.  Looking for a parking space I was more willing to let folks turn in front of me, even if we were competing for that parking spot.  I was humming Christmas songs most of the morning.  (Okay, nothing really different there, I do that all year.)  Something akin to Frosty’s silk hat, there was a transformation.

It was, of course, not the hat.  Nor was it Christmas.  It iwas/s a state of mind, and I can, if I choose, have it all the rest of the year without people wondering “Why is that guy wearing a Santa hat in July?”  There is of course no original thought here.  This thought is in fact much older than the May of 1957 date on this passage from Dr. Seuss, but this passage is what came to mind.

“But this sound wasn’t sad!
Why, this sound sounded glad!
Every Who down in Whoville, the tall and the small,
Was singing without any presents at all!
He hadn’t stopped Christmas from coming! It came!
Somehow or other, it came just the same!
And the Grinch, with his Grinch feet ice-cold in the snow,
Stood puzzling and puzzling. “How could it be so?
It came without ribbons! It came without tags!
It came without packages, boxes, or bags!”
He puzzled and puzzled till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before.
Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store.
Maybe Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more!”

Here’s to the “little bit more.”  Merry Christmas – always.

Today’s reading in my Daily Reflections for Advent points to Luke 1.  So much occurs in that chapter I can only hit the high points.  Elizabeth (Mary’s sister), who was barren and, along with her mute husband, Zechariah, was “well along in years,” (Luke 1:7) gives birth to a son.  Rather than, as is tradition, name the child after Zechariah or a family member, Elizabeth wants to name the child John, fulfilling the direction of an angel who appeared to Zechariah.  Luke 1:11-14  (Zechariah had been struck mute when he doubted an angel about the prophecy told him of his son, having the audacity to ask: “How can I be sure of this?”  Luke 1:18-20)  Others are not happy with Elizabeth’s choice of names, so they go to Zechariah, who, writes “His name is John” on a tablet, and immediately regains the ability to speak.

I love the next verse: “The neighbors were filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things.”  (NIV)   You bet they did!  I particularly like the King James rendition of the “talking about all these things” – that with regard to these events, people “noised abroad throughout all the hill country of Judaea.”  While I am no Biblical scholar, my translation of that would read: “People’s tongues started waggin’ with gossip about all these things.”  How could they not!

Zechariah doubted the angelic prophecy about John the Baptist.  Mary doubted the angelic prophecy about Jesus – “How can this be….”  Luke 1:34  Amidst their doubt, people started talking.  Hang on here — It is almost as if Bonnie Raitt has this all in mind when she wrote in Something To Talk About:

People are talkin’, talkin’ ’bout people
I hear them whisper, you won’t believe it.

Zechariah, Elizabeth, and Mary, of course, tamp their doubt and concern down and find enough faith to allow the rest of the story to occur.  Which channels the chorus from the same song:

Let’s give them something to talk about
Let’s give them something to talk about
Let’s give them something to talk about
How about love?

And indeed, they delivered on that promise.  Christmas.

“Want to keep Christ in Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you.”  Steve Maraboli

Wait, that sounds a whole lot harder than lamenting about having fewer public nativity scenes and people not saying “Merry Christmas” any more.

“Don’t look for miracles.  You yourself are a miracle.”  Henry Miller

I admit to the following:

Looking for keys that were in my pocket.

Looking for a phone that was hand.

Looking for my glasses I had on….

Some might think this is a sign of a memory problem, and it might be, but it is certainly an awareness problem.  The same concept applies to miracles.  They surround me.  They ARE me (and everyone else).

“’But’ is a fence over which few leap.”  German Proverb

I thought of this proverb today when reading the Christmas Story (not the one with the BB gun) in Matthew’s Gospel in the Bible.  Matthew 1 & 2  In the midst of all that is going on in Joseph’s life, an angel appears to Joseph and tells him “do not be afraid” (“fear not” in many translations.  (Though I have not personally counted them, I am told that there are more than 365 instances in the Bible where “fear not” or the like appears.  I know it is in there a lot.)

The angel’s imperative notwithstanding, Joseph of course has every reason to be afraid, not the least of which is having an angel appear to him and tell him what he should and should not do in response to all that craziness that is happening or is predicted to soon be happening around him.  It is, of course, the perfect opportunity for Joseph to walk away, or to stand his ground and “’but’ the angel/God to death,” a tradition that started with Moses and continues today (I’ve heard about people who do that!)  Had it been written yet, Joseph could have sung Kristofferson’s “Why Me, Lord” here with relish.  Yet Joseph, against all reason, yet for some reason, takes it all in and “did what the angel of the Lord commanded him….”  Matthew 1:24

Which returns me to the start: ’But’ is a fence over which few leap.”  Joseph, of course, leaped.  Yes, Jesus has the lead role in the Christmas Story, Mary’s role is of course significant, but let’s not forget Joseph.

There is probably no time of year we hear/think more of angels than the Christmas season.  Angels We Have Heard On High (listen to the Indigo Girls version) and Hark!  The Herald Angels Sing (the classic Nat King Cole) surround us, as do manger scenes and Bible readings about the nativity.  Thus I guess it is no wonder my mind (and iTunes) went to an old favorite of mine – Angels Among Us by Alabama, though it is not necessarily a Christmas tune.  The chorus:

“I believe there are, angels among us

Sent down to us, form somewhere up above

They come to you, and me, in our darkest hour

To show us how to live, teach us how to give

And guide us with a light of love.”

My only complaint with the chorus is that it can leave us with the thought that those angels show up only “in our darkest hour.”  In my experience, those angels are ever present, and more properly described in a later verse:

“They were so many faces, show up in the strangest places

To grace us with their mercy, in our time of need.”

And of course, our time of need, at least my time of need, is almost always.  Indeed, “I believe there are angels among us” and if I put that nasty pride thing aside, I can look back and see how they have helped me in life.  Whether I asked for or admitted I needed their help or not, they have been/are there to “show [me] how to live, teach [me] how to give, and guide [me] with a light of love.”

Beware, free and random thought ahead:

In both my office at work and at home, I have a clock, the “old -timey” clock you have to wind up with a key every several days in order to keep it running.  Both are a bit noisy, and the audible results of the pendulum’s travels can be heard anywhere in the room – if I am listening.  I add the “if I am listening” part because more often than not, though the pendulums are swinging (and in their noise-making mode) I don’t hear them.  They have become “white noise” to me.  Yet, when others walk into my office I often see them respond to the “tick-tick-tick” with a glance around the room in an effort to see where the noise is coming from – the noise I don’t hear.

All of that in reaction to the reading in my Advent meditation book today:

“He who has ears, let him hear.”  Matthew 11:15

The noise from the clocks, and my ability to tune them out, reminds me how easily I can be tune out that which is occurring around me.  I have the ability to shut out all “noise,” and do at times, but perhaps more often I engage in selective hearing.  As Simon & Garfunkel sing in the The Boxer “a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest.”

That (of course, as my mind works) points me to another song by Steve Goodman – My Old Man.  In that homage to his father, Goodman writes:

“And oh, the fights that we had, when my brother and I got him mad.  He’d get all boiled up, and start to shout, and I knew what was comin’ so I tuned him out.  But now the old man’s gone, and I’d give all I own, to hear what he said when I wasn’t listening, to my old man.”

All that to say that while selective hearing has its benefits, it causes me to lose a lot.  Let’s just say that my selection process as to what to tune in and out is imperfect.  While I may miss the sound of my clocks, I might also miss that “still small voice” pointing me this way or that.  Which is perhaps where Jesus was going with — “He who has ears, let him hear.”