Christmas Eve: Light

Climb into the wayback machine with me for a few minutes. All the way back to Christmas, 1980. It was a special Christmas for my family because we knew that it would be my grandmother’s last.  And everyone wanted to give her something special.  We all wanted to make her wishes come true. 

It was an extravagant Christmas that year.  She got all the things she had dreamed of. 

There was a plush velour rose-colored blanket. To be precise, the color was mauve, which was a very big color in the eighties. Mauve velour was all the rage. It would have been perfect if it could have been a mauve-colored velour electric blanket, but I think the heating elements would have melted that old velour material, so it wasn’t a choice. 

Then there was an exquisitely beautiful doll.  Yes, this might seem a bit childish.  But you need to understand that my grandmother didn’t come from the kind of family who could afford to buy their children beautiful dolls or much of anything else, so this dream was a very old one – almost as old as she was.

But the best gift of all that year was a rain lamp.

Do you know what a rain lamp is?  They were kind of popular in the 1970’s.  Some people say they were the equivalent of the lava lamp for older folks.  A rain lamp is a tall, cylindrical shaped lamp, usually with a Greek goddess in the middle, surrounded by fishing lines strung from top to bottom, all around the goddess.  You plug it in, turn on the light, and it starts a pump inside that sends oil dripping down the wires.  It is supposed to look like rain. 

Some people thought they were elegant.  Others thought they were tacky.  It’s a matter of taste.  To my grandmother it was beautiful, so she got one for Christmas.

We loved her so much; we tried to give her everything she wanted.  Have you ever felt like that?

We have all felt that way – when we wanted nothing more than to fulfill the hopes and dreams of the ones we love. 

Every year, during the month of December you can find the film It’s A Wonderful Life playing on some channel at some time of the day. The story of George Bailey of Bedford Falls, and all his dreams and desires, his glories and his disappointments.  All his life, George was looking for his happiness somewhere else.  He wanted so much to leave Bedford Falls and have a real adventure, but every time his plans were foiled.  George couldn’t understand why it always had to be such a struggle, why he always had to be waiting for his life to begin.  But we, who are watching the film, can see something he couldn’t see – that all the love, all the goodness, all the living was going on right there all the time. 

One dark night in December when George thought he had lost everything, he lost his hope as well.  George thought there was nothing for him this Christmas, and that he had nothing to give anyone else – absolutely nothing.

But George didn’t count on the love that had been accumulating for him over all those years, like interest in a bank account.  He didn’t know that the years of struggle had born fruit all around him.  He didn’t know that there was a whole town full of people who loved him and wanted to give him everything he needed. 

They all showed up for him that year. It was the most blessed Christmas George had ever known.  In that darkest night the light shone, and the darkness did not overcome it.

The story of George Bailey is a mere reflection of the story that draws us together every year at Christmas.  The story we come here to listen to, again and again, is a story of a people who dreamed of salvation.  The treasure they sought was a land of promise, a land of milk and honey where they might live in peace. 

It is a story of a people who dreamed of a savior – one who would break the chains of slavery; relieve them from oppression and war and hunger. 

It is the story of a man and a woman, about to become parents, who held simple dreams – a dream of finding shelter and the safe delivery of their child.  They sought to be faithful to God’s design for their lives, to honor the treasure they had been given, even if not to understand it. 

In the darkness of that night so long ago, these two people were being watched over and cared for and loved, by a God who wants to fulfill the dream –

The dream of peace; the dream of a world where all people are fed and safe; the dream of a world where love reigns supreme.

You and I share this dream.  We often get distracted by lesser dreams – which could, possibly, be having your very own rain lamp (FYI, you can get one from Etsy.)  But deep in our hearts we treasure a greater dream – a dream of a wonderful life ruled by love.  Let us not lose sight of this dream, no matter how dark the night. 

No matter how dark the night, the light shines.  And the darkness will not overcome it.

 Photo: ChurchArt.com