Amidst the craziness of the preparations for the coming Christmas season and all that will take place, many people, I am sure, have been reflecting on the most appropriate way to prepare our hearts and our minds for what is to come, and I am going to share some thoughts I have had.
More specifically than my thoughts, I guess, I will start with thoughts shared with me recently by my Bishop, the Bishop of Pittsburgh David Zubik. He was speaking of forgiveness, and he was talking about the story (or stories) in the Gospel of a sheep leaving the flock and the Shepherd going after the sheep to get them. He said that (I trust this to be accurate, although it doesn't really matter as it is simply a cool reflection) when a sheep runs away from the flock and from the shepherd, it will eventually realize that it was wrong, realize that it is no longer next to its shepherd, and it will freeze. The sheep, scared about the fact that the world no longer seems to make sense without the guiding voice of a shepherd, will simply stay in place and wait for the shepherd to come and pick it up and bring it back to the flock. We must be this sheep, he said; we must freeze and wait for the shepherd; we must realize that we have done wrong and stop moving away from our Shepherd. He seeks to bring us back, all we have to do is admit that we were wrong, and the first step in this many times is simply to stop.
Looking ahead to Christmas, this takes on a particular meaning. In the world, every single sheep had turned its back. Through the sin that plagued and still plagues the world, all of the sheep had, to some degree, turned and run from the loving God who created them and gave them life. Then, just as Christ told us and just as had been foretold in the prophets, the Shepherd came to bring us back.
The strange thing, though, was how He did it-the Shepherd didn't come looking like He would conquer, as the people expected. The Shepherd came humbly. The Shepherd came into the world born of a Woman, born as a tiny infant laid in a manger. What a holy night that truly was, and what a beautiful image it is for us to realize that our Shepherd has come to bring us back, and has come in the form of a little boy.
For me, this Christmas, and the Advent season we are in leading up to it, must be about freezing. I must realize the areas of my life where I have run away so rapidly from the voice of the Shepherd and let Him come to get me. You see, I already know how it ends. He does come. He lives. He teaches. And then, most radically, He dies a horrendous death to bring me back. And it does bring me back. And so this Christmas I must freeze, and I must look upon that little boy. He is coming into the world out of love for me. He is coming as my Shepherd knowing what He has to do bring me back-He picks me up, but in order to really be able to bring me back He has to pick up that cross and die so that He can conquer sin and death and I no longer have to be afraid of running away for I know that He is chasing me and coming after me at every turn.
So this Advent and Christmas season I must freeze. Through the business and the celebrations, all of which are good, I must and I will take time to ponder that little infant child born on that night for the salvation of the world, and I must stop to let Him be born into my very heart in a new and a unique way.
May that Child bless each one of us as we freeze to let Him into our lives this year.
