joy

I often find December and Advent tiring and stressful. The season begins soon after my birthday, when I focus on how far I am from the person I would like to be. December in Australia brings warmer weather (which I don’t like), the jarring emphasis on ‘Christmas’ as a period of conspicuous consumption, and a sense of urgency at work, of everybody trying to finish projects before the end of the year. I spend most of December in a stew of anxiety and anger, but also make an effort to put on a happy face—and when I fail in this, I fail spectacularly.

And I forget about Jesus.

Of course I keep praying the office, going to church and hearing that we are in a season of waiting for God. But I don’t quite believe it. What if Christmas doesn’t happen this year?

But it does. Somehow I fight through the wildly fluctuating climate and the crowds of shoppers and party-goers, and arrive at the cathedral. I don’t want to be here. On Christmas Eve, more than on any other day of the year, this church in the heart of party city is filled with visitors, strangers, outsiders who do not know our ways. Outsiders: the very people for whom God came to earth in the form of a poor, dirty and hated child.

I know how the Advent story concludes—with the birth of the child Jesus—and I know how the life of Jesus concludes, too. Still, the cares of the world give me enough anxiety that, as the feast of the Nativity dawns, I am genuinely—again—surprised by the presence of God in the midst of our earthly mess. That is a fine reason to party.