{"id":203194,"date":"2025-12-25T11:44:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-25T11:44:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/203194\/"},"modified":"2025-12-25T11:44:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-25T11:44:10","slug":"a-meditation-on-the-manger-a-longing-for-paradise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/203194\/","title":{"rendered":"A Meditation on the Manger; A Longing for Paradise"},"content":{"rendered":"

I stood in line at Aldi\u2019s, a few items in my cart for supper. Nearby, store clerks restocked grocery bags. One worried that his paycheck wouldn\u2019t last the month. Another, close to tears, had just learned that his sister\u2014newly enlisted in the military\u2014had been in a near-fatal accident. A third lamented the toxic work environment she faced day in and day out.<\/p>\n

One aisle over, several moms shared Advent and Christmas survival stories\u2014restless children at home, late-night online shopping for forgotten gifts, neighborhood debates about the number and color of holiday lights, worries about credit card balances, and even a pastor telling one mom that Christmas shouldn\u2019t be such a big deal for Christians. \u201cWe\u2019re an Easter people,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The huddle broke up with one mom sighing, \u201cI\u2019m just so ready for this Christmas to be over.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Joy That Endures<\/p>\n

No matter how clearly it seems the world is falling apart\u2014perhaps especially because it seems to be falling apart\u2014the joy this season brings is great. No, the joy is more than great. It is brilliant.<\/p>\n

Some say Christmas joy is a distraction from the world\u2019s pain. It can be that, an escapist, fanciful refuge, but this happens only when the manger, \u00a0is relegated to an afterthought or a sentimental detail.<\/p>\n

When the manger is exchanged for tinsel, Mel Torm\u00e9, and Salvation Army kettles, the effort\u00a0to sustain seasonal contentment can expand and become an all-consuming task and burden. Eventually, even the most exuberant spirit can falter\u2014much as it did for the moms and clerks at Aldi\u2019s.<\/p>\n

A Diary of the Heart<\/p>\n

When you were young, your diary was thin. Life was opening before you, its pages unwritten. Over time, your heart filled that diary: a first love, a lost love, an academic disappointment, the death of a grandparent, the loss of a friend.<\/p>\n

A family move, a physical injury, a marriage, the birth of a child, the death of a best friend, professional triumphs and failures, the slow effects of aging, the loss of memory and control\u2014all these became entries in your life\u2019s diary.<\/p>\n

Particularly painful are the entries near Christmas. They can overshadow the thrill you once felt in the season. Perhaps this is why our culture largely treats Christmas as a feast for those with thin diaries, or\u2014as the modern legend of St. Nicholas insists\u2014a feast for children alone. How often have you wondered if you would ever experience Christmas as you did when young, only to resign yourself to the role of a stand-in Nicholas, hoping your heart might be warmed by the act of giving?<\/p>\n

A Return to the Manger<\/p>\n

To be lost in stress this Christmas, confined by past and present pain, or to seek hope only in gift-giving is to miss the manger, or stumble over it unaware.<\/p>\n

You have spent a season, Advent, preparing to visit the manger and present your heart as a home for the Christ Child. The joy of Christmas lies in this: God loves you so much that he could not leave you alone.<\/p>\n

The taste of paradise still lingers. The Tree of Life that sustained us in Eden is not forgotten, but our choices bear out the truth of the Fall. Banished from the Garden, our first parents received the promise of a coming Messiah who would restore us. Hearts that mourn paradise lost come to Bethlehem longing for paradise restored.<\/p>\n

The angels sing of peace on earth. Shepherds, eager for that peace, leave the comfort of what they know for a glimpse of what God has done. Come with them and see the salvation of the world. A stable light is lit, and the Tree of Life bends low. The joy offered at the manger becomes the foundation upon which all hope is built. God is among us.<\/p>\n

The Tree of Life Restored<\/p>\n

The 14th-century Northumbrian poem Cursor Mundi\u2014\u201cthe course of the world\u201d\u2014draws on old legends to tell creation and redemption as one great arc of divine mercy: the Gospel of Nicodemus, The Life of Adam and Eve, The Legend of the True Cross.<\/p>\n

Adam lies on his deathbed, longing for a taste of the Tree of Life. He asks his son Seth to return to Eden and bring back a drop of its oil so his pain might be lifted, if only briefly. Seth despairs\u2014he has never seen Eden. But Adam tells him, \u201cFollow the footsteps your mother and I left as we were driven from the Garden. Everywhere we stepped, the grass beneath our feet withered.\u201d<\/p>\n

In essence Adam is saying, Follow the pain of my life. \u00a0Follow the path of my tears. \u00a0By them you will find Eden. \u00a0By them, you will find the balm of the Tree of Life.<\/p>\n

Seth makes the journey. Though Adam dies while he is away, Seth returns with seeds from the Tree of Life\u2014the promise of salvation in Jesus. He plants them in Adam\u2019s grave, and they grow into the tree that will preside over all history.<\/p>\n

Wood from this tree provides a staff for Moses, a throne for David, beams for Solomon\u2019s temple, the manger for the Christ Child, and finally the cross for the Lord of all. From Adam\u2019s longing and Seth\u2019s quest comes a tree that serves as a constant sign of joy and hope, offering paradise restored and anticipating the hope found at the manger.<\/p>\n

Incarnation and the Hope of the World<\/p>\n

Robert Jenson once wrote that the true God is not eternal because he lacks time, but because he takes time; indeed, \u201cHis very identity is set by what he does in time.\u201d<\/p>\n

At Christmas, that \u201cwhat he does in time\u201d is not an abstraction\u2014it\u2019s about flesh and blood. It\u2019s about the mystery of the Incarnation, where God condescends, enters history, and makes our fragile, time-bound life the dwelling place of divine mercy. In the Christ Child eternity does not stand apart from time; eternity inhabits time.<\/p>\n

God does not remain distant, watching from the heavens. He enters as an infant\u2014fragile, dependent, subject to every ache\u2014and begins to transform the world from within. The Word becomes flesh not to rescue us from our humanity, but to redeem it and make it whole, including anxious moment in line at Aldi\u2019s where the burdens of the world threaten to overwhelm<\/p>\n

Longing for Paradise<\/p>\n

Do you hope for a family gathering at which father and son forgive one another? That\u2019s a longing for paradise. Do you miss the child, spouse, sibling, or parent who died this past year? That\u2019s a longing for paradise.<\/p>\n

Do you hope for wars to end, for hunger to be conquered, for the stranger to be welcomed, for injustice to be abolished? That\u2019s a longing for paradise. Do you long for every exile to find a home, every wound to be healed, every tear wiped away? That\u2019s a longing for paradise.<\/p>\n

Do you hope to see the face of God, to walk with him in the cool of the evening? That is the deepest longing for paradise.<\/p>\n

This Christmas hear the good news announced by angels. \u00a0Rush to the manger with shepherds and kings. \u00a0See the salvation of the world. \u00a0Come and taste the fruit of paradise<\/p>\n

The Feast of Hope<\/p>\n

You may be tired and exhausted, worn out from the year, but even a glimpse\u2014just a glimpse\u2014of the Christ Child\u2019s face will sustain you through every trial and tear. The carpenter\u2019s workshop, the desert, and the cross lie ahead. Beyond them, the empty tomb and the Mount of Olives. But for now\u2014and especially on the Feast of the Nativity\u2014know this: This manger cradles every joy and hope of your life and the world.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Rev. Timothy E. Kimbrough is a Guest Writer. He is the Director of the Anglican Episcopal House of Studies and the Jack and Barbara Bovender Professor of the Practice of Anglican Studies at Duke Divinity School. Previous appointments include Dean of Christ Church Cathedral, Nashville, TN. He is a seven-time deputy to General Convention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I stood in line at Aldi\u2019s, a few items in my cart for supper. Nearby, store clerks restocked…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":203195,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[39529,85,114193,46,43,45563],"class_list":["post-203194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-christmas","tag-il","tag-incarnation","tag-israel","tag-news","tag-paradise-lost"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203194\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/203195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}