Inspired by a nativity play

Christmas Sunday and nativity plays were happening all over the country. They rarely portray accurately the true Christmas story and generally contain a huge number of factual errors. Donkeys seem to play a major role, 3 wise men and camels get a regular mention and in this particular rendition of the story, a multitude of stars fill the sky rather than a multitude of the heavenly host. But I don’t mind the artistic licence and the guesswork that goes into re-imagining a story that we only have a few paragraphs about.

The inspiration of this particular nativity play was not the performance of a child star who delivered his or her lines with great theatrical fervour nor a calamity in the middle of the show like the star following the wise men or a fight breaking out amongst the sheepdogs accompanying the 4 year old shepherds who claimed that lambs were too girly and instead brought a combination of collie and rottweiler soft toys.

No, the inspiration was for all the right reasons. Here was a nativity play that grasped and drew my focus to the perplexity that the King of Kings would humble himself and be born as a child in a stable. As the children regularly reminded me, “it was a topsy turvy or turvy topsy night.” As they said later in the play, “smelly places and smelly people welcome the coming of the King of Kings.” The message penetrated deep into my thinking.

This is our God: King of Kings, Majesty, God of heaven. The splendour of the King is not found in beauty, in robes of purple or golden crowns. It is found in a deep love that chooses a descending way and comes to me in “smelly places and among smelly people.”

I struggle with this. My acute sense of smell and my fallen sinful nature draws me away from smelly people and smelly places. As I discovered on Saturday, I am more comfortable sitting in a concert hall with people who have put beautiful perfume on, chatting about the quality of the performance, than on a crowded train home chatting with someone whose personal hygiene was causing me the dilemma whether to move or just turn my back on them.

Yet the children inspired me to reflect again on what it truly means to live like Jesus. If I am going to live “under Christ’s rule” then it must mean choosing the same descending path! Henri Nouwen writes in his short book Letters to Marc about Jesus, “We don’t mind paying attention to poor people from time to time; but descending to a state of poverty and becoming poor with the poor, that we don’t want to do. And yet that is the way Jesus chose as the way to know God.”

Working out what this means is a real challenge for me. The steps I have taken in the past are important but the challenge is to ask how am I living “under Christ’s rule” today. As I enter the new year and some time for quiet reflection, my prayer is to find this descending way of love for me and to ask the Lord that you too will learn to live “under Christ’s rule.”