Well, here we are again.
\nTime has a way scrunching everything up, and here we are again, at that time on the yearly cycle that is so special to so many of us.
\nIsn\u2019t it wonderful?
\nI\u2019m going to keep this short and sweet. No long sermons, no long messages. I think the message of this special time need not come from me. It\u2019s what we\u2019re feeling in our hearts that counts today, and nobody needs to tell us what those feelings are.
\nSo I thought I\u2019d make just a few gentle observations, if you will permit, and let it go at that\u2014allowing this delicious time we are in to speak to each of us as it will. As it always has, each year at this moment.
\nEach year at this moment we celebrate. But I was thinking this morning as I got up\u2014what if we made it a different kind of celebration this year?
\nNot the celebration of the birth of the savior, but the celebration of the birth of the savior.
\nLet me explain.
\nThe Christmas celebration itself has gotten so big, so almost out of hand, that it seems that a lot of different people have a lot of different ideas about what it\u2019s all about.
\nOne thing that I know it\u2019s not about, for me, is a doctrine or a dogma. It\u2019s about celebrating the birth of Christ, for sure, because that is a cause for celebration, but it\u2019s not about, for me, the birth of a religion or a theology.
\nIt\u2019s about the birth of the savior, for sure, but only if the savior is born during this time.
\nThere was a savior born, in a manger, so we are told, many, many years ago. But here is something that we have not often been told…<\/p>\n
\n…there has been a savior born every night, and every day, and every minute somewhere on this planet, from the beginning.
\nThat\u2019s my thought about it, anyway. And I place it before you today as a possible consideration, as an idea. Nothing more.
\nNot a dogma, not a doctrine. Just something to consider, to think about, to ponder in our hearts.
\nWhat if each of us was intended to be a savior? What if we all were? What if every time someone is born, a savior is born? The only question then would be, whether we know it or not\u2026
\nThere is something we are celebrating now, and it feels to me like it\u2019s larger than any one person or any one religion or any one spiritual doctrine.
\nThere\u2019s a feeling that millions of people experience\u2014they experience it in common and they experience it together. And boy, I\u2019m sorry if this sounds na\u00efve, or even sappy, but I think that feeling can be put into one word: LOVE.
\nNow if Love really is what we are celebrating, it will not matter what kind of package it comes in, what kind of dogma it\u2019s wrapped in, or what kind of doctrine it\u2019s flavored with. It would only matter whether it was real and true, and present, here and now\u2014in our lives and in our world.
\nAnd there is one way to guarantee that it is. By putting it there.
\nIt is, in the end, up to us.
\nIf we want humanity to receive the true gift of Christmas, and to have it last the whole year through, we have to agree to become, each of us in our own way, the savior.
\nI realized this morning as I was thinking about this that nothing that is going on during this special time will have any meaning until I give it meaning in my own life, and in the lives of others. We\u2019re living in a world right now that is not the kind of world we would choose, if we thought we had a choice.
\nHere is the news on this day. It is the news that Christ came to tell us.
\nWe do.
\nWe do have a choice.
\nAll of us do, and if we will give ourselves permission to see it that way, and to see ourselves that way\u2014as the person making the choice, as the person modeling the choice, as the person sharing the choice, we can save the day for humanity. The savior can be born right now, today, when we allow love unconditional to be born again in our hearts.
\nI got something in my email the other day, and I want to share it with you. It\u2019s perfect for this time of year, because it reveals to us just how easy it is to love, just how easy it is to be an individual savior in a world that\u2019s begging to be saved, person by person, moment by moment.
\nThis is a story which comes to us from a woman who, many years ago, worked as a volunteer at a hospital. She got to know a little girl named Liz who was suffering from a rare and serious disease.
\nHer only chance of recovery appeared to be a blood transfusion from her 5-year-old brother, who had miraculously survived the same disease and had developed the antibodies needed to combat the illness.
\nThe doctor explained the situation to her little brother, and asked the little boy if he would be willing to give his blood to his sister. The boy hesitated for only a moment before taking a deep breath and saying, “Yes, I’ll do it if it will save her.”
\nAs the transfusion progressed, he lay in bed next to his sister and smiled, as we all did, seeing the color returning to her cheeks.
\nThen his face grew pale and his smile faded. He looked up at the doctor and asked with a trembling voice, \u201cWill I start to die right away?”
\nYou see, being young, the little boy had misunderstood the doctor; he thought he was going to have to give his sister all of his blood in order to save her.
\nWhat we\u2019re talking about here is love. Plain and simple, short and sweet. We\u2019re talking about love.
\nLove can be sent to others in a thousand ways. Even thoughts of love can change things. They can be felt. Be you, and by the person you are thinking of, too.
\nYes, they can.
\nYou can literally \u201csend love to another\u201d with the power of your thought. In fact, you have a chance to do that right now. If you think of someone with love in this moment, whether they are in their body or have left their earthly body, it will not matter. They will feel it.
\nAnd this is how it begins. Through simple acts such as this. I promise you. The love for another that you ignite in your heart is ignited in the heart of the other. The light may be dim at first, but it will never go out. It cannot, as long as you keep placing it there.
\nThat was the message of the man whose birth we celebrate now. And, as I said, you don\u2019t need me to tell you that. But I need you. I have not done so good in this love department in my life. I would have liked to do better. I wish I could be more loving. So here\u2019s the gift you can give tonight. Help me be that. And, for that matter, help everyone whose life you touch.
\nDo it by loving them, simply, plainly, openly, without condition. Return them to themselves. If you\u2019ll give me back to myself, maybe I can do better.
\nYou\u2019re my only hope. You\u2019ve got to see me as I have stopped seeing myself. You\u2019ve got to see in me what I, myself, have lost sight of. That\u2019s when you give me the unspeakable gift. That\u2019s the treasure of treasures.
\nI\u2019ll try my very best to give it to you. I know you\u2019ll try to give it to me. Let\u2019s give it to each other, and to all people everywhere. Then, the savior is born\u2026.in us.
\nAnd then we can bring, we can truly bring, Joy to the World.
\nMerry Christmas, everyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Well, here we are again. Time has a way scrunching everything up, and here we are again, at that time on the yearly cycle that is so special to so many of us. Isn\u2019t it wonderful? I\u2019m going to keep this short and sweet. No long sermons, no long messages. I think the message of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-and-the-new-spirituality"],"yoast_head":"\n