Stump:
Welcome to Language of God. I’m Jim Stump.
So that is Christmas. The media market I stay in has a radio station that shifts to all Christmas music beginning the week of Thanksgiving. Once I’m within the automobile, I normally tune in with a way of obligation that that’s what I ought to be listening to this time of 12 months. [sounds of radio tuning to Christmas music] They play an eclectic mixture of conventional Christmas carols sung by present pop stars, classics from Bing Crosby, a mariachi band singing Feliz Navidad, and “you’re a imply one, Mr. Grinch”. It’s a variety of songs, but it surely’s not very deep, because it appears like the identical 10 songs on a loop each time you get within the automobile. A kind of is John Lennon’s “Blissful Christmas” that begins with that line, “So that is Christmas.” I’ve not ever actually favored that track. The British “Blissful” Christmas all the time feels a bit of skinny and superficial. But when I’m trustworthy, I don’t really feel very “merry” this 12 months both. So the melancholy opening, “so that is Christmas” has summed issues up for me fairly nicely this 12 months.
You will have heard from our earlier episode that Colin and I have been in Baku Azerbaijan for the massive United Nations local weather convention, COP29. It was a exceptional expertise in lots of respects, and we’re engaged on an episode about that, however the consequence of the convention for the longer term livability of the planet was fairly disappointing.
Clip From COP29:
12 months after 12 months, we’re selecting extinction as an alternative of selecting hope.
(Juan Carlos Gomez, Panama’s particular consultant for local weather change)
Stump:
And we got here again to a rustic that’s deeply divided alongside ideological traces, and for these of us who’re Christians and settle for the scientific consensus on issues, that line of division runs proper down the center of most issues we care about. I’m additionally amongst many I do know who’re going through different challenges in private circumstances or household conditions or work dynamics or the entire above. It’s chilly and grey in my a part of the world — each actually and metaphorically. It feels extra like the outline within the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe the place it’s all the time winter however by no means Christmas. [background music begins] I do know Christmas is coming, however thus far it has simply felt just like the glitzy superficial Christmas of vacation gross sales and Hallmark films. There’s a sort of skinny happiness and faux-merriment throughout that appears to me to disclaim actuality.
Is that this simply me? It appears to be a whole lot of the individuals in my circles, however I don’t need to fake to talk for everybody. Possibly issues are going very nicely for you proper now and this Christmas season does appear glad and merry. I don’t need to speak you out of that, however I’ve been questioning whether or not we miss one thing vital when every thing is cheery. I ponder if there’s something deeper — one thing joyful — that requires that we undergo seasons of problem.
I do know there’s a sort of system we’re purported to undertake now: some identification with the prophets of outdated whose individuals have been in troublesome circumstances; however they foretold of higher days coming. That is Isaiah 9 the place Handel took the textual content of a few of his songs from the Messiah that we love a lot, “The individuals strolling in darkness have seen a terrific gentle” and “For unto us a baby is born.” We’re on the opposite aspect of these prophecies now, so shouldn’t issues be totally different? I’m not saying I don’t imagine these issues, simply that I’m not feeling it.
What ought to we do with our emotions? I’ve been studying about feelings and emotions for the subsequent guide I’m engaged on. I’m actually interested by how far down our evolutionary growth feelings go, and for that matter, how extensively they’re present in different species right now. It positive seems like your canine feels glad generally, and that your cat is melancholy more often than not. However undoubtedly we’re studying into these conditions what we’d really feel like if we have been in these circumstances. That doesn’t imply our feelings aren’t actual — quite the opposite, they’re enormously actual and we don’t have a whole lot of management over them. It may be tempting to assume we simply must “snap out of it” or one way or the other power ourselves to really feel higher after we’re down. However feelings don’t work that manner. They aren’t switches we are able to flip on or off, and denying or suppressing what we’re feeling can typically make issues worse.
What if as an alternative of dashing to repair our feelings, we realized to take a seat with them — particularly on this season, to acknowledge the ache or disappointment that has occurred in our lives? Feeling unhappiness or grief and even anger doesn’t imply one thing is fallacious with us, it’d imply there’s one thing fallacious with the world, and that we’re eager for one thing extra, one thing higher, and the one thing extra and higher is nowhere to be discovered at current. [music beings]
As an alternative of the standard biblical texts from the prophets which might be used for the Introduction season, this 12 months I’m extra drawn to Habakkuk 3: “Although the fig tree doesn’t bud and there aren’t any grapes on the vines, although the olive crop fails and the fields produce no meals, although there aren’t any sheep within the pen and no cattle within the stalls, but I’ll rejoice within the Lord, I will likely be joyful in God my Savior.”
Can I pull a thinker’s trick right here and outline the phrases the best way I need to resolve an issue? I’ve achieved this earlier than with hope and optimism, claiming that it’s doable to be hopeful even in case you’re not very optimistic. Now I’m claiming we’d rejoice within the Lord, I could be joyful in God my savior, even when I’m not very glad about how issues are going. Can I’ve a joyful Christmas even when it’s not very merry?
On this passage, “rejoicing” and “being joyful” don’t sound passive, like issues that occur to us relying on the exterior circumstances. They sound like decisions, issues I’ve at the least some management of.
Can I select to be joyful in these current circumstances? That doesn’t imply the troublesome feelings immediately disappear, and it doesn’t imply we fake every thing is OK. Habakkuk’s pleasure wasn’t a superficial happiness or a denial of actuality. It was a alternative — a choice to look past his speedy circumstances and proceed to commit himself to a longed-for actuality that he didn’t see. Pleasure requires cultivating a perspective that sees deeper than the current circumstances and committing ourselves to that.
There’s no higher literary illustration of this than Puddleglum in one other of Lewis’s Narnia books, The Silver Chair. He’s a melancholy character from the swamps who helps lead the kids seeking a misplaced prince, and their journey takes them to a nasty, underground kingdom the place the circumstances get as dangerous as ours are right now. They discover the prince, however he’s underneath the spell of a witch. And she or he makes an attempt to place them underneath the identical spell by some incense in a fireplace and her soothing phrases that their reminiscences of the world above and Aslan their king are only a dream of foolish kids. All of them come to the purpose the place that clarification does the truth is appear completely cheap and in step with their expertise. However then Puddleglum, in a herculean effort to interrupt free from the spell, stamps out the fireplace and makes this speech to the witch queen:
“One phrase, Ma’am,” he mentioned, getting back from the fireplace; limping, due to the ache. “One phrase. All you’ve been saying is sort of proper, I shouldn’t marvel. I’m a chap who all the time favored to know the worst after which put the very best face I can on it. So I gained’t deny any of what you mentioned. However there’s one factor extra to be mentioned, even so. Suppose we now have solely dreamed, or made up, all these issues—timber and grass and solar and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we now have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up issues appear a great deal extra vital than the true ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the one world. Nicely, it strikes me as a reasonably poor one. And that’s a humorous factor, whenever you come to think about it. We’re simply infants making up a recreation, in case you’re proper. However 4 infants enjoying a recreation could make a play-world which licks your actual world hole. That’s why I’m going to face by the play world. I’m on Aslan’s aspect even when there isn’t any Aslan to steer it. I’m going to stay as like a Narnian as I can even when there isn’t any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gents and the younger woman are prepared, we’re leaving your courtroom directly and setting out at midnight to spend our lives on the lookout for Overland. Not that our lives will likely be very lengthy, I ought to assume; however that’s small loss if the world’s as boring a spot as you say.”
If this Christmas feels fantastic and glad, then I’m glad for you. Don’t let my melancholy pull you down. Maybe you’ve already made your solution to the Overland.
But when this Christmas feels exhausting, know that you just’re not alone. Many people are in that ready line. However we’re standing with the prophets, with generations of people that have waited. Their ready wasn’t passive. It was energetic and stuffed with longing. They prayed, they wrote, they most likely would have made podcasts if they’d the know-how, they did all this stuff to name their individuals to a greater imaginative and prescient of the world.
So that is Christmas. It’s exhausting and chilly and bleak. The fig timber aren’t blossoming and no fruit is on the vine. The way in which we expect issues ought to be moving into our world has been thwarted, and our imaginative and prescient of the nice future we anticipated looks like it might need been only a dream. But… I’ll rejoice in God. I’ll stay as like a Narnian as I can even when there isn’t any Narnia. I’ll rejoice that God has turn into flesh to place issues proper, regardless that the Kingdom of God has not but been made totally identified. I’ll act within the expectation that it truly is true, even when present circumstances recommend in any other case. [In the Bleak Midwinter begins in background]
Pleasure like this doesn’t come to us within the second the best way happiness does when one thing good occurs. And possibly the enjoyment that comes from such circumstances is best than the happiness we’d really feel when every thing is nice.
This Introduction season, we’re invited into the sort of ready that doesn’t deny our struggles however permits us to search out God within the midst of them. Like Habakkuk, we are able to study to say, “But I’ll rejoice.” Not as a result of every thing is nice, however as a result of God is current. Not as a result of our circumstances are straightforward, however as a result of we imagine that pleasure can develop even right here, even now.
[musical interlude]
We’ll be again within the new 12 months with a bunch of tales that we’ve been engaged on, after which we now have another concepts we need to comply with.
Till then, we want you all a…joyful Christmas.
Credit
Hoogerwerf:
Language for God is produced by BioLogos. BioLogos is supported by particular person donors and listeners such as you. When you’d like to assist maintain this dialog happening the podcast and elsewhere, you could find methods to contribute at BioLogos.org. You’ll discover a number of different nice assets on science and religion there as nicely. Language of God is produced and combined by Colin Hoogerwerf, that’s me. Our theme track is by Breakmaster Cylinder. BioLogos workplaces are situated in Grand Rapids, Michigan within the Grand River Watershed. Thanks for listening.
