Let me start with a purposely provocative question: What if the Christmas story was true?

No, I’m not talking about the AMC classic movie by the same name. I am also not talking about that perennial Dickens classic, A Christmas Carol. I’m talking about the original Christmas story. You know… the one recorded in the Bible in the second chapter of Luke, specifically. 

I mean, what if?

If you call yourself a person of faith, I imagine right now you might be gasping, sputtering, and spitting Diet Coke all over your computer screen. 

“WHAT?? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT, DUDE?? WHAT DO YOU MEAN, ‘WHAT IF THE CHRISTMAS STORY IS TRUE?’ OF COURSE IT’S TRUE! IT’S THE ORIGIN STORY OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH, for crying out loud!!!”

Yes. Yes it is. What I am really asking is: do we believe it? And if we do, why doesn’t our behavior seem to coincide with that belief? Because most of the time, when we say that a thing is TRUE, we see that truth actively influencing the way we live our lives and the way we make decisions.

If we say something is true, we should LIVE as if it is… shouldn’t we?

Stop reading my words for a moment and read the words of the Gospel of Luke, chapter 2. In fact, start at Luke 1:26 and read all the way to the end of Luke chapter 2. Pay special attention to Luke 1:47-55, also known as The Magnificat. As you complete that reading assignment, you will no doubt notice that all the elements of Luke’s Christmas story are carefully assembled so that they point a giant, flashing red arrow to one blatantly obvious declaration. 

The story starts with a young, unwed, impoverished Middle Eastern woman. To that inauspicious beginning we add an unplanned pregnancy. Next, we throw in an arduous overland journey with her betrothed in obedience to the mandate of the Empire… a journey that piles one frustration on top of another. 

Then, when the young woman’s miracle child is born – to the accompaniment of bright, shining stars, choirs of angels, and the Divine Declaration that THIS is God’s long-awaited Messiah – the first visitors to the young woman and her anointed baby are a bunch of SHEPHERDS! 

SHEPHERDS? SERIOUSLY? People of that day knew that shepherds were one of the most disregarded and overlooked groups of people imaginable. You might as well say that the first people invited to the cribside of God’s Chosen One were a bunch of day laborers, or parking lot attendants, or street sweepers, or telemarketers, or car wash workers. 

Yes, there is the part of the Christmas story where ornately attired wise men from the east come to visit the Christ child, bowing, scraping and bearing magnificent gifts. But that is Matthew’s gospel. That version of the Christmas story is all about revealing Jesus’ kingly pedigree. Matthew’s message is: “Yo! People! This guy is LEGIT!”

The writer of Luke’s gospel aims to communicate a different message. He (she?) wants us to understand the upside-down nature of God’s economy. That writer (let’s just say “Luke” for simplicity purposes, OK?) wants to tell us something about the surprising people God seems to regard most favorably.

The stars of Luke’s Christmas story are the poor, unwed young woman and the shepherds. It is almost as if Luke is telling us, “The places and people most overlooked and undervalued by the world are the places and people for whom God has a special affinity.”

And so, I will finish this post the same way I started: What if Luke’s story – and its main message – were true? That is, what if we each lived as if we really BELIEVED that God has placed an inordinately high value on the overlooked and undervalued people of the world? 

What if the people you and I want to quickly brush by and ignore are – in reality – the people who occupy a special, even privileged place in God’s heart?

I mean, what if?

Abundant blessings;