The True Spirit of Christmas

Are you where God wants you to be this Christmas season?

We began our discussion by each class member writing a definition of humility. After some conversation about these definitions, Ed launched the following lesson.

In last week’s lesson, our writers emphasized that if our Christmas is to be spiritually successful, we must prepare for it. Today they are going to tell us that a critical part of that preparation will be to develop the correct attitude … and the attitude they suggest will prepare us for Christmas is … humility. We have taken a stab at definitions, but oftentimes definitions of attitudes and emotions are pretty theoretical until we see them clothed in human flesh. So for the next few minutes, we are going to see some living definitions of humility.

The first definition is found in the first chapter of Luke. It is the story of a little girl named Mary and her response to an event in her life that was bigger than she could possibly comprehend. Mary was probably 13 or 14 years old. She was probably amore mature than the 13 or 14 year old that we were … but she was still very young. And, as was the custom for girls her age, she was betrothed to be married to a carpenter named Joseph … said a little more precisely, her family had made a contractual arrangement with Joseph or Joseph’s family and to exit that arrangement would effectively be as serious as ending a marriage.

Suddenly, one day as this little girl works around the house, probably daydreaming about marriage … wondering how it would be to live with Joseph, she is visited by someone … someone whom Luke identifies as the angel Gabriel … who turns her world upside down. “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.” Gabriel goes on to tell her a disturbing story. She will become pregnant, she will give birth, the son she will bear will be extraordinary. These are not things that were part of the world she knew 15 minutes earlier.

But Mary puzzles. This story does not mesh well with what her mother had been telling her about how babies got started. “How can this be, … for I am a virgin?”

Then the most startling news. The pregnancy will come from God …” For nothing is impossible to God.”

Mary sat quietly for a long time, trying to recover the world that had been hers only minutes earlier … and failing totally. Then she provided us with a definition of humility:

I am the Lord’s servant. May it be to me as you have said.

Our authors tell us that we find within this story the incarnation of humility in the person of this little girl Mary. And they say that at the heart of humility is surrender … I am the Lord’s servant, let me serve him in the way that he asks.


In a minute, we will take some time and respond to this notion … that a spirit of humility lies at the heart of preparation for the Christmas. But first, I would like us to hear two more stories that will help us define humility.

The first is a story from the life of Corrie Ten Boom. The Ten Boom story is in itself a rich and inspiring story, the story of a Christian Dutch family who had distinguished itself in the service of the weak and marginalized prior to World War II. During the war, the family began to shelter Dutch Jews who were pursued by the Gestapo. Hundreds of persons were saved by their efforts, but in 1944 the family was arrested and sent to concentration camps. The Ten Boom father died almost immediately after incarceration and the two unmarried middle aged women, Corrie and her sister, were subjected to every possible indignity and deprivation including being paraded in the nude before the male guards at the camp. Corrie’s sister died; Corrie was released due to a clerical error shortly before she was to be gassed. After the war Corrie began an international career as a teacher and preacher. This is the story of what occurred when after a preaching service, Corrie came face to face with one of the guards who had humiliated Corrie and her sister at the Ravensbruck concentration camp.

Corrie Ten Boom tells the story of when she was speaking in a church and recognized a man who was a guard at the concentration camp she and her sister were in during World War II. Memories of the concentration camp came back with a rush: the huge room with its harsh overhead lights, the pathetic pile of dresses and shoes in the center of the floor, the shame of walking naked past the man. Now this former guard was in front of her with his hand thrust out: “A fine message, fraulein. How good it is to know that, as you say, all our sins are at the bottom of the sea!”
It was the first time since her release that she had been face to face with one of her captors. She froze. “You mentioned Ravensbruck in your talk,” he said. “I was a guard there. But since that time, I’ve become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I did there, but I’d like to hear it from your lips as well.” Again the hand came out—“Will you forgive me?” She stood there—and couldn’t do it. Her sister had died in that place. Hours seemed to pass as the man stood there with his hand held out, and Corrie wrestled with the most difficult thing she ever had to do. She knew she didn’t really have a choice. Jesus commanded it. So she prayed: “Jesus, help me! I can lift my hand. I can do that much. You supply the feeling.” And so, mechanically, she thrust her hand into his. As she did, she said a current started in her shoulder, raced down her arm, and sprang into their joined hands. And then a healing warmth seemed to flood her whole being, bringing tears to her eyes. “I forgive you, brother!” she cried. “With all my heart!”

For a long moment, they grasped each other’s hands—the former guard and the former prisoner. Corrie made the same choice Mary did. Those are hard choices to make, but could it be that, as with Mary, our greatest gifts come disguised as intrusions demanding our surrender?

I have one last story I would like for you to hear before we begin discussion. It turns around one of my favorite basketball players of all time, David Robinson. You may or may not remember that Robinson did not play high school basketball until his senior year in high school, as a consequence was not recruited by major colleges, went to the Naval Academy with a 1365 SAT to study mathematics, and as an afterthought, decided to play basketball there. He became one of the dominant players in college ball, graduated to serve two years in the Navy, then became a San Antonio Spur where he immediately became a force in professional basket ball, harvesting all awards from Rookie of the Year to MVP of the league. However, during an extraordinary ten year career, the Spurs never won a championship. Late in his career he was seriously injured, the Spurs had a 20-50 season, and hence got the opportunity to draft Tim Duncan out of Wake Forest University. The next year, with Robinson in the post and Duncan at power forward, the Spurs owned the league and Robinson finally earned his championship. But Tim Duncan was chosen as tournament Most Valuable Player.

In Sports Illustrated, Robinson reflected on what this was like for him:
I can’t overstate how important my faith has been to me as an athlete and as a person. It’s helped me deal with so many things, including matters of ego and pride. For instance, I can’t deny that it felt weird to see Tim standing on the podium with the finals MVP trophy. I was thinking, Man, never have I come to the end of a tournament and not been the one holding up that trophy. It was hard.
But I thought about the Bible story of David and Goliath. David helped King Saul win a battle, but the king wasn’t happy because he had killed thousands of men while David had killed tens of thousands. So King Saul couldn’t enjoy the victory because he was thinking about David’s getting more credit than he was.
I’m blessed that God has given me the ability to just enjoy the victory. So Tim killed the tens of thousands. That’s great. I’m for him.
That’s the spirit of Christmas—knowing you’re accepting your role in God’s plan. Thomas Merton once said, “Give me humility, in which alone is rest, and deliver me from pride, which is the heaviest of burdens.”

Three Questions for Reflection:
1. The authors have asserted that if we correctly understand Christmas, we understand that humility is the true spirit of Chistmas. Do you agree? In what way might this understanding make this Christmas season more powerful for you?
2. In our efforts to understand a spirit of humility, we have looked at humility as it has manifest itself in the lives of three persons. Mary, mother of Jesus, Corrie Ten Boom, David Robinson. Was there any one of those three stories that spoke to you especially powerfully?
3. In each of our examples, we have seen persons who had plans for their lives, found their plans changed, and understood that change as requiring surrender to the will of God.
· Mary planned to wed Joseph and settle down to quiet, traditional life in Nazareth … but was called to another vocation
· Corrie Ten Boom planned to preach her sermon, shake the hands of friends and supporters, and go on her way … but was faced with an unexpected encounter.
· David Robinson had planned to lead his team to a championship as the star … and found himself there, but in a supporting role
(a) Have you ever had to surrender something to God and found it difficult? If so, tell us about it: What was the hardest thing about it? What was the outcome?
(b) Have you ever refused to surrender something to God? If so, what was the outcome of that?