Just some seasonal thoughts

An unusually nice piece of road

There’s something about riding in an uncomfortable taxi bus that puts me in a poetic mood. I think it makes me more aware of what’s around me: from the body odor wafting from all the people around me, to the cool breeze coming from the window, the natural beauty surrounding me, the sheer drop-offs next to disintegrating roads… and then I put in ear buds and suddenly I’m in a movie with an awesome Christmas soundtrack. 

Truly He taught us to love one another

His law is love and His gospel is peace

Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother

And in His name all oppression shall cease. 

There’s oppression here, so much of it. The rich get favor from the courts and the poor are left to suffer. Corruption abounds and, as much as people are tired of it (see a popular local song titled “We’re Tired”), they also are resigned to it, because putting down one corrupt person inevitably means another rises up. 

O Holy Night makes me think of the longing of the world for redemption, for transformation, for change that can only begin with the heart.

I think, being here I see a far greater distinction between holiday songs and Christmas songs. Christmas songs sing of the Savior and His birth, the world-shaking, ground-breaking wonder of Christ in the manger. They’re just as true here on Clove Island as they are in North America. Holiday songs I can only sing ironically (oh yes, let it snow! Let it snow!), but the story of Christmas holds as much or more relevance here as it ever has anywhere else. This season, as I sweat while putting up Christmas lights and drink ice-cold chocolate milk, I see the importance of the “true Christmas spirit.”

So, as you sing the well-known songs and I sing them too, let’s pray for the world and seek to see His Kingdom come, His will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.