As the fake snow begins to melt on the original live nativity scene, all is not well in Christendom. The sheep still need tending and the cattle need lowing and the wise men have been forewarned to forget the star and high tail it out of Dodge to dodge Herod’s evil plot to slaughter the babies in Bethlehem.
Threatened by the possibility of a political rival, King Herod’s rage turns into a tizzy. He becomes an imperial maniac who feels like this whole Christmas drama about another king being born in his domain was coming a bit too close to home. Too close for comfort. And so the executive order to kill the kids in order to eradicate the unknown suspect. He really did not want to keep Christ in Christmas!
Unbeknownst to the newly born Jesus, his parents must do the best they can to protect their brand spanking new boy. Mary and Joseph were unlikely candidates for bearing a child to begin with. Unmarried and unsettled. Much too young and poor. Without too much common sense. Mary’s time for delivery could happen anytime, and they strike off to Bethlehem. No reservations for the inn for the holidays, so it’s off to the stables. Inexperienced at midwifery — immaculate or otherwise — Joseph had to figure out what to do with the umbilical cord. The infant mortality rate was high enough in that culture under normal conditions, and here’s this freshly born child lying in a cattle feeder. Jesus’s birth must have been a real close call, even without the madness of King Herod.
Against all those odds and in the perilous poverty of that night, Mary gave birth to a life that from the beginning courted death. That he survived is miracle enough. The claim that this is Emmanuel ‑‑ God with us in the middle of it all ‑‑ is almost scandalous to our way of life that seeks safety above all. The life of Jesus was antithetical to our fretful ways of protecting our vulnerability. He seemed to live and die as if he were only a heartbeat away from God. Maybe when God gets that close, it’s too close for comfort. Or it could be the only kind of comfort that finally matters.