Always Winter, Never Christmas

My mother stood on the porch this morning in her pajamas, no shoes or socks on, taking pictures of the snow that was falling from the heavens, our first snow of the season.  In October.  And you know Christmas has officially arrived according to Hallmark, since today kicks off their "Countdown to Christmas."  A whopping 21 movies premiering between now and New Year's Eve.  My mother has had a countdown to Christmas going since sometime in August, and now she's practically shivering with excitement with all these signs pointing to that magical day of December 25.

I don't know that I'm too far behind her, if I'm being honest.  I'm just a little less demonstrative about it, and wave my "I love Christmas" flag a little less boldly.  I purchased Christy Nockels' Christmas album, The Thrill of Hope, the other day and listened to it on my way to work.  ("Wrap This One Up" is definitely worth a listen.)  Although, I will say I don't necessarily care to have Christmas constantly in my face either.  I don't want to walk into a retail store right now and be bombdarded by all things ornaments, tinsel, Santa and jingle bells.  My mother asked my dad and me if we could put up one (yes, there are multiple - I think we maxed out at 7 trees one year when I was a kid) of the Christmas trees this weekend, and my face must have twisted into some sort of appalled, disgusted look which very firmly conveyed "no" without so much as saying a word.  There's a happy medium to this whole Christmas celebrating thing.  Not too much, too soon.

I discovered the band Relient K has a song called "In Like a Lion (Always Winter)," which is based on one of my very favorite movies, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: 

It's always nice to look out the window
And see those very first few flakes of snow
And later on we can go outside
And create the impression of an angel that just fell from the sky

When February rolls around I'll roll my eyes
Turn a cold shoulder to these even colder skies
And by the fire my heart it heaves a sigh
For the green grass waiting on the other side

It's always winter but never Christmas
It seems this curse just can't be lifted
Yet in the midst of all this ice and snow
Our hearts stay warm cause they are filled with hope

The lyrics speak to a scene in the movie where Mr. Tumnus, one of the creatures in the land of Narnia, explains how a curse has come upon the land since the evil White Witch has taken power.  Narnia is covered in ice and snow, the rivers have frozen over, the flowers have stopped blooming, the trees have lost their leaves, and a perpetual cold has settled on the kingdom.  "Always winter, never Christmas," Tumnus declares.  He's really saying there's a barrenness here in this place, and not just barrenness, but barrennes without hope.  No hope of a thaw, no hope of green things growing again, no hope of a freedom from the weight of the curse.

Always winter, never Christmas.

I realized that's what the 400-plus years of silence must have felt like, the time stretched between the final words of Malachi 4 in the Old Testament and the first words of Matthew 1 in the New Testament. 

Four hundred long, long years of no prophets, no words from on high, no documented miracles.  Nothing.  Silence.  This great gaping void, the threat of a curse looming from Malachi 4:6, the last verse of the Old Testament, standing as the parting words from God before he would seemingly go underground and let a deep winter sweep over humanity, "He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers; or else I will come and strike the land with a curse."    

Always winter, never Christmas. 

But then - but then -

Praise God, but then.

But then there arrives a baby in a manger, a King born in a stable, there among the cattle and the donkeys and the hay and the stench.  "The time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son.  She wrapped him in clothes and placed him in a manger..." (Luke 2:6-7).

Four hundred years of silence broken by the cry of a baby and the shout of angels.  Four hundred years of a seeming barrenness without hope completely wrecked by "a great company of the heavenly host" appearing, "praising God and saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests' " (Luke 2:13-14).

Four hundred years of silence ushered in by a thunderous shout and proclamation of glory. 

Christmas.

Finally.

And not Christmas because it was marked by a day on the calendar, but Christmas because it was marked by a season of waiting met by a season of fulfillment.  Christmas because it was marked by hope - the thrill of hope.  "Our hearts stay warm cause they are filled with hope," as Relient K says.

Jesus came to earth - a baby who grew into a man who became the Savior who went to the cross - and the thaw began.  The thawing of the hearts of men, the thawing of humanity that had been blanketed in cold and ice.  Buds began to appear on the trees yet again, and the people began to shake off the winter clothes wrapped tightly around their hearts.

But it seems winter has returned to our hearts.  We now live stretched between the time of his first coming as a baby and the time of his second coming as divine King.  It seems things have frozen over yet again, and humanity is showing its tendency to harden their hearts with ice, thickened with violence, pride, abuse, unforgiveness, slander, brutality, treachery, conceit, "lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God" (2 Timothy 3:1-5).

Always winter, never Christmas.

And it's in the waiting where we are most prone to lose heart.  To feel like the snow surrounding us is a permanent fixture, and the icicles hanging from our souls will never melt away.        

But then - but then -

Praise God, but then.

But then some day - a day that only God knows about -

The frost of over two thousand years will be broken by the cry of the four the living creatures, and the elders and the saints.  Two thousand-plus years of a seeming barrenness without hope completely wrecked by, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come" (Revelation 4:8).

Two thousand-plus years of seeming silence ushered in by flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder (Revelation 4:5), and a mighty shout and proclamation of glory.

Christmas.

Finally. 

Finally it will never be winter.

But always Christmas.

Cause when it's always winter but never Christmas
Sometimes it feels like you're not with us
But deep inside our hearts we know
That you are here and we will not lose hope.

You are here, Jesus, and we will not lose hope in the waiting.  We long for when it is always Christmas, never winter.  We will celebrate you even in the cold, even in the barrenness, even in the silence of our world gone mad, all while we wait for the warmth of your Son.