Christmas – Page 2

Old Saint Fred

December 15, 2014 by Billy Coffey 2 Comments

I’ve always had trouble with the parking lot at Wal-Mart. Don’t ask me why. Maybe because it’s so big or my mind is usually on what I need and what aisle I can find it. Not sure. But regardless, a trip there usually concludes with me wandering around looking for my vehicle, thinking that this must be what old feels like.

Take the weekend, for instance. Nice Saturday afternoon. Sunny. Cold but not frigid. Christmastime. And me, wandering around the west end of the parking lot feeling like one of the misfit toys.

As it is the weekend and it’s only another couple weeks until Christmas, the parking lot is full of cars. Squeezing between cars and trucks, I happen upon a green mini-van. The driver is nestled snug in his seat, seatbelt on, and dead to the world.

Lucky guy, I think. Lets his wife go into the throng of crazed discount shoppers. Lets her fight and claw and scream for the last Elmo or Barbie, and then lets her stand in line alone for half an hour while since only three of the forty checkout lines are open. And he gets to snooze in the mini-van.

Then something about him catches my eye. Not something in particular, but overall: longish white hair and beard, red shirt and pants, and a jelly-like pudge in the midsection.

This was no mere guy.

This was Santa.

One of his eyes opens and stares at me staring at him. We’re locked that way for a moment, each trying to figure out what’s going on and what’s happened. I smile. He smiles.

“Hiya,” he says, rolling down the window.

I nod. “Guess if anyone’s tired this time of year, it’d be you.”

He lets out a long exhale, shakes his head, and says, “Buddy, you don’t know.”

Santa, as it turns out, isn’t Santa at all. Fred’s his real name. Just finished his shift at a local store and was on his way home when Mrs. Fred called. Could he stop by Wal-Mart and pick up a few things?

He’d made it, but barely. Having kids sit on your lap for four hours tends to tucker a person out, Fred said. As soon as he put the car in park he felt that warm sunshine streaming through the window. Next thing he knew, he was awake and staring at me.

“Been a rough year,” he told me. “I’m used to kids wanting things, you know? ‘I’d like a truck’ or ‘I’d like a dolly’ or ‘Could you bring me a dinosaur?'”

“What’s the big gift this year?” I asked him.

“Hope,” he said. “Kids want hope.”

Those words stunned me. I swallowed nothing and furrowed my brow.

“What you you mean?” I asked him.

“Shoot, son,” he said. “Take a look around. It’s bad out here. Money’s dryin’ up, parents losin’ their jobs. I had a kid sit on my lap this morning and ask me to find his daddy a job. Had another who just wanted her mommy to stop crying all the time. And one, one said his daddy told him Santa might not come this year, but he knew that since he’d been a good boy, Santa’d have to come and leave him something. And that’s just today. Just today, you see? Hey, don’t get me wrong. I love Christmas. But between you and me, I’ll be glad when this one’s over.”

“Guess so,” I said. “I’ll leave you to your napping, then.”

“Thanks,” Fred answered. “And Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas.”

I found my truck right where I left it and decided to drive by Fred on my way out of the lot. He was asleep again.

My ride home wasn’t filled with Jimmy Buffett’s Christmas Island or Harry Connick Jr.’s When My Heart Finds Christmas. There was instead only silent contemplation.

Hope. That’s what Fred said the kids want this year. I would imagine that’s what a lot of grownups want this year, too.

Sad, isn’t it, that for many people this time of year isn’t a time for hope? For presents, certainly. And for family. But not hope. Christmas was turned into X-mas, which has now been turned into Holiday (that story comes tomorrow). All of this was conceived to keep everyone happy. To include everyone and give no reason for offense. But by doing so, I fear we’ve buried the very hope so many people seek this year.

The hope that was born on Christmas day a couple thousand years ago in a tiny manger in a tiny town. Hope wrapped in a baby.

Behold

December 11, 2014 by Billy Coffey 1 Comment

So. Things have been a little tough around here lately, and for a variety of reasons. Seems to be that way for a lot of folks this year. Times are tough out there, no doubt about it.

I’ve never understood how anyone could be melancholy during Christmas. To feel a heaviness amidst such beauty seems impossible, and to possess a measure of fear while surrounded by so much joy seems tragic. Such people have always been alien to me. I understand them better now.

The Nativity story is a popular one in our house these days; the kids have fallen into the habit of reciting the first verses of Luke 2 each night before bed. One of my favorite parts of the Bible, Luke 2. It is a fantastic retelling of fact—of shepherds and angels and a big miracle in a tiny baby. Last night as I listened, heart heavy and sadness there, what struck me was the tenth verse:

“But the angel said unto them, ‘Fear not; for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be for all people.’”

I imagined those shepherds—alone that night in darkness, guarding their flocks, trying to keep the wolves away. It was likely a tough time for them then, just as it is now for us. It was a life of work and of scraping by, of dealing with loss and hardship. And fear, especially fear. They were trying to keep the wolves away, after all. Maybe that’s why so many of us are afraid, too.

I think it’s fear that lies deep inside our troubles. Fear that the bad things will get worse, that the black hole we’re in will get deeper, and that whatever joy is left for us in this world will be carried away by a cold wind that will leave us shivering.

For a tiny group of shepherds one night long ago, help came in the form of an angel with Good News to tell. But before that News was given came four words that were even more needed, at least for that group of sheep herders in the Bethlehem countryside:

“Fear not; for behold…”

If there is a magic to all the Christmases that have followed that first one (and I have no doubt there is), then the secret to that magic lies in one word—behold.

My problem was that I was familiar with that word but didn’t really know what to behold something truly entailed. My dictionary put it this way:

“To perceive through use of the mental faculty; comprehend.”

In other words, to behold something means not merely to see it, but to ponder it. To seek to understand it.

Our worries and cares shrink not only our hearts and minds, but our vision as well. The more we look upon what we fear, the less we can see of what can comfort. I think that’s why beholding is so important. It involves interest. It requires attention. It demands participation. It means that for one moment we chance a small step outside of ourselves to gaze upon larger things.

So let us—you and I—do just that this Christmas. Let’s take a moment to ponder and wonder and try to comprehend. In that even our sadness will be coated with a sheen of joy, and the angels will proclaim even in our darkness. For the reason we celebrate this time, this Holy Child, is because by His presence the sadness we feel in this life was rendered temporary, and by Him we know that fairer lands await.

Do not be afraid. Behold.

Tidings of comfort

December 30, 2013 by Billy Coffey 3 Comments

Evernote Camera Roll 20131229 090031 This Christmas began what I hope will become a new tradition for the Coffey house. On Christmas Eve, my daughter sat at the grand piano in the equally grand foyer of the local hospital. For forty-five minutes, she provided background music to the steady pulse of whispers and footsteps and intercom pages.

“Silent Night.” “Joy to the World.” “Away in a Manger.” The notes shaky at first, timid, only to gain in both confidence and volume as the moments drew on.

I sat with my son and wife on the worn leather sofa in the middle of the foyer. The perfect spot to listen and nod and smile in support. Also, the perfect spot to see what would happen when those songs of hope and joy were played in such a setting. To see a bit of light cast into such a darkened place.

We were alone for a while. There is a current to every public place, one that flows and meanders of its own accord regardless of what attempts are made to alter it. So we all settled in, us on the sofa and she at the keys, joining the crowd rather than ask the crowd to join us.

The automatic doors leading to the parking lot squeaked with a certain poetic regularity. The people who entered did so with a slow purpose, as if walking through molasses. Their arms ladened with ribboned bags overstuffed with gifts. Plastic smiles that sunk no deeper than the first layer of skin greeted us. Their thoughts were plain enough that I saw them well. It is Christmas, these people thought, and I am here—not at home, but here.

My daughter played: Let every heart/Prepare Him room.

In those small spaces where the elevators clustered, those coming in met those going out. These people, too, could not hide their thoughts. I watched as orderlies pushed the freed in wheelchairs as worn and tired as the smile on the patients’ faces. They were greeted at the doors by family members who rushed in from the circular drive just outside—rushed in, I thought, not to escape the cold, but to rescue their loved ones before some unknown doctor reconsidered the discharge order.

My daughter bolder now, smiling down at the ivory keys: And heaven and nature sing.

A nurse stopped on her way to some far-flung department to listen. An old man sat in the chair across from us, drawn there more by the music than the promise of comfort. The December sun glinted off the wall of windows in front of us. Puffy clouds raced overhead, molded into shapes by the wind. More people stopped—patients and visitors, security officers, doctors. Not for long and only to smile as those notes rang out (Round yon virgin, mother and child) before walking on with a nod and a smile.

And slowly, ever so gently, that current changed.

It was not diverted, nor could it have been. This was a hospital, after all. In such places where so much life mingles with so much death, the heaviness in the air is both constant and unchanging. And yet I saw smiles during my daughter’s recital, and I heard the hard sighs of comfort and the sound of applause.

And I knew then this great truth—we cannot heal what has been irrevocably broken. We cannot bring peace in a life where there will always be war, nor healing to a place fallen from grace. Such things are beyond our ability. We have no such power.

Yet even if we are powerless to change this world, we still have the power to nudge it a bit in the direction it should go. To bring joy to another, even for a moment. To inspire and lift up. To give hope.

To endure.

Her favorite gift

December 25, 2013 by Billy Coffey 2 Comments

Ask any kid—or better yet, search your own memory— and you’ll find the most pressing question in the days proceeding Christmas is three one-syllable words:

What’d you get?

I’ve both asked and answered that question hundreds of times in my life (and if I’m honest, I’ll confess to asking and answering it much more now than when I was seven). I think that’s okay. So much is made of how commercial Christmas has become and how secular everything has gotten. Both are valid points. But hey, everyone wants to know when you’ve gotten new stuff.

As for the Coffey household, I’ll say Santa was pretty good to us this year. Some of us would say he was better to us than we deserve. That, too, is okay. What better presents to receive than grace and mercy? Which is pretty much what the world’s presents were on that first Christmas long ago, all wrapped up in bone and flesh and blood.

My son would say we had “a good haul.” A pretty typical response from a pretty average nine-year-old boy. But there’s someone I know who received far more this year, and that’s what I wanted to share.

Many of you know my wife is a teacher. If you have one of those in your life, then you understand my saying that profession could be best described as a thankless one. Lots of work, lots of stress, lots of blame. Sometimes, though, there are those little rays of light that break through an otherwise dour world. One of her co-workers received just that on the last day before Christmas vacation.

This was what a little girl in class delivered to her:

Deciphering a child’s art is an art unto itself. It can often be a tricky thing, even for an experienced teacher. Thankfully, said teacher has spent enough years in a classroom to know just how to coax meaning without offending.

“Tell me about this wonderful picture,” she said.

The girl told her it was the two of them holding hands as they lay upon the playground grass trying to make shapes out of the clouds. The white, winged figure? An angel, of course. It’s a pretty day, she said, but see that swirl of black in the middle on the left side? There’s a bad storm coming. Already, it’s blocking out the sun.

Beautiful, yes? The teacher thought so. My wife thought so. I thought so, too.

But there was more.

As it turned out, the picture was sort of a stocking stuffer—an hors d’oeuvre meant to whet the appetite for the main course to come. The girl pointed to the maroon blob just beneath the angel, which was not a blob at all. It was a special something packaged in a Tootsie-pop wrapper, held in place by a bit of Scotch tape. Then the girl grinned a big, toothy smile.

The teacher peeled the gift from its place beneath the angel, careful not to ball the tape, and unraveled the packaging. The girl shifted her weight from left to right. Stood on her tiptoes. Licked her lips. Kept smiling. If the teacher didn’t hurry up, she thought her student was going to explode with anticipation.

This was what she found inside:

A river rock. Worn smooth by time and polished by two tiny, patient hands.

Cheap, some would say. But not in my town. In my town, we know how hard things have gotten because things have always been that way. There isn’t a classroom in my wife’s school that doesn’t contain children who each day arrive in hand-me-downs so threadbare that they are nearly transparent. Children whose shoes are held together by duct tape. Who are given free lunches because their parents are too poor to feed their children or themselves.

And yet these children still come, every day. They still smile and laugh. They still give out of their hearts and their love, even if it is a rock.

I don’t know what that teacher got for Christmas. She has a husband and grown children who all earn livings. I’m sure she received quite a bit, and rightly so.

But I guarantee you that rock is her favorite of them all.

My favorite miracle

December 23, 2013 by Billy Coffey Leave a Comment

Quick, tell me your favorite miracle.

Isn’t easy, is it? The Bible is full of them, after all—those sixty-six books of God’s revelation. It is history and theology, philosophy and poetry. From a strictly literary perspective, it’s some of the finest ever produced. And yet the Bible is especially a long collection of miracles, one strung after the other, spanning thousands of years.

So, which is your favorite?

Creation itself, perhaps. The parting of the Red Sea. Jesus feeding the five thousand. Lazarus raised.

Those are only a few, of course. The miracle that came to my mind was Christ’s first (or first recorded, at any rate), while attending a wedding at Cana. It isn’t my personal favorite, though I’ll say His turning water into wine holds a certain significance to me. I’ve felt felt that particular miracle was a bit different than all the others that came after. To me, this one was simply a son wanting to do something for his mother. There is a deep sense of humanity in that small but great act.

Here’s the thing about that miracle: it wasn’t simply that water was changed to wine, it was that something less was made into something more. That seems the general rule. So far as I can tell, miracles follow that pattern of less to greater.

Consider the examples I mentioned earlier. For all its mystery and grandeur, the miracle of creation can be boiled down to the “less” of nothing being transformed into the “more” of everything.

The parting of the Red Sea? Danger to safety.

It was hunger changed to fullness when Christ fed the five thousand.

It was death made into life when Lazarus walked out of his tomb.

That’s the way all miracles are. All but one.

We celebrate this time of year because it commemorates the birth of Christ. It is, to every Christian, a miracle. Think of that miracle in the most rational of terms—Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How—and you’ll find that within that miracle are many more.

Who was born? The Savior of the world.

What happened? An angel appeared to a group of shepherds, some of the poorest people in the world, who became the first witnesses of what had just occurred.

When? According to Paul, God sent forth his son “in the fullness of time.” A wonderful phrase, that. Meaning that it happened just when God meant it to happen, just as with all things.

Where? Bethlehem, so fulfilling a prophecy made centuries before.

Why? So death could become for us not an end, but a door.

How?

Ah, how.

How did all of this happen? I suppose it could only be best described as the miracle of miracles. Because in all the other times before and all the times since, something less was made more. But in this instance, something more was made less. God Himself became man. The all-powerful was changed to pink-skinned and frail.

Amazing, isn’t it? And yet I can think of no truer expression of love than that of a God so big squeezing Himself into a world so small. Of living alongside us and understanding the joys and pains of our short existence. Of dying so that we all may live.

That, friend, is why the birth of Christ is my favorite miracle.

And that is how I can wish you the most happiest of Christmases.

No home for the weary

December 19, 2013 by Billy Coffey 1 Comment

It just wouldn’t be Christmas in our house without someone getting hurt. It’s sort of an unintentional family tradition, one that is inevitable given all of the wires and lights and greenery (yes, greenery is dangerous. I’ve proven that).

This year the ouchy came by way of those cardboard tubes that are at the end of every roll of wrapping paper. The ones that look like they were made specifically for impromptu sword fighting. Which is what my daughter and I were doing in the living room.

It was a mostly benign affair in the beginning, and I will say that she started it. I was walking by, and she tapped me on the leg. And since I’m one of those fathers who won’t allow his kids to one-up him, I grabbed the other empty tube and tapped her back.

She tapped me.

I tapped her.

It started like that. It ended with the two of us whacking away at each other like extras in Pirates of the Caribbean. The laughs and giggles and threats ended when our heads collided and we sprawled onto the floor.

Uh-oh.

My daughter had the benefit of youth and a harder head. She rolled over and got up immediately, ready for more. Then she saw me still on the carpet. The miniature mommy inside her kicked into gear.

She dropped her piece of cardboard, raced over to me, and said, “Don’t move!”

“Why?” I asked her.

“Because you might be hurt. We learned about this in school.”

So I didn’t move. Partly because I wanted to see a bit of what she’d been learning in school, and partly because lying on the carpet really felt good.

“Okay,” she said, “first, what happened?”

“You whacked me with your head,” I told her.

“Can you move?”

“Yes.”

“Do you see stars?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know who you are?”

“I think so.”

She nodded. “Okay, then you’re supposed to get up.”

So I did just that. She said I was supposed to ask her the same questions she’d asked me. I obliged. We both arrived at the conclusion that we were fine and so should resume our cardboard-sword fight.

We flailed our arms again, this time careful to keep a bit of empty space between us. Then the thought occurred to me that what my daughter had just asked me would be pertinent to more than the body taking a tumble. It could work when your life takes one, too.

We’ve all been knocked on our backs a time or two. Losing a job. Losing a love. The routine visit to the doctor that turns out to be something serious.

And sometimes things aren’t that dramatic. We don’t always land on our backs with a thud. Sometimes it’s just the constant weariness that goes along with being alive or the apparent ordinariness of our days.

If that’s you, you’re not alone. But it’s time to do something about it. So in the spirit of my daughter, I ask you these questions:

What happened? Identifying the problem is an important first step. Knowing what went wrong can help you make sure it doesn’t happen again.

Once you figure that out, Can you move? Is this something that’s paralyzed you with fear or sadness? If it has, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Counseling can do amazing things. I speak from experience.

Do you see stars? This isn’t a good thing when your body takes a tumble, but it’s a necessity when your life takes one. Looking down on yourself seldom improves anything. Better is to look up to God.

Do you know who you are? Always an important question, and one that will likely take most of your life to figure out. But you’re doing well as long as you’re trying.

Pretty simple, huh? Simple enough for me to try it out the next time my own life takes a tumble. I’ll ask myself those questions and answer them as honestly as I’m able. And after all that, I’ll do what my daughter said and what we’re all supposed to do.

Get up.

Keep going.

Try again.

Because life is not for the faint, and this world is no home for the weary.

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