Keep your heart open this last week before Christmas

 

As we move into the final week before Christmas, I want us to encourage others to step back and reflect on what will happen to us this week. 

I’m talking about more than the presents we buy, the parties we attend, and the Christmas celebrations we will enjoy. These are lovely parts of Christmas. 

However Jesus didn’t come into the world as a baby, so we could purchase the newest electronic gift for our favorite person. 

Jesus didn’t come into the world as a baby, so we could eat so much that we have to go on a diet when Christmas is over. 

Jesus didn’t come into the world as a baby, so that we would have the perfect family celebration. 

I gave a sermon once entitled “Will Christmas or X-mas comes this year.” In the sermon I made the case that the celebration of Christmas does not have to be that complicated. But if we find ourselves at the end of Christmas in greater debt, needing to go on a diet, and exhausted from Christmas celebrations, then something has gone amiss. 

This year at Chain of Lakes I’m sharing a sermon series called “The keeps on giving.” I’m talking about preparing our heart to celebrate Christmas. (To watch all of the sermons, find the link at colpres.org.) 

I’m talking about what this gift can do to our heart. Even though many have gone through Christmas many times, we can still have our heart touched and find ourselves touched in a spiritual way. 

Two themes I’ve talked about in this series. 

One is to be open to being surprised. The entrance of Jesus into the world was a great surprise to those who were part of the story. Zechariah and Elizabeth and Mary and Joseph as the silent partner, did not know that they would be participants in this story. The angel Gabriel showed up to Zechariah and Mary and basically said, “surprise!” 

Zechariah and Mary didn’t have a choice about being surprised. But I wonder if we can be open to being surprised. In my research on that sermon, I learned about the psychology of being surprised. When we are surprised our brain freezes for a moent and then releases neutrotransmiters into our body. This cements the memory for us. I learned that surprise can help us experience happiness. 

But to be surprised our hearts have to be opened to being surprised. 

I get it some of us don’t like to be surprised. We want to be in control and have a sense of predictability about what is going to happen. And some of us fall into cynicism. A cynic is going to protect his or her heart from being surprised. A cynic has a sense of know-it-all. They have a been there done that” mentality. 

I hope that you, the reader, don’t fall into this pattern. 

To be surprised means we have a sense of adventure. Even if we’ve done something a hundred times, we are willing to do it again because we want to see what happens. 

Even if we have celebrated Christmas often, I want to encourage us not to let the experiences dull the adventure of the celebration. Be open to being surprised. 

Yesterday I talked about mercy. When the angel, Gabriel appeared to Zechariah, Gabriel shared that God was sending Jesus into the world from the perspective of mercy. 

In fact one of the qualities of God is mercy. I had people at Chain of Lakes write down five qualities of God that they identify. One of them has to be mercy. 

When God appeared to Moses God declared the first descriptive word of the divine character was mercy. Don’t believe me? Check out Exodus 34:6.

 I encouraged people and encourage you the reader to focus on mercy this last week of Advent. Go out of your way to extend mercy to the people who you meet. For some of us this is easy as our hearts naturally are merciful. For others this is hard as mercy doesn’t describe us. Whatever our spiritual make-up, though, we can train ourselves to respond in mercy. 

My prayer this week is we can be open to being surprised and orient ourselves towards mercy. If we do this, I think this could be one of the best Christmas weeks that we’ve had.

A tribute to Gary Crippen

 

What a treat it was for me to attend the funeral of Gary Crippen yesterday. Of course, I am sad for his passing and the hole that his absence will create for his family. And the huge hole for the world. But going to the funeral brought back so many wonderful memories of going to the Crippen house while I was in High School. 

In the 1980’s Worthington, Minnesota was a place where everyone knew everyone in high school. (And it probably is the same today.) We weren’t a small high school compared to the neighboring towns—approximately 160 in a graduating class. But we were small enough that we knew everyone’s names. 

And everyone knew the Crippens. Or it seemed that way.

They lived in a fairly large house on Lake Avenue in Worthington. Just turn the corner and there was the house. Across the street from Lake Okabena. They moved to Mendota Heights in the mid-80’s, but even today when I’m in Worthington and drive around the lake, I look at the house and think, “Crippen house.” 

One of my best friends dated Sarah in high school, and the three of us (and others) hung out—a lot. And often we would find ourselves at the kitchen table in the Crippen house talking to Nancy, Gary’s wife. We would talk about everything—politics, religion, relationships in school, what was happening on the School Board, and would the inevitable referendum for more funding for schools pass. I was quite devoted to playing the violin in that season in my life, so we would talk about the orchestra. And because I was passionate about football we would talk about football. No topic was off-limits at the Crippen table. It was like a symposium. 

Those memories came streaming back yesterday at Gary’s funeral. 

And to call the gathering a funeral does not do justice to the occasion. It truly was a celebration of life. 

The Crippens were passionately devoted to education, particularly public education. This commitment has been lived out by their seven children. They have taken on the most honorable of professions—two are pastors, one a lawyer, one an administrator of a museum, and one the CEO of the children’s cancer research fund. 

I hadn’t talked to Gary since attending the funeral of Nancy.  But hearing the memories shared yesterday by his children and others brought back memories of conversations. And reminded me of the impact a kind and decent person can make. Gary was brilliant himself. A lawyer who became a judge who eventually served on the MN Court of Appeals. 

His kindness was mentioned often yesterday—a part of the Fruit of the Spirit. And this part of the Fruit was embodied in his life. He was a curious person. I loved the story that was shared about Gary loving trees. His interest seemed a bit odd; however being reminded of his curiosity made his interest make sense. He was interested in what made a tree grow, how it weathered the Minnesota climate, what it would take for a tree to develop fully.

The world needs curious people.

What was so touching at the funeral was the genuine smiles from his family. Sure they experienced sadness for Gary's passing, but more importantly they could smile about the beauty of a life very well lived. 

The tributes that others have wrote are worth reading. 

One by his son, Stephen.  https://www.stephencrippen.com/blog/2023/12/11/f7uedctbcq7mg2k5d56ho07thhjbu9?fbclid=IwAR0OfZNiBmN20qQfX0uMqAL-vvX6CogI2f514MdOUypC1TDKwt9Xkqyn2NM

One written in the Worthington Daily Globe.

https://www.dglobe.com/news/local/crippen-a-native-son-was-a-leader-in-state-judicial-community

One shared as a Facebook post by his daughter, Mary

https://www.facebook.com/mary.miklethun

I never got to meet his second wife, Sandy, but I’m sure I would have enjoyed sitting at their table talking about the events of the day. 

The world needs more people and especially men who are good and kind and decent. Gary Crippen was our role model. His legacy will live on in the intelligent, compassionate, decent response to a world that is too often, too harsh. 

Gary embodied, Philippians 2:1-5, a Scripture read at the service. 

May the rest of us live by his example.