Happy Birthday, Jesus

Today I had another wonderful Christmas worship experience.  I was home alone (which is sort of a miracle these days with wonderful hubby in the house most of the time and adorable grandchildren here quite a bit too).  I had picked up some of the clutter left from three boys playing at full-speed for several hours.  I sat down to rest a minute and kept hearing in my head a tune I’ve heard somewhere but can’t remember where or when… “Happy Birthday, Jesus!”  I love that I can Google and YouTube anything that is puzzling me.  So I YouTubed the title and found an adorable little 4-yr-old singing:

Happy Birthday to You … Happy Birthday to You
Happy Birthday, dear Jesus …Happy Birthday to You.
 
Happy birthday Jesus.  I’m so glad its Christmas.
All the tinsel and lights and the presents are nice,
But the real gift is You.

Happy birthday, Jesus.  I’m so glad its Christmas.
All the carols and bells make the holiday swell -
And it’s all about You.
Happy birthday Jesus …Jesus I love You!

That was all it took for me to enter into His Presence and begin to worship Him in earnest…and the tears began to flow.  You see…I’ve been focusing on so many things that have kept me from the reason for the season.  I knew He was the reason…but I’ve let so much loss affect my heart.  And today I listened to this song…and then listened to it in Spanish…and then listened to the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir sing it.  And I was just covered in goosebumps!  I felt like I was at the manger…such a profound experience.  My focus moved to “the heart of worship”…and it was all about Jesus!  And I’m not sure how I got where I did next…but I found myself listening to Mark Lowery sing, “Mary, Did You Know?”  No one sings a song as well as the writer does…and Mark’s rendition of this beautiful song had me blubbering when Dan walked in the door.  He was so precious.  I tried to stop crying so he wouldn’t see…but he knows me too well and noticed that I didn’t look “too happy”.  I shared the songs with him…and then tried to get up to go bathe and try to collect myself…and I just started crying again.  Like I am right now…good tears…the kind that release loads and loads of pain and sorrow. 

Ever since listening to “Mary, Did You Know?” I’ve found myself thinking about Mary…about so many strange things (I often wonder if other folks ever think “weird” things like I do…someone could comment and put me out of misery and tell me that they also think this way too).  I don’t wonder about what Mary thought that night as she held the baby.  I wonder how she ever let Him out of her sight!  How does the mother of “God with us” let her child go outside to play with other children?  Did she teach her Son how to bow His head in prayer?  Did she teach Him what to say to His Father…or marvel at what she heard come from His mouth when He talked to “Dad”?  How do you help your child with math knowing that He was at creation…that He knows how many hairs are on a head?  Did she ever explain the “birds and the bees” to the Creator of life?  And how in the world do you lose track of your son…the Son of God…when you make a trip to the Temple?

 

I also found myself thinking today that Jesus had to be born then…because if He’d been born nowadays He’d never have gotten any recognition or respect.  His mother was 14 or 15 years old…that means she would be what people today call “a baby raising a baby”!  We forget that God chose to place His Son in the arms of a teenager and we act like teenage pregnancies are an abomination.  Puullleeeeaaaassssseeee.  The only reason teens having babies is a “bad” thing in today’s society is because of money.  Teens can’t spend a crazy amount of money spoiling their newborns.  They struggle to give their children “name brands” as they’re growing.  Teen moms make places like WalMart and Target thrive…not what the free enterprise system wants to see.  Maybe it’s time for some of us to realize that teen moms are CAPABLE…God sure thought so.  Of course…the teen He picked “found favor with God”.  That means she already honored God in her life and raised her Son to know Him.  So we need to make sure that we’re teaching our young women to respect and honor God as we teach them to respect themselves.  And we need to stop thinking that the world’s way of doing things is the only way to do them.

In the past 5 months I've lost my mother...my dear, dear, dear friend lost her husband too quickly...and my son and his beautiful girlfriend are losing their son to CPS and so much stuff I can't talk about.  So the Christmas season has been feeling "tainted".  But you know what????  JESUS CAME ANYWAY because satan has no power over Him.  A 4-yr-old sang, “Happy Birthday, Jesus” and the light broke through the darkness.  In just a little while it will be Christmas Day!  I will rejoice as the angels rejoiced.  I will tell the good news just like the shepherds did.  I will share gifts in remembrance as the wise men did.  And I will ponder all these things in my heart.  I will delight myself in the Lord…and pray that He will give me the desires of my heart…to see my grandson restored to our family…to watch my mother and father live on in mysterious ways. 

Isn’t it amazing that God uses the foolish to confound the wise!  A baby…in a manger…King of Kings...Savior of the world?  I’m so glad God doesn’t do things the way we think He should…but that He’s the kind of God Who does what He wants to do…because He can…because HE IS THE GREAT I AM. 

Merry Christmas, world…and Happy Birthday, Jesus!