A donkey, a baby and the kiss of God. Christmas 2019

+Brennan Manning wrote: “Jesus comes not for the super spiritual but for the wobbly and the weak-kneed who know they don’t have it all together and who are not too proud to accept the handout of amazing grace.”
What is represented in this manger scene is the greatest gift of all time. Given for you and for me. Not because we earned it but because we are that adored by our God. Whether you feel worthy of this gift isn’t the point. The point is that the gift has been given….we just need to open it.
     Just like Cristofero, the donkey who carried Mary to Bethlehem.
Cristofero was a little donkey. He was much smaller than the rest of the donkeys and whenever he was hooked up to a cart it was too heavy to pull. Cristofero never got to help. Because he wasn’t strong enough, he wasn’t big enough.
Now there was one thing about Cristofero that wasn’t small. Or weak.
That was his bray—-HEEEEEEEEEEEHAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.
That bray would make your toes curl.
One afternoon, standing all by himself in the barn, feeling lonely and sad, angry and worried, frightened and worthless, Cristofero, let loose a bray louder than anything ever heard—-it was so loud God heard it all the way in heaven!
Which was good because just at that moment God was wondering how Mary was going to make it to Bethlehem.
You see, Joseph and Mary were so poor they didn’t own a donkey, a horse or even a cart. The only way to get to Bethlehem was to walk.
And so that’s what they were doing. Walking the 98 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Most pregnant women have trouble walking 98 feet when they’re nine months pregnant let alone 98 miles…..
The walk wasn’t going real well….
God was worried. Now God worries about all pregnancies but God was particularly worried about this one because Mary and Joseph’s baby was God in the flesh—because God wanted to know what it was like to be a human being….how it felt to be born,  grow up, walk around, have friends. So God made a baby who could do all of those things, feel all of those things, be all of those things—Jesus of Nazareth. God was desperate to keep Mary and Joseph and Jesus safe… so just about the time Cristofero was crying out in his sadness, God had an idea—
God needed Mary to be safe and secure to deliver Jesus....but she needed help getting to Bethlehem (so she could follow God’s orders as well as the emperor’s)
And Cristofero needed to feel needed. And wanted. And useful.
And, because the world had become (and remains) very dark and scary, the world needed Light and Love and Joy.

The world needed help.
Mary, Joseph and Jesus needed help.
And that little donkey? Cristofero, needed help, too.
     So God whispered in Cristofero’s great big ears:
“I have a job for you. Go to the road which leads to Bethlehem and walk until you find a couple—-a good and solid man named Joseph and his wife, the young and very pregnant Mary. Let Mary climb aboard and carry her to Bethlehem. There won’t be any room at the inn, so make a space for her in the barn where she can give birth. Protect her from every danger by using your GREAT BIG BRAY.
Cristofero, I’m counting on you.”
And you know what?
That little donkey found his way to the road that leads to Bethlehem, found the couple who did what they we’re told even though they were scared and he did what God asked him to do (even though he was a little scared too) and carried them all the way to Bethlehem, guarding them every step of the way.
And once Jesus was born Cristofero added his GREAT BIG BRAY to the choir of angels singing, Glory to God in the Highest Heaven, on this Night, the one to save us all has been born…and it’s the greatest gift anyone has ever and will ever receive”
      To mark the role of that little donkey in the greatest night ever, every donkey born has a cross imbedded into the fur on their back—it’s the mark made by God’s kiss of thanks saying, “thank you little donkey for making sure Mary, Joseph and Jesus were safe. I know it was a big job, and I also knew you were just the right little donkey to do it.  Even though you were a little nervous and little scared.”
     My friends, “Jesus comes not for the super spiritual but for the wobbly and the weak-kneed who aren’t too proud to accept the handout of amazing grace.”
My Christmas wish for us all is that we be like Cristofero—-accepting this gift of amazing grace, Emmanuel, God come to us in the flesh.
Merry Christmas. And Amen.