I currently sit in a remarkably comfortable easy chair in a room at the Hampton Inn that I am sharing with four others here in St. Louis. A busload of us arrived here in town around noon today for Urbana. This is a conference put on every three years by Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship and they are expecting somewhere around 25,000 college students from North America and around the world.

This is a photo taken just moments ago. Do not underestimate the difficulty in taking a photo with one’s left hand.

Say what you will about McDonald’s, they are doing their best to revamp the atmosphere in their restaurants.

This is what a bus full of tired people look like after riding through the heart of America in the night.

This is Brian, a Texas native. The light you see in the vicinity of his face is an apt metaphor for the wisdom e’er emanating from his mouth.

In this photo I would like to direct your attention to two things. One, Brian is reading (which explains the sunspot above). Also, please note Dan the Bus Driver’s killer shades.

This is Beau soon after waking up.

This is a huge cross you can’t miss from the highway. Less obvious is the tiny little independent Baptist church it belongs to. Also, the van ahead of us is from Lancaster and has “Urbana or Bust” painted on the back. We spotted them by chance somewhere in Indiana or Illinois and proceeded to journey the rest of the way together.

Most of you have probably heard about the war we currently have on our hands. We hear the rumblings, we see the signs. And we are urged, through forwarded emails mostly, to take up arms.

That’s right, it’s the war on Christmas.

I must confess I have been a pretty bad Christian this holiday season. Oops! I mean, this Christmas season. Gosh, sorry. Where did the word “holiday” come from anyway? I know that some liberal wackos probably came up with the word as a safe and secular alternative to saying Christmas… except that it does have the word holy at its root, so I guess that argument is out the window. But nevermind. I should be ashamed of myself for that slip.

Anyway, as I was saying, I haven’t done a very good job at taking up arms this Christmas season. Would you believe it if I told you I haven’t even sent one malicious Merry Christmas card to the ACLU to show them that they can’t take Christ out of my Christmas? It’s true. But I suppose that all those clever and conniving Christians committed to taking up arms in this war have it covered on their own.

Besides, I have been preoccupied with some aspects of the Christmas story I had never really pondered in depth before. I’m not talking about the commercialized and highly culturally westernized version of Christmas that Fox News junkies are fighting to defend, but the old version, the one in the Bible. And rather than throwing insults and/or rocks at people who don’t like the glowing neon (and awfully tacky) Merry Christmas sign on the town hall, I decided the better way to defend Christmas and what it is all about would be to take seriously some of that goodwill stuff we sing about this time of year rather than to pick fights.

What kick-started me on this process of thinking through these things was watching The Nativity Story a couple of weeks ago with my family. To be honest, I didn’t have very high expectations beforehand, but I enjoyed the film thoroughly. On a couple of occasions, tears came to my eyes as I pondered the depths of the profound story unfolding before me as if for the first time.

I’d like to share a couple of these things with you. For starters, the cast is very international (and the fact that Joseph is played by a Guatemalan did not go unnoticed by we Hoilands). The Middle Eastern culture of first century Palestine bleeds through in every scene and with only two exceptions, no one had blonde hair and blue eyes. But even more importantly, I think the filmmakers made some profound insights through their cultural sensitivity. For one, I have always, in one way or another, thought of Mary and Joseph as this happy couple, very much in love with each other, eager to go on this little romantic adventure to Bethlehem before settling down happily ever after. But in the film, Mary’s father tells her she will marry Joseph, and rather than jumping up and down yelling “thank you daddy!” she runs outside and starts crying. She is fifteen and doesn’t know Joseph all that well, for crying out loud. But then things progress, and they have shared experiences, not least of which is a long and arduous and not very romantic journey to Bethlehem just before she gives birth. Trust and respect between them grows, and they come to love each other more and more deeply. But this story, though probably a lot more accurate, doesn’t make for a good Hollywood love story, because it involves being faithful for a long period of time rather than relying solely on feelings to determine who sleeps with whom and when.

Another profound insight was how the shepherds and the wise men are portrayed. I have often thought of the shepherds as simple and rustic people, and I still think this is probably true, but the film brings out a slightly different element. It suggests that shepherds are defined largely by loneliness and by their status as ordinary people. And if Thoreau was right when he suggested that most of us lead lives of quiet desperation, then the shepherds have a lot in common with all of us, the ordinary people. Then there are the wise men, these rich and elite members of some exotic and interesting society. They track the convergence of these three stars through the use of some creepy sort of astrology, and then set out to find the child described in the prophecies, to bring him lavish gifts.

The impression I get is that shepherds don’t appreciate or need great aesthetics. When we see the shepherds gathering around Jesus in the cave, surrounded by animals who have no doubt done both numbers one and two, the shepherds seem to be right at home. And then the wise men come around the corner on their high horses (or camels), all decked out in ridiculous garb, and the contrast is just really profound.

It is not that one is shown to be better than the other so much as that the differences just really don’t matter. The simplicity of the shepherds, their ordinariness if you will, does not exclude them from the presence of the King. But again, the high society background of the wise men suddenly becomes mostly unimportant, and the tall hats look ridiculous and silly.

And though the film leaves this out for some reason, I considered the angelic choir that filled the skies, announcing the birth of the King, singing glory to God in the highest. This would have blown anyone away, and if I were God, I probably would have chosen to put on the show for those with a taste for the finer things in life. I would have dazzled the wise men, because they would have been most able to appreciate it. And yet (if I may say it), God wasted the splendor and the extravagance of this amazing announcement on the shepherds, the simple people. Sure, everyone else got the star, but the shepherds got the real show. It seems to me a lot like wasting a Michelangelo sculpture or a fine wine on a NASCAR fan (no offense to Italian-Americans who appreciate motor sports).

So it is now Christmas Eve, one of the most sacred nights of the year. And I’d say on this night the enemy would rather us focus on anything but the baby in the manger, whether that means fighting the ACLU or boycotting Wal-Mart or doing any number of other things suggested in the emails currently occupying my junk folder. The message of Christmas is life-giving. The baby in the manger is our Lord and Savior. He is the Prince of Peace. He is Emmanuel, God with us. And He is the light of the world. Let’s reflect some of that light to a dark and hurting world.

And I mean it when I say, Merry Christmas.

I’ve been back in the country for about two weeks now. After an initial 72 hour period with about four hours of sleep, I have since slept an average of 8 or 9 hours each night since then. This means that thankfully, I have conquered jet lag, and with much more haste than the experts’ prediction of a day for each time zone crossed.

My routine these days entails a lot of sleeping in, hanging out with friends, and spending time in atmospheric locations where coffee is sold and people like myself go to type. You know, all the things you’d expect from an unemployed 24-year-old recently returned from Southeast Asia who is trying to figure out what to do with the rest of his life, or at least with his immediate future. I do have some ideas that are pending, but for the moment I’m in limbo. Many of you were aware that I had applied for a two-year position in Cambodia, but you may not know that I have since withdrawn from the selection process. This was a the culmination of a tough process of prayer and soul-searching over the past month. The future is now wide open, but I have peace about it.

I wasn’t sure what it would be like to return home after my 92-day hiatus from life as usual, but in many ways, it was as if I had never left. There are a few new turning lanes and stop lights on the roads, there is a nice new coffeeshop on Prince Street, and the heat of August has given way to Old Man Winter, but otherwise things are basically the same. Of course, I doubt it is possible to spend three months in Cambodia (or anywhere) and come back unchanged. These changes have been mostly subtle, however, which has led me to identify as of late with the words of Paul Simon when he sang: “Nothing is different but everything has changed.”

I thought that once I returned home I’d be able to articulate what these three months have meant to me, but I still haven’t found the words. Nonetheless, in the coming week I will have two opportunities to share publicly about my time in Cambodia.

This Sunday (the 17th) I will be speaking for five minutes or so during the evening service at Calvary Church about what I was doing this fall and how it has influenced my life, and I will have some photos to share. The service runs from 6 to 7.15pm and I’ll most likely be speaking towards the beginning of that time. Anyone is welcome to come on out for that.

I’ll also be speaking briefly at C4, the young adult ministry at Calvary, during the weekly large group gathering this Tuesday (the 19th) at 7.30pm. So if you consider yourself a young adult, feel free to swing by.

Finally, and slightly off topic, the C4 Christmas coffeehouse will be this Friday (the 15th) at 7pm in the student ministry wing at Calvary and best of all, it is free. There will be hot beverages, tasty treats, and a whole slew of Christmas music performed live by super-talented artists. A few skilled orators like myself (ha!) will also be doing Christmas readings that are sure to warm our hearts and stir our affection for the One this season is all about.

You can only hope I’ll be wearing a festive holiday sweater.

Here is an incomplete list of the plusses and minuses of being back in the United States generally, and Lancaster more specifically.

+ fast internet without megabyte restrictions

+ hence, being able to download 33 songs from Lancaster native Denison Witmer for free in a short amount of time

+ feeling at home listening to Denison

+ reflecting on the timeliness of his song “Everything But Sleep” as I recover from jet lag (see below)

- not being able to sleep

- fat and temperamental airport security people (having grown accustomed to skinny and polite Asians)

+ carpet

+ warm water for showers

+ having/driving a car

- everything is expensive (except gasoline, which has fallen considerably)

+ family

+ friends

- no more flip flops

+ being able to print things out on paper other than A4 size stuff