One Christmas while I was celebrating one of the Christmas masses, I noticed a three-year old boy wander into the middle aisle. He was wearing a backpack almost as big as he was. He started spinning in a circle, a slow spinning. He was probably anxious for the arrival of Santa Claus and I was the warm-up act for him.
His mother looked over and saw him spinning around and reached out for him. But he stepped back from her and kept spinning. I looked up and noticed his mother reach out for him again. He took another step back. Finally he began to stagger. His mother’s hand was there. He grabbed it and she reeled him in. She took him into her arms where his head flopped into her shoulder.
I think this is what happens to us. We go round and round in circles during the stages of our lives and especially during the pandemic, spinning round and round but going nowhere. But God is there waiting for us with a hand out, ready to pull us in. But like the boy, we say, “NO thank you Lord, I can get by in life all by myself.” So we step back and keep on spinning.
This is how I felt so many, many times the past few years. Then I took one bad step on November 21st, down I went and I’ve been in a wheelchair ever since. Boy, did I wish I had a hand to reach out and grab onto as I spun and went down and broke my left leg.
This Christmas, God Our Father reaches out to us not with a hand, but with Jesus, his own Son. The pandemic has left all of us spinning, wondering and confused about our future.
This Christmas we seem to be waiting more for a vaccine than for a Savior. In effect, we’re saying again, “NO thank you Lord, just get me the vaccine I need and I can get by in life all by myself.” And we can get by, until we take just one sinful step and down we go.
Let’s stop kidding ourselves, we need a Savior a whole lot more than we need a vaccine to stop all our spinning and falling and to make it through life and get to God’s loving arms waiting for us in heaven.
