Christmas Counting

Philippians 2:3-11 3 Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, 8 he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

I oftentimes fall into the pattern of reducing my life to counting integers--the equally subdivided ticks on a line which quantify the things which I believe important. All this data--this numbering--is meant somehow to bring a predictability and control to my life. I count: sermons, days, dollars, compliments, mistakes, peaceful minutes, miles.... On December 5th, I started a new line.

It took three days for what I believed to be true to be confirmed. It was 45 minutes from when my wife picked our daughter up at school till she called from the doctor's office with the results of two tests which confirmed the diagnosis that our youngest, one of three lovely children, had what 39 other children in the U.S. would be diagnosed with on that very day: Juvenile Diabetes.

It is 11 miles or 20 minutes from our house to the Baptist Hospital's Emergency Room, and it is 9 floors up Ardmore Tower to room 810 at Brenner Children's Hospital where we will stay for the next three days. On the evening of the second day I am nervous, as I prepare to administer my daughter's fourth injection -- her first full day of injections for the rest of her days, and she is nervous. She is nervous because in her mind it still counts as a shot. I am nervous because I count it the same, and this is my first time. Her blood glucose level is down to 211 from the 305 it was at dinner. I inject her with an insulin called Lantis (one of two types she receives) with one of the new pen-type syringes, one of three ways to administer insulin.

My daughter's life and my life are now divided into three's and subsets of threes. Three meals a day before which she receives doses of insulin based on her blood glucose count. Three meals a day with one snack in between. We count 180 grams of carbohydrates per day, 45 grams per meal, 15 grams per snack. We keep meticulous records of her blood sugar and times it is taken. This vigilance gives power to the illusion that the accurate and diligent collection of data provides control, and control means safety, and safety means that when I wake up at 2:37 in the morning and am unable to resist going into my daughter's room to check on her, probably for the second time that night, I will find her okay, and that she will remain okay until I wake her, before the eighth hour to measure her blood sugar and give her her first shot.

Growing up, I had imagined that my membership among the number of humanity would mean that I would one day, count. I had hoped that that this addition would add up to success, achievement, and a decent though not ostentatious life -- one that would be both moderately enviable and worth emulating.

Over the course of my life, my counting has taken different forms. As a child, I counted presents at Christmas time and meatballs in my Spaghetti-O's at dinner time. As a teenager, I counted the "hutts" as center for the high school football team as I passed the ball through my legs to the hands of a team mate whom I should've counted a much closer friend for the intimacy we shared five days a week for four months each fall. As a college student, I counted years, semesters and class hours till graduation. After graduation, I counted the dollars for an engagement ring which I would give to one whom I counted above all the rest, and whom I was counting on saying, "Yes". In my first real job as a teacher, I counted down the classes to the end of the day, the days of the week to Friday, and the hours of the weekend till Monday. As a seminary student I was one of a graduating class of 90 or so, who were counting on positions in the church in which they would go to make a difference and whose lives would "count for Christ". While working in the second of three churches, I would learn to number mortgage payments, diapers, bottles of formula, and doses of Tylenol. I had always hoped that I would count, but I never imagined those things which I would end up counting. And now, I count blood sugar levels and doses of insulin.

In our house we've been counting the days until Christmas. And as I said, that all changed on the fifth of those days. Since then, I've been thinking of how that first Christmas was replete with counting. When Gabriel first appeared to Mary to tell her that she was chosen to bear and raise the King of whom the number of the days of his reign would have no end, she neither balked at her own unworthiness nor chaffed at the inconvenience but in humility both rejoiced and received what was put upon her. You recall that when Mary became pregnant she was only betrothed to Joseph. And when Joseph discovered she was pregnant, he intended to divorce her privately because he was a kind man. Nevertheless, he could after all count, and a pregnant fiance did not add up. But even while he was still counting what he should do, the Angel of the Lord appeared to him to assure him. Mary was carrying the one who would deliver his people from their sins. And so, Joseph obeyed the command of God to marry a woman bearing a child not his own. The irregularity was plain for all to see, and no doubt it was probably assumed that this couple, for whom some may have had high hopes, was not only un-special but of no account.

And so it came about in the long line of human events, that Caesar Augustus wanted to count the world so that he might have more money to count. Because Joseph was numbered among the descendants of King David, Joseph and his new wife walked the 80 miles from Nazareth to the ancestral home of David's descendants, Bethlehem. As you might imagine if you were to return to your home town, you would likely count on some help and a place to stay, but Mary and Joseph were relegated to the inn. And not only the inn, but the inn's stable because there was no room. In this stable, after her numbered days were completed, Mary delivered Jesus, the Son of David, the Son of Man, the Son of God that he might deliver us.

Now in the fields beyond the region of Bethlehem, there were shepherds, who being good shepherds, counted their sheep. All of a sudden, the Angel of the Lord appeared among them glowing with light so heavy that it almost crushed them. His first words were, "Don't be afraid." And he told them of the birth of Christ the Lord. And that they should you go to see him, and as a sign that this was both special and true, the Angel told them that they would find, this king in swaddling cloths lying in a manger. And then, countless angles appeared in the dark sky lit by numberless lights and sang. They sang of wonder, of triumph, of the turning of a tide, of good news that the interminable slide into the same ol' same ol' relentless skid further into the ways things shouldn't be, had been arrested by the stark cry of newborn in the City of David. These shepherds marveled that they were the first to hear this news -- those whom the world did not count. They traveled to Bethlehem and saw it just as they were told, and they shared with Mary and Joseph all that they had seen and heard. And they went away rejoicing and praising God for all that they had seen and heard.

About the same time in another land, Wise men -- Magi, were counting stars in the sky and they counted a new star -- a star which foretold the coming of the king of the Jews. These same also, came to see this new born king, and bearing gifts to honor the king, they rejoiced at being among the first number to visit and honor him. Of all these things, St. Luke tells us that Mary counted as a dear treasure and pondered them in her heart even as she treasured the child in her arms.

As I take into account this Christmas, my 44th, and the numbered events of Jesus' birth and the numbered circumstances which I and my family are walking through, I am most stayed and strengthened by the good news that there was One who did not count.

In his letter to the Philippians, St. Paul tells us that Jesus Christ did not count. Now, when he entered the wilderness at the beginning of his ministry, he both counted the cost and counted the days of his temptation. As a good shepherd, Jesus counted and still counts the sheep. I'm sure he counted the days he had left with his disciples even as he counted down the Passovers. After being handed over by the religious elite to the efficient and heartless Imperial justice, I do not doubt that he lost count of the lashes and the insults and the blows. And how could he have counted the weight of such a payment for such a debt and born the condemnation from his Heavenly Father -- one whom he never counted as an enemy? Yet, St. Paul tells us that Jesus did not count this one thing: "equality with God something to be grasped". The honor and glory offered was not one to be taken, demanded, or expected. Rather, it was to be received and conferred but only after his being born -- and that to serve and suffer. And so in this act of love and obedience, we see that Jesus did not count himself above the rest, but he numbered himself among the least: a homeless family with tainted reputation, wandering to the ancestral home of a dried up royal dynasty.

St. Paul tells us, he "made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men". This means more to me this Christmas because by that I realize that he subjected himself to the same body which has a pancreas and the same endocrinology in which requires that that same pancreas produce insulin so that cells can use glucose. By being born that first Christmas, the King of Glory bore the first of many ignominious sufferings. And though it may mean many things, it does mean at least, this: that he played by his own rules, and though he was greater, he did not count himself above the rest -- he did not count himself above me or you or my Maddie. He counted the cost of the humiliation and the suffering and the waiting well worth the price because of the joy set before him. St. Paul tells us that for those of whom such a great accounting has been made, for those who treasure these things in their heart, they will be set free from counting: offenses born, rights owed, wrongs endured, successes achieved, victories won and failures lost. But rather, having been counted by the one who did not count, they will be set free from counting themselves so that they might count on Him and count others more important.

I will go home tonight, and count, and you too, will likely count hours till bedtime or hours till morning. But if we are to keep Christmas, this Christmas, and if we are to keep from falling into the mire and false security of those things which you and I like to count on, we must treasure the one who "did not count equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, talking the form of a servant, and being born."