Harry Reasoner of TV’s “Sixty Minutes” died in 1991. Years ago he wrote something for that program about Christmas. Harry also believed that there was something about Christmas that goes beyond perfection — even beyond logic. It’s worth repeating his words this morning as we continue preparing ourselves to celebrate Christ’s coming into the world. He wrote:
“The basis for this tremendous burst of buying things and gift giving and parties and near hysteria, is a quiet event that Christians believe actually happened a long time ago. You can say that in all societies there has always been a midwinter festival, and that many of the trappings of our Christmas are almost violently pagan, but you come back to the central fact of the day, …the birth of God on earth.
“It leaves you only three ways of accepting Christmas. One is cynically, as a time to make money or endorse the making of it. One is graciously, the appropriate attitude for non-Christians, who wish their fellow citizens all the joys their beliefs entitle them. And the third, of course, is reverently. If this is the anniversary of the appearance of the Lord of the universe in the form of a helpless babe — it is a very important day. It’s a startling idea, of course, the whole story that a virgin was selected by God to bear His Son as a way of showing His love and concern for man. It’s my guess that, in spite of all the lip service given to it, it is not an idea that has been popular with theologians.
“It’s a somewhat illogical idea, and theologians like logic almost as much as they like God. It’s so revolutionary an idea that it probably could only have come from a God that is beyond logic, and beyond theology. It has a magnificent appeal. Almost nobody has seen God, and almost nobody has any real idea of what He is like, and the truth is that among men the idea of seeing God suddenly, and standing in a very bright light, is not necessarily a completely comforting and appealing idea. But everyone has seen babies, and most people like them. If God wanted to be loved as well as feared, He moved correctly here, for a baby growing up learns all about people. If God wanted to be intimately a part of Man he moved correctly, for the experience of birth and family-hood is our most intimate and precious experience.
“So it comes beyond logic. It is either a falsehood or it is the truest thing in the world. It’s the story of the great innocence of God the baby. God in the person of man has such a dramatic shock toward the heart, that it, if it is not true, for Christians, nothing is true.
“So, if a Christian is touched only once a year, the touching is still worth it, and maybe on some given Christmas, some final quiet morning, the touch will take.”