Welcome to the first night of the Gloria! Christmas Tour with me, Cindy Morgan and Travis Cottrell. Show starts at 7PM CST. Enjoy and please help us improve by letting us know what you think in the chat window or by sending us some mail.
To catch this tour in a city near you this month, visit the Tour Page.
Thanks for watching.
Tonight’s the first night of the Gloria! Christmas Tour, which will be broadcast live right here tonight, and in better quality at mogulus.com/sgtv. Curtain goes up at 7PM CST.
Brian brought me on this tour to speak about Compassion and to do three very short “teachings” during the show. He gave me three themes - waiting, incarnation, worship - and a time limit of two minutes to talk about each.
I’ve learned a lot while preparing, a lot more than I can possibly fit in two minutes. For instance, I learned that the last words of the Old Testament were written by Malachi in 397 BC. In his letter, Malachi warned of hard times ahead for the Jews and then asks them to do two things: remember the Law God gave you through Moses, and believe, no matter how bad things get, God will send help again.
Remember God has done great things and He’s not through doing.
And then the prophet Malachi put down his pen. And for the next 400 years the Jews changed hands, ruled by empire after empire. Syrians, Persians, Greeks, Egyptians and Romans. Those 400 years are sometimes called the “dark period” in Jewish history, the darkest. Why? The Jews had been oppressed before, they’d been slaves, they’d been captured and brutalized. They were no strangers to foreign rule and injustice. Why were these 400 years the darkest?
Because God was silent.
After Malachi spoke, God was silent. For four hundred years there were no signs. No miracles. No prophets. Nothing.
The Psalmist David had predicted this dark period when he wrote: We are given no miraculous signs; no prophets are left, and none of us knows how long this will be (Psalm 74:9)
Before healing there was sickness. Before songs of joy there were cries of sorrow. Before peace on earth, wars were waged. Before justice there was oppression. Before the Light of the World dawned there was darkness. Before God with us there was silence. Before the One there was waiting.
And remembering: God has done great things and He’s not through doing. Remember.
I caught up on my blog reading this morning. Looky what I found.
Pastors: Tony Morgan says church marketing is not the answer - with a one two punch.
Skeptics: DJ Unplugged is in the Philippines visiting a boy named Frans. Seeing is believing.
Learners: Get an education like none other for free! And work in New York City.
No one in particular: This made me blush. And then I bought some chaps.
Curious: How many blogs are you following? Find anything worth passing on? Link to it in the comments.
It’s not necessarily a good thing to have grown up immersed in Christianity. In fact, I’d liken daily exposure to Christianity to a vaccine. I’m inoculated from awe and insight.
For instance, Christmas. I know the story. Mary and Joseph have to travel to Joseph’s hometown, Bethlehem, to be counted by the government census takers. While there, Mary gives birth to Jesus, God in the flesh. There are angels and shepherds and…
Every year, for going on 34 years now, it’s the same story. I know it’s supposed to be miraculous but, honestly, it doesn’t seem that way anymore. I’m listening to the story through a thick layer of repetition that shields my mind from being penetrated and my heart from being moved. The story just doesn’t punch me in the gut like I know it would if I were hearing it for the first time, or if I were a shepherd under that star two thousand years ago.
This year, I’m attempting to hear the story in a new way. I’m reading Luke’s account of Jesus’ birth in different translations and commentaries all month. Really reading it. In new words. The repetition alone is helping reveal details I’ve never noticed before and that is making the story more meaningful to me.
Luke 2:21-24 On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived. When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord”, and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: “a pair of doves or two young pigeons.”
I’m learning for the first time about two very meaningful things going on in this small section I’ve never noticed before. First, Jesus is Mary’s first son, so there had to be a consecration ceremony called “pidyon-haben.” It literally means “redemption of the first son.” During this ceremony the son is handed over to the Temple officials and dedicated to the service of God. In other words, he becomes a priest, a hired worker in the Temple, a slave to God. Then, immediately, the son, is “redeemed” or randsomed back from the Temple for the price of five shekels (Numbers 18:16). An exchange is made. For five shekels the parents get their son back and a Levite (a descendent of Levi) serves in the child’s place - a substitute priest.
How’s that for foreshadowing?
The second thing I’ve never noticed happening in this passage is the purification of Mary. A Jewish mother was considered ceremonially unclean for forty days after giving birth - so she was unable to worship in the Temple and was cut off from the rest of the community. After forty days she could sacrifice a year-old lamb as a burnt offering, and a dove or a pigeon as a sin offering, so that she could rejoin her community. But what if she couldn’t afford a lamb?
The “Law of the Lord” says…
If she cannot afford a lamb, she is to bring two doves or two young pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering. In this way the priest will make atonement for her, and she will be clean. (Leviticus 12:8)
Suddenly the seemingly innocuous detail about Mary’s sacrifice is meaningful. Now I get it. Mary couldn’t afford a lamb. And why is that important? One smart guy
says that Jesus came to earth partly to “provide a tangible manifestation of God’s attitude toward poverty and injustice.” How better to start showing the world how much the poor matter to God than for God to be born into poverty?
A few years back, my former labelmates and I (and a couple guests) recorded a Christmas CD called Gloria. Then we went on tour and cleverly named it...Gloria. I hated it. I loved hanging out with my friends and fellow singer type people and the crew guys but I hated the concept of me on a Christmas tour. Still do.
You see, I fool people for a living. I fool people into thinking I can play the piano and the guitar and that I can sing. And I can do those thing OK, if I’m singing and playing MY music. But ask me to remember the words to a bunch of songs I didn’t write - I don’t care if every kid in the the world knows them - and I’m a nervous wreck. Bonus: Take away my guitar or piano, put me in a suit - yes, I said a suit - and make me walk the stage while I sing and you’ll see me at my most awkward and unhappy. What on earth am I supposed to do with my hands???
Another downside to Christmas tours is the ticket price. People pay money to see these shows. Now, I’m used to playing for free so if I screw up I can wittily turn to the crowd and say something like “Well, you get what you pay for, folks” and they laugh and I move on without a second thought. But there’s nothing amusing about charging people $15 to hear you screw up O Come All Ye Faithful. Nothing. I know. I’ve done it. A few times.
And then there’s missing my kids’ programs at school and church, and not seeing the first snow flakes to it my front yard, not being home for the entire month of December.
So, understandably, I said no more Christmas tours. Nossir. I’m out. I don’t need the gigs. I don’t need the money. I’m staying put in December from now on.
And then Brian called a few months ago and made me an offer. He asked me to go on tour with Travis and Cindy. Travis would headline and we’d do mostly his Christmas music. Cindy and I would sing a few songs each. We’d be out on weekends and home all week.
I don’t know many Christmas songs, I explained. “I don’t want you for your singing,” he said. (Gee, thanks) “I’m bringing you along to talk about Compassion.” (That’s better.)
Well, since he put it that way…
I’m on tour this Christmas. I’m singing in a suit. And I will screw up. It will not be pretty or comfortable. But hundreds of kids will be released from poverty. And that’s pretty worth it.
Check out the tour page to see where we’ll be playing this month. While you do that, I’ve got some stuff to practice and lyrics to memorize before rehearsal tomorrow.
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