The Fleeting Quality of Snow Angels

My job was pretty simple.  Take Zoe to preschool.  She was four and the preschool was at the Lutheran Church just down the road, maybe a mile.  I am not sure why I was tasked with this responsibility. But I was smart enough not to ask.  To seek clarity would have appeared as unwillingness which is not a good move so close to Christmas.  Best to simply be a helper.

Zoe was dressed to the nines.  Red velvet dress with the crinkly stuff making the gown quite festive.  White stockings, patten leather shoes with a buckle.  Her hair was coifed and replete with a band and a bow.  To complete the ensemble was a woolen red coat.

She was quite excited.  This was the holiday party at preschool.  There had been snow the night before so it looked like Christmas.  The parking lot had been plowed and the pathways cleared so the young learners had no need to fight their way to cookies and punch.  We made it through the parking lot and were just reaching the door when Zoe slipped her hand from mine and I saw her dive to the ground. 

She threw herself into a patch of snow commingled with wet leaves, twigs, and mud.  Waving her arms back and forth and swinging her legs together and apart I could begin to see the once pristine child was now covered with muck and her feet were drenched.  It was an out of body moment.  I was lost in the surreal quality until I heard a mother shout, “Only Zoe!”

I picked up my now unpresentable child and began to take her inside when I could feel the resistance in her grip.  She was trying to pull me toward her patch of muddy snow.  “Do you see it?”  I looked quickly at the ground and she asked again, “Do you see my snow angel?” 

I am not sure what I said.  Probably grunted more than spoke, but I distinctly remember looking and not seeing it.  After dropping her off in the class and helping her dry off, I apologized to the teacher for her disheveled state, and I headed back to the car.  Just outside I lingered by the patch of ground where my daughter had dove and tried to get me to look.  I really did try to look again.  But I still didn’t see it.

Having read and heard many Christmas stories, I can tell you this tale of the fleeting-snow-angel in mud is consistent.  Has all the classic markers.  Harried parents miss the moments of joy children provide because we have lost the eyes of wonder.  The wonderful book Polar Express is this same type of tale.  Only instead of seeing something it is hearing the magical bells of Santa’s reindeer.  Only the believers can hear it.

One way of lingering with Zoe’s snow angel is that my eyes had lost the vision of wonder; I no longer had a childlike vision for angels be it in the snow or sky.  And it is true.  My eyes are not as keen as they once were to behold the splendor of life, the gaze of one discovering the world.  Standing in a field on Christmas eve, I am more inclined to check my email than I am to gaze at the night sky, let alone look for a sleigh.  And what is more, I must confess that too often the news and information I have to share is not the ecstatic stories of shepherds come to find the child; my news is too often about struggles or worries or updates about a concern.  Zoe had that voice declaring joy, “do you see it?  Do you see my angel?”  She had it when she was four; I hope she has it still.

Can you remember that voice?  Can you remember the last time you heard it?  “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this;” and they went with haste.  Can you remember a joy prompting you to hurry off, to rush forward with excitement?  I want to say this is the tenderness of spending a Christmas morning with a child or grandchild.  Just to glimpse the rush to open the present, simply hoping against hope that whatever lies beneath the wrapping is the greatest thing any child could ever possess.  It must be opened as quickly as possible. I tend to open presents slowly now hoping for warm socks.  Not much haste.

In the year 2000 I stood atop the hills that encircle the city of Bethlehem.  The hills are desolate and craggy and the wind is fierce having nothing to block its approach.  It was near sunset and the chill of the desert was beginning to take hold.  The city of Jesus’ birth was a few miles away.  I was standing where the shepherds most likely would have stood or walked or sat to rest.  Looking at the city now dotted with streetlights and homes lit by those preparing dinner, I looked at the city to see Jesus’ birth and the shepherds, but I just didn’t see it.  Granted there were no multitude of angels in the sky so it was not all on account of my lack of imagination.  But it just didn’t seem like anything but the side of a road outside of a town at sunset.  And it was cold.

Then, all of sudden, I could hear a bell, the tinkling of a small bell.  Rising up the canyon, almost on cue, was a Bedouin shepherdess leading her flock.  She didn’t look up or linger; she was making her way home.  As she passed with her flock, I turned to the tour guide who was standing next to me and said, “man you are good!”  He smiled because he knew it was good.  As the shepherdess passed it was as if I were standing with those who heard the angels sing.  It was a moment of splendor.

I dare say we need moments of splendor today.

Right now, in this place and time, in our slow recovery or our difficult discovery of life after so much turmoil and change, it is just right to gather here, to sing here, to pray here, for our life to find just a moment of splendor. 

Such unimpeded joy may be a tall order right now.  You may be more like the hassled parent just trying to get your kid to preschool than a young girl ready to dive into a patch of snow.  This is fair.

And I hope you have more success than I did that day when I couldn’t see the angel. 

Despite this moment of not seeing, the good news is that I have had other opportunities since and my eyes were not as dim. Perhaps today is a such a moment for you, a night for you to see the angel.  I am not sure if I could ever again play Zoe’s role and dive to the ground.  Perhaps you too feel that limitation.  Better for us to gaze at snow angels than to make one diving onto the muddy ground.

No matter your physical dexterity, I pray your soul can find the way to joy.  Put aside the worries you carry and remember this: our faith begins in the songs of angels; lay down the weary thoughts and remember, our life together begins anew in the wonder of birth.  Remember: our hope is fulfilled when we can speak and hear with a joy we cannot contain.  They went with haste.  So too let us be made ready to seek joy with haste, to tell of God’s son born in us as soon as we can.  May this be the gift we open anew.  Merry Christmas. Amen.