When Luke tells his now famous Christmas story, he begins by grounding the narrative in the historical events that surround it: "In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be enrolled. This was the first enrollment when Quirinius was governor of Syria ..." (Luke 2:1) A particular birth took place in a particular time and place. A certain person was the Caesar and another man was a governor in a particular country. If Luke were telling this story today at the welcome center of a shopping mall he would point to the red X on the mall map and say, "You are here."
Sometimes that particularity is disarming. It makes the outrageous claim that God acts in particular times and places through particular people. God moves then and there, here and now. God comes in concrete terms.
When it comes to spiritual life we may have an inclination to escapism; surely life in the spirit is above all those particulars of history, coordinates of time and place. Surely God's movement is not limited to that. But the Gospels will have none of that kind of thinking. The universal infinite God of all time and eternity shows up under the auspicious of ordinary time, an in-breaking.
What that means is that we should continue to search for the great appearances of the Spirit in time, our time, all the time. In this moment and in this place with particular names in the news we find the Spirit moving. The world may be unaware that God is showing up because it is so enamored with other distractions, but God shows up none the less.
It's important to notice that at the very same moment a world leader makes a proclamation he is absolutely ignorant of the fact that off in the backwaters of nowhere a family has just received God's gift to the world. That's where the real action is. In the gentle light of the humblest of dwellings, with no fanfare, hype, or trumpets to herald the arrival, a baby cries. Caesar speaks and cattle low. Armies march and a young woman nurses her newborn. All the power of empire is on display but God creeps in the shadows.
This is how it happens. At the very moment people are preoccupied with everything else God makes an entrance onto the stage. Rather than a royal display of power, holiness shows itself in lowliness and humility. God reveals among peasants to confound the mighty.
Remember: Not one angel sings one song for empire. But infinite choruses accompany no-account shepherds as they run toward a mystery they can't begin to explain.
