Presents and Presence

Monday, December 22, 2025

Happy Monday, my friends! Have you read or watched O. Henry’s classic story “The Gift of the Magi?” A married couple, husband and wife, each decide to buy a special gift for the other for Christmas. The husband sells his pocket watch to buy decorative combs for his wife’s hair. The wife sells her hair in order to buy a proper watch chain for her husband’s watch. The moral of the story is that they each cared so much for the other as to sell their most prized possession to buy a gift for the other. Sure, the story’s a bit quaint (it was written in 1905 after all), but it still has something to say for us.

The winter holiday season is stressful and can be a minefield of family drama and other forms of trauma. While the situation doesn’t happen as much anymore, can you remember when adults would fight each other for Tickle Me Elmo, the latest Power Ranger, or whatever the hottest toy was that year? Those were strange times, but they also spoke (speak) to our need for more “stuff.” We or our children had to have the best thing or the coolest toy even if it only gave us a fleeting minute of joy. My nephew has reached the age where he will be over any gift I get him before I’ve figured out how it works. So, I listen to his mom and buy him whatever he’s been talking about lately. I can put effort into his gifts again in 10 to 15 years.

As adults we know now that Christmas and other holidays aren’t about the presents, but the presence we have with each other. Yes, the food and the presents can be fun, but we remember and we treasure the moments watching it snow from inside a warm home or times watching classic holiday movies with our loved ones. And when the kids look back they, like us, won’t remember the toys, but the people and the places.

How can you be more present this holiday season? How do you demonstrate the meaning of the presence, not the presents?

Let us pray: God, help us be present with our families and friends this holiday. Grant us the grace to look past the food, desserts, presents, and the trappings of the season to the faces, smiles, and presence of the people we love. Amen.

Blessings on your weeks and your holidays, my friends! Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben +

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBb_b2GlQv0

God is With Us

Sunday, December 21, 2025 - Fourth Sunday of Advent

The Rev. Morgan Walker Annable (she/her)

Pastor, Grace Lutheran Church (Wadsworth, OH)

Allied Christian

Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant from the Holy Spirit. Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to divorce her quietly. But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: “Look, the virgin shall become pregnant and give birth to a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means, ‘God is with us.”

(Matthew 1:18-23)

Our world leaves us with much to be afraid of. For the LGBTQIA+ community, those fears are often amplified. Questions like these flood the minds of Queer folks on a daily basis:

• Am I free to be myself in a world that often shows me hate instead of love?

• Will I face public disgrace or even violence?

• How long, O Lord, will the suffering continue for our LGBTQIA+siblings?

Our world leaves us with much to be afraid of, and rightfully so. The injustices against LGBTQIA+ folks don’t seem to go away. The questions and worries creep their way into our minds with ample justification for our fears. Even still, the nativity story from Matthew offers us two reminders:

1. Do not be afraid.

2. God is with us.

These reminders are easier said than felt most of the time. How are we to let go of our fear when danger seems so close? And how are we to know that God is with us when God often feels so far away? I don’t have easy answers to these questions. And yet, in this Christmas

season, we are still reminded: Do not be afraid. God is with us.

In the midst of our fear, God is with us. In holiday gatherings with chosen family, God is with us. In the midst of injustice and violence, God is with us. In the joy of a person living into their identity as someone made in the image of God, God is with us. Even when fear creeps in, even when our hope seems lost, even when we feel like things will never change, God’s gentle voice whispers: “My beloved child, do not be afraid. I am with you.:

Reflection

What fears do you want to let go of so you can experience God’s presence more fully?

Action

Elyse Myers often says she doesn’t “get over” her fear before doing something. Instead, she just “does things scared.” So today, do one thing that scares you. Maybe you tell someone how you feel, set a boundary, or try something new. Whatever you do, know that God is with you each step of the way. In the process, you may learn more about yourself and about God’s presence in your life.

Praying and Suffering

Monday, December 15, 2025

Happy Monday, my friends! I apologize that this present season has caused me to be unable to write and publish Monday Moments as regularly as in the past, but I’m happy to be able to write something for you today. At Blue Ocean Faith Columbus, the church I pastor, we’re reading Living Buddha, Living Christ by the Zen Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hahn. As the title implies, Nhat Hahn writes about the similarities and differences between Buddhism and Christianity which he senses having studied Christianity and interacted with Christians including both French Roman Catholics and American Progressive Protestants (among them Martin Luther King, Jr. and Bayard Rustin).

Though his project is oriented to comparing the Buddha and Jesus, he also spends time discussing Buddhist mindfulness and community consciousness and the Holy Spirit. Speaking to mindfulness and the Spirit, he addresses prayer: “Many people pray to God because they want God to fulfill some of their needs.”[1] Very true, we do almost always pray because we want a need fulfilled, from our favorite team to win a game to the recovery of a loved one who is close to death. We also pray in thanksgiving and because something routine, but nevertheless important has happened. My TFAM siblings often talk about getting out of bed and thanking God for waking them up another day. I admit that is not part of my normal prayer routine.

Nhat Hahn goes on to address praying for our enemies, a practice preached by Jesus, but by no means unique to the Christian tradition. He says, “When you look deeply into your anger, you will see that the person you call your enemy is also suffering. As soon as you see that, the capacity of accepting and having compassion for him [sic] is there…The idea of ‘enemy’ vanishes and is replaced by the notion of someone who is suffering and needs your compassion.”[2] A perhaps overused phrase that is nevertheless true says that “hurt people hurt people.” When we looked closely at the people who hurt us, who commit evil against us and against others, we often find a person who is themselves deeply hurt. It should be obvious, though, that just because a person is hurt and suffering, the evil they do is not excused. We can be hurt and still be accountable to our actions. We can be hurt and be forgiven, but forgiveness is not immunity from the consequences of our actions.

Praying for our enemies and recognizing their suffering no less makes them immune to consequences as it relieves us of our call to practice the work of justice. Nhat Hahn ends his section on prayer, enemies, and suffering with a reminder that prayer necessarily involves action: “To a Buddhist, praying without practicing is not real prayer.”[3] So too for a Christian.

Do you recognize how the people you call “enemies” are also suffering? How can you merge prayers for your enemies and holding them accountable through your actions?

Let us pray: God, we pray for our enemies not only because Jesus commanded us to, but because we know they too are suffering. We know that their actions are a product of their insecurities, their attachments to ideas and paradigms which aren’t life giving. Yet, we still do not excuse their actions. Help us to walk the path of prayer and forgiveness which still participates in the work of justice, and which never negates accountability. Grant us the grace which Jesus had as he prayed for those people who participated in his death. We ask this in the name of Jesus, our savior and liberator. Amen.

Blessings on your weeks, my friends! Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben +

[1] Thich Nhat Hahn, Living Buddha, Living Christ, (Riverhead Books, 2007), 78.

[2] Thich Nhat Hahn, 2007, 78-79.

[3] Thich Nhat Hahn, 2007, 79.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joNaYQzmwuM