Choosing Small

The angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. . . . With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” 

Luke 1:13-15, 17

Zechariah was an obscure country priest, who came to Jerusalem once a year to serve in the Temple. Inside this holy place, where no one else could see, an angel told him that his faithful prayer over decades had been heard. He and his wife, Elizabeth, would have the child for whom they had hoped so long. More than that, God was entrusting them to shape John (later called “the Baptist”) to be a great prophet, who would prepare Israel to receive its long-promised Messiah.

No one would have nominated Zechariah and Elizabeth for greatness. Sometimes we feel that way about ourselves. What we can do is small. Never does it seem smaller than when the end of a semester is bearing down, along with Christmas events and activities. How can we also prepare our hearts spiritually? But for the birth of Jesus, God chose “small.” Zechariah and Elizabeth had been faithful in small things. After God gave them John, they still probably looked little different from their child-rearing neighbors. In scripture, God consistently opts for faithful, often obscure, people over high-profile ones.

Christmas, of all seasons, is not a time to think big. It’s a time to join God in thinking small – seeking to give thanks faithfully for our blessings, offering our lives and tasks to God daily, looking for God in small moments of connection with others, and not asking of ourselves more than we can do. If God can choose small, so can we.

God’s peace,

Katie