Day 121 Whole lotta Kissing goin' on!

At the Christmas Eve service, the pastor said, "The incarnation is God's kiss on the mouth of humanity." Adults looked up from their bulletins. Kids giggled. The image struck a chord...or maybe a nerve. A ten year old boy sitting near us leaned over to his dad and said (not so quietly), "Kissed on the mouth? That's gross!"

The difference between "saints" and the rest of us is that saints know they have been kissed by God. Of course, the rest of us have also been kissed by God, we just don't know it.... Not yet.    

Knowing God's kiss (Or what monks call "mystical union".... Creepy, eh?) changes everything. This knowing can't be taught. It must be experienced. This new knowing relaxes us into a deeper certainty -- one that softens our edges and opens our center to all of life -- its joys and sorrows, its beauty and affliction. Our souls expand, and we find room for things we never thought possible. God's kiss returns us to ourselves and we become real: we become human. This is what it means to be kissed by God. This is our blessing in Christ.

  

God's kiss takes many forms in the Bible. God kisses the dirt and we become human. God kisses Cain after murdering his brother protecting Cain (and others) from further violence. God kisses Hagar when she's alone in the dessert fleeing for her life. God kisses Abraham on a mountain when he's preparing to sacrifice his son Isaac. God kisses Jacob in a wrestling match that leaves him wounded but transformed. God kisses Moses in a burning bush and later on a mountain with his "hind parts."(Now that's an image!) God kisses Elijah in silence at the mouth of a cave. God kisses Isaiah on the lips with burning coals. The Spirit descends at the baptism and God kisses the Son.

  

The form of the kiss varies, but in each case the kiss transforms. Always. That is how we (and others) know that we have been kissed by God. There is no kiss without transformation and no transformation without a kiss. 

  

In the definitive act of "mystical union," God kisses Mary and she conceives. (It's the inverse of the Genesis story.) Eastern traditions call Mary, Theotokos, which means God-bearer. 

Sadly, in our efforts to protect the Incarnation as the unique event that it is, we have sealed it in "doctrinal purity" and thrown away the key.  That means we cut ourselves off from its ongoing liberating power, and it becomes an event with no encore. As hard as it might be for a westernized, literalistic, patriarchal, overly-sexualized, male-dominated church culture to hear, we are all heirs to this kiss. 

Like Mary, we all bear God in some way.  

We are all empowered by the Spirit to give birth to the holy.  This is God's great pleasure -- to be born in and through humanity. When we are not giving birth to the holy in our own lives, we are midwives helping others give birth to the holy in theirs. What a mystery! 

  

Incarnation is not only the celebration of God becoming flesh in Jesus.  It is also the reminder that God wants to be born again and again and again. It all begins with a kiss - the kiss of God in Christ. This is our blessing.