Standing on the beloved back deck, the ocean is roaring a few blocks away and I'm mesmerized by the sound. The tide is high and "Blondie" lyrics are running through my head. "The tide is high but I'm rolling on. You're gonna be my number one, my number one."
It's a beautiful December day with bright sunshine and temperature pushing 70. I'm barefoot staring at the Palm Tree with the oyster face, coconut bra and grass skirt. "This is the way that winter should be," I think to myself. To hell with Christmas snow!"
I stare through the sliding glass doors at the Christmas tree on the other end of the house with it's colored lights and am struck by the contrast ... Palm Tree? ... Christmas Tree? ...
As if that merits serious consideration.
This will be the first Christmas in seven years that I spend in the United States. The rest have been spent on St. Martin and I have countless messages from my dear friends there asking when I'm arriving. White Christmas there means sand. The powdery kind. With warm Trade Winds kissing the reef before the aqua blue/green water kisses the shore. Normally, I'm standing there with my feet in that place where the water ends, sunk into the wet sand, beer in hand, I-Pod blasting in my ears, nodding at passerby's wearing Santa hats but nothing else.
Now that's Christmas!
"Seven years" I think to myself as the waves continue to sing and the sun continues to beam.
Seven times seven.
The Year of Jubilee.
Before God got around to thinking about having a son and birthing Christmas, the celebration was the year of Jubilee. It's Old Testament stuff. Slaves were set free because in the end God doesn't believe in slavery. Land that had been bought or stolen or confiscated by the government was returned to the original over (and it all started again.) Everybody got the chance to start over.
It all started when someone would blow into a Ram's horn and, I imagine, all hell broke lose! It was the forerunner of Christmas morning when presents are ripped open. Back then, it was everything about the way that you'd been living was ripped opened. You were re-born and got back the things you'd lost. Being owned by someone was obliterated because you were set free. There was dancing in the street.
God's greatest gift came in the Year of Jubilee ... the chance to start over.
From bad relationships ... meaningless jobs ... unfulfilling places ... discrimination ... unrealistic expectations ... people you don't really like ... people who don't really like you ... marriages that no longer do anything for either ... from not not forgiving yourself.
If you follow God's logic here (and She never has to logical because ... she's God for God's sake!), Jesus was born and Christmas was created so that we could all be forgiven for all of the mean things that we do to ourselves and each other whenever it's NOT the Year of Jubilee!
These things run through my mind as I listen to roar of the waves, in bare feet, with sunshine washing my skin golden.
Last year at this time it was 23 degrees with a Twenty-five knot wind blowing from the northeast. I was freezing, lonely and sad. I fled to another Christmas in the Caribbean.
I'm not doing that this year (though I will be going back sometime).
I don't need to.
The Tides are telling me that this is the Year of Jubilee.
Tides of Comfort and Joy.
