As poor as it's possible to be - by Helen Murray

Dear God,

It's almost your Son's birthday. Two more sleeps.

There are a lot of reminders at this time of year. 'Hark, the Herald Angels Sing' and 'Once in Royal David's City', and when the vicar turns Brussels sprouts into symbolism and when the Queen gives her speech about compassion and courage and the vestiges of Christian service in the despair and confusion of our country; when we open our presents and the mountain of wrapping paper reminds me of the miracle of the greatest gift ever given.

And then there's the little plywood crib in church. It's been there for a whole run of Christmas services with what appears to be an elderly Tiny Tears doll lying on a few meagre handfuls of hamster bedding.

I was born in poverty, too.

Not the sort of poverty that speaks of cold and deprivation - oh no. I have, all my life, been warm and looked after and well fed (just look at me); I had my own Tiny Tears with all the accessories. No, not that sort of poverty.

When I was born, the birth that I'm talking about, I was as poor as it's possible to be in every way that matters. I had nothing, and lived with nothing for sixteen years until the day I realised how poor I was - that was the day that I was born. That should be my birthday, really; that was when life began for real. I realised the void. The gut-wrenching poverty. The absence. The emptiness. The need.

For me, I didn't have to live with that feeling of poverty too long, for no sooner had I realised that I did not have the only thing that mattered, that I longed for it, asked for it - then it was given to me.
You are endlessly generous like that.

How much more awful for those who know, and feel the desperation but don't know where to come to find it, this the new birth. It must break your heart, Father God. No wonder you moved heaven and earth to come and find us.

He had everything, Everything, and He chose to lay it aside to come to this place of filth and cold and hurt to be close to us. He laid aside His majesty indeed, and chose the sweat and smells and roughness of humanity.

He was rich, and He became poor. I was poor, and you gave me riches.

He and I, reborn - humble, vulnerable nakedness. For Him, the vastness of Almighty God, shrunk into a tiny kicking, feeding baby. For me, the smallness and pettiness of a created being expansively given another chance by the grace of the One who reached down and lifted up my chin so that He could look into my eyes with love.

I am a baby as He was. I have all that I need only because You provide it. Mary fed Him, cleaned Him, dressed Him, sang to Him and loved Him through childhood and into adulthood, to execution and beyond. I live because You sustain me. Everything that I have comes from You. If you forgot about me for one second I am sure that I would cease to be. I am hopelessly dependent.

I am uncomfortable in my manger of hay; it prickles. I'd like it to be more comfy. I've come to realise that the times that I don't feel at home are because You have given me a longing for my eternal home. I sense that Somewhere Else from time to time, even insensitive and short-sighted as I am, and the wonder and awe of it makes me speechless, and yet the King of Glory walked purposefully away from that place; You chose to become small. The transcendental made finite. Did You ever feel homesick for the heaven that You left behind?

I am lifted gently out of the dirt to be called a Child of God. A crown has been placed on my head and a robe around my shoulders even though I am unworthy. I live honoured as Your daughter, heir to a wonderful place in your Kingdom. You, the very Son of God, fought your way down the birth canal of a peasant girl and landed in straw, surrounded by people and livestock.

The hands that arranged the stars in the heavens and created the animals and the birds would have brushed against the roughness and splinters of an animal's feeding trough. With Your first breaths You would have inhaled the odour people and cattle. Me, I'm used to the stench of life down here - it seems normal to me, but to You, it must have been strange indeed. You came from a place of peace, beauty, power and honour and put Yourself in the hands of two poor, bewildered kids, far from home, who had not the faintest idea of the magnitude of what was happening.

My rebirth opens up miraculous doors of wonder and possibility; You became confined in a tiny, frail body, kicking and wailing, feeding and sleeping.

You were born so that I could be born again.

And I've realised by staring at that roughly-made trough-cradle, that it is as I stand here with nothing, without anything at all, just me as You made me, unable to conceal a single part of me - I am most blessed. I am a new creation.

You turned your back on your glory to become one of us.

You were exalted, and You became weak. I am weak, and You raise me up. I can't get my head around it. You know what it feels like to be poor, to be vulnerable, to be human.

Lord Jesus, baby Jesus, King of Kings, Redeemer, Saviour.

Thank you, Lord God, for the gift of your Son.

Helen Murray lives in Derbyshire, England, with her husband, two daughters and her mum.

As well as being a reader and a writer, she is a student of theology, a master of procrastination, a drinker of far too much coffee and a full-time swim mum. If you get a whiff of chlorine while reading the blog, it's probably because it was written on a poolside somewhere. 

Helen has a blog: Are We Nearly There Yet? where she writes about life and faith.

You can also find her here:

Pinterest: @HelenMMurray

Twitter: @helenmurray01