Blessings of the Christ-Consciousness this Holiday Season
This image by artist Morgan Weistling is titled, “Kissing the Face of God”. I first saw it on a boxed set of Christmas cards my husband brought home, and we were both captured by the tangible sense of human and divine love the artist conveyed.
The artist has said that the thought of Mary loving and cuddling Jesus as a little baby was so inspiring that he was “propelled” into the painting, which took only three days to complete.
In India it is common to see images of Krishna as a baby and as a young child; stories of his childhood are favorites with people of all ages. The childhood of Jesus was “lost” in antiquity, so in the West we have only Christ’s birth, the nativity story, in which we see God as a newborn baby, needing care and comfort as all babies do.
A child can awaken the human heart and propel us into compassion, joyful willingness, and boundless, loving concern-all in an instant. Our hearts are so often closed; the human experience can be so painful and impossibly hard.
Yogananda said that God is sitting right there in our heart!
But he can’t do anything for us until we open to his presence.
Envision God as a child you can love and cuddle in your arms and devotion will bubble to the surface and soften the hardest, coldest places you didn’t even realize were there, keeping God away.
My daughter has a realistic baby doll named Benjamin, who has had the honor of playing the role of baby Jesus in the Ananda nativity service for about 10 years now. We hope he will be asked to perform again this Christmas Eve. His face is sweet and his eyes are clear and bright.
Every young lady who has played the role of Mary in the service has said it was a surprisingly powerful experience to look into those eyes and pretend they held the real Christ child.
Heavenly Father, Divine Mother, Friend, Beloved, God: that is the way we say our prayers at Ananda. These are roles that God can play in our life, ways we can relate to an infinite consciousness in a personal way.
Who can be more beloved than a baby? Try playing a part in the nativity story this Christmas, in the privacy of your thoughts and meditation. Hold God in your arms and look into the eyes of love. Give yourself to God as you would a child–with joyful willingness. Celebrate Christmas with the Christ Child and kiss the face of God.
Have a Merry, Blessed Christmas.