Our community met Marie in the summer of 2012 when our team insulated and replaced a ceiling in her home. We all feel instantly in love.  It was easy to do.  We were quickly encircled in her gratitude and hospitality.

There are objects all over Marie’s home that reveal her nature: bird feeders, pictures of children, grandchildren, great nieces, handmade objects, baby dolls, and the most telling—a toy once enjoyed by a grandson who died.  Marie has lived a life full of great sadness and great love.  She has raised a gaggle of children, not all biologically hers, and with such love has come sorrow. She is honest about her heart break and free with her love. Her husbands have disappointed her, but she continues to live in the world as one who trusts love is the only answer.

How could we not have fallen in love with Marie?

Last year after installing a skirt around her trailer and painting the back of her home we had a lazy afternoon before us, talking with Marie about her farm. She had lost her coop in a fire and now only had a few chickens strolling around her yard. One of these chickens, a rooster, had a comb splattered with white paint from our children’s wild painting job. Marie was tickled pink at the sight. She enjoyed even more watching our children play in her field, exploring the nooks and crannies of her beautiful farm.

Not too long after I was called aside by the treasurer in our community. Knowing the numbers, she was happy to report we had a surplus in our mission trip account. What if we hired someone to build a coop for Marie to house her chickens? It didn’t take long for the “official” leaders in our community (note: that is pretty much all the adults) to agree that this would be the best way to spend our surplus. By October, Marie had a coop. Last winter she wrote us twice to report on her snug chickens and the joy they brought her was evident on the lined page.

I once read an article entitled Bread and Roses. Although I cannot remember the details of the article, the title has forever informed my thinking about those who Jesus calls the least among us. The author of the article argued (more articulately than I ever can) that the poor need both bread and roses. We could have made sure Marie’s oil tank was full for the winter, paid her electric bill, or filled her pantry. We could have even done more repair work on Marie’s home which sorely needs it. But our wise treasurer thought building Marie a chicken coop was the best thing to do and she was right. Marie, like all of us, needs bread and roses. Her new chicken coop is, I am sure, more beautiful to her than a vase of long stem roses. And there is no question that is has brought her great joy.

We’re going to see Marie in a few short days. We are eager to see her new coop and meet her new chickens. Hopefully her roosters white painted comb has worn off. I am sure Marie will encircle us in love and her natural hospitality. But I wonder what roses we might offer her this year. I wonder what roses we all need in our lives, beyond daily bread, that remind us that love is always worth the risk of heartache. 

The above quote isn’t strictly a Christmas text, but it should be. We need to be careful not to tame it, imagining it painted on a tea cozy in a nice cursive hand, but see it for what it is:  a call to radical welcome, and risky service. After all, the author of Hebrews goes on to say:  “Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured.” Tough words, when what it means is to pray for violent offenders.

But I didn’t mean to go there. It is Advent, after all, that sweet and spicy time of the year. It’s a time when a lot of us are doing extra entertaining, and being entertained. But what would it mean to make strangers, in addition to loved ones, the beneficiaries of our hospitality? What would it mean to entertain an angel?

The Christmas texts are rife with angels:  from the angel of the Lord’s visit to Zechariah, father of John the Baptist, on through the heavenly host singing the Messiah over the shepherd’s fields.  In almost every instance, the first thing they say to those they visit is “Be not afraid!” What kind of message is this?

We have so stripped angels of any kind of awe-ful presence, so domesticated them with our tchotchkes that we can’t imagine being afraid of one. But who and what are angels actually? What are they for?

Angelos means messenger. Angels are the FedEx workers of God:  there to deliver urgent letters and instructions, some welcome, some unwelcome. They also arrive, on occasion, to help or heal, hence the mythos of the guardian angel. They always come unannounced, and do nobody’s bidding but God’s. But Angels are not always safe—don’t forget that Satan was once and is forever an angel. They are strange, and they are strangers.

In New England, strangers ignore each other in public—it’s the polite thing to do. But I’ve seen this:  when that rarity, a natural extrovert (usually a Buffalonian) shows up and starts acting all friendly, we’re grateful for a chance to drop the façade, to get to know one another, to bridge the gulf of loneliness and difference and feel that there may be something to this “body of Christ,” “one human family” thing after all.

One thing the angels and the newborn Jesus have in common is this: anyone might be a divine messenger, or Godself, disguised in ordinary flesh, walking around on this planet. That is what “incarnation” means.

During this holy time of Advent, why not try to redefine the normal magazine definition of “holiday hospitality.” Forget about the cute place markers and perfect bottle of wine to accompany the perfect spread of Hors D’oeuvres. Instead try making a connection with a stranger (yes, a stranger!). Say hello on the train. Invite the neighbor you say nothing more than “hi” to for dinner? Talk to the mom who always waits quietly to pick up her child from school. Sit next to someone you don’t know at the senior center. Speaking with stranger is about really believing that YOU are worthy of visitation from an angel—that Someone has a message for you.