Quick Summary:

50 years ago on this night, the astronauts in Apollo 8 emerged from orbit around the moon to behold a vista never seen before: a blue marble Earth rising over the desolate lunar landscape. The photo Astronaut Bill Anders took, dubbed Earthrise, showed Earth as a breathtaking jewel of color and life amid the blackness of space--fragile, small, finite.

This night, in the babe of Bethlehem, we watch as God bridges the gap from the scale of the infinite to the fragile, small and finite confines of Mary’s womb. Like a trapeze artist working without a net, God let’s go of the infinite and takes the plunge into the world of matter—into flesh, bone and blood—banishing forever any notion we may carry that he is apart from us, distant, uncaring, aloof.

After this night the question, Where is God? has a new answer: God is made real, knowable and accessible in the fragile, finite child who lies in the manger. And knowing this—knowing him—makes all our relationships new.