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House to Home for Christmas

House to Home for Christmas

Last updated on: December 22, 2022 at 3:45 pm by Ted Peters

House to Home for Christmas 2022-12-22T15:45:34-08:00 Ted Peters

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From House to Home for Christmas

Framing House and Home with Kelly, Madeleine, and Derek Nelson

Professor Derek Nelson

“I’ll be home for Christmas,” sang Bing Crosby. “I’ll be home for Christmas,” sings Michael Bublé. What is it about our house that makes us want to be home for Christmas?

Advent Diorama by Madeleine Nelson.

When we “have a home,” says Derek Nelson, we feel “belonging, comfort, and delight.” At Christmas, we remind ourselves that God is “indwelling” in our home.

Might we say this: with the baby Jesus in a Bethlehem manger God has is saying to us: “I feel at home in the cosmos!” The cosmic house has become God’s home.

Please pause at this point and watch this brief video, Framing House and Home by Derek Nelson. You’ll love it.

Madeleine’s Advent Diorama

Derek and his wife, Kelly, along with eight year old Madeleine, live in an Indiana forest with a flowing creek just down the ravine. This past Sunday, Madeleine made an Advent diorama, inviting you and me into her home. All belong in the kingdom of God, she says. This is quite a theology of hospitality![1]

More than likely, you and I will go to our own family home for Christmas. But we’ll know that Madeline would welcome us.

Home for Christmas with Les Miserables

Do you recall Les Misérables? The original author was Victor Hugo (1802-1883. Hug compares a house to a home.

Madeleine Nelson welcomes us. Will you be at home for Christmas?

A house is built of logs and stone,

Of tiles and posts and piers.

A home is built of loving deeds

That stand a thousand years.

What Is It to Be at Home?

You might like to know that Professor Derek is principal investigator on a research project asking, “What Is It to Be at Home?” He’s invited a number of American and Nordic scholars to contribute chapters. Lexington will publish this book in 2023 or 2024. Watch for it.

Note the special attention to Nordic scholars. I hope against great odds that Norwegians and Swedes will finally feel at home with one another. Whew!

Our Christmas Meditations Thus Far

O Come Emmanuel

House to Home for Christmas

Christmas Blues

Christmas Meditation 1: God Desired a Harlot with St. John Chrysostom

Christmas Mediation 2: The Word Became Flesh with St. Augustine

Christmas Mediation 3: Truth at Christmas with St. Augustine

Christmas Mediation 4: Mean Estate with Martin Luther

Home for Christmas: Our Takeaway

Here’s the takeaway from this brief excurses on being Home for Christmas. We cannot manufacture or manage the dimensions of belonging, comfort, or delight. We can only accept them as gifts of grace.

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Ted Peters with hospitality theologian Madeleine Nelson 2014

Ted Peters is a Lutheran pastor and emeritus professor at the Graduate Theological Union, In this Patheos series on Public Theology, he raises concerns conceived in the church, rationally critiqued in the academy, and offered to the wider culture for the sake of the global common good.

Ted Peters co-edits the journal, Theology and Science, with Robert John Russell on behalf of the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, in Berkeley, California, USA. His single volume systematic theology, God—The World’s Future, is now in the 3rd edition. He has also authored God as Trinity plus Sin: Radical Evil in Soul and Society as well as Sin Boldly: Justifying Faith for Fragile and Broken Souls. See his website: TedsTimelyTake.com.

He has just published a new 2023 book, The Voice of Public Theology, to be published by ATF Press.

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[1] In Advent we sing, “O Come O Come Emmanuel.” We ask God to ransom captive Israel and make a divine home with us.

Home and Religion

About Ted Peters

Ted Peters is a Lutheran pastor an emeritus professor at the Graduate Theological Union. He co-edits the journal, Theology and Science, with Robert John Russell on behalf of the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, in Berkeley, California, USA. His single volume systematic theology, God—The World’s Future, is now in the 3rd edition. He has also authored God as Trinity plus Sin: Radical Evil in Soul and Society as well as Sin Boldly: Justifying Faith for Fragile and Broken Souls. See his website: TedsTimelyTake.com. He has just published a new 2023 book, The Voice of Public Theology, with ATF Press. You can read more about the author here.

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