Hidden Announcement

So while going for a run yesterday, to get myself ready for all the extra eating I plan on doing at Christmas, I got listening to one of Rob Bell's messages, about Christmas, called The Hidden Announcement. In his message he talked about how God chose to announce the birth of Jesus to a few random, unknown shepherds, out in the middle of the wops. He talked about how in advertising, there are 3 basic rules: Make sure that your message is short; Deliver it creatively; and Make sure you get the most amount of people in your target audience as possible to watch it at each time. He talked about how this is typical God...he announces it creatively, (Angels singing in the sky, tick), it is short and sweet, (Son of God is born, tick), but he Royally screws up the target audience...(the whole world)...when he tells a couple of randoms in a field!!

I got to thinking about this! And I have to say that I love it! And I love it for two reasons! Firstly, God isn't showy!! He's not loud and in your face. He's not OTT! He's not standing there with a bull horn! He's not screaming at me on Oxford Street about how I am a sinner and going to hell unless I repent. He didn't have to send out fliers. He didn't have to make pamphlets. He didn't put on some massive light show in the middle of the Colosseum during the Gladiator World Cup! But he could have. He was capable of doing it like that. But...He didn't need to! He knew that His goods would practically sell themselves, cos they're THAT good! So he sends a bunch of angels to a bunch of shepherds in the middle of nowhere, and knows that will be enough! And then to top it off...after the big announcement, Jesus himself spends 30 years of his life just as subtle and hidden. Not advertising who he was to the point of almost denying who he was. And when he finally decided to act, it wasn't cos he had been hanging out for the moment to finally show off how cool he actually was...nup, he had to be practically begged by his Mum, at a wedding, to make a whole heap of wine for a bunch of drunken partyers!

And I love this about God. That he doesn't get in my face about my issues and faults and problems. Or how I can be cruel and nasty, and bitch and moan. Or how I get grumpy and take it out on Ben. Oh He knows about all of that. And I know about all of that. And He will be ready to deal with all that when I am ready to deal with all that. But he is patient. He is gentle. He is SUBTLE. He makes a quiet announcement, and then waits patiently for me to act upon it.

So then I wonder to myself...if He can be that subtle and gentle...why can't we? Why can't we be that patient with others? Why aren't we that subtle? Why do we feel we need to advertise God? Why do we make big announcements about who we are and what we believe? Or who we aren't and what we don't believe? Or who God is and what he wants us to believe? Or what he wants us to do or not do? And what we have to be or not be before we can get to know him? Which brings me to reason two for loving this about story about God...

He puts a hell of a lot of trust in us. Screwed up, messy, cruel, nasty, selfish, greedy, lazy, us! He trusted His world wide message, for all of creation, with a bunch of nobodies! They are not even named in the bible, that is how important they were...they had nothing special about them these shepherds, no qualifications for being message bearers...nothing. But He chose them! And He even took it a step further. He sent his son in human form to be CARED FOR by one of us. Just some normal woman, a little bit messy like the rest of us. And he trusted her, and her husband to raise HIS own son.

So if God can trust us with HIS SON, and HIS MESSAGE, and if he can do it subtly and gently, then why do we feel we need to get in people's faces? What gave us the idea that advertising to as many as possible, as loudly as possible was God's intention? Since when did we make the rules about what qualifies one as KNOWING God? When did subtlety and gentleness become so unfashionable?

And all this coming from Miss Opinionated herself! ;-)

Has there ever been a time when in-your-face, OTT has worked for you? Or are you in favor of a more subtle approach?