Unexpected and mysterious
is the gentle Word of grace.
Everloving and sustaining
is the peace of God’s embrace.
If we falter in our courage
and we doubt what we have known,
God is faithful to console us
as a mother tends her own.
In a momentary meeting
of eternity and time,
Mary learned that she would carry
both the mortal and divine.
Then she learned of God’s compassion,
of Elizabeth’s great joy,
and she ran to greet the woman
who would recognize her boy.
We are called to ponder myst’ry
and await the coming Christ,
to embody God’s compassion
for each fragile human life.
God is with us in our longing
to bring healing to the earth,
while we watch with joy and wonder
for the promised Savior’s birth.
-Unexpected and Mysterious, Jeannette Lindholm, ELW #258

I am a big fan of the musical Wicked. (This is probably not a surprise to you.) After all, I’m from the generation of high schoolers who begged to sing “For Good” at our baccalaureate services. When the film adaptation was confirmed after years of rumors, I was, well: ecstatic might be too mild a word. Then, with the timing of the release and my own busy schedule, I couldn’t see the movie until a week after the first showings. This raised a problem for me. You see, as much as I wanted to see the movie, I wanted to see it whole, without spoilers. (I’m doing my best to keep this devotion free of Wicked spoilers, in case you’re also waiting to see it.)

Spoilers are those bits of information that give away some big moment in a book or movie. Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s dad. George Bailey really was much more worthwhile alive than dead. Juliet and Romeo both die. It feels totally different to experience those moments unexpectedly than to know ahead of time. It ruins the surprise if somebody tells you before you watch it.

For a whole week, when I heard someone talk about the movie or saw a blog post or review about it, I quickly moved on, dodging spoilers however I could. When I watched Wicked in the theater last week, it was all worth it. There was an unexpected cameo that delighted me. I, along with others in the theater, gasped or cheered aloud as familiar faces filled the screen.

I have been pondering the gift of unexpected joy alongside familiar stories. I knew the plot of Wicked. (I knew every word of every song, for that matter.) But I had no idea that a particular person would show up in a particular moment and transform my experience of the whole movie. I wonder if it was like that for Mary and Joseph, for the shepherds, even the angels. They knew the story of God: God rescues. From Eden to Egypt, by Deborah and David, with might and manna and mercy, God had always worked to provide what the people needed, to send faithful leaders, to make whole what was broken. That’s just God’s character. God loves us, always has, and always will.

I wonder if the birth of Jesus wasn’t something like the sudden joy of a familiar face in an unexpected place. God, whose character was so well known by Mary, was unexpectedly here, now, in her arms: Emmanuel, “God is with us.” No spoilers, just joy.

I used to think that knowing the Christmas story too well might make it stale. How many different ways can you write a children’s pageant or preach a story that we hear over and over, year by year? Now, thanks to Wicked, I wonder if instead, something else is true. I wonder if it’s knowing a story well that makes surprise possible. People who didn’t recognize the cameo just didn’t get it. They missed the surprise. They missed the joy.

Knowing the story doesn’t make it stale. It makes it possible for us to wonder more deeply and to notice the unexpected ways that God continues to show up in our world. Jesus wasn’t just Emmanuel 2000 years ago. He is still with us today. As the hymn directs, we ponder the mystery and await God’s Word of grace.