We invite you to enjoy coffee and conversation among friends in the half hour prior to our 10:15 AM Worship tomorrow, as we gather for worship on December 8th. Then next Sunday (December 15th) is our annual Birthday Breakfast for Jesus! Event. Please sign up on the Birthday Breakfast for Jesus clipboard on the Connections Table. Note the Birthday Breakfast gathering starts at 10:00 AM next Sunday. For the brightest and best of all birthdays, we celebrate together. Join us!

Twice in my late teens, I spent some time in communities near New Orleans, including one of the bayou towns south of the city, called Broussard Louisiana. A vibrant Cajun mix of food, language and hilarious storytelling surprised me in several ways. First, at 19, I hadn’t actually realized there were any towns SOUTH of New Orleans!

All I could imagine was water everywhere in that humid network of passageways into the Gulf of Mexico.

Visualizing crocodiles happily seizing their prey in the bayous off the Mississippi river was scary enough. The last thing I wanted to do was spend a night anywhere south of the Big Easy, as the locals often refer to NOLA.

Well, my ignorance made the serendipity even better when I was so warmly welcomed into the home of a friend whose maternal grandparents’ name was Broussard, linking them with a long line of immigrants from France who had immigrated to the Louisiana in the 19^th century. Being treated there as if I was “a brother from a different mother” was an unforgettable experience.

The hospitality was as strong as the Cajun accents that filled the dining room and close-quarters kitchen of the Broussard family.

Plus, it was there in their bustling bayou town that I realized why Christmas has had such a widespread impact in cultures around the world. If we stop to ask, “Do you hear what I hear?”, the answer from the bayous of Louisiana to the bodegas of the Bronx, is a boisterous “YES!”

Why is that? How is it that the birth of a carpenter’s son in a tiny town a few miles south of Old Jerusalem stirs jubilant celebrations in a bayou town just a few miles south of New Orleans?

The answer, of course, is quite simply, the Person we celebrate.

It’s Jesus Himself. His astoundingly obscure entrance into this sin-cursed world is the center of The Story. But there are so many ways His story touches hearts that God clearly intended for the Bethlehem story to break cultural barriers around the globe.

The sparkling vitality of Christmas, with its timeless appeal for “peace on earth and God’s favor toward mankind” is as compelling among the Cajuns as it is anywhere in the world.

Another aspect of that crash course I got in a ‘Nawlins’ area neighborhood symbolizes the story we celebrate in Advent.

My first ever taste of Cajun jambalaya was at a Christmas feast with the Broussard family.  That zesty mix of beans, rice and seafood became a favorite of mine any time of year, simply because it was delicious. But the ingredients also remind me of a specific strategic purpose in the Gospel. The Messiah’s mission, according to Isaiah 52:15 is “to sprinkle many nations” so that “kings will be astonished by Him”.

That “sprinkling” of the nations is virtually a chef’s reference – the ingredients of Christ’s conquest over sin and death are vibrant and spicy. What a “jambalaya” of ingredients God gives us! 

Our Wonderful Counselor who comes to each culture as Prince of peace will rule and reign forever. Like a holy “jambalaya” of those qualities that baby Jesus brought to planet Earth, Christmas simply calls us to “taste and see that the LORD is good!” 

So whatever cuisine you may be cooking up this Christmas, may you know it’s part of the JOY of giving God’s global good news to others, for the glory of the newborn King.